This. Well, this is not what made us have a poor, lost generation, but for sure this mega theme of the most dominant sport on the planet somehow still here in our nation in 2019 is not covered in more depth and more insight leads to an odd culture here. What I have witnessed as an old coach is that while I have tons of teenage boys that play the sport, they do not live the sport. I talk to my gridiron boys I coach in the Fall and they all watched last nights Monday Night Football game and then on the weekends take in as much of their favorite sport they can. They talk about the players, the upcoming games and so on. They live their sport. Same with my basketball players and baseball players. Helps that those are the traditional sports in our culture no doubt but with so much ease of access to pro soccer nowadays, the American teen is still just not as engaged to their soccer. Many don't watch on TV, even Champions League action, certainly few follow MLS or the young players that are perhaps coming outta their very own city. The players they should be idolizing as younger boys and growing up with a solid passion to be professionals soon. Simply put, all too often for soccer boys in our nation, why is it that me the coach, why do I care more about the game than my own teenage players do?!? It could be argued that just the lack of intimacy with the sport dents our boys at an early age. Good as individuals but dented when asked to gel as one being, one cohesive unit. I mean these are the very best of the millions that played and it appears nowadays, our American men had a generation that did not have it mentally. Also, I think of Scotland or Argentina and what the teenage boys a man coaches over there, how much of a conversation he can have with his players. The players do live and die their soccer. I believe that this goes hand to hand with why, all these years on from USA1994, our boys are good players but when asked to really come together, each guy looks at the sport in their own way. Like the American teenage boy that is indeed good at his soccer, he just doesn't get outta his own house enough and it shows! HA! Go get in the random pick up games and learn how to adapt to playing with a field full of Sallies and Chapines with that fuc{ed up plastic Mikasa ball they love to play with! Do this a million times and then when called into a National Team camp, quickly adapting to your new teammates from all corners of the U.S. is now a snap! "Lacrosse is the fastest growing sport!!!"---the son
I recall, as late as 2004 or 2005, hearing about a MLS rookie who literally saw a professional match for the first time in his life when he was playing in it. At least we haven't seen that recently. Not saying things are great with the current generation, it's just an indication of just how disconnected the soccer culture was as recently as the early 2000s.
It's amazing that we were able to compete in the 90s and aughts, quite frankly. that's the long-term potential for us.
If you look at player stories, they can be illuminating, What they tend to show is that the traditional development path in the US was never great and was soon made obsolete by a new professional youth model made famous in Germany if not invented there. If you haven't listened to the Mike Grella interview on BS the Podcast, do yourself a favor and do it. Hilarious. But Grella is a good example of the problem and is in the cohort just ahead of the "Lost Generation". It is a little twist that probably really did the USA in. Grella was a great player at 18 in the domestic scene. He wanted badly to be a pro player. He thought the path to that was to play NCAA soccer. He quickly learned that NCAA soccer is a joke; but his parents made him get his degree. So, 18-22 were basically wasted. He does do what none of the Lost Generation really did and go to England. But, he can't break into Leeds and falls out of favor. He loans around, but the lower leagues in England at this time are not conducive to development at all (have to hear his stories). He does make better money not playing in England than he would have playing in MLS. Most of the players in his and the previous generation, whether starting in MLS or not, go to Europe to get paid. If he had gone to England (or Germany) at 18, maybe he is a better player. He still turned out, before a knee problem, to be a pretty good MLS player. But that path of skipping college and turning pro at 16-18 really wasn't open or even the possibility wasn't known (famous players had done it before, but it was never common or normal). The double whammy that probably really affected the true Lost Generation is this: 1. MLS got successful enough to pay enough to keep guys from going to Europe to get paid. 2. England tightened their WP requirements and overnight, the amount of Americans in the EPL declines drastically. The motivation to go was sapped and the ability to go easily was cut off. Guys like Besler, Trapp, Zardes, Opara, Hamid, McCarty, never had to go to Europe to get paid. Which is probably good for them as the fact they played 3-4 years of college put them well behind the curve of the players in their generation coming up in Europe.
