Here's how important national letters of intent are in the recruiting process: you can't just sign one whenever you want.

The NCAA has specific time periods in place for inking such important agreements. They vary by sport, and there are a lot of sports. So it's easy for recruits to commit to a school but really have no idea when they're supposed to sign their letter of intent to make it official.

Here is a breakdown of when national letters of intent are signed for athletes wanting to earn a scholarship for the 2009-10 school year, according to the NCAA website:

Basketball (early signing period): Nov. 12-19, 2008

Basketball (regular period): April 15-May 20, 2009

Football (mid-year junior college transfers): Dec. 17, 2008-Jan. 15, 2009

Football (regular period): Feb. 4-April 1, 2009

All Other Sports (early period): Nov. 12-19, 2008

All Other Sports (regular period): April 8-Aug. 1, 2009

The coaches of most sports seemed satisfied with the calendar in place, but there are discussions of implementing an early-signing period for high school football recruits. In recent years, football prospects have committed, decommitted, recommitted, decommitted and committed elsewhere, filling all the time they have to make a decision before February.

One Division I coach told me he uses 25 percent of his recruiting budget "babysitting" recruits, or visiting recruits who have already committed to make sure they don't stray.

Nothing is imminent, though, so the dates in place will be a good forecast of years to come.

Visit Active Recruiting to throw your hat in the recruiting ring.

Last weekend marked the 35th anniversary of Title IX, the legislation credited with increasing gender equity in sports. According to the Women���s Sports Foundation, since its enactment in 1972, female athletic participation has increased by a staggering 904 percent in high school and by 456 percent in college.

As someone who has benefited from Title IX, softball star Jennie Finch is quick to share her appreciation for those women that came before her. "I'm truly grateful for people who have paved the way, and have fought the fight," Finch said in the Daily Freeman. "I'm happy they broke down barriers to give women like myself the opportunity to be successful athletes and make a living playing a sport that I love."

I���m no softball star, but I am also thankful for the positive influence of Title IX in my life and the opportunity to play ball in college. Here are some other women who have enjoyed the effects of Title IX and are part of my favorite moments in sports history:

1996 | New Women's Olympic Sports. Women's softball and soccer made their Olympic debut at the Summer Games in Atlanta, and the U.S. dominated, winning the gold in both sports, as well as in basketball, gymnastics and synchronized swimming. The Atlanta Games made stars of Lisa Leslie, Mia Hamm and Lisa Fernandez, giving rise to professional softball and soccer leagues for women in the U.S.

1999 | Women's World Cup. A billion TV viewers and a stadium crowd of 90,000 witness the celebration as the U.S. wins the Women's World Cup in an overtime shoot-out against China. Brandi Chastain ripped off her jersey after scoring the winning goal, giving little girls someone besides a model to look at for a strong, beautiful body. And for the first time, a women's soccer team got as much attention a men's squad usually does.

2007 | Equal Pay at Wimbledon. After 123 years of awarding more prize money to men than women, Wimbledon yielded to public pressure and announced on Feb. 22, that it will offer equal pay through all rounds at this year's tournament.

2006 | Winningest Coach in NCAA History. Pat Summitt, the all-time winningest coach in NCAA basketball historymale or femaleearned her 900th career win as the Tennessee Lady Vols beat Vanderbilt, 80-68. That year, Summitt signed a $1.125 million deal for the 2006-07 season, making her the first women's basketball coach in history to be paid a million dollars or more.

2003 | Annika Plays a PGA Tour Event. Annika Sorenstam became the first woman since Babe Didrikson Zaharias in 1945 to compete in a PGA Tour event. Sorenstam missed the cut at the Colonialin Fort Worth, Texasby four strokes, but walked off the course to a standing ovation.

1997 | The WNBA is Born. The WNBA kicked off its inaugural season with eight teams, but unlike the other women's pro basketball leagues before it, this one has enjoyed longevity, this year celebrating its 10th year of existence.

2001 | Increased Exposure for the Women's Tournament. The NCAA and ESPN announced an 11-year agreement for the cable outlet to televise every game of the women's national championship basketball tournament.

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All right folks, it���s the end of the road for the metal-versus-wood bat debate in New York City. According to The Associated Press, metal bats will be banned in high school baseball starting in September after the City Council on Monday overrode a mayoral veto of the bill, 41-4. This decision subscribes to the theory that metal bats produce harder and faster hits, risking serious injury to young players due to less reaction time.

Youth leagues and lawmakers are proposing similar bans in other areas, including New Jersey, where a 12-year-old boy went into cardiac arrest after a batted ball struck him in the chest in between heart beats last summer (he did recover and returned home this past winter.)

