With COVID, and ever-evolving recruiting rules that seem to be tweaked each year in some way or another by the NCAA, the recruiting landscape has changed massively in the past 5-10 years. While there is a crowd pushing the panic button on social media, shaking their fist at the transfer portal, NIL, and everything else that comes with today's era of college baseball, I do not believe the shift is as massive as some make it out to be.

I talk to worried parents on the occasion, asking "When will my son get his recognition?" ... "How did ____ recruit ____ but not my son?" ... I've done a dive on the two classes that have been influenced most by the new recruiting landscape and compared their data to the four classes that came before them.

For those not familiar, a rule was set in place during the spring of 2023 that prohibited contact from NCAA coaches to high school prospects until August 1st of their junior year, forever changing the model of recruiting - especially at the very top of college baseball. Understandably, the system had become flawed in some ways. Before the rule change in April, our 2026 class had ten players commit to D1 programs before they had even played a game of high school baseball. The recruiting model for the best of the best was simple, stockpile as much young talent as you can, as fast as you can, and cut the players that do not develop the way they had thought prior to signing day. Of the 10 early commits we saw in this 2026 class, only 60% (6/10) are still committed to the program they committed to as freshman. 

There was also a rule set into place this summer that moved the roster size for D1 baseball from 40 to 34. While this seems like a massive shift, trimming rosters by 15%?!? It really isn't. The 40-man roster was implemented to mitigate the influx of college baseball players left with the COVID pandemic allowing all college players an extra year. Prior to COVID, the roster limit was 35. The effects of the roster limit finding its level have not been fully felt just yet, but the question I pose is, have all these rules really made it much tougher on a high school player to play at the college level? Furthermore, is it tougher to make it to the D1 level in today's landscape? Read along to find the data trends that start to answer these questions...

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Recruiting Trends

*All data is reflective of the Prep Baseball database and exclusive to trends in the Hoosier State only*

Total # of D1 recruits out of HS (#s based on signing day)

Classes unaffected by rule change:

• 2021: 56
• 2022: 59
• 2023: 53
• 2024: 72

Classes affected by rule change:

• 2025: 55
• 2026: 55 (to date)

*the data for the class of 2027 is still incomplete, 30 players currently committed to D1 programs*

Power 4 commits:

• 2021: 20
• 2022: 15
• 2023: 10
• 2024: 28
• 2025: 23
• 2026: 20 (to date)

*the data for the class of 2027 is still incomplete, 18 players currently committed to P4 programs*

Total # of college recruits:

• 2021: 228
• 2022: 231
• 2023: 217
• 2024: 298 (!!)
• 2025: 349 (!!!)
• 2026: 235 (to date, 2025 class had 210 commits on 11/22 of last year)

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Takeaways

+ When looking at this data, the first thing that jumps out is the depth of the 2024 class, and the quality that came with it. This can be chalked up to an outlier class with several future pros and big leaguers surely to come from a historic class within the Hoosier State. If that class is taken out, it is pretty obvious to see that the trends, especially on the D1 side of things, have not changed much. There are still 2-5 players in the 2026 class that I expect to commit to a D1 program, while the P4 numbers have seemed to even climb with the new recruiting landscape. Again, the 2024 class outshines the rest, but the 2025/2026 totals surpass (or equal) the three classes the came before the talented '24's - and the numbers we've seen so far with the 2027 class indicate that the overall number of P4 commits within the state is in fact on the rise in the past four classes that include the 2027s. We could attribute a slight tick-down in overall D1 commitments to the roster changes that occured this past summer, however, the drop is not far enough to be significant compared to the 2021-2023 classes. In terms of overall commitments, the spike seen in 2024-2025 can be attributed in part to the growth of our database, along with the growth of baseball talent in Indiana. The variance is not likely as a high as what the numbers above say, but there is a significant difference in the overall number of college commits that are database has seen since 2023. The 2026 class is still incomplete and hard to project completely, but it is ahead of where the 2025s were at this time last year. I expect the overall commitment total in the 2026 class to finish close to the numbers that we saw in 2024-2025, setting the expectation that Indiana should average approximately 300-350 college recruits in a given class. 

+ For players, parents, coaches, and everyone involved in the baseball community in Indiana, this data should bring a sense of relief in the fact that there is ample opportunity for our players at the next level out of high school. Baseball is on the rise in the Hoosier State, and despite the panic felt from outside sources, the growth of high level prospects within the state is booming. While the process has undoubtedly gotten slower with underclassmen unable to commit like we saw 'in the old days', !requiring more patience! from players and parents than ever before, the data indicates that if anything - college baseball opportunities are on the rise for Hoosier State natives, not the other way around...

Congratulations to all 2026 grads who are signing their letters of intent today. We look forward to providing an in-depth breakdown of notable senior classes, in-state recruiting classes, DI conference breakdowns, NAIA/JC/D2/D3 winners, and more in the coming weeks.