He Keeps His Eyes on County’s Talent : Scouting: Skip Redman is seeking a few good high school and community college athletes to promote.

Skip Redman is a headhunter, and he spends his mornings, afternoons and nights scouring high school and community college gymnasiums and playing fields.

He’s looking for talent--talent that one of the 1,300 colleges he’s hooked into will deem worthy of a scholarship.

Redman is the regional scouting director for the Atlanta-based National Scouting Report, which touts itself as the world’s leading recruiting authority.

His mission: Find high school or community college athletes and fine arts talents who believe in themselves and are willing to pay for his company’s services.

He knows his position. He’s not looking for blue-chip athletes, but blue-light specials--those talented individuals the colleges can’t find because of their limited scouting resources.

“There’s more quality athletes out there than we can possibly find,” Redman said. “You add on the fine arts people and it boggles the mind. When people think of sports, they think of football and basketball and the top Division I schools.

“There are Division I teams way below the Notre Dames and North Carolinas that can take a deserving kid. (Celebrated Lakewood Artesia player) Charles O’Bannon doesn’t need us, but the kids below him do.”

Kids such as Sonora’s Chris St. Clair, who said he had received only marginal interest before enlisting the aid of Redman. St. Clair, a point guard who was a first-team Times all-county selection, accepted a scholarship from Cal State Fullerton, but was offered it only after other universities, having received his profile from the National Scouting Report, began calling.

“The scouting report is the reason the other schools were interested in him,” Redman said. “As much publicity as he got in Orange County, you would think more schools would know about him, but schools outside the area don’t know.”

San Jose State, San Diego State and Boise State were among those that contacted St. Clair after they found out about him.

“The premise of the company is that no kid can get a scholarship to a college unless the person that makes the decision about the scholarship knows about them,” Redman said. “We identify by different means the kids that have the talent and ability, in sports, for instance, that can perform at some level in college.”

And then they get the word out, for $495.

Redman initially conducts an interview in the home with the athlete and parents to see if the athlete is qualified and eligible for the program--the reason is that Redman needs to maintain his and the company’s credibility with the colleges.

“Desire, ability and academics is all part of it,” said Redman, who then shows the candidates a videotape explaining the program and assures that coaches will find out about them.

Redman then writes up a profile, a resume, that is put into a computer in the company’s Birmingham, Ala., office. A proof is sent to the family to be double-checked, then it goes back to Birmingham, where it is sent to at least 1,300 colleges.

If a vertical leap or time in the 40-yard dash improves, or there’s a change in the grade-point average, the profile can be updated monthly. If it is, it will automatically be mailed again.

Late in the junior year or early in the senior, the student-athlete selects 100 schools to which an individual mailing will be sent to a specific coach. Those schools can be selected with the aid of free counseling to ensure they offer the student’s desired field of study. From that list, 10 schools are selected by the student-athlete and targeted more completely.

“We ask them--and they don’t have to do this--to put together a 10- to 15-minute highlight video using their high school’s audio-visual department,” Redman said. “They send those to our Birmingham office and any coach that wants to know about the kid--it says on their profile that they have a videotape available--we make a copy after they call our 800 number and send it to them.”

The counseling service also provides an information packet that includes booklets and forms on obtaining educational loans and grants, SAT study guides, the NCAA rule book and other pre-college guides.

Nationwide, about 85% of those who enlist the service get at least a partial scholarship, Redman said.

Redman, whose passion is tennis, was in the truck fleet management business until last October. Then he started looking to make a career change. His daughter, Chyra, who was captain of Sunny Hills’ 1990 Southern Section championship tennis team, had graduated.

He yearned to do something for enjoyment rather than money. He answered an ad in the newspaper, got hired, “understood the concept and became the most productive person” among the 35 people who were hired, he said.

The company president, Bob Rigney, noticed, and put him in charge of his region in February. Redman is now assembling his own cast of scouts to help him cover all of Southern California, except for San Diego.

This career has given him an avenue in which to enjoy young people and, though it doesn’t lend itself to getting rich, make a living doing it.

“Helping the kids out is so satisfying,” Redman said. “I was invited to six graduation services. It’s fun. I like kids, I love teen-agers, I love sports.

“I’m really lucky because I get to see the good teen-agers. All the stuff you see in newspapers about the gang-bangers, the ones that are tagging things. . . . I’m seeing all the good kids, the ones that are doing something positive.”