Walk-on tryouts give opportunities to those who may not have had the best luck with recruiting in high school. It gives the athletes an opportunity to showcase their passion and dedication to the game and to prove themselves. Many hopefuls dream of playing collegiate sports and wearing their university’s jersey with their favorite number on it and hopefully contribute to team success. Even if they aren’t offered a scholarship, the thought of just being able to play college sports will get any athlete thrilled.
However, at Florida A&M University most of the sports teams neglect and dismiss student athletes who show interest in their programs. There have been rumblings of college coaches at the university who have ghosted players who have tried out and were very active in the walk-on process from the beginning. The nerve to just dismiss someone who shows significant interest in playing for your program when the athletics teams haven’t been too good as of recently is disrespectful to the game and to the players.
The Famuan asked an anonymous athlete if he feels FAMU coaches give walk-ons fair opportunities to try out and play for the school.
“I don’t feel like they give us a fair chance, for example, we had a tryout interest meeting a week before tryouts and during the meeting they told us we need to get a physical and blood test,” they said. “To get all that takes 3-5 days, so a lot of people couldn’t try out because they didn’t have their paperwork.”
Florida A&M’s basketball team has not been the best the last couple of years and most of the rumbling that has been heard has come from the aspiring collegiate basketball players. It’s been said that the coaches don’t even pay attention to the workouts and drills, and they plan to keep the same team intact that just had 7 wins and 23 losses. The lack of awareness that the scouting department has is why they went 7-23 during the 2023 season.
An anonymous athlete, who tried out for the basketball team said, “I feel they should at least look and take walk-ons seriously because some of those players could bring value to the team not just for the upcoming season but for seasons down the line.”
Ghosting student athletes may cause mental and emotional impacts on their life because many of these kids put their lives into sports. The coaches have too much power over them and need to be stopped. If a program is not performing or has not improved year to year, there should be changes. Ghosting players has a toll on some students and may hurt their confidence, and some people never recover when their confidence is shot.
The Famuan also asked a student why they think coaches ghost players. They said, “I think they ghost students because they know who they want on the team, and they don’t care about anyone they don’t know enough to give them a shot. Instead of ghosting or promising they will put someone on the team they should say they don’t see a place for you on the team.”