Youth Yanks Abroad, '97-'00 YOBs: 2018/19 Thread

I think a lot of it's effectiveness depends on how they plan to use it once FCDII exists. It'd be impossible for it to be a precursor to playing regularly for FCDII just because of the age restrictions, but it also seems unlikely that it would be logical step after just because of how overstructured that would be.

Does that mean, then, that it's just a cookie to throw at kids that say they want to go to Europe?

 

I agree with you the FCD academy is largely overrated and is cruising on a reputation built years ago by nature of the fact they were one of the first and they have good facilities. They haven't produced much for all that investment.

I disagree that it would be better to be in Bayern as for Richards and hopefully Roberts it will be better than to stay at FCD. If FCD has shown anything it's that they don't trust their academy players ( mainly attacking players). I don't think any of these players would get 50-75 appearances for FCD as long as Peraja is in charge of the first team. ( how many is Paxton at now after 2 years?)

A few defenders, a holding mid and goalie are not a great achievement out of the academy. I tend to think the best thing is for these young players to get to Europe in any shape or form and get out of the MLS development system. I do think the U19 loan path is the better than the FCD pro path for hg attackers and history will probably bear that out. Could be wrong but Roberts will be a big test case. So far Pomykal's career at FCD has been a non-starter.

 

I agree with what you are saying. I'm just making the point that if Dallas would actually bring through some players from their academy, it would be the better path. I don't think either path is good. Its best that they sign elsewhere in Europe.

Is it a coincidence that the FC Dallas player who signed elsewhere in Europe is the most successful player thats come out of the academy?

 

Agree. I don't think any of these kids will ever play for Bayern's first team, but my thought is they are in the window over there every weekend when playing with the Bayern 23s. Add to the fact I am pretty confident the Bayern U23 and pro coaches are better to develop young players than Oscar and Co at FCD. I still think if Mckennie stayed here he would be practicing 5 days a week in Frisco right next to Pax and watching the games on TV, having made 2 or 3 appearances. No way Oscar plays him in front of Gruezo or Ulloa.

 

2 or 3 appearances? Reports at the time were that Weston was offered the highest starting homegrown contract ever. That was 2 and a half years ago. I highly doubt he wouldn't be a starter by now.

 

It is impossible to say, of course. The important parts are:

1. McKennie or Pulisic riding the MLS pine isn't so implausible that it doesn't suggest an issue
2. Many kids and their agents believe it.

 

This is part of the problem. The HG contract was probably near the BL youth contract. However, even if he was starting in MLS the last 12 months, he would still be on that HG contract. Schalke has since given him a senior contract worth 5-10X that HG contract I guess (anyone know what he is on?).

Even more telling, if McKennie starred in MLS, he would be on that HG contract making 1/5th what he is making now until 2021. In 2021, if McKennie continues to start for Schalke, he will probably be making DP money not HG peanuts. And Bradley DP money, not Bradley Wright Phillips money.

 

Greuzo was on a 700K contract and Ulloa is up over 200K. You can take Pomykal, or any of the other host of HG as examples. Weston made the best move possible and saved his career in doing so.

 

Exactly, if they don't renegotiate Reggie will he be making 60 something a year for the next 3 or 4 years even as a fulltime starter?

 

This always makes me giggle when someone gets it so wrong.

 

Straight from the FCD Website:

FC Dallas players who have signed Homegrown contracts are: Bryan Leyva, Ruben Luna, Moises Hernandez, Victor Ulloa, Richard Sanchez, Bradlee Baladez, London Woodberry, Kellyn Acosta, Danny Garcia, Jesse Gonzalez, Coy Craft, Jonathan Top, Alejandro Zendejas, Aaron Guillen, Paxton Pomykal, Jesus Ferreira, Bryan Reynolds, Reggie Cannon, Brandon Servania, Kris Reaves, Jordan Cano, Chris Richards and Thomas Roberts.

It's actually worse than I suggested. Not one attacking HG player that contributed to the FCD first team. That is pretty funny. Ulloa, Gonzalez, Acosta are the cream of the crop. They should be doing better with the resources, geographic area and player pool. They dominate DA but can't get more than three significant contributors over the course of the club history. Four if you add Reggie.

 

No one wants to talk about this?

Y'all'd rather bitch more about MLS?

 

Is it that good?

I’m certainly not anti-Dest or anything like that, but shouldn’t he be playing for Ajax II at his age if he’s to have any chance at breaking into the first team?

 

And he just made his debut for them.

Which is kinda the point.

 

I believe that the relationship is precisely because of McK. FCD want to provide a profitable avenue to Europe for the top level YNTers that get immediate interest from Europe. Otherwise, it's just watching them run off in to the sunset never to be seen again.

 

The long term of the NT lies and continues to lie with MLS academies. If we prop up FCD it's because they are one of the few clubs that has tangible fruits continuously. Not as good as NYRB but still they have put a lot of work in. Better yet, they continue to adjust and give players options. I don't think that anybody is satisfied with current position but certainly we like the growth.

 

Try again. You said the vaunted FC Dallas Academy was a joke "A few defenders, a holding mid and goalie are not a great achievement out of the academy". Not every player that played in their academy signed a HG deal with them. They still developed them. Some more and longer than others. I guess in your mind not even McKennie who played their for eight or so years counts since he didn't do an HG deal with them.

 

Agree. It's to try and satisfy any players who otherwise leave for nothing. May not necessarily be best for the national team although anything that nudges clubs to put more effort into training is a good thing long term.

 

You could be correct, but we also see this type of partnership all the time between big clubs and teams in big leagues and teams in small leagues.

