Kinda true, but not entirely. Most of the cases you might be referring to happen at the U-14 or U-15 level, where it's not so much that teams develop players; it's often that some kids have worked very hard in polishing their skill and passion for the game, athletic enough, and fortunate enough to have a good coach who wouldn't inhibit them or teach them (too many) bad habits. Having said that, there are some clubs where this happens more often than at others. Case in point: the Juventus club in Redwood City has a much stronger record of producing such players compared to, say, Santa Clara Sporting, though the latter is often equally or more successful at the youth level (tournaments, rankings and such). De Anza, for its part, has both developed players that went to NT programs from the club (Pelosi and Amick are two, but not the only, examples) and recruited + developed players from good local clubs long before the USSF noticed them (examples: Joya, Bonomo, Romero are some recent examples).
I know nothing of the coaching at either club, but at least superficially, Santa Clara Sporting had both Sebastian Lletget and Christian Dean pass through in recent years (before Dean joined the Force). Do you happen to know where Benji Joya was playing before he got hooked up with the Force?
That's how development works. Teams develop them to a certain level then pass them off to the next level team. Very few elite players should play with one team for 6 yrs. Then after a few years DeAnza passes them off to the next level team.
Not sure, probably the PAC club (Portuguese Athletic Club), which has fielded a number good teams in the East San Jose area. He might have played briefly with the Sporting club as well. Also, afaik, Lletget and Dean mostly passed through the Sporting club, not so much as developed there.
http://www.socceramerica.com/article/57354/latino-inclusion-how-far-have-we-come-part-1.html Latino Inclusion - How Far Have We Come? Interesting article from Soccer America. As someone who is looking to tap into this market in the future in my own area, I find that the biggest obstacle by far is money. There is a reason that the kids that care the most about the game are not always involved in it and it is pretty straight forward. If I want the players who are the most passionate about the game of soccer in my area, I am going to have to find a way to pay for them to play. If I can't do that, all of my attempts to tap into that market will be frustrating at best.
We live in a land of capitalism and truly think that local, regional, and even national corporate money is the future. They want to tap into a growing latino market and there are brokers who try to connect the money with the one's needing the money. There are also so many foundations of the uber rich who love to help underprivilidged kids in their pursuit and passion. To go and ask for money may be a full time job but some young hungry latino recent graduate may be right for the job.
Mike Woitalla knows better than to write this intro: "Only two decades ago, the United States had never had a Hispanic head coach at any level of its national team program and Latino players were rarely seen in a U.S uniform." The reality is that two decades ago, the US was fielding about as many Latino players as it is now. Clavijo, Ramos, and Balboa were all World Cup starters, Perez started one game, and Claudio Reyna would likely have played quite a bit if not for injury. More generally, it feels as though Woitalla shied away from the tough questions. Specifically, if Southern California is doing a better job with Hispanic players, why aren't we seeing vastly more of them reaching high levels? Instead, the most successful Hispanic player from that area continues to be Carlos Bocanegra, who began wearing a US YNT uniform nearly two decades ago. Based on demographics alone, SoCal should've started cranking out Bocanegras every year by now.
Here's a little article on soccer players being born in January. I know favoring older players has been discussed as an issue here in the past. http://regressing.deadspin.com/if-y...-player-it-helps-to-be-b-1562359856/+reubenfb
I think development quite clearly has changed greatly from when Boca was 16. So it's difficult to judge the impact of Latinos right now. Around 2020-ish we might have a clearer view on where the system is at.
It's been nearly two decades since Bocanegra was 16. Waiting another five years won't change much. If things had been improving nearly as fast as some people claim, we'd be seeing strong trends by now.
Here's one of the pieces linked by the one you provided. http://www.bloodyelbow.com/2012/1/4...lm-gladwell-gets-wrong-about-the-relative-age One of the things it shows is that in hockey, the relative age effect has been diminishing over time (i.e., things getting better). In contrast, with US Soccer's increased focus on early January kids, our relative age situation has been getting worse.
Players in club based academies, who have been with their club teams since a young age are barely starting to come through right now; which is why in 6 years when some of these players are in their 20's it would be a fairer judge of quality. Not to mention the USMNT and MLS are very different to when Boca was first coming into football.
Just to use an example of how things are different, Oscar Sorto has time before someone can claim he's behind schedule when comparing him to Bocanegra. At his age Boca hadn't appeared for an MLS club. He could start playing club football more regularly by next season and by 21 starting to get looks from the USMNT. Hell, I would prefer him right now instead of Dan Gargan at RB. ..... Saying that it's difficult with defenders because for some reason our better prospects seem to be up the field which is interesting.
Never mind. Bradford Jamieson with the first goal of the game. 1-0 @LAGalaxyAcademy over Anderlecht. 23 minutes in— LA Galaxy Academy (@LAGalaxyAcademy) April 13, 2014 Is there a general Dallas cup thread?
