What happened to the 26-28 age range?

[Elninho]

In the Eddie Pope retirement thread, the observation was made that the prime soccer years were strangely underrepresented on the national team. I then looked and found that they were underrepresented not only on the national team, but also in MLS. I think this is worth giving its own thread, so as to allow the other thread to give Pope his due respect rather than discuss the USMNT's generation issue.

Relevant ages (on MLS rosters as of July 1, and ages as of same date):

...
24 - 32 players
25 - 19 players
26 - 6 players
27 - 9 players
28 - 10 players
29 - 18 players
30 - 11 players
...

At this point I think it's worthwhile to look into why this might have happened.

Here's one thought:
These are interesting numbers. One possible explanation is that the ten-year gap between the demise of the NASL and World Cup 1994 created a bit of a "lost generation" in terms of young players lacking a league or role models toward which they could direct their aspirations. Even at the national team level there is a gap between guys of the Pope-Reyna generation and the Donovan-Beasley generation. There were some exceptions such as JOB and Mathis but they really didn't have much behind them. This lack of depth was reflected in the mediocre performance of the youth teams for that group. And the problem was worsened by the fact that JOB and Mathis had such short periods where they were effective international level players. Injuries really hit that group hard. Olsen and Wolff could also have been much more important players if not for injuries.


I had another thought on this... consider what each of the following age ranges would have faced when first entering MLS, mostly aged 20-23.

Ages 29+ would have entered MLS in 2000 or earlier, when the league was in its infancy. The level of play was not all that high, so up until 1998 or 1999 many talented rookies, including just about anyone with youth NT experience, would have immediately gotten playing time.

Ages 26-28 would have mostly entered MLS in years 1998-2002. By 1998-99 MLS had matured to a point where we were beginning to see many players with youth NT experience entering the league, being relegated to the bench, and not developing. It seems like Pro-40 players from 1998-2000 saw especially little playing time, as the established MLS players now had several years of experience in the league, and the difference in talent/potential was insufficient to unseat the veterans.

The 23-to-25-year-olds at the national team level are the Bradenton generation, the first to get year-round intensive training from a relatively young age. Upon reaching the point that they could go pro, between 2000 and 2004, they were already refined enough to break into MLS lineups as rookies, and were thus able to continue to develop without interruption. These players also helped squeeze the previous generation out of MLS and into the USL: while the veterans who were in the league from the beginning were still mostly able to hold their places because of their extensive pro experience, the players who had sat on the bench as rookies and were just beginning to become good enough to start suddenly found their places being grabbed by younger, better players.

And while the Bradenton players are relatively few in number, there is no gap afterward because ages 24-and-under can also be called the MLS Reserve League generation, where being good enough to start for the first team as a rookie is no longer as critical as it once was. We've already seen a number of players start off in the reserves in 2005 and become solid first-team players.

I think it's worth examining the numbers to see if this theory actually bears out - any thoughts on how to go about that?

[ursula]

Your question is a good one but I'm not gonna answer your question yet because I want to look again at the best players in that 26-29 lost generation. After-all, if any players of the 26-29 group could have broken the pattern of what seems to have happened to the rest of the age group in MLS it would have been the best and the brightest.

The following four players should have been the backbone of the Germany team:

- Ben Olsen, ROY in 98 should have been the starting right winger not only in Germany but also in Korea but had his ankle destroyed.

- John O'Brien, same age, was thought good enough by SS to accompany the France team. Who knows what his career would have been like if he didn't get his injuries.

- Josh Wolff, runner-up to Olsen for ROY. Made it to Korea and Germany but injuries starting after his great MNT debut vs Mexico and CR have blunted his career.

- Clint Mathis. Imagine if he had his head wasn't perpetually injured.

An interesting thing about the three MLS players here is that they all broke in with and started for the three best and deepest teams in 98, United, Fire, and Galaxy. JOB was doing likewise with Ajax.

Take these four players and play the what if game and the whole makeup of both the Korea and Germany teams changes. Especially in Germany we would not have relied on LD, DMB, McBride, or Reyna like we did. The leadership would have unquestionably come from the four players above. Those other players in turn would have been looking for playing time around the edges. With Mathis and Wolff as the starting forwards, Donovan would be getting sub minutes. Same at a-mid where JOB would have held the fort. D-mid should have unquestionably been Mastroeni's (another member of the 26-29 group) with Reyna on the sidelines. (Remember Pablo has had a long history of injuries too.) Throw in Olsen at right wing and I've just detailed where the creative force of the Germany team should have been. Instead we relied on players that were too old and too young.

