It's not just about how long ago it was. No MLS club has won a CONCACAF tournament that required winning two leg series. Correct me if I'm wrong.
MAJOR LEAGUE SOCCER AS A CASE STUDY IN COMPLEXITY THEORY Steven A. Bank (UCLA School of Law) Credit goes to asharenko@reddit
I thought this was an interesting article: http://americansoccernow.com/articles/should-we-all-get-along-a-look-at-soccer-in-america I don't really know a lot about the dynamics, but I think a split up is unlikely. US Soccer can hire the next coach either from MLS, or pick someone who is less likely to pontificate in public about the state of the domestic league. I think the public comments are what MLS doesn't like more than anything, and they aren't really necessary. It also seems that the owners are really more concerned about losing players to Europe before they get to MLS more so than players play in Europe. I'm sure NYRB wishes Matt Miazga signed a longer deal and they got a bigger transfer fee, but bringing a guy through the academy, making it to the first team and then selling the player to a bigger European club is presumably what the owners have in mind, as it is unrealistic to expect any top players to just decide they want to play only in MLS (although it does/could happen). I do think players should play at the highest level possible, but I am less sure that a 17 year old going to a European academy is a significant improvement over just going to a USL team then an MLS team. Most of our best players have come up through the US, and even those who do go to Europe tend to do so at an age where it is unlikely to have greatly changed things. Christian Pulisic seems to be doing very well, but he has only been in Germany since Jan 2015 and was already on US Youth National Teams. As the academy systems get more developed (and there are more MLS academies) there will be more cases where promising US youth players will be in MLS academies, and having the national team coach convincing them to go abroad before signing a contract is not going to sit well with the owners. If Jurgen ends up coaching past the 2018 world cup (or gets an extension) it will be interesting to see how it plays out.
You don't see a significant difference between playing for BVB's U19's, then 1st team compared to likely playing for Philly's USL team? Thing is, the older rooks might benefit more by jumping into MLS as they're more physically mature and likely to play, guys like Polster or Alashe. But youngsters, particularly attackers like Pulisic, Akale, Perez, De La Torre, etc? They're playing regularly in far more competitive and tactical systems overseas. And I'd clearly take a BVB or Fiorentina or Villarreal reserve setup over USL. Not even close. I watch Sac Rep a decent amount and sorry but it doesn't compare to the Villarreal C team where Akale is playing as an example.
Currently, MLS is in the investing in infrastructure phase of their league and until the league matures when do we start seeing the salary cap go up and academies producing world class players? @triplet1 do you have an opinion on my comment?
START seeing the salary cap go up? And "world class players" is a lofty goal, innit? We have produced how many "world class players" in 100+ years? It's sure asking a lot of nascent academies to suddenly start cranking them out. How many world class players ARE there, really? The 11 starters on the last 16 in a World Cup = 176. Surely there are some reserves on some of those sides who are better players than some on others, but we can call it 200 if you like. We're going to create multiple ones?
Maybe I should have rephrased my post. I should have said when will we start seeing the MLS salary cap be even remotely close to Liga MX? I also should have said when will the United States be able to consistently produce World Class tier 2 and 3 players who actually have market value in the multi-millions. I am beginning to wonder if we are still 15 to 20 years away from being close to Mexico and I am fine with Major League Soccers slow and go business approach. I also believe American's are not valued high enough because we are well, Americans.
We have had academies for four years or so, and are just starting. I'd expect that every generation of players will get better but we haven't had the first groups who started at u12 go through yet. This is also a strategy to avoid paying bigger money on player salaries. World class is also a very nebulous goal. What does it even mean? I guess where I'm going is that it takes as long as it takes. The budget thing is different. MLS is starting to pay more, but the reality is that paying more just means the same players we have now make more.
For that matter, even the first players to start at U14 haven't turned 18 yet, and only a handful of players from that cohort have gone pro. By the way, "11 starters on the last 16" includes the USMNT in three of the last four World Cups. If we have no world-class players, then there's no way there are more than 200 world-class players active at a time. Sure, there are players outside the last 16 of the World Cup who are world-class, but there are also starters on last-16 teams who aren't world-class. As I've said before, I don't think we underrate US players as much as we overrate other countries' player pools. Outside of the top 8-10 teams in the world, everyone has a similar player pool to us: a few players in the upper halves of the top 4 leagues, and otherwise a mixture of lower-half players from the top 4 leagues and players from lesser leagues. The fact that there were more players from the Turkish league than the Spanish league in Euro 2016 says it all. And that's ignoring the fact that not all of the English/Spanish/German/Italian clubs that had players in Euro 2016 were in the top divisions.
I also think we underestimate what it means to go through an overseas academy. Wood did this, and credit to him, but FFS he was 14 and by himself 8000 miles from home. That is an incredibly tough kid, and the ability to do that without falling apart is rare, incredibly rare. If you want players to fully benefit from overseas academies, they need to be in them by about that age, when they go dormitory at least. As Wood notes, on his dark days, it was hellishly hard. the other kids were maybe 50 to 100 miles from home. It makes far more sense, and is far more humane and practical, to expand and improve domestic academies. As noted, they're new, but they're already having some success. Kids with the mental toughness to deal with going it alone from a young age will always remain the exception. The exceptional are good, but you can't base an overall development strategy on them.
