College opportunities are GOALS only goal
Video service aids athletes' quests for post-prep careers
By Patrick Z. McGavin
As the calendar pushed toward the middle of October, Jose Navarro braced for what could be end of his interscholastic soccer career. It was the opening week of play in the Class 3A state tournament. The season was now in the knockout stage -- win or go home.
A senior defensive midfielder at Neuqua Valley, Navarro had much to play for -- he had set an objective to play in college. But despite playing for high-profile programs with the Wildcats and the Naperville-based club program Galaxy, there were more questions than answers about his future.
Navarro remains unsigned.
Recruiting is tricky and complex with a curiously open set of constantly evolving rules. Decisions are influenced by complex factors of supply and demand, timing and opportunity.
Any advantage a player has at his disposal can make the difference.
With his future in flux, Navarro took an added step with video production expert Jim Corno Jr.
“It was a good way to get another perspective,” Navarro said.
Corno Jr. was thrilled to provide his expertise. On Oct. 16, he fixated his camera on Navarro and documented his every action in Neuqua Valley’s Class 3A Naperville North Regional semifinal with Naperville Central.
As the founder of GOALS Productions, Inc., his Batavia-based production company, Corno Jr. played his part in showcasing Navarro’s skill set in an effort to help widen his exposure to a vast network of college coaches.
On Oct. 18, Corno Jr. assembled a deft four-minute video and uploaded it to YouTube. It highlighted Navarro’s contributions in the Wildcats’ 2-1 upset victory over Naperville Central. While he didn't score a goal, midfielders Tom Bludgen and Jack Bella did those honors for the Wildcats, Navarro impacted the game.
Among the notable moments, Navarro can be seen starting the attack, pushing the ball in space and breaking up a dangerous Central scoring opportunity by clearing a throw-in toward the Wildcats’ box.
The editing is invisible, almost unobtrusive, and clearly shows Navarro’s strengths, privileging his feel for the game, high soccer IQ and versatility as a two-way player.
The game footage sells the video.
Every new action sequence on the video identifies Navarro with a red circle that allows the viewer to instantly locate him and then follow his play.
Special attention and care have gone into the entire production -- from the background sound of fans cheering Navarro as he makes a positive play to the music, sound and graphic effects that shape the work. The opening scene is a graphics layout with the player's picture, name, height and weight, year of graduation, position, hometown, high school and club affiliate.
“It was one game, and it focuses on that game and not necessarily the highlights of the season,” Navarro said. “It focused on what I did in the game. Typically highlights just include goals and everything. It gave me a different perspective of the highlight tape.”
This is the new paradigm. The internet and the advent of digital media have transformed every stage of recruiting. Having a professionally produced recruiting video marks the next frontier, a way for the athlete and his family to have some representation in the recruiting process.
“The high school is going to be able to show it to some coaches and other people,” Navarro said. “It was cool. It was really well made, and it helped a lot.”
Corno Jr. has seen the evidence and also heard from others how his videos have connected interested parties.
“I know it works,” he said. “I know it helps kids get exposure. I have had coaches tell me: ‘I might not sign this kid or offer him a scholarship based on video. But if I like what I see, I will get one of my assistants to go out and watch him live.’
“That is step one of the process.”
Corno Jr. has a unique, double perspective. Soccer and television production have been his passions. He grew up in the Detroit suburb of Grosse Pointe and arrived in the western suburbs as a teenager just as sports cable television made its first significant impact in Chicago.
“I was always a sports guy, and I was always a television guy,” he said. “It was in the family. My dad came here in 1983 to start SportsVision. I was a junior in high school when he moved the family here. I played soccer at Naperville Central -- one year at Central as a right wing in the fall of 1984."
Corno Jr.'s 18 goals that season tied Dave Robert's school record for tallies in a season. Currently, he's tied for fifth all-time in that category and ranks eighth for total points in a season with 40.
Corno Jr. was recruited to play at Northern Illinois University. After a redshirt season, he started four years for the Huskies as a forward, outside back and midfielder. In the spring of his senior year, he was offered a spot on the practice squad for the Chicago Power.
By that time, his television career had begun to take off.
By the time of his college graduation in 1990, Michael Jordan had taken hold of the national consciousness. The Bulls were one of the hottest teams in the country. SportsVision was now called SportsChannel Chicago. It originated as a pay cable regional sports outlet that produced and broadcast Bulls and Blackhawks games as a separate package of games from what WGN-TV broadcast over the air.
Over time that network grew and mutated into different iterations: Fox Sports Chicago (FSN), Comcast SportsNet Chicago (CSN Chicago) and now NBC Sports Chicago.