In that light it was unsurprising that we did as poorly as we did. Not only did the rank-and-file 26-29 year olds have it harder breaking into the professional ranks as Elninho has outlined but the best players from that generation all got repeatedly hit over the head with the injury stick so much that their core abilities were affected. (Compare to McHead who didn't have to change his game at all even with his injuries.)

It's almost like this generation was cursed.


--------

As an addendum it's interesting to look at maybe the next best group of players in the 26-29 group, most of whom are defenders. The interesting thing about them is that they developed relatively slowly compared to the first four players above:

- Cherundolo and Bocanegra were the quickest to develop and were right on the edge of the Korea team. Cher made it of course due to injuries while Boca might have made it if he hadn't gotten hurt.

-Conrad and Gibbs weren't on anyone's Korea radar.

- Then there's Nick Garcia who IMO was neglected by Arena maybe more than any other good US player.


Bocanegra's and Conrad's and Cherundolo's decent performances in Germany tell me in retrospect that that a decent WC team needs to have players of this age group being the core of the team if the team hopes to advance. The players of this age have 1) experience and 2) all their physical tools to compete on the world stage. The same can't be said for younger or older players. I'm not saying that a team's "star" player can't be younger or older. I am saying that the team is defined by the 26-29 year olds. This was not done in Germany for the US and we paid the price.

- The one non-defender who I could put in this group is barely too old for this generation, Chris Klein. He too has been injured too many times.

-----

A final way to see how this generation didn't pan out is to look at the Sydney Olympic team which had many of these guys on it. (And I haven't even mentioned the strange case of John Thorrington who could well have started over DMB if he hadn't gotten hurt.) They promised so much in Australia and it all crashed down on them.

[JohnR]

With Mathis and Wolff as the starting forwards, Donovan would be getting sub minutes.

Josh Wolff has 50% of Donovan's talent. Had Wolff never been injured, he wouldn't possibly have become as good as Landon is today.

Now, if you're arguing that Wolff would have won the starting job and Landon been on the bench because Landon's head was known to be inferior, hmmm I'm not sure about that. Heading into Germany '06, most of us and certainly Bruce Arena believed in Landon's ability to notch it up for the big matches.

D-mid should have unquestionably been Mastroeni's (another member of the 26-29 group) with Reyna on the sidelines.

Maybe, but I wonder if Arena would have agreed.

Instead we relied on players that were too old and too young.

True 'nuff.

Bocanegra's and Conrad's and Cherundolo's decent performances in Germany tell me in retrospect that that a decent WC team needs to have players of this age group being the core of the team if the team hopes to advance.

Agreed.

A final way to see how this generation didn't pan out is to look at the Sydney Olympic team which had many of these guys on it. (And I haven't even mentioned the strange case of John Thorrington who could well have started over DMB if he hadn't gotten hurt.) They promised so much in Australia and it all crashed down on them.

Good point.

Excellent post, overall.

[Lloyd Heilbrunn]

What are the foreigner numbers in MLS in this age group?? In other words, are they not developing because they are sitting the bench behind foreigners,or even getting cut in favor of same???

[Ghost]

I actually brought up the age gap in the prophet of doom thread but no one picked up on it. I'm glad this thread has been started, because it gives us at least a bit of comfort in our performance which was not as bad as people say but still left plenty of room for imporvement. We all draw the borders of the age gap differently, but the diagnosis is about the same.

The player who most exemplifies this gap, to me, was Convey. He made some sweet moves here and there, but the final ball, the final play was lacking. In four years, hopefully that will change. (Or he might even be surpassed.) But had we not had this gap, then he really shouldn't have been on the field. Nothing against his play, but we should have had a left wings in his mid to late 20s.

[DoctorD]

So the real problem was the poor quality of medical care for our soccer players 10 years ago? :)

[Maximum Optimal]

One of the things that this thread emphasizes is how thin the upper tail of the talent distribution is. I think this is generally true of all countries (even Brazil). We are talking about the creme de la creme here. But I think it might be a bit more true for the US because of our development system/professional opportunities. With MLS and a slowly but surely improving youth system, it is changing a bit.