I'm not a buyer of the theory that if this generation headed to "Europe" en masse at 18 or post-college that it would have made a difference. Water finds its level and for reasons discussed here, it's a pretty low level.
Post college is too late. In fact 18 is too late for the first exposure to a real developmental system. We could develop players if we actually wanted to but all the top people at US soccer really want is to assure that they continue to receive their paycheck. The only other place where people are so consistently rewarded for failure is governmental politics and baseball bating where a failure rate of 70% is said to be great. We are currently only developing players for the other teams in CONCACAF. Our high school and college system makes sure that most potential top soccer players fail to develop with any reasonable speed for about seven years during their most important development period.
It is hard to prove one way or another. But I think players that were very good in MLS and very good for the USMNT, probably had higher ceilings than that. A guy like Besler, who had serious interest and was paid well by the league office to forgo moving, could have been playing for a top club. He was basically one of few good players down the stretch in the Hex. The few players that did go, like Bobby Wood, seemed to exceed expectations. Even those that went, but came back, still seem to perform better for the USMNT than players that never left (Lletget, Altidore versus Roldan, Zardes, Trapp). 1 more point in the Hex, and there would be little talk of a Lost Generation. Maybe we get that 1 point if McCarty had spent time playing for Freiburg and was on the field instead of Nagbe. Or if Nagbe had been playing at Celtic.
What options do we have? Not all of our players have the requisite euro passport to go before 18. It would be nice if ussf worked with fifa to get a waiver between G7 countries to go at 16 but I’m not holding my breath.
I think it has changed recently. But I agree with your basic point. We had a system that turned out raw products at 22. Europe had moved to turning out equivalent players at 16. The rules of NCAA soccer were also detrimental. The unlimited subs favors tactics that are high intensity and low technicality. This was actually good for players going to England in the 90s. But the game moved on at the highest levels.
This is actually a very insightful point. Our "Americanizing" of the sport gave rise to unforeseen pitfalls that our boys fell into in their way of approaching the sport as is. Our soccer culture breeds kick and run robots, at best deers that can for sure run for days but no concept of how to manage out a 90 minute match. I agree! I mean Gen X men rodeo the fuc{ up and formed a team that literally made so many Mexicans cry!!! THIS TEAM=
Or we could do something really innovative and fix our sports system in general and divorce sports from education. A high school and college education should have zero connection to any major sport. We then could expand our club/youth system where we actually develop players and only educate those that will really benefit from that education and that actually want to learn. But the "idea" of college being a benefit to most athletes is so ingrained into our culture that we will never change and we are doomed to miss out on key development time. I am not saying that education or sport are bad rather I am saying that forcing education and sport to be combined is bad and detrimental to both education and sport.
These are good points. It's going to be very difficult to separate education and sport in our country though. There is simply too much money involved currently, and that makes changing the system difficult. Education shouldn't be scoffed at either. One of the drawbacks that is often outlined in the ways that youth football is done in England is that there is little emphasis on non-football education. Kids are cast aside at 18 when it's clear that pro football is not for them, and then don't have an education to fall back on. One of the things that YSC Academy (Philadelphia Union) does very well is that in addition to giving a very competitive soccer development environment, they also put their players through a rigorous academic environment. For those players (i.e. most) that don't go on to a professional soccer career, they are able to parlay their Prep School education into a higher education. Many will go on to play soccer at the NCAA level as well. There is no shame in that. As fans we tend to focus on the playing side of things. It's equally as important that the development academies, be they MLS or USDA, also have a focus on developing boys and girls into becoming fine young men and women as well. The average career for a pro athlete is what? 2-3 years? Soccer in the US is ahead of this curve in terms of player development at the professional level. Granted that's not saying a whole lot. Obviously teams like RBNY and FCD are way ahead of every one else, as they've been committed to it for 10 years now. Philadelphia is starting to bear fruit in their academy, as is RSL and Colorado (surprisingly). It's going to be interesting to see how the academies of the Galaxy under Te Klosse, and LAFC progress in the coming years. If those two teams get their setups correct, there's going to be a lot of talent being injected into not MLS, but also the US setup as well. Of course then there is the rest of the league, which to be fair most of those teams haven't even existed for 10 years. Those teams have a lot of catching up to do. Would also be nice to see MLS academies have a girls side as well. The USWNT is going to need more technical players in the coming years. With the new emphasis on Women's soccer in European countries, the US may fall behind quicker than most care to admit. I can see the NBA starting to go the development route with academies. Adam Silver have talking about this since he became commissioner. It just makes sense. The Big Market teams would not have to worry about having talent any longer. Philly, New York, Boston, LA, Washington DC, Chicago, Detroit....if they each had an academy........ Difficult to see the NFL and MLB moving to an academy centered development path. MLR will be interesting to watch as it grows over the next several years. They are probably a good decade away from being established enough to begin to open up their own academies.
