Mike ‘Big Star’ Starling uses his videography skills to help high school players connect with college coaches
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Videographer Mike Starling and his family.
Clockwise from upper left: wife Keisha Starling, Starling (with ball), Saafir Starling, 19; Syeer Starling, 12; Shakur Starling, 10; and Shyheim Starling, 8.Mike Starling
https://www.inquirer.com/high-school-sports/pennsylvania/mike-big-star-starling-recruiting-videography-skills-high-school-sports-college-coaches-20190606.html
PENNSYLVANIA HIGH SCHOOL SPORTS
Mike ‘Big Star’ Starling uses his videography skills to help high school players connect with college coaches
He helps high school players "brand themselves and market and promote themselves in a way that you couldn’t do years ago when it was just word of mouth."
Mike ‘Big Star’ Starling uses his videography skills to help high school players connect with college coaches
He helps high school players "brand themselves and market and promote themselves in a way that you couldn’t do years ago when it was just word of mouth."
by Aaron Carter
Updated on Jun 6, 2019, 12:33 p.m. ET
In 1997, Michael Starling was a 20-year-old with hip hop in his heart, sports in his rear view and some change in his pocket after his student loan refund check came during his second year at West Chester University.
Years earlier, the 6-foot-5 Starling had helped Norristown High, from which he graduated in 1995, build a 12-point halftime lead against Lower Merion. That is, of course, before Kobe Bryant, “came out in the second half and went ballistic.”
Despite his height, Starling knew a career playing basketball wouldn’t make cents. His love for music and a new video camera, however, could.
“I got that refund check, bought a video camera and never looked back,” Starling said.
Starling, now one of Pennsylvania’s biggest names in the growing field of high school sports videographing, was first known for raising the voices of rappers in Philadelphia’s underground rap and hip hop scene in the late 1990s and 2000s.
After he used his refund check to buy a camera, Starling taught himself how to use it and edit the video, all while he earned a degree in public health promotion.
The result was Too Raw for the Streets, which he calls a “rap DVD movement in 1998 that would impact the world.”
Starling took his camera into the city and helped spread the talents of rappers such as Cassidy, Freeway and others to others across the country, helping them earn earn mainstream opportunities along the way.
And as he grew in popularity, his clientele also grew in stature. Former 76ers great Allen Iverson even appeared in one of Starling’s films during the early 2000s.
Starling’s growth eventually included a wife and family, which yielded an evolution that years later has become part of a revolution that has helped elevate young athletes in the state and beyond.
Though he says he never smoked or drank, the negativity and violence reflected in some of the hip-hop culture changed him, as did his wife, Keisha Starling.
“The direction I was going in was in conflict with who I was becoming as a man,” Starling said.
His wife, Keisha, who was heavily involved in the church before they met, he said, “started to change my heart and my mind.”
So did the couple’s four children, who perhaps helped make Starling even bigger.
Today, he goes by “Big Star,” a leader in the videography world in high school sports in Pennsylvania.
His YouTube channel boasts more than 15,000 subscribers. On Instagram, Starling has more than 8,000 followers, while about 3,700 follow him on Twitter.
You can find photos of him online with Duke stars Zion Williamson and Cam Reddish, Houston Rockets coach Mike D’Antoni at the NBA summer league or on a football field with Coatesville footballers or on the court with former Reading star Lonnie Walker, who was drafted by the San Antonio Spurs in 2018.
Starling’s transformation into sports, however, was driven by his most important clientele: his sons.
When his oldest, Saafir, now 18, was about 13 or 14, Starling described himself as a “camera dad,” the dad who filmed all of his sons’ games.
One day, another parent asked if Starling was selling any of the videos.
The only problem was that Starling ran out of DVDs. So, he put the video he made on YouTube as a way to deliver his goods and services.
“A couple days later,” Starling said, “there was a couple hundred views, and a lightbulb went off.”
Today, he sells merchandise on his website, creates highlight tapes for high school athletes, shows full-game replays on his YouTube channel, travels the country to attend games, cultivates relationships with college coaches who follow his website for game film and tries to mentor young videographers making their own path.
And Starling does all of that while maintaining his full-time job as a juvenile advocate in the Dauphin County public defender’s office.
“Working with kids has always been my passion,” he said. “The kids you hear about on the news that are supposed to be the ‘worst kids, the bad kids,’ that’s my crew, man. That’s my population of kids that I connect with. I speak their language, and they respond to me. That’s always been a population that I’ve been drawn to.”
Starling grew up without his father. Instead, a local barber in Norristown named Lamar “Buddy” Epps played a fatherly role, even taking Starling on his first college visit.
“Some people couldn’t wait to get home and show their dad their report card,” Starling said. “I couldn’t wait to get home and run to the barber shop and show Buddy Epps.”
These days, Starling helps college coaches visit high school athletes by filming and producing videos that reveal their talents to coaches, who no longer have to rely on high school coaches to send videos.
In the process, Starling also helps high schoolers and their parents who commission his work to control their own marketing, branding and recruiting.
“That’s the new wave, man,” he said. “I can’t tell you how much my college-coach network has increased.”
“Us in conjunction with Instagram,” he added, “these kids have been able to brand themselves and market and promote themselves in a way that you couldn’t do years ago when it was just word of mouth.”
That doesn’t mean everyone understands a change has come.
Starling said he still gets questioned by security staff at events who don’t believe he is in “the media” because he doesn’t work for a major outlet.
"I don’t see Channel 6 on your shirt,” he recalls hearing someone say. “What do you mean you’re with the media?”
