You'd get rid of the political selections. But you'd still tilt very heavily toward speed, power, early physical maturity, and aggression. Actually, even more heavily toward those items. It's quite amusing to hear them comment, "X used to be good but now he sucks," or "Y is awesome." Inevitably, X hasn't hit puberty yet and Y is fully grown.
[John, in case you missed this. Gives a sense of progress, if slow and uneven. Might be worth its own thread.] http://www.socceramerica.com/index.cfm?fuseaction=Articles.showArticleHomePage&art_aid=3394 .... Walker also believes that the trend of Coast Soccer League clubs to field a significant amount of Latinos, a trend he traces to within the last decade, will eventually lead to an increase of Latino players at the national level. "It's hit the regional level but not the national level yet," Walker says. "At the national level they're still interested in selecting the big, strong athletic kid, not taking a smaller, technical, Latino kid. "As the national program kind of wavers and doesn't really continue to progress on the international scene, more and more you're going to see these players getting chances. "Or they hire coaches who have more of a mindset like that ... or it just evolves. The influx of creative players with flair will change the whole dynamic of how the national team plays."
Uh-huh. They took 5 Latino kids who play in our state onto the 92/93 Regional pool. These are all kids who hadn't even entered 8th grade. Three were fully grown, and a fourth was almost fully grown, and was the second biggest player on the '93 State team. Small Latino flair player ... sure. Yeah.
haha I have noticed the same thing. All seem to be GIGANTIC and fast. Not the type of players that are small, creative, smooth, and good in the ball.
Don't get me wrong, some of these guys are very good on the ball. But that's not what got most of them selected.
I havent read a single thing i n this thread. but i just want to state my opinion, which is that ODP is a waste of money, it's not the true all state team they make it out to be.. i know plenty kids that coul;d be on but just dont have the money to pay for everything. its a rip
I agree...our state team is very weak this year. We are lucky to have a good coach; one from son's club. Last year was not the case. However, ODP is about the individual, not development as the name implies. My son is only in it to get to regional camp as he was a selection last year and I guess will be this year as well....hope he makes it this time! I hate to have to shell out the money and take him to the weekly practices...and play the tournament....that should be painful to see this year. If you don't do it, how do you get recognized by colleges? Practically every American on the roster has "ODP" next to his name.
I think if you are a good player with a good club, you will get the exposure. That appears to be truer as each year passes. At one time players were very dependent on ODP for not only exposure, but for advanced training too. That may still be the case in some parts of the country, but there are many parts of the country where the clubs are providing better coaching and training than ODP can provide. One of the benefits of playing for these clubs is the connections they have and the ability to promote their players. A lot of parents aren't aware of how things have changed and still assume ODP is necessary for the success of their kids. It, of course, is dependent on what the player's ultimate goals are and the ODP route may be more important depending on gender. I'm thinking it is perhaps more important for girls than it is for boys.
I'm starting to hear this a lot from parents who are visiting colleges and college coaches. The coaches are almost dismissing the ODP experience (unless it's on a consistent regional or/or national scale) and are far more impressed by what club you are playing for.
This is certainly true in NorCal. There are a few small and skilled Latino kids out there, but there are plenty of big and skilled ones too and those guys get noticed. Not necessarily noticed by ODP, if their parents lack the time and money to haul them out to the boonies for tryouts, but certainly recruited by the major clubs. There are so many Latino man-child players around, in fact, that dark murmurs about faked birth certificates are a staple of sideline chatter among your non-Latino typical soccer parent set. And in fact, there definitely are kids out there playing with their cousin's brith certificate, etc. Many of them are Latino, but not all.
I'm looking at the Cal South Summer Pools that were released yesterday and in my sons age group of 93s there are many with Spanish names/surnames. Also noticed only 1 or 2 defenders selected in this age group out of 40 something kids. Guess it is true that coaches think they can make anybody a defender at least for Cal South ODP. Most of the Latino players my son plays against in Coast don't fit the smaller, more skilled stereotype. Although they aren't my sons height at 6'0 and 145 lbs. We played City of Bell Hawks in the first game of Nationals, and the kids my son were guarding all had 20 to 40 pounds on him and were solid. I think we will definitely see a heavily weighted African/Mexican or Central American US National team at the 2014 WC. With the exception of course. Altidore is Haitan/American. I'm just a little jaded right now. My son was scouted and didn't make it. I have seen these 93 kids play and there are a few standouts, but the rest, please. You see the politics when 5-7 kids from 1 team make it, representing over 10% of the pool. Well, at least my son still has his Colombian citizenship! Now that I bring that up how many of these kids when they actually have to make a choice for what national team to play with will chose the US team over Mexico or their parents or their country of birth.? Is the system going to train these talents only to have them take their skills elsewhere when its time to join the senior team.
