Keyser Soze: And like that - poof! - they're gone. YNT players who've disappeared

#4 is definitely Packwood.

I did some digging and I think you are right. I found the camp roster for this group, but Metzger wasn't on the list so I didn't consider him. But on the BigSoccer thread for this camp, indications are that he started the game so it's clear that he must have been added to the squad after the initial announcement.

I even found one of my own posts asking whether it was announced that Metzger had shown up!

The missing 11th starter who wasn't in the photo for whatever reason was Luis Gil. Dennis Flores(!) and Omar Salgado came off the bench and scored!

 

I thought #4 was Eric Miller.

 

It's Packwood for sure.

Here's the thread from this camp (a U23 friendly vs. the Bahamas NT)

https://www.bigsoccer.com/threads/u-23-friendly-against-the-bahamas.2008211/

 

I remember that camp. Our players are so much better now. We were discussing a lot of guys out of the game six years later. Do we expect Pulisic or Adams to be out of the game in six years? What about even someone like James Sands or Paxton Pomykal?

 

How dare you toss his name out there in this kind of discussion. You know his injury history. Don't tempt fate!

 

What I'm most confident of is that it must be a confluence of a variety of factors. I think it's all happened too fast to be just one or two things.

 

I think multiple things have made us better at producing players, but I definitely think this is permanent as opposed to a good five years of producing players.

 

TransferMarket says that Junior Flores retired? Is that true?

I followed Benji Joya for a bit, he seemed promising way back in the U20WC during the Javan Torre era, he had some appearances for Santos Laguna and then out of nowhere he just disappeared off the radar, that was until I later found out the 27 year old decided to talk to a 16 year old.

 

Not sure if he ever made an official announcement, but it's been over two years since his last pro contract expired.

 

We closed that shithole Bradenton. And all of a sudden one 15 yo doesn't think that he's already made it, and another 15 yo doesn't think that his time is up and he will never make it. And we choose among hundreds of talented kids, taught by really good youth coaches and not among two dozens coached by federation clerks. So it's not a golden generation, that's a regular crop from now forward (unless we open another shithole to give guaranteed employment to another bunch of clerks).

 

Well, we

• Implemented the Development Academy to get players more competition and structure.
  
• There's been both an informal push and a formal push to have coaches be better educated and focus more on development than winning - still a ways to go but better, I am sure.
• There's more and more parents and coaches who played soccer ready to teach their kids and others every year.
  
• The popularity of FIFA video game and the accessibility of professional soccer both home due to the rise of many more professional teams and abroad via the internet have changed mindsets towards soccer as a career path rather than just a recreational sport.
• We've added a slew of youth organizations with professional affiliations, a path to a pro career, access to pro coaching, free to play, training with the first team, etc. Going from just Bradenton to 25 MLS academies + ~5-10 USL Academies(?), all of whom are at different stages but all but a few are improving rapidly

I think all of those things contribute.

 

Think you pretty much nailed it with the big stuff.

 

The 2000's (our best age group to this point) were part of Bradenton, as were the 97's, 98's, 99's, and 01's.

Unless you are going to suggest the change has really come with the 02's and younger (we've had two players capped from these age groups, one of which wasn't developed in this country), I don't think Bradenton's had much effect.

 

How many of the 2000s that are currently in the picture actually went to Bradenton as a full time resident? Weah, Richards, Soto, Ledezma, Dest, etc?

Asking seriously since I thought most of these folks were pretty full time at their youth clubs. I know Dest, Richards, Weah weren't. I think Soto was in SD until he went to RSL. Not sure about Ledezma or some of the other guys like Durkin.

I don't think Bradenton was bad -- the issue is that it doesn't scale easily. It's not the elimination of Bradenton, it's the rise of 30+ Bradentons out there (or realistically, about five Bradentons, another 10-15 trying, and a bunch more not trying or too soon to tell).

 

Of the 00's who've been capped, Sargent and Weah are the only two one's who were living there, and getting the daily training of the coaching staff there. Weah eventually left for PSG, and became more of a player who only showed up for certain camps. Dest his whole time with the U-17's only came for certain camps.

Soto got a few camps his U-17 cycle. Ledezma I believe didn't. Richards was a player a lot of people were clamoring for to get caps, but Hackworth's biggest mistake was he refused to make changes at CB, which caused issues in CM because it caused him to move Durkin/Sands to CB. Aaronson was completely left out of the U-17 cycle I believe. Gioacchini, as well. I believe he wasn't even known back then. Ferreira was involved with the U-17's (invited to a camp), and he almost certainly would've been involved in Bradenton, if eligible at the time.

 

In the latest years kids were just refusing to go there. Before that: pure extortion. Lletget and Gyau were top players in their year and kicked off the team for going to Europe. That was openly and proudly announced to make a point, injured Renken was forced to play that stupid friendly that ended his career. The first class didn't go there either, the kids were picked a few month before the WC and were products of the clubs. Could you name those who were fully developed there in 18 years of existence? Or compare those 2000's from Bradenton and from the academies?

 

Okay which of you is this... I don’t believe it’s a coincidence, with many of the players in common (Cropper, Packwood, Joya, Morris, and Shane O’Neill come up) from that other lineup [emoji23]

#TheFutureIsBright pic.twitter.com/qIl9iBgvZx

— Daniel (@DanielSmith1022) December 5, 2020

5 and a half years is an eternity in sports. Check out this u23 team.

-Six players currently not under any kind of contract or options weren’t picked up
-One player’s contract is up on 1/1/21
-Two are on MLS deals but I can’t find details
-Two are Green and Morris

— Daniel (@DanielSmith1022) December 5, 2020

 

I'm embarrassed to say I didn't even remember "Allen" until I looked it up... and now I'm sad.

In 2015 I never would’ve guessed that Arriola would have the most senior caps from this pic as of today. But 5 and a half years later, I get it. pic.twitter.com/YxiEywpYZ7

— Daniel (@DanielSmith1022) December 15, 2020

I had such high hopes for Rubio Rubin and Desevio Payne...

Also relevant for this thread (with both Rubin and Payne mentioned... Zelalem too):

trying to predict what the 2026 world cup team will look like is literally impossible

exhibits A B and C (2017) @scuffedpod pic.twitter.com/UxhM0wNER9

— Alex Calabrese (@amcalabrese12) December 14, 2020

 

Arriola was easily the best attacking player on that team, but Rubin, Zelalem and Hyndman were hyped hard.

 

Rubin, Zelalem, and Hyndman all deserved the hype at the time. Zelalem playing up a u23 cycle was a huge testament to his talent. If Gedion didn't have the knee injury who knows where he'd be now. Emerson Hyndman was by far our best player that tournament imo, he was the engine of that team and was the game changer for me. Rubio had all the makings of a high level 9 but plateaued hard, that one is really hard to face reality for.

 

Zelalem never been good. He was poor in Netherlands, he was poor in Scotland and horrible in MLS. He had a good game against NZ which looked like a pub team. Besides that he was the worst player on U-20 team. No problem, he was promoted to U-23 team where he was the worst player player again of course.
Rubio Rubin is our traditional striker, that scores on youth teams and nobody knows why as his abilities are highly suspect. Then they disappear.
Hyndman was OK, not as good as the keeper, CBs or Arriola, but OK. He is still OK, average MLS player.

 

Agreed

 

Remember how happy we all were when Zelalem announced he was choosing to represent the US.... we won a lot of dual national battles back then that turned out to be fairly irrelevant (Omar Salgado, Jesse Gonzalez, etc.)... not quite Dest and Musah level

 

1339383942881955841 is not a valid tweet id

sigh