Nevertheless, Starling said he will push on with one caveat.
He will quit “once it becomes not fun for me,” he said.
His son, Saafir, just completed his freshman year as a lineman at Virginia Union University. Starling and family make it a point to attend all of his son’s home games in Virginia, which sometimes means missing the highest profile high school football games. His priority, he said, will always be his family.
“This is my hobby,” he said. "I do it at my leisure ... and I want it to kind of stay that way. I want to be able to make videos and have fun with the camera because I want to.”
Published June 6, 2019
Updated on Jun 6, 2019, 12:33 p.m. ET
In 1997, Michael Starling was a 20-year-old with hip hop in his heart, sports in his rear view and some change in his pocket after his student loan refund check came during his second year at West Chester University.
Years earlier, the 6-foot-5 Starling had helped Norristown High, from which he graduated in 1995, build a 12-point halftime lead against Lower Merion. That is, of course, before Kobe Bryant, “came out in the second half and went ballistic.”
Despite his height, Starling knew a career playing basketball wouldn’t make cents. His love for music and a new video camera, however, could.
“I got that refund check, bought a video camera and never looked back,” Starling said.
Starling, now one of Pennsylvania’s biggest names in the growing field of high school sports videographing, was first known for raising the voices of rappers in Philadelphia’s underground rap and hip hop scene in the late 1990s and 2000s.
After he used his refund check to buy a camera, Starling taught himself how to use it and edit the video, all while he earned a degree in public health promotion.
The result was Too Raw for the Streets, which he calls a “rap DVD movement in 1998 that would impact the world.”
Starling took his camera into the city and helped spread the talents of rappers such as Cassidy, Freeway and others to others across the country, helping them earn earn mainstream opportunities along the way.
And as he grew in popularity, his clientele also grew in stature. Former 76ers great Allen Iverson even appeared in one of Starling’s films during the early 2000s.
Starling’s growth eventually included a wife and family, which yielded an evolution that years later has become part of a revolution that has helped elevate young athletes in the state and beyond.
Though he says he never smoked or drank, the negativity and violence reflected in some of the hip-hop culture changed him, as did his wife, Keisha Starling.
“The direction I was going in was in conflict with who I was becoming as a man,” Starling said.
His wife, Keisha, who was heavily involved in the church before they met, he said, “started to change my heart and my mind.”
So did the couple’s four children, who perhaps helped make Starling even bigger.
Today, he goes by “Big Star,” a leader in the videography world in high school sports in Pennsylvania.
His YouTube channel boasts more than 15,000 subscribers. On Instagram, Starling has more than 8,000 followers, while about 3,700 follow him on Twitter.
You can find photos of him online with Duke stars Zion Williamson and Cam Reddish, Houston Rockets coach Mike D’Antoni at the NBA summer league or on a football field with Coatesville footballers or on the court with former Reading star Lonnie Walker, who was drafted by the San Antonio Spurs in 2018.
Starling’s transformation into sports, however, was driven by his most important clientele: his sons.
When his oldest, Saafir, now 18, was about 13 or 14, Starling described himself as a “camera dad,” the dad who filmed all of his sons’ games.
One day, another parent asked if Starling was selling any of the videos.
The only problem was that Starling ran out of DVDs. So, he put the video he made on YouTube as a way to deliver his goods and services.
“A couple days later,” Starling said, “there was a couple hundred views, and a lightbulb went off.”
Today, he sells merchandise on his website, creates highlight tapes for high school athletes, shows full-game replays on his YouTube channel, travels the country to attend games, cultivates relationships with college coaches who follow his website for game film and tries to mentor young videographers making their own path.
And Starling does all of that while maintaining his full-time job as a juvenile advocate in the Dauphin County public defender’s office.
“Working with kids has always been my passion,” he said. “The kids you hear about on the news that are supposed to be the ‘worst kids, the bad kids,’ that’s my crew, man. That’s my population of kids that I connect with. I speak their language, and they respond to me. That’s always been a population that I’ve been drawn to.”
Starling grew up without his father. Instead, a local barber in Norristown named Lamar “Buddy” Epps played a fatherly role, even taking Starling on his first college visit.
“Some people couldn’t wait to get home and show their dad their report card,” Starling said. “I couldn’t wait to get home and run to the barber shop and show Buddy Epps.”
These days, Starling helps college coaches visit high school athletes by filming and producing videos that reveal their talents to coaches, who no longer have to rely on high school coaches to send videos.
In the process, Starling also helps high schoolers and their parents who commission his work to control their own marketing, branding and recruiting.
“That’s the new wave, man,” he said. “I can’t tell you how much my college-coach network has increased.”
“Us in conjunction with Instagram,” he added, “these kids have been able to brand themselves and market and promote themselves in a way that you couldn’t do years ago when it was just word of mouth.”
That doesn’t mean everyone understands a change has come.
Starling said he still gets questioned by security staff at events who don’t believe he is in “the media” because he doesn’t work for a major outlet.
"I don’t see Channel 6 on your shirt,” he recalls hearing someone say. “What do you mean you’re with the media?”
Nevertheless, Starling said he will push on with one caveat.
He will quit “once it becomes not fun for me,” he said.
His son, Saafir, just completed his freshman year as a lineman at Virginia Union University. Starling and family make it a point to attend all of his son’s home games in Virginia, which sometimes means missing the highest profile high school football games. His priority, he said, will always be his family.
“This is my hobby,” he said. "I do it at my leisure ... and I want it to kind of stay that way. I want to be able to make videos and have fun with the camera because I want to.”
Published June 6, 2019
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