AAU over high school when it comes to recruiting

In 1888, when the Amateur Athletic Union (AAU) began, its main purpose was to prepare athletes to compete in the Olympics. For an athlete at the time, competing in the Olympics was everyone's dream in life. Now that pro sports have become prominent, especially in America, AAU has morphed into an organization that preps young athletes to play at the collegiate and professional level.

Since the mid-1990s that is. Before that time AAU still stood as an Olympic prep organization, but it excluded women. That of course, did not sit well during the women's right movement in the late 60s. Because of that AAU had to regroup and change some of their tactics.

When the dust settled, AAU emerged as a player in the preparation of younger kids for collegiate sports. Since then they have grown into a widely known organization for young basketball players over the summers. Prior to AAU's growth, the main way an athlete would prepare for college and be seen by scouts was simply playing for the local high school team.

But because of the popularity that AAU has managed to adapt, many of the biggest recruits in the nation began to team up and play in AAU tournaments in the summer. That caused the big-time college coaches to drift more to watching AAU tournaments when most of the players on the coaches list are in action.

But that has taken away from the high school athletic director and the coaches job and role in prepping these kids for the change they are about to embark on. Is it a bad thing though? The coaches are only trying to be cost and time efficient when they attend AAU tournaments. When advantages and disadvantages does AAU cause? If AAU is so crutial to a high school players future in athletics, why does that athletes play in high school? Isn't that a big risk of injury when the summers are the most important time for the the athlete?

With the 2018 signing class just about to get under-way in the next few months, it will be interesting to see the answers to these questions and more. This time next Sunday, I will have a story out on Sports Bar's Facebook page diving deeper into these questions.