Coaches in general in club ball and with the US National team and other countries teams think they can take a mid, a wing mid and a forward who would not start and make them a starting back. This is not new Spector was not always a back. This is something to think about defensive play in general at higher levels of coaching is defensive skills is deemed unimportant up until 13 yrs old for the individual player. Most of what players work on is offensive skills. Then the ones who are less likely to start at the attacking positions can be made or some people think can be made into a back. On novice coaches putting young players as backs they never spend as much time with them on their offensive skills. So no matter how good they maybe defensively they are pretty much doomed to oblivian at higher levels. Thank their coaches for that. What if Brian McBride can't attack well enough anymore to make our National team as a striker? Should we just dump him off the team if he still wanted to play? He would make a great center back who could attack at times through the middle and even on a longer overlap. What do you guys think about that possibility? --------- There is no guarantee that our immigrant odp players no matter how good they become would play for our national team at this entry level in the future. However I think to get into reginal you may have to be a citizen and that is not a guarantee either because they are dual citizenship. They could play for either one, but not both.
Your son weighs 145 pounds, is in 8th grade, and has guys who outweigh him by 20 to 40 pounds on the field? For reference's sake, the two players from my high school who played NFL linebacker were about 150 pounds in 8th grade, and the one who was an NFL running back was about 140 pounds. As for the SoCal '93 selections, the State picked a kid who never got off the bench on his club team's critical State Cup match. Wasn't one of the squad's top 14 players, according to the coach. Last year, I saw something similar ... a kid who later made the Regional ODP team getting 10 minutes of game play during his club team's most important match of the year. Different coaches see different things. Flamengo liked 13 year old Ronaldo, but not enough to spend the bus money on him, so it took a pass when he tried out.
I understand JohnR that this is the philosophy of coaches that you can turn mids and forwards into defenders at the higher levels, it justs frustrates me. My son played forward this past season for the first 6 games for his club team at the Silver Elite level in CSL and the team was in first place. I then took him off the team because the hamstring I thought that was still bothering him turned out to be a fractured pelvis that he had been playing on for those 6 games. He was upset, he still wanted to play and the the last 8 games his team lost half of them and dropped to 3rd for the final standings. Now that Nationals came around the coach and trainer wanted him back at sweeper because"he was to valuable on defense and was not a natural striker". What actually gets lost in this is that my son enjoys playing defense, but of course I want something different. I am over my initial anger with the pools, still don't agree with the system. I feel you have to want to play defender and have that mindset to be successful at it. Not many kids out here want to play defense, they want the glory. I hope by your calculations he won't be an NFL linebacker. I wonder what the kids he played with will be, lineman?
I don't think anyone would accuse me of being a big supporter of the current process but unless you are talking about a San Diego team, which is harder to search through google, I don't see the polical bias in the boys (girls are probably a different story). The teams with a lot of players or those teams that won a lot of games and got seen a lot of times. They don't put much time in scouting (although I saw them much more out in force this year than last) and often blow it big time. I've seen little used subs picked and key starters from the same year left out. So if you are counting on getting seen in pool play or the round of 32 they'll often blow it big time. Also age bias is a big factor. Valley United had a strong U14 team but I believe had just 1 player selected to the an ODP pool while the U15 Blast and Blast Red teams had quite a few. The reason for this isn't bias against a club but instead bias against younger players. As for defenders not making it I can think of 5 defenders from one club that have made it over the last couple of years. Of course these kids all were pretty skilled on the ball rather than pure destroyers.
I did see them scouting us in pool play and my sons U14 team made it to the round of 32, before bowing out to Notts Forest, a San Diego based team you might be familiar with who have 2 ODP 93 players on their team, 1 being a forward and the other a midfielder. Those defenders you were speaking of who had been picked in the past I did not see 2 or 3 of them on the pools this time and I know 1 or 2 are still playing in Coast. 1 plays on Force which gave up only 1 goal throughout Nationals and is now in the finals. I am not a Force fan, but I did see them play and wonder how at least 2 of those defenders didn't make it to their respective pools. I remember last year 6 or 7 players made it from FC Barcelona for the 93 pool. Now I don't think they had that many 93's starting for Barca which was very successful last year and did pretty good this year. Speaking of Notts Forest I saw both of those 93 players. Although 1 definitely looked like a standout(which is why he is in the National pool), the other didn't make that much of an impact with me.
I would venture to guess that a lot of these successful current Gold U14 teams in Coast are heavily weighted with 92s in their starting lineup or team. Definitely not all of them, but maybe that explains why VUSC Blast who won league and league cup(this year, not last year) didn't have any player in the pools last year. I also don't recall seeing any this year for them in the 93s.
So would you agree the players who get seen more are ones who are playing for the Gold(Coast) or Premier(Presidio) teams at this age group and continues at the older levels? It's not to hard to find the Presidio link to check out the standings, but as far as the rosters of those top tier team it takes a little more digging. I believe the top 3 team far and away for the Boys U14 this year in Presidio were Notts Forest( I forget red or black but it was the team that knocked my sons out of the Nationals), Surf and Nomads. So I imagine the likelyhood of being seen is greater for those top level teams during league and state tourney play along with being in the high profile tournaments(or having your own).