Corno Jr. interned at SportsChannel Chicago while he completed his degree in media studies at NIU. He was in the right place at the right time. The field was exploding, and he had the great fortune of being there at the ground level.
“When I got out of school, they launched a nightly news program that I was hired on with a dozen other people,” he said. “We started producing the SportsChannel Report. I directed that quite a bit and produced it on occasion, and was doing local high school and college stuff.”
When Comcast took over running the channel in 2004, Corno Jr. worked as a production manager and executive producer on live game broadcasts. He directed Blackhawks and White Sox games as well as high school and college sports.
He produced and directed a lot of studio programming. He also worked on many niche sports like cycling, volleyball and track and field.
The advent and massive popularity of the internet was the next seismic change in the industry. Audiences got younger and that was the demographic executives started to chase. Coverage naturally changed.
“I think today’s generation is not as quick to sell their souls for the local professional team like when I was young,” Corno Jr. said. “I think today’s youth are a lot more focused on their own lives. When I was younger, I was very happy to be in the stands no matter where the team was in the standings. It could be last place, and I didn’t care.
“I am not so sure everybody today really feels that way.”
The internet personalized everything. The rise of social media was the next turning point.
“I know live sports on television are about as strong as live content [gets] with regard to ratings and advertisers,” he said. “At the same time, the younger audiences are harder to sell on to the notion of tuning into every White Sox or Cubs game this summer. They have more going on and more options.
“I think the business is evolving with that younger audience’s interest. If you watch a game now at any station, you see a lot more respect paid to social media, to people using their phones at games and getting them involved with something happening inside the stadium. The teams and broadcasters are aware of that and are trying to keep that younger generation engaged.”
His career shift into making recruiting videos began roughly a decade ago as he was watching his youngest son, Joe Corno, participate in U-8 travel games. Like any parent, he was eager to have a physical record of those precious moments.
“I thought it would be cool when he was growing up to have footage when he was nine years old,” Corno Jr. said. “I used to bring a camera. I enjoyed documenting some of those moments for him and his teammates, and I would come home and cut highlights and send them to all the other families. I’d get a lot of fun response, and it was something I enjoyed doing.”
As Joe Corno matriculated through Batavia and made his impact as a gifted forward, Corno Jr. realized he could leverage his experience to open up awareness of his son's abilities and help him fulfill his desire to play soccer at the college level.
The pieces all fit together. He had his own epiphany.
“When my son was at the age that colleges were recruiting him and he was starting to shop schools, I spent a little more time putting together a resume video,” he said. “One coach was very complimentary. I did a couple of videos for some friends as well. One of the sons of those friends ended up playing Division I.
“I always wanted to see if I could turn it into something more. I have always enjoyed doing it, and it is a perfect blend of my two biggest passions with soccer and television.”
Joe Corno earned All-Sectional recognition from the Illinois High School Coaches Association last year. He was named the Chicagoland Soccer Man of the Match in a 4-0 Batavia victory over Lemont on Oct. 2, 2017. Now, Joe plays at St. Norbert College, in DePere, Wisconsin. He scored a goal in nine games of action for the Midwest Conference champion Green Knights (17-1-1), who ended the season ranked 14th in Division III.
“When Joe went away to school, I was looking at this as a hobby and wondered what could I do with it,” Corno Jr. said. “It was something I loved doing, and I wanted to see if I could make it grow.”
It is. Besides the Chicago market, Corno Jr. has created recruiting videos for clients in Boston, Las Vegas and Arkansas.
“Usually it is the parents who contact me,” he said. “They either have footage or need my help shooting footage. Obviously I don’t go to those [out-of-state] towns to watch their kids play high school soccer. They have existing footage. They send me links of their games; they send me information.
“I build the video with tools like stabilization, zooming in and out, and graphics circles around the players so coaches know who they are looking at.”
He posts the videos on YouTube and creates a high definition digital file for the player and his or her family. In the case of Navarro, he posted the video on his recruiting website. Hopefully it will help the senior get more looks at the national event he will play at with Galaxy on Dec. 6-9 in North Carolina.
“Coaches want to hear from the kids,” Corno Jr. said. “They want to see kids who are motivated and taking it on themselves, (who) want to go to their school. That is what the coaches want to hear.”
Recruiting is both art and science. It's a game unto itself. Corno Jr. has once again demonstrated his great knack for putting himself in the middle of the action.
“I think there is a service there that is going to definitely help those kids who want to play at the next level,” he said. “I know there are other options besides me, but I am hoping with my background in both soccer and television, I can help as many kids as possible.”
