LA Galaxy, leftback Kobe H-Foster, has signed with Wolfsburg. Alan Sonora got the start for Independence in the South American Cup. The diagrams indicate he played LCM in a 4312. His opta score was 7.2, good for 6th in the team. He was 4/5 in ground duels and 92% in passing. He is left-footed. Have to say JK would've had a field day in recruiting these duals.
TC isn't even going to equal one good transfer payment let alone all the losses those three represent.
And the longer the list gets that kids can use your academy as a platform to go to Europe the more talent that flocks to your academy.
Absolutely but there’s still one major problem and another issue. The problem is the kids are limited to academy’s in their area. They don’t have the freedom to go to any academy they want. This comes back to the MLS restricting the movement of their players because they don’t believe in a meritocracy. The other issue is that the MLS still doesn’t sell Americans. Adams and Richards are the only two recent ones and are outliers. They also come from two clubs that actually try to develop and play youth. Long’s experience is much more common. Maybe, hell hopefully that changes. I’m not holding my breath.
Players are not limited to MLS academies. There are plenty of academies outside of MLS that do a very good job also. Just here in C.FL if you don’t want to play for OC you can play for Clearwater DA. They had a defender on the U17 Nats last yr. from their academy. We,OC had none. So players are not stuck without choices if they don’t want to play for their local MLS team.
Sure their not limited to MLS academies but there isn’t a wealth of top level academies across the US, MLS or not. There shouldn’t be a restriction on kids based on territories drawn up to protect the owners from their own incompetency. It certainly isn’t in place to protect the kids. It’s ridiculous and bush league.
Oh no doubt. I’m just saying if a kid wants to play soccer somewhere, they can as long as it’s not a MLS academy outside their area.
Screw the Gals, and screw MLS generally. They have zero interest in playing young Americans. The new cap structure where there is/are exception/s for young players - that's not to pay/play young American players. That is so teams can buy young players from other countries, play 'em, and sell them. It will work to reduce the already paltry number of young Americans that see the field. I say good for the guys that are getting out early. I'd counsel a kid to go to a USL team's academy, rather than MLS. At a USL team you'll get a fair chance to play. And, if you prove yourself, you're not hamstrung by MLS's crazy rules. No pity for the Gals.
Reyna is basically in the rotation and playing every game for Dortmund. He is big for his age and very good. Am I really to believe he couldn't have played one minute for NYCFC last year? If an MLS team had bought him from SA would he have played?
The question is why a 16 yr old should not be playing against grown men? Relax. MLS is getting better at recognizing talent. Look at Jackson Yueil. He was going nowhere til Almeyda arrived and decalred Yueil as somebody who should be in Europe. That would never have happened if he had been drafted by Crew. Agree? We have more and more talent coming in to MLS on both the playing and coaching side. Let's not get stuck in the past.
I think you've misunderstood what @Patrick167 was saying. I understood him indicating that Reyna would have gotten PT with NYCFC if he'd have stayed there. Otherwise, I agree with your argument.
We shouldn't want this even for teams / clubs we don't like. Eventually they will drop their academy if it is such a money loser. They have tons of blame for not playing their young players and instead playing a lot of spare veterans from around the world. Hopefully this is the last straw and they have finally have their wake up moment like FCD did when McKennie did this to them.
You have to look at these situations and wonder why these European top flight clubs have the courage and conviction to test their top youth and why MLS teams don't.
people keep talking about academies being money losers and I keep questioning this. They make a ton of local money off of their camps and seasonal programs outside of the free academies. My guess is it’s not a terrible business even without any first team benefits.
They are required to have academies and if they did drop them then the league would have to give up on being a top league. ai still dont understand why anyone wants young talented players to sign with MLS when the league doesnt have a track record of developing quality professionals. FCD is the best at it and their top players still havent matured to that level yet. I sure hope they do but is there any reason to think Cannon, Pomykal, and others wont stall like the players that came before them. Mckennie didnt do anything to FCD. He chose to gi a direction that he thought was better for him. I'd expect many kids to continue a similar path until MLS teams show they will play kids and sell them when they are ready. LA Galaxy's reactionary firing of their coach doesnt show they have any clue of what the problem is. These clubs should be expecting to lose players and need focus on developing more of them and appreciate the ones that stay. There is no reason the Galaxy shouldn't be able to develop more players every couple of years than this group that includes Araujo, Alvarez, Mendez, Llainez, Kobe, etc. They cant incorporate that many players into their team every couple of years, especially when you have 3 DPs and the G/TAM bunch.
Legally, no he didn't. He did get free training for years and then left FC Dallas without them getting a penny back for what they did for him. Not sure why everyone thinks owners are supposed to give away their best players to those penniless Euro clubs. I do know that integration and selling needs to improve. Wish there were equivalents to sign and trade deals in other American sports.
So a couple of questions... when did FCD make their academy free? Did Mckennie ever pay a fee? Does the FCD youth programs not subsidize the academy? Why do MLS fans expect everyone to cater to the teams when they dont seem interested in much besides making a profit? Why should people feel sorry for these MLS academies when they refused to acknowledge TC/SP when it was favorable for them? It isnt anybody's fault other than MLS for ignoring how the global market works. There is a structure in place to protect clubs, but they chose to not participate. Having an academy is part of having a professional team. The fact that MLS has chosen to be monopoly of the game in this country means they have an extra obligation in this area. Further, the league has has done everything they can until recently to keep wages low and treated players as property instead of assets. They are also the ones that over value their players so seldom sell them and have unfavorable contracts that allow them to keep players on low wages for too much time. This article should give you some more ideas why I'm not sympathetic to these teams... https://www.dallasnews.com/sports/f...ional-team-and-the-fc-dallas-academy-problem/ Let's look at FC Dallas for example. They currently have about 5000 kids in the FC Dallas Youth system, both boys and girls. According to people we've talked to, on a rough average they each pay $3000 per year for the club fee (again before kit and travel expenses). That's $15 million in revenue for FC Dallas. Now there are a lot of expenses and overhead FCD is paying, but a lot of those are sunk costs FCD (and Frisco?) paid up front. Sunk costs like building the complex at the stadium. Make no mistake FC Dallas is making a profit off their youth club. The second problem the pay-for-play system creates is the emphasis it places on volume. If clubs revenue is tied to player fees then profit is based on the number of players the club has. The more players, the more volume, and the more profit. Instead of putting efforts into creating the best players and teams, a.k.a quality, the incentive for clubs is to add as many teams and players as possible with no regard for the quality of said teams and players, a.k.a quantity. In addition, in FCD's case, the youth system fees pay for the Academy teams. The FCD Academy is free-to-play as the academy teams are subsidized and paid for by all the youth team fees. FCD needs pay-for-play for the FCD Academy teams to exist and function. The youth clubs prop up the whole FCD system. Side note: Most academy teams aren't free, not even all the MLS academy teams are free.