It is not just California ODP where you see many examples of this. I see several Eastern ODP lists where players that are seldom significant contributors on their club teams make their state and even regional ODP teams. I see one Region 1 player who was cut from his club team last year because he was not in the top 18 players there. I see another Region 1 player who is a substitute on his club and high school teams. There is one eastern association whose boys ODP list reads like a who is who among soccer club presidents, association officers, influential parents, etc. with most top players who are not politically connected conspicuously missing. US Soccer has to overhaul this system and make it based strictly on merit, with larger numbers of players included, if we are to compete for World Cup championships in the future.
Most people believe strongly in meritocracies in theory, and equally strongly that they should help friends & family in practice. The exceptions to the above rule are the people who make the best things in youth soccer possible, and I admire the hell out of them.
I'm not at all familiar with Notts Forest since they are in San Diego but I am more familiar with the other two. By my count, Barca had 6 players listed last year (second to Italia with 8 of which six where on a club that for all intents and purposes folded and two on their very good U13 team), but only 1, a kid listed in the National pool, was selected again this summer. Five of the other kids are still on their roster and one seems to have moved to a new team. However, Barca has 4 new kids in the 93 pool. Two other kids listed in the National team pool - one that played for Necaxa/Arsenal and one that played for Force. And a kid that was on the roster last year who didn't make it - and from what I understand from reliable sources has been their Captain and CM for the past two years. Also their keeper is the only 92' in the entire Cal-South pool that plays U14. Finally they have another kid that on their roster that made the '93 ODP pool last year, but didn't make it this year. So from what I can tell Barca U14 team has 11 kids named to ODP pool in the last two years that are involved with the team and 10 still are on the coastsoccer.com roster in google. But somehow the first year they managed pick 6 kids from the team and miss the CM and captain of the regional champion. Also if you do a search on Topdrawer on Barcelona you can see that 8 kids from the coastsoccer.com roster are listed in the most recent Dallas Cup report, but only 3 are only current ODP pool and 4 from the match report were never listed on any ODP pool. It was also interesting that the first article that popped up in google showed half the US national team 93 pool beating Cal-South 12-1 and the other half losing 4-1 to the Barcelona U15 team. In the 12-1 game, two of the National pool kids from Barcelona's U14 team each scored two early goals. Bacelona's U15 team was described as big, which they certainly were as U14's. But from what I've heard, the two U14's who scored are both tiny. So what does this all tell you? If you pick the right team you'll get looked at even if you sit on the bench except if you are the captain of the most successful team. Size means everything unless you are a really shifty forward or attacking mid. So if the captain of the regional champions didn't make it, the fact that a forward/sweeper of a losing team in the round of 32 shouldn't feel too bad. Its a real crapshoot, but if you're like a Bornstien of a Felbhaber they will eventually get it right - even if it takes getting to the professional level to find out.
Well, I will finally post my opinions AGAIN regarding ODP. For those of you who have heard it all before.....hang on, you may be surprised. Background- I have felt as though my child was passed over in the identification process, and have complained about it for nearly four years now. I kept telling my daughter, hang in there....eventually talent will win out in the end. She perservered, and she was scouted by the State ODP coaches (at the request of her Club coach)-- was asked to attend the State training sessions-- and now was asked to join the team in Camp this summer. LESSON HERE- the system is not perfect (not every parent who laments the system is necessarily incorrect about the inadequacies), but eventually if the talent is there it will be recognized. I know first hand how hard it is to be quiet and have patience.....but it does work. I am not fishing for compiments or congratulations for her, I am just trying to be as vocal about when the system works as I was when I didn't think it was working.
The system doesn't start working because your child was selected. Unless the system was completely overhauled and an unbiased selection criteria employed, then nothing has changed. Can you point to a change in your state's ODP which would account for the system being fixed? Was your daughter worthy of being selected before? Probably. Is there someone else out there who could take her place right now? Probably. If she doesn't make the squad next year, is the system still working? What about the next parent out there whose child was not selected? Do they have to start thinking the system is now working? Stepping aside from the specifics of this post, I'm being critical because I think the people posting on BigSoccer about ODP are not being realistic - "all star" selection processes appear broken because worth is a judgment call and when the judgment does not go our way, we see the evaluator as being biased. This isn't a soccer only issue - look at Little League All Star message boards when those teams are formed. They have the same perceived problems of coach/BOD politics. The reality is that evaluations are biased and there are always players just as good as those picked. And sometimes there are better players who were not picked. The selection of a player does not validate the system. The rejection of a player does not prove the system is broken. PS: MenaceFanatic, congrats on your daughter making her state ODP team. I'm sure missing it out for 3 years in a row made her work harder to improve her game. I'm sure she is savoring this accomplishment. The next real question for you in a year is whether the coaching she gets at ODP is worthy.
And I'm not sure. Not at all. I think we've all watched too many movies here, believing in the notion that rejection fuels success. All the best math students in high school the ones who were told as 5th graders that they weren't very good? The ones who got the message that math was maybe for other people, say boys? No. No chance. The best math students are the ones who were praised as 5th graders, and who were given challenging assignments. Those are the students who worked harder at the subject then, who work harder at the subject now, and are better. For most people, success leads to motivation, and more success. Failure leads to depression and doing something else. That there are exceptions doesn't change the general rule.