I don’t know where you live, but here in the south, I see and hear more about Atlanta United than the Falcons. In Greenville, a League One team, in the parking lot of my workplace, which is just a small outpatient office, there are at least six different cars that have Greenville Triumph stickers on their cars. Part of the Triumph’s problems has been though poor facilities and overpricing, otherwise they would sell out every game. Point being, the sport is not just growing but exploding, at least here where I live.
we're not talking about small circles of friends and acquaintances talking amongst themselves. We're talking about the mainstream media. Newspapers, national TV networks, sports talk radio. I see Philadelphia Union stickers on cars all over the Philly area, yet we hear very little talk of them on the major sports stations (NBC Sports Philly, WIP, TheFAN, etc.). You see and hear more because you are a fan and seek out information. For the casual fan, and non-fan though........
Fixed your post. DA players haven't been allowed to play high school soccer since 2012. Not sure that the ban was necessary but it sure demonstrates that the Fed was serious about bypassing college and high school. For the most part, they have been successful. The number of college players in our U-20s has dropped to virtually zero.
Where I live, in SE Tennessee soccer is one sport I NEVER have to worry about hearing or seeing spoilers. The media does not cover soccer at all except for one or two paragraphs about one of the local HS or college teams once or twice a week and news set to be targeted to my area gets very limited soccer reports even if soccer is checked in the preferences. While there are areas that are hot beds of soccer news, support and activity there are still large swaths of the country where "soccer" is a word in a foreign language that few people speak or understand.
College and HS still ruins players and hurts development. Kids will play HS because of peer pressure and therefore not enter any development system that forbids it. The only way to get the best players to always not play HS soccer is to eliminate the HS/college programs or find a way to work with them and that requires two sided cooperation and both sides are much too political for that to happen. Forbidding players from playing HS simply has the effect of driving players out of soccer altogether. What the ban actually shows is that the fed cares nothing for the players by making them choose between soccer and their friends in HS. That is a choice NO kid should ever have to make.
Maybe so... In Greenville, if honestly I had to rate what I see most as far as sports gear #1 Clemson #2 UGA/Carolina #3 Panthers/AtlUtd/Drive/Swamp Rabbits/Triumph /Furman Honestly, the Drive (baseball) is a much more fun in stadium experience, even from someone who doesn’t really baseball that much. The stadium is in the heart of downtown, the facility is nice, and the tickets/concessions are dirt cheap. In comparison, the Triumph is a little harder to get to unless someone lives in that neighborhood, the tickets are stupid for that level and at least double the cost of Drive games, but I do see more Triumph apparel and more people talking about the Triumph than anywhere else... and I kind of live in a veteran bubble, which is typically much more your Apple pie America. Nonetheless, I hear more people talk about the Triumph than the Drive. It could be bias. I’ll concede that. But at least in the opinion of this BigSoccer poster, soccer is quite popular around town and in the media.