Opponents cite an American Legion Baseball study from 2005 that found no substantial scientific proof to support the argument that wooden bats are safer than metal bats.

I know this is stirring up a lot of discussion in baseball across the country. I can���t make myself believe that a baseball reacts the same off a wooden bat as it does off of a metal one. Perhaps a different study would produce varying results. But even if it didn���t ��� what���s the harm in changing over to wood bats all the way up? It is how the game was originally played. It has a pure quality about it. If it does happen to be safer for youth athletes, it���s a win-win situation.

Do you think the issue should be left up to those who run the youth leagues or that the New York City government made the right move?

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With a publicity boost from Hall of Fame linebacker Dick Butkus, Lt. Gov. David Dewhurst introduced a state Senate bill last week to require random steroid testing for Texas public school athletes. The bill would require public school athletes to agree not to take steroids and to submit to testing if randomly selected.

Lawmakers hope to test as many as 22,000 students per year or more. Texas has about 733,000 students in approximately 1,300 high schools. Testing would be conducted at 30 percent, about 390, of the schools. The program could start as early as next fall.

Studies have shown as many 1 million high school students nationwide have taken steroids and as many as 40,000 in Texas, Dewhurst said. Steroids can lead to dramatic mood swings, heart disease and cancer, among other complications.

If approved, the bill leaves most of the testing details, such as which schools are selected, how and when samples are collected and punishment for positive results, to the University Interscholastic League, the state's governing body for high school sports. Dewhurst, however, said punishments for positive tests should include a ban from playing in sports.

The program wouldn't be the first of its kind nationally, but it would be the largest. New Jersey started a limited program last fall that tests athletes and teams that advance to the postseason.

Do you support steroid testing in high school sports?

(Photo provided by Getty Images/taken by Doug Benc)

[http://active.typepad.com/.shared/image.html?/photos/uncategorized/57579794.jpg] I just read a story about the recruiting trail for Washington State University's basketball program -- they are already focusing on 2010. Patrick Simon, a freshman in high school, committed to play basketball at Washington State University despite the fact that he's only in the middle of his first season of prep basketball. The Cougars on Monday made a scholarship offer to the 6-foot-7 Simon, who is only 14 and won't play there until the next decade.

Simon leads his team in scoring and rebounding and orally accepted the offer. No one from the Washington State basketball program can comment on Simon's commitment until he signs a letter of intent, which would happen in fall 2009 at the earliest.

"I've thought about it quite a bit and it all came to how good they've been doing this season, they're No. 9 now, and how coach Tony Bennett really made the team a top team," Simon told The Spokesman-Review.

I know an oral commitment doesn���t mean a whole lot until he signs a letter of intent more than two years from now, but it still seems a little rushed. Isn���t this a little too young to make such a huge life decision? He���s only 14!

(Photo provided by Getty Images, taken by Jeff Gross)

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Nicole Woody was recently featured as a stand out high school athlete as read in Sports Illustrated: She is one of the top female wrestlers in the U.S. and still encounters people who think the mat is no place for a woman.

Reportedly, some schools forfeit rather than send a boy to face her, and one fellow wrestler transferred rather than be on her team. But Woody, a graduating junior and team captain, also hears plenty of encouragement. Several girls from states across the country have reached out to her online telling of how they have been inspired to start wrestling.

It's a choice more girls are making. At U.S. high schools the number of female wrestlers has tripled in the last decade, from 1,629 to 4,975. (There are 50 times as many boy wrestlers.)  Woody's coach, Bill Royer, says, "It's not a girl-boy thing. She's a wrestler. She lives and dies and bleeds this sport."

Woody began wrestling at age nine at the suggestion of her mother, Mary, who liked the discipline it taught her son. In August, Woody was the only American of either sex to win a title at the Junior World Championships. Her ultimate goal is the Olympics, which added women's wrestling in 2004. Good luck to her!

(Photo provided by AFP, taken by Yuri Kadobnov)

!http://active.typepad.com/teamsports/images/football2_4.jpg![http://active.typepad.com/.shared/image.html?/photos/uncategorized/football2_4.jpg]In the height of the bowl season and as the NFL playoffs get underway, ESPN.com ran a great article to find out how the states stack up across all levels of football. They asked their NFL, college and Scouts Inc. editors to rank the states and District of Columbia at each level, then combined those rankings for an overall number.



Read on for the rankings they found... and let us hear your description of football in your state. Are the rankings right? Did they miss an important fact, player, coach or game?

New Jersey high school teams that make it to state championship games are now subject to steroid testing. The New Jersey governor signed an order today that requires random testing. If an athlete test positive once, they're out.

[View article|http://sports.espn.go.com/sports/news/sto