I also am not sure a partnership with Bayern benefits FC Dallas academy players that much. There probably aren't many clubs in Europe where they would benefit less. Its good to train at a high level at a club with good facilities, but what matters is moving up the club ladder. That hasn't happened at Bayern for an academy player in probably 10 years.

 

I can't go along with the idea that Bayern sinks players. For the most part they are realists and move players on to lower clubs if it looks like they won't make it. Like Real and Barca, their academy players have a certain added value and smaller clubs often snap up their "rejects". At the worst they would be playing in 2nd BuLi for a more than decent wage.

 

I'm just thinking about it from the point of view of the clubs.

They need to find ways to avoid what just happened to RSL with Ochoa, Ledesma, Soto, and Booth. Having a great academy, but losing all of the players for nothing is a complete waste of investment. Complete waste.

So clubs need to be creative finding ways to retain players. Or at least to get paid. FCD's partnership with Bayern Munich provides an opportunity for kids to both train in Europe, get exposure to that environment, get scouted in Europe, etc. It can't hurt...........................

I would like for you now to do that analysis for the rest of MLS.
How many MLS academy/US eligible players are currently in the top 50 goal-scorers or assist men in the league. I await your extensive list. This issue is not an FCD issue. Its a league wide problem.

Shall we do the analysis for the other big city MLS clubs? Let's see Houston's list. Chicago's list. Come on. LA Galaxy's list. San Jose sits in the Northern California soccer hotbed. Let's see their list. Let's see the NE Revolution's list. Let's see Portland's list. Columbus' list. Come on. If FCD is so terrible, you're going to need to back that up with anything remotely resembling a fair analysis. Let's see the Colorado Rapids' list.

We had yet another kid from the FCD academy capped by the full USMNT yesterday. Two academy products STARTING. And yet we spend an awful lot of time criticizing the FCD academy.

Let's see. How many LA Galaxy academy products, the club sitting in the mecca of US youth soccer, were in the squad? I think the answer is zero.

 

So I was trying to make a list of former MLS academy players who have senior USMNT caps.

Some of these are generous with their affiliation with the academy but the clubs should get some credit for having them in their system at some point.

Chivas USA: Marky Delgado (5), Jorge Villafana (18)
Columbus Crew: Wil Trapp (9)
FC Dallas: Kellyn Acosta (21), *Weston McKennie (6), *Shaq Moore (3), Reggie Cannon (1)
DC United: Bill Hamid (6), *CJ Sapong (4)
LA Galaxy: *Paul Arriola (17), Gyasi Zardes (40)
New York Red Bulls: Tyler Adams (7), Juan Agudelo (28), Matt Miazga (10), *Matthew Olosunde (1), *Tim Weah (7)
Portland Timbers: *Rubio Rubin (8)
Philadelphia Union: *Zack Steffen (6)
Seattle Sounders: Jordan Morris (25), DeAndre Yedlin (56)
Sporting Kansas City: Erik Palmer-Brown (2)

*Never played for that club's first-team.

 

By the way, I'm surprised by how few USMNT caps RSL products have. Glad, Acosta, Lennon, etc. have been called up but not capped. [Like say Jesse Gonzalez of the FCD academy] They do have Salcedo for Mexico.

Giving FCD credit for Shaq Moore is REALLY generous, but then again so are others on your list. If you're giving them credit for Shaq Moore, then the Funes Mori brothers are also on the list (who actually spent more time at the FCD academy than Moore).

At one point I was trying to keep track of EVERYTHING and it got too complicated. A running list of callups and caps per academy for both the USMNT and other national teams. So in FCD's case you add people like Jesse Gonzalez, Moises Hernandez, Emerson Hyndman and company.

No academy in MLS is perfect. Even the academies that started early didn't take it seriously until about 2007 (when the homegrown initiative started). So they're 10 years old. Of course....................every academy has certain challenges and problems they're currently trying to address. Holes in their programs they're working on. FCD has a hole with their reserve team. And they have a hole perhaps in figuring out how to get attacking youngsters minutes. Other clubs have infrastructure problems. The Revolution just announced the opening of their new academy training complex. They had one, ONE, field at the complex dedicated to their academy. Other clubs have serious scouting, player evaluation, and coaching challenges. Half the clubs in the league were founded since 2011 (with more on the way) so they barely have a clue what they're doing with their first team much less the academy. What are we expecting exactly from Atlanta? The club is less than 2 years old. The fact that we have expectations at all means they're doing something right.

I just think sometimes we're seriously prone to overanalysis on these boards. We're just starting. OF COURSE the FCD academy has problems. Everybody has problems.

 

I want to point out that there have been a lot of players that went through the FCD Academy and never were signed to HG contracts including - Niko Hamalainen at QPR, Emerson Hyndman at Bournemouth, Ramiro Funes Mori at Everton and played on the Argentine National team, Rogelio Funes Mori at Monterey, Shaq Moore at Levante, Shaft Brewer got a cup of coffee in Germany and Weston McKennie at Schalke. I'm probably forgetting some but when discussing the academy it's not just those who signed with the team.

FCD is not alone in this of course. LAG has lost many to Europe and Mexico for nothing and RBNY too.

 

Lots of kids that have gone all over the world. We could probably make a long list of kids that went down to Mexico. None of them have really "made it," though. The homegrowns they sold to Mexico (Zendejas and Sanchez) are still playing professionally, though.

Evidence of Roberts and Servania joining up with Richards in Germany.

.@FCDallas-Trio am #FCBayernCampus: https://t.co/xqPcnW53Pa #MiaSanMia pic.twitter.com/MURfQMs9jO

— FC Bayern Campus (@fcbayerncampus) October 17, 2018