Video service aids athletes' quests for post-prep careers
By Patrick Z. McGavin
As the calendar pushed toward the middle of October, Jose Navarro braced for what could be end of his interscholastic soccer career. It was the opening week of play in the Class 3A state tournament. The season was now in the knockout stage -- win or go home.
A senior defensive midfielder at Neuqua Valley, Navarro had much to play for -- he had set an objective to play in college. But despite playing for high-profile programs with the Wildcats and the Naperville-based club program Galaxy, there were more questions than answers about his future.
Navarro remains unsigned.
Recruiting is tricky and complex with a curiously open set of constantly evolving rules. Decisions are influenced by complex factors of supply and demand, timing and opportunity.
Any advantage a player has at his disposal can make the difference.
With his future in flux, Navarro took an added step with video production expert Jim Corno Jr.
“It was a good way to get another perspective,” Navarro said.
Corno Jr. was thrilled to provide his expertise. On Oct. 16, he fixated his camera on Navarro and documented his every action in Neuqua Valley’s Class 3A Naperville North Regional semifinal with Naperville Central.
As the founder of GOALS Productions, Inc., his Batavia-based production company, Corno Jr. played his part in showcasing Navarro’s skill set in an effort to help widen his exposure to a vast network of college coaches.
On Oct. 18, Corno Jr. assembled a deft four-minute video and uploaded it to YouTube. It highlighted Navarro’s contributions in the Wildcats’ 2-1 upset victory over Naperville Central. While he didn't score a goal, midfielders Tom Bludgen and Jack Bella did those honors for the Wildcats, Navarro impacted the game.
Among the notable moments, Navarro can be seen starting the attack, pushing the ball in space and breaking up a dangerous Central scoring opportunity by clearing a throw-in toward the Wildcats’ box.
The editing is invisible, almost unobtrusive, and clearly shows Navarro’s strengths, privileging his feel for the game, high soccer IQ and versatility as a two-way player.
The game footage sells the video.
Every new action sequence on the video identifies Navarro with a red circle that allows the viewer to instantly locate him and then follow his play.
Special attention and care have gone into the entire production -- from the background sound of fans cheering Navarro as he makes a positive play to the music, sound and graphic effects that shape the work. The opening scene is a graphics layout with the player's picture, name, height and weight, year of graduation, position, hometown, high school and club affiliate.
“It was one game, and it focuses on that game and not necessarily the highlights of the season,” Navarro said. “It focused on what I did in the game. Typically highlights just include goals and everything. It gave me a different perspective of the highlight tape.”
This is the new paradigm. The internet and the advent of digital media have transformed every stage of recruiting. Having a professionally produced recruiting video marks the next frontier, a way for the athlete and his family to have some representation in the recruiting process.
“The high school is going to be able to show it to some coaches and other people,” Navarro said. “It was cool. It was really well made, and it helped a lot.”
Corno Jr. has seen the evidence and also heard from others how his videos have connected interested parties.
“I know it works,” he said. “I know it helps kids get exposure. I have had coaches tell me: ‘I might not sign this kid or offer him a scholarship based on video. But if I like what I see, I will get one of my assistants to go out and watch him live.’
“That is step one of the process.”
Corno Jr. has a unique, double perspective. Soccer and television production have been his passions. He grew up in the Detroit suburb of Grosse Pointe and arrived in the western suburbs as a teenager just as sports cable television made its first significant impact in Chicago.
“I was always a sports guy, and I was always a television guy,” he said. “It was in the family. My dad came here in 1983 to start SportsVision. I was a junior in high school when he moved the family here. I played soccer at Naperville Central -- one year at Central as a right wing in the fall of 1984."
Corno Jr.'s 18 goals that season tied Dave Robert's school record for tallies in a season. Currently, he's tied for fifth all-time in that category and ranks eighth for total points in a season with 40.
Corno Jr. was recruited to play at Northern Illinois University. After a redshirt season, he started four years for the Huskies as a forward, outside back and midfielder. In the spring of his senior year, he was offered a spot on the practice squad for the Chicago Power.
By that time, his television career had begun to take off.
By the time of his college graduation in 1990, Michael Jordan had taken hold of the national consciousness. The Bulls were one of the hottest teams in the country. SportsVision was now called SportsChannel Chicago. It originated as a pay cable regional sports outlet that produced and broadcast Bulls and Blackhawks games as a separate package of games from what WGN-TV broadcast over the air.
Over time that network grew and mutated into different iterations: Fox Sports Chicago (FSN), Comcast SportsNet Chicago (CSN Chicago) and now NBC Sports Chicago.