If we're talking about the results of recent changes, then I can buy the argument that need to wait for a while to judge the end product, perhaps well beyond 2020. (We may be able to judge the intermediate product, though.) But if we're talking about the claim that things have been getting better at a steady pace for two decades, then I think that one is clearly wrong. Either the improvements have been smaller than we thought, or else other things have interfered with player development to limit our success in the end product.
The first paragraph is what I was referring to. I agree real change might be longer than 2022 but we could see the first signs of it by then because a lot of the current prospects will be moving into their mid 20s.
Even though there are always some Beslers and Zusis, I tend to think that we can draw mostly correct conclusions before that age. For example, if there's ever an American Xavi or an American Messi, we'll know that we've got something special much sooner.
The class of player you're referring to is mostly apparent. I remember when Totti was around 18, everyone knew he was going to be good, same with De Rossi. Maldini started for Milan when he was 16. On the other hand you have players like Pirlo who nobody would have called him being one of the best deep lying play makers, or Cannavaro one of the best defenders of his era. For one both played as side midfielders. Same thing with Bale, people knew he was a gifted athlete but nobody could have called him being one of the best attacking players in the world. I just remember him being a goofy looking injury prone LB. To get another Bocanegra is more feasible than getting an American Messi. You look at guys like John Terry, I didn't think much of him until around 2003-ish, when he was around 23. Nobody thought John Terry would be one of the best English defenders of his era with Rio, King and Woodgate (who I still believe had higher ceilings without the injuries).
Dennis Flores going to Leon is related to this issue. We've got Alianza offering showcase events for teens, up to 5K teens apparently in multiple cities, for free. No money at all. Also shows that on one hand some arguing we just need time for academies and development of prospects to pan out, which is somewhat true, but also shows how we still aren't recognizing some of the talent we have right under our noses. We're needing to wait years for guys in the academies to see how they pan out in their early to mid 20's, yet completely miss out on a 20 yr old kid playing in CA who's just jumped into the Leon first XI. He didn't need 6+ years in the LAG academy to eventually break in. http://americansoccernow.com/articles/pasadena-native-dennis-flores-debuts-for-club-leon
Realistically, though, how do you know LAG or Chivas didn't want him? In the end this is a two way street. The MLS team has to want to sign the player AND the prospect has to want to sign with the league. For most of the Mex-Americans some would rather go to LIGA MX. This is slowly changing but there will always be a pull for some players. We can continue to call out every prospect that doesn't pop up in MLS academies that shows up in some other league or realize that we lose some and we win some. I don't expect MLS, or specifically Galaxy or Chivas, to get every prospects, let alone every high level prospect, out of socal. Not even teams around the world get every prospect in their area. I do agree that more and more effort has to be put forward to continue to reach these players, though.
It's not about any one prospect for me. This was just another example. It's more a systematic issue and the need to confront the issues in our system. Concentrating on one prospect here or prospect there somewhat misses the point IMO. It's multiple issues here. Liga MX and Euro clubs raiding our youths and us not having a system in place to prevent that or really even get compensated for these kids, as well as what IMO is continued questionable scouting as well as pay to play. I'd say what's more important is confronting this and learning from it, not just zeroing in on one prospect here or there. We keep complaining about pay to play for example. Well, here's a Mexican organization which is confronting that issue head on while we continue complaining. They're not concentrating on one player here or there, they're focused on the big picture and taking advantage of our systematic flaws. That's the issue.
How about we wait till one of these elusive Mexican-American stars actually does something....seems like every day I come to this board and hear about the next great Mexican-American and none have amounted to anything yet. Hell even Ponce had his hay day... I mean lets look at what the Gals have signed, what they have, what they lost (Arriola) and what many claim they missed on (Guido/Esteban Rodriquez).... How in the F are they gonna find room for all these kids at once.... Bottom line is...as long as Mexican teams are sniffing around, they are always gonna get something. Gals/Chivas/SJ could all be on the top of their game...but if one Mexican gets the 10th best striker in California because he can't get into one of the MLS teams...then happens to be a late bloomer, MLS is gonna miss out...its just impossible to corner the market 100%.
I agree with your overall point. That's why the last line in the post you quoted said that USsoccer needs to continue to put resources to try and reach these players. I don't want you to think my post made it seem like our system is all rainbows and lollipops. I have bemoaned MLS for not working with the Alianza people especially when the Alianza people have asked MLS to just show up. It just always seems that when a prospect leaves an MLS area and signs with a foreign team it's the MLS team's fault. My post was just posting the other side of it. Even if we had the perfect setup some players will still want to go to other leagues. The systematic issues are easily identified by an person that follows our youth development. Things like pay to play, coaching education, etc. are just things that are going to take a while to get out of our system. I know a lot of you guys have been following soccer much longer than me but sometimes I think we miss the forest for the trees. This is just something that we can't all have right now. Not even 5 years ago the league, as a whole, had youth development as an afterthought. To expect us to have developed all that infrastructure in this time is disingenuous, imo. Especially with everything else we needed to develop at not just the 1st division level but the lower levels also. This is just an ongoing process.