If I could be Dictator-in-Chief for the USSF... What I would have done with Bradenton is turn into a travel abroad academy that played all the different youth teams across Europe, and help those aspiring YA adapt to the European culture and language sooner. Therefore, they would be more primed and ready to sign a contract when they turn 18. In a way, a sort of adaptation of the USA-2010 idea, but instead USA-YA. I would have recruited the guys who thought Europe was their preferred destination over MLS. Maybe half the season would have been played in Europe, and the other half would have been played against DA in America. But for the kids who were good enough and whose parents would be okay with (which to be honest, I’d be the parent who probably wouldn’t be okay with it), they would have the opportunity to go abroad and be in America during the teenage years. For some, that’s not a bad sale.
On this point, eventually i’d like to see the powers-that-be implement a u21/u23 league that is a much more “premier” version of the PDL/NPSL. As players graduate from the academies, they may not be ready for the full rigors of the USL (even as that league hopefully improves) at 16, 17, 18 years old... even at 19-20, they might not be mentally mature enough yet to cope with a fully professional development. I mean, seriously, these are still kids. But, a league that focused on college education, that bypasses the restrictions of the NCAA, would be ideal.
They are already doing this....it's called USL League One. MLS teams are putting their "reserve" teams there now. FC Dallas' team North Texas is chock full of their academy kids. Some MLS teams have their "Two" sides in the USL Championship. RBNY, Bethlehem Steel (Philly Union), Tacoma (Seattle Sounders), etc. these teams are full of academy players. For as much schtick USMNT fans (at least many in this corner of the internet) like to heap onto MLS, MLS is largely driving the youth and professional player development pathway in the US. The USSF is NOT driving that bus, nor are they investing in it close to the levels that MLS teams are. Granted, MLS teams have a long way to go still as there are still too many teams who view their academies as an afterthought (hello Chicago Fire and Portland Timbers).
Same thing that has happened on these boards thanks to moderators: personality and character have been manicured out of the American ethic. Weak ass milk toast cliche spouting Nancy boys seem to be everywhere. Sadly the : you can believe whatever you want as long as it is what I believe permeates our world. Soccer is brutal conflict. Drama is conflict. Innovation is conflict. And it is out of favor. Also the arrogance associated with many major American endeavors. We used to be crap and we fought to disprove it then the marketing department at ML$ said we were great so now we are great. Until everyone stands up and says: we are terrible, how can we learn? How can we change? We will continue to be the Bud Light of international soccer.
We’re still a ways away from this, but following the progression of the depth of an MLS squad, which in my opinion, has drastically improved in the past 10-20 years. I could see USL Championship/League One be more of a place for players on the fringe to make their case for the senior team. And there will be a need for the guys who aren’t ready yet for a more pro level in their adolescent years. For instance, let’s say a MLS u18 team has 4 players ready for the reserves. The natural progression would still be for those guys who aren’t ready to make that cut under 18, and they would need that bridge to the next level. Taking Atl Utd for example, I’d like to see their reserve squad mostly be made up of: GK Kann RB Ambrose CB Campbell CB Pogba LB Bello M6 Adams M8 Kratz 10 Hyndman RW Carleton FW Vasquez LW Pereira Bench: Moore, Metcalf, Decas, Bashti, Shea, Luiz Fernando, Conway ...Ideally, we’d learn to schedule USL games on different dates than MLS games so players can participate in both USL and MLS U21 team GK ?? RB Clagette/Matthews/Tubbs CB Reilly CB Vint LB Benitez MF Castro MF Kissiedou 10 Luiz Fernando RW Okonkwo FW Conway LW Kanakima
I hear what you’re saying, but hopefully at least, the Reserve team will be used to give the bench players more matches. Best model I can use is Atlanta United because of how closely I follow them... They’ve been terrible this year. But part of that problem could have been fixed had Kann, Carleton, Bello (injury), Kratz (injury), Ambrose, Adams, Vasquez, Pogba, Pereira, and Ambrose has more PT with the second team. Point being, there seems to be a gap where these guys on the fringe of MLS teams aren’t getting PT for their USL team. And, ideally, MLS continues to improve, further making it difficult for players to make it into the league, and creating more need for guys who were MLS regulars in 2000-2007 will need a place to play. And kids who are just coming up from the academies or new players who show promise but never been in an academy, they will also need a place to prove their worth.