Corno Jr. interned at SportsChannel Chicago while he completed his degree in media studies at NIU. He was in the right place at the right time. The field was exploding, and he had the great fortune of being there at the ground level.
“When I got out of school, they launched a nightly news program that I was hired on with a dozen other people,” he said. “We started producing the SportsChannel Report. I directed that quite a bit and produced it on occasion, and was doing local high school and college stuff.”
When Comcast took over running the channel in 2004, Corno Jr. worked as a production manager and executive producer on live game broadcasts. He directed Blackhawks and White Sox games as well as high school and college sports.
He produced and directed a lot of studio programming. He also worked on many niche sports like cycling, volleyball and track and field.
The advent and massive popularity of the internet was the next seismic change in the industry. Audiences got younger and that was the demographic executives started to chase. Coverage naturally changed.
“I think today’s generation is not as quick to sell their souls for the local professional team like when I was young,” Corno Jr. said. “I think today’s youth are a lot more focused on their own lives. When I was younger, I was very happy to be in the stands no matter where the team was in the standings. It could be last place, and I didn’t care.
“I am not so sure everybody today really feels that way.”
The internet personalized everything. The rise of social media was the next turning point.
“I know live sports on television are about as strong as live content [gets] with regard to ratings and advertisers,” he said. “At the same time, the younger audiences are harder to sell on to the notion of tuning into every White Sox or Cubs game this summer. They have more going on and more options.
“I think the business is evolving with that younger audience’s interest. If you watch a game now at any station, you see a lot more respect paid to social media, to people using their phones at games and getting them involved with something happening inside the stadium. The teams and broadcasters are aware of that and are trying to keep that younger generation engaged.”
His career shift into making recruiting videos began roughly a decade ago as he was watching his youngest son, Joe Corno, participate in U-8 travel games. Like any parent, he was eager to have a physical record of those precious moments.
“I thought it would be cool when he was growing up to have footage when he was nine years old,” Corno Jr. said. “I used to bring a camera. I enjoyed documenting some of those moments for him and his teammates, and I would come home and cut highlights and send them to all the other families. I’d get a lot of fun response, and it was something I enjoyed doing.”
As Joe Corno matriculated through Batavia and made his impact as a gifted forward, Corno Jr. realized he could leverage his experience to open up awareness of his son's abilities and help him fulfill his desire to play soccer at the college level.
The pieces all fit together. He had his own epiphany.
“When my son was at the age that colleges were recruiting him and he was starting to shop schools, I spent a little more time putting together a resume video,” he said. “One coach was very complimentary. I did a couple of videos for some friends as well. One of the sons of those friends ended up playing Division I.
“I always wanted to see if I could turn it into something more. I have always enjoyed doing it, and it is a perfect blend of my two biggest passions with soccer and television.”
Joe Corno earned All-Sectional recognition from the Illinois High School Coaches Association last year. He was named the Chicagoland Soccer Man of the Match in a 4-0 Batavia victory over Lemont on Oct. 2, 2017. Now, Joe plays at St. Norbert College, in DePere, Wisconsin. He scored a goal in nine games of action for the Midwest Conference champion Green Knights (17-1-1), who ended the season ranked 14th in Division III.
“When Joe went away to school, I was looking at this as a hobby and wondered what could I do with it,” Corno Jr. said. “It was something I loved doing, and I wanted to see if I could make it grow.”
It is. Besides the Chicago market, Corno Jr. has created recruiting videos for clients in Boston, Las Vegas and Arkansas.
“Usually it is the parents who contact me,” he said. “They either have footage or need my help shooting footage. Obviously I don’t go to those [out-of-state] towns to watch their kids play high school soccer. They have existing footage. They send me links of their games; they send me information.
“I build the video with tools like stabilization, zooming in and out, and graphics circles around the players so coaches know who they are looking at.”
He posts the videos on YouTube and creates a high definition digital file for the player and his or her family. In the case of Navarro, he posted the video on his recruiting website. Hopefully it will help the senior get more looks at the national event he will play at with Galaxy on Dec. 6-9 in North Carolina.
“Coaches want to hear from the kids,” Corno Jr. said. “They want to see kids who are motivated and taking it on themselves, (who) want to go to their school. That is what the coaches want to hear.”
Recruiting is both art and science. It's a game unto itself. Corno Jr. has once again demonstrated his great knack for putting himself in the middle of the action.
“I think there is a service there that is going to definitely help those kids who want to play at the next level,” he said. “I know there are other options besides me, but I am hoping with my background in both soccer and television, I can help as many kids as possible.”