But I think every pre-Bradenton generation had maybe two players per year that we just simply could not afford to lose. Suppose Reyna and Pope (who were hardly the picture of durability themselves) had suffered the kind of injury/fitness problems that JOB, Mathis and Olsen did. Then we would be talking about the gap in that age group. The harsh truth is that if you lose two or three players who would have been the best in their age group there will be a significant impact on the team's performance. Even post-Bradenton this will continue to be the case, though hopefully with less severity as we develop more depth. To take a worst case scenario, suppose Adu and Altidore have the same kind of injury problems that JOB and Olsen had. Then you can kiss goodbye to any sort of miracle run in 2014.

[Casper]

If we accept ursula's theory from above, about the core of a World Cup squad needing to be 26-29 ...

In 2010, the US 26-29 pool will include:

Onyewu
Convey
Beasley
Dempsey
Donovan
Johnson

Basically, the core of guys who are ALREADY our best players, plus:

Borchers
Buddle
Carroll
Casey
Davis
Eskandarian
Magee
Mapp
Quaranta
Rolfe
Simms
Whitbread

[Tigerpunk]

Borchers
Buddle
Carroll
Casey
Davis
Eskandarian
Magee
Mapp
Quaranta
Rolfe
Simms
Whitbread

There's an almost 50% chance that a total of ZERO of those will be on our 2010 squad.

[sidefootsitter]

I actually brought up the age gap in the prophet of doom thread but no one picked up on it... Uhm ...

as to the "lost generation", I was going to propose a different theory.

Folks who let the US down in 2,006 were the young stars or almost stars of the 2,002 team - Donovan, Beasley, JOB, even Wolff to some extent. Those were the players who got the first taste of the international competition in Japan/Korea and who were expected to become leaders and the best players for the 2,006 squad.

And there you saw an almost universal failure.

As Ghost must remember from the "Doom" thread, I pointed out that the number of the US players in their "prime" getting regular playing time at decent Euro clubs/Euro leagues went down from five (Friedel, Sanneh, Hejduk, O'Brien, Reyna) to one (Cherundolo).

That's the core "battle group" of any team. The vets have gotten four years older, the young'un's haven't made it to the top level yet, instead being employed in the various Euro minors.

However, I don't think it's an anomaly. This is why most nations go through their ups and downs, including the perennial powers of France, Italy, Argentina, Germany and Brazil. There are too many variables to deliver consistent talent on a uniform basis.

[Ghost]

As Ghost must remember from the "Doom" thread, I pointed out that the number of the US players in their "prime" getting regular playing time at decent Euro clubs/Euro leagues went down from five (Friedel, Sanneh, Hejduk, O'Brien, Reyna) to one (Cherundolo).


True, Sidefoot was over there, too. did he start it or did I? Heck, I don't remember. But most people there just kept ripping on Bruce.

[clashcityrocker]

Without having looked at any supporting information, I would propose the following potential explantion, which has nothing to do with talent, skill, or potential.

Players in this 26-28 range are likely to have somewhere between 4-8 years in the league, which puts them at a point past their first contract and extension. It is at this point where their perceived utility starts to compare unfavorably to the salary they would demand as a veteran. If they haven't established themselves as a top-tier player deserving of a top level contract extension, they are likely to be dropped in favor of a cheaper, younger player, or move to Europe, where they can get a better offer from a Norweigan or Bundes2 side. Ian Russell is an example of the former, and Danny Califf an example of the latter.

[mtr8967]

I knew the USMNT is thin at that age, but I assumed it was just bad luck. But doesn't the fact there's a drop in MLS as well as the national team suggest it's more than that? If it was just our four best prospects getting hurt, yea, the MNT will suffer but those guys were likely to be in Europe during their primes, so MLS should be unaffected.

I have to admit I can't think of a strong enough reason to create this.

[Maximum Optimal]

I knew the USMNT is thin at that age, but I assumed it was just bad luck. But doesn't the fact there's a drop in MLS as well as the national team suggest it's more than that? If it was just our four best prospects getting hurt, yea, the MNT will suffer but those guys were likely to be in Europe during their primes, so MLS should be unaffected.