And that's just for the kids in academies close to home (i.e. 2-300 miles). Doing it overseas is exponentially tougher (language barriers, cultural differences, etc.). And then you're hoping that his ACLs hold up (see Josh Gatt). On top of that, there's the possibility that he'll realize that maybe he's not going to make it at BL1 or even Ligue1 level and the prospect of 10-15 years as a journeyman in the lower divisions before trying to start a new career at 35 isn't what he wants from his life (see Preston Zimmermann). The truth is, kids who make it in any serious academy are, by definition, exceptional, but having academies closer to home reduces the number of obstacles to those kids reaching the necessary level. Even in the 60s Belfast was only 45 minutes from Manchester by plane: it still didn't stop George Best from nearly quitting because of homesickness.
I graduated high school at 16 and went to college in the US while my family was in Bolivia. That didn't go well. Not something I recommend for 99% of kids. There are some though. CR7 is a notable one.
At least put the discussion in context. The average salary in MLS is half what it is in Mexico, and we know that the MLS average is actually quite inflated by the DP. MLS has only really started to improve in the last 10 years, while the MX was considered, at times, a top 5 league in the world decades back. Why don't MLS clubs win the CCL? they aren't as good. They are, however, getting better. but yeah, they're quite a bit behind, esp once you get past the top couple players on MLS rosters. And a $150k defender in MLS is a $150k defender in Holland, or England, or here. In recent years, we've seen quite a few folks move to England and succeed, correct? But yeah, the level of talent in MLS is reflected by the pay in MLS, because that is how the world works.
However, those clubs that do make it to the knockout rounds of the CCL are normally in the same financial weight class as the Liga MX clubs they face. The Galaxy, at $20-22M, definitely had a significantly higher payroll than Tijuana and Santos. You can blame the MLS economic structure all you want - and I certainly have - but these ought to have been very closely contested series. LA-Tijuana was, to some extent, but Santos blew out the Galz. As to the Mexican being a top 5 league - pre-Bosman, there were, at least, a dozen Euro leagues better. And there still are. On the Mexican behalf, their team style has been changing due to the influx of foreign coaches and foreign players and will change more with the new rules on foreign players. And, simultaneously, their economy has been transforming from the pseudo-socialist to, to a large extent, market driven - nothing more free market than narco-trafficking ... at least, from the supply perspective - bringing up the standards of living in the thereto poverty stricken parts of the country and thus providing the nutritional necessities to the budding stars and starlets of tomorrow. PS. I'd mentioned this long, long, ago - back in the 1990's, there was a PBS program on the same genetic group of people, who were split by the US-Mexico border. On the US side, the natives were allowed to build a casino, which brought many well paying jobs to the community. The Mexican side was de facto living as they had for many years previously. The American side was often grossly obese, with all the health problems associated with their high intake of calories. The Mexicans were showing none of those symptoms, as they had to rely on my lower food and leisure budgets. From the cursory search : according to the CIA Factbook, the Mexican PPP/capita was $12,500 in 2007. Now, CIA has them at just under $19,000. By the modern standards, Mexico is almost middle class and certainly large portions of its populace are there already.
In my opinion if both leagues were playing identical spring to winter or fall to spring schedules the games would be more competitive.
Maybe there should be a salary base as well as a salary cap. Not sure what the value this is but it seemed like a good idea in my brain for a millisecond.
Would it be that meaningful? In 2007 or 2008, it would have been (New England was reportedly spending barely over half of the salary cap), but right now all 20 teams are spending above the salary cap.
I'm not nearly as up on all of this as I once was, but I'll give it a shot. The last time I added it up total payroll spending was about twice the salary cap league wide, and a lot of those dollars above the cap were spent at the discretion of individual owners. So while it really is a salary cap IMO, it's a very, very soft cap. Total payroll spending is significantly higher, and that trend seems to be not only continuing, but widening as more and more exceptions are created. Why not just put more of the payroll dollars into the salary budget and simplify the rules? I suspect the reason is that if MLS dumped all of the money it spends on players into the salary budgets, it would be negotiated under the CBA and MLS owners would have less flexibility over how it's spent. I'm even less qualified to answer the player development piece of this, but I think it's probably another generation or two. The academies certainly help, but I think with each generation parents are much more knowledgeable about the game, and that's even more important. It's been a looonnnnng time since I coached youth soccer, but nearly 20 years ago it was rare if any of the parents of my kids had ever played the game, or, for that matter, even seen a professional game in person. That's not exactly an environment that spawns great players. Today, I suspect parents -- mothers and fathers -- of kids on youth teams are much more likely to have played the sport on a varsity level in high school and a few beyond that. What's more, MLS has brought pro soccer to their communities, and means leagues are beamed to their televisions. In short, the game is simply more accessible. Will that matter? I think so. When I was a kid, fathers taught their sons how to throw a curve ball. Today, both fathers and mothers are just as likely to give them good instruction on how to take a penalty. And with that, we'll start to produce better players. {edited to fix typo}
Because the budget, it's not a cap, is money supplied by the league to pay your team, not spending to at least the cap doesn't save anything. It's leaving money on the table that you never get back.
I do agree that there should be a floor, or minimum spending line. Take all of the "other" spending out of the equation. That's what the cap is about, the bare bones money spent. Take out the overage for DPs, the exemptions for HGs, or whatever else is an "altered" amount on the books. Whatever that number is .... it has a floor and a ceiling.
And the fact that the majority of the current players are strongly against raising the cap. BTW, anyone caught Dell Loy Hansen's interview on the RSL - Inter pregame show?
My impression is that every team is already either maxed out on cap space or close to it, except the ones that have just dropped players to clear cap space for new signings in this window. Which shouldn't surprise anyone. Not spending to the cap is basically saying no to free money.
There are about 200 countries on the planet. We have about 4.4% of the world's population. There are some nations so impoverished, war torn, and unstable that producing world-class players isn't possible. We have as good a chance as anyone to produce multiple world-class footballers.