NCAA rule change proposal that could be HUGE for MLS player development

Great find. This could have huge implications for MLS academy teams.

 

I always trust that someone involved in higher education will eff up pretty much any good idea so I'm lowering my expectations, but it would be a wonderful development.

 

My reading of the article differs from yours. The emphasis over and over again was about recruits who had played beside pros. Not about recruits who had signed pro contracts themselves. As I read the article, this won't help teams sign academy kids, but it will allow academy kids more and better playing opportunities. For example, they should be able to be on the reserve team if/when MLS revives them.

 

I read it both ways. It will help MLS play academy players against pros, but it will also allow MLS to sign and keep kids in the academy without jeopardizing the eligibility of their teammates.

For instance if this rule were in place, Bill Hamid could have played in reserve-type matches before he signed for DCU, but also could have continued with the academy team after he signed.

 

Depending on how the real rule worked, though, it may allow what is essentially an exclusivity arrangement that doesn't happen to pay. . . ie "we train you for free, and in exchange we get the first crack at you as a pro."

 

Hmm. . . for instance, DC United and RBNY each have a player (Julio Arjona and Juan Agudelo, respectively) who look like MLS prospects at this point but yet don't seem ready for MLS play.

 

Anything that the NCAA does to help it's own men's soccer players avoid any eligibility pitfalls makes my day.

 

Great point. I didn't see that.

Yes, quite.

To me, allowing a kid to sign a contract with an academy and then go to college and play sports would be a huge, HUGE mental leap for the NCAA. Personally, I don't see it happening. I hope to be wrong, but I don't see it.

 

Can't hockey trade a year of eligibility for each year in Junior B or something like that? I could see MLS totally revamping the system - and any other academy system doing the same - if that were possible.

But that's getting ahead of ourselves. Just let kids play alongside pros first.

 

Would it be possible under these new rules for MLS teams to sign players to amateur contracts, train with the first team and even get into MLS league games, and still retain their NCAA eligibility? I would think that labor laws could preclude that, unless they could be classified as unpaid interns or something. There has to be some labor lawyers who post on BigSoccer, I hope one of them can sort this out.

If that isn't possible, then MLS teams could just go the PDL route, and field their own fully amateur teams.

 

This rule could be something that MLS teams ultimatly use to create a PDL team. As of right now there is no incentive for a PDL team because players you have under contract can't play (kills everyone else's eligibility) and you can't sign players from the team. However, if you can put pro players on a PDL team and not kill eligibilty you can have a hybrid PDL team that you can actually sign players from (theoretically).

For instance: DC starts a PDL team and lets a few developmental players play as well as any homegrown players. They can then take a few young players they are interested in on their academy teams and put them on the roster as well. They would then fill out their roster with local college talent like other PDL teams do. The PDL side now lets you get game time for reserves and young players and lets you evaluate your top academy players in a higher level environment over the summer. If they do well you can sign the, if not it gets them better prepared for college ball.

 

Wow this sounds like an awsome change for both MLS and PDL. IT will drastacally improve the quality of the PDL while allowing faster development of Academy players and MLS rookies. I would like to add that this could also be a great bridge for our U-17 national team program since many of those guys are still years away from starting for an MLS team, and must chose between college or an MLS bench (see Isreal Seasay or Nick Besagno amongst others)

 

AGREED!!! i beleive Players should have as many opportunities as possible. I cant think of any league in the world that can do this, not even the english leagues. There is nothing wrong with Playing and developing in college, alot of good players came out of college. Like I said Im for as much avenues as possible. if a Kid goes to college and that MLS club has a decent investment in him I think its a win - win.. Player gets alil more playing time and a education, and MLS can still have thier lil eurostyle academies too..

 

No, this is not possible. MLSPU would strike over this issue, having first team jobs replaced with unpaid labor. There's not much that would trigger a strike by this young, weak union, but that would do it.

 

Agreed, and they would be striking rightly so.

 

Yeah, I hadn't thought of that. The union would certainly have a point, if it were simply imposed on them.

Suppose, however, that the league negotiated, say, four roster spots on each team for college players into the next CBA (giving up something in return, obviously). Would the intern idea be able to fly, from a legal standpoint?

 

The issue right now for the MLS/PDL thing isn't the presence of pro players on PDL rosters, that's allowed now (up to a certain limit, four, I think). The issue is the ownership of the club. NCAA rules now state that any player who plays for a club owned by a professional club, whether or not any of the players are paid, forfeits their amateur standing, and therefore their NCAA eligibility.

If we assume that that rule is going away, MLS could do exactly what PhillyMLS and Sandon describe, even without any other rules changing. If MLS were to allow clubs to sign players to amateur contracts, and retain their rights for more than the one year for unsigned draftees, it would be an absolute turning point in the development of pro soccer players, and the sport as a whole, in the US.

 

Reserve league matches, however, are a different story. I could see the Union allowing use of amateurs for them in exchange for, essentially, bringing back the reserve league and giving out some extra roster spots (though I don't think it's going back up to 28 anytime soon).

My understanding was that yes, that is one factor, but the other is that while you could play against pros in meaningful competition, you couldn't (I thought) play with them (in any game for which the pros were paid). But NCAA rules confuse me.

Regardless, yes, one of the most intriguing angles is how USL would respond to this challenge/opportunity (because it's a bit of both).

 

I'll admit I know nothing about NCAA eligibility requirements but I'm not sure if what you are saying is true based on a couple things. One, how do youth acadamies play into the ownership question? All the MLS youth squads are owned by professional club and do not effect eligibility. Zakuani played for the Arsenal youth squad and he lost no eligibility either. I understand that this may not be what you were referring to but I would think the differences between a MLS team running a youth academy team and running a PDL team are fairly small (from a strictly ownership point of view).

Second, players in that article actually played for pro teams in Europe and retained their amateur status. The problem was when players on their team actually made money from playing that the NCAA would step in. I don't know enough about the sports at hand (volleyball?!?) to know how many of these players played for pro clubs and exactly how pro they were.

As far as I understand the PDL system is that teams can either have all college players or paid players. Any college player that was on a PDL-Pro team would lose his eligibility since he was playing alongside a professional player. There is very little info I could find on the system though that really nails down the exact rules though.

 

This is exactly the case; the team I work for, Hollywood United, was part of the league-approved PDL-Pro system, whereby we paid all our players, and got 3-4 players from the fringes of LA Galaxy on loan, but because of the NCAA rules we were not allowed to have any active NCAA athletes on our roster; our players were all ex-MLSers, ex-USL1ers, and youngsters from local community colleges and non-NCAA affiliated colleges in the area.

If this rule goes away, then it will have a positive effect all tolled, because that way you can have MLS academy amateurs retaining their collegiate eligibility through the new system playing alongside the existing PDL teams. If Galaxy started a PDL team, for example, they could use their new academy members (who are legally amateurs) playing under the new system with other players from local NCAA colleges (who are also legally amateurs).

The only thing you couldn't do is loan fringe first team MLS players to your PDL side, because then that would preclude you having non-academy NCAA players.

All in all, though, I think it's a superb idea and a definite step in the right direction.