I have to admit I can't think of a strong enough reason to create this.

You're right that we are talking about two different gaps. The national team gap among players age 28-29, which is mainly due to injuries to JOB, Olsen, Mathis and Wolff. And the MLS gap which covers a slightly younger age group and obviously is due to something else.

[Shackleton]

At least as far as the National Team goes, the drought extends beyond the 26-28 age range. The USMNT was woefully underrepresented by players born between 1975-1981.

The USMNT had only 7 of 18 players in the 25-31 age bracket (38.9%). But, according to Voros's numbers from another thread, this age group makes up 60.5% of total WC players.

The dearth of players for the US is even more apparent when you consider that two (Conrad and Olsen) played only because of injury and suspension to starters, and two more (O'Brien and Wolff) were only substitues in one game.

If only starters are looked at, then this age group (25-31) accounts for only 4 of 14 players (28.6%).

Here is the other thread in the Statistics forum that discusses this issue.

http://www.bigsoccer.com/forum/showthread.php?t=385242

[Shackleton]

As far as explanations for this "lost generation," here are my quick, unstudied thoughts from the other thread.

Players born in 1975 (the beginning of the dead period) would have turned 19 in MLS's first season, 1994. So, at least on the surface, the beginning of MLS seems to coincide with the beginning of professional careers for players of the dead period. Is there possibly some reason that MLS set back the development of top level talent? Perhaps players went into MLS instead of Europe as in prior years and failed to develop as well as the previous generation? Not sure this theory really fits the facts.

As to the end of the dead period, there seems like a fairly reasonable answer. Bradenton opened in 1999. This corresponds exactly with the end of the dead period, as players born in 1982 were the first to go through the system. Of the players born in 1982 or later on the USMNT, Beasley, Donovan, Convey, Onyewu, and Johnson all went to Bradenton, while only Dempsey did not. Thus, although Bradenton has been much maligned, it seems to me that it has been quite beneficial in developing USMNT players.

Or, maybe it is just random luck. Or injuries. This is an interesting issue that deserves more analysis.

Whatever the reason, I do think it partially accounts for our poor showing in Germany and provides hope that we will improve for 2010.

[metx]

There's an almost 50% chance that a total of ZERO of those will be on our 2010 squad.


¿50%? ....I say 80% ....

[Elninho]

But there are plenty of 29-to-31-year-old players in MLS. What's interesting about the missing 26-to-28-year-olds is that even the moves to Europe don't make up the difference - if you were to selectively pull every single first- and second-division YA in that age group back from Europe, there would still be a gap in the raw number of players in MLS. And then there are still both older and younger YAs.

Arguably we had more depth in 2002 than we do at this moment, because our depth is not yet ready for the senior NT; and I claim that the effect of MLS and Bradenton on the rank and file has something to do with our lack of depth right now. Every national team seems to have a number of players who started off their careers as ordinary players, and stepped it up several years down the road to break into the national team between ages 24 and 28. In the case of our 26-28 age range, as soon as they were good enough to take minutes from the veterans above them, Bradenton squeezed them out of the league.

I suppose what I'm saying is that, just as an artifact of the timing of Bradenton's first generation, there was going to be a lost generation. Had Bradenton started two or three years earlier, we probably would not have had that issue. At the same time, it turns out that the MLS reserve league arrived at the right time: the oldest players entering MLS in 2005 are about the same age as the first Bradenton generation. Had the reserve league been delayed two years, we most likely would have seen a lot of MLS depth lost in the same age group as the Bradenton players.

[ursula]

I suppose what I'm saying is that, just as an artifact of the timing of Bradenton's first generation, there was going to be a lost generation. Had Bradenton started two or three years earlier, we probably would not have had that issue. At the same time, it turns out that the MLS reserve league arrived at the right time: the oldest players entering MLS in 2005 are about the same age as the first Bradenton generation. Had the reserve league been delayed two years, we most likely would have seen a lot of MLS depth lost in the same age group as the Bradenton players.


Well said. It's remarkable what the effect on the MLS/professional/Nats talent base is by having MLS then Bradenton and then reserve league. Now just wait till the Youth academies get up and running for a couple for years. We'll see a talent bump again.

[Elninho]

Well, an explanation at least for how the Bradenton players pushed the generation above them out of MLS yet did not force out their own generation.