Moultrie Case- Age Requirements?

I’m not a misogynist. I’ve hired, mentored, and championed women. And I continue to do so. What I objected to is this poster’s statement: “Shaw is a generational talent. Moultrie is not”
So here’s my question: How do you know that? How do you know that a 13-year old or 17 year-old young lady is a generational talent?
Did coaches know that about Michelle Akers, Carin Jennings, Mia Hamm, Abby Wambach, and Crystal Dunn? Or did they know that after their first year of playing in college or after they have retired from the game? (Or in the case of Moultrie, Shaw, et al., after a year of playing professional soccer with the parent club or parent club’s affiliates). I have been a fan of women’s soccer since the early 1990’s after watching Judy Foudy play for the Card. I’ve watched the ‘99ers when they were young women. I was amazed at their talent. But, I didn’t know that their talent was generational and transformative until after they won the 1999 Women’s World Cup. What I object to is judging these young women when they are at a very vulnerable stage in their young life and still learning to play the game. Please, don’t be “another brick in the wall.”
Reference:
The Psychology of “Sad Girl” Pop: Why Music By Billie Eilish, Gracie Abrams, Olivia Rodrigo & More Is Resonating So Widely.”
www.Grammy.com

 

My issue is with you downplaying the women's pro league, and female athletes. This isn't your first time being called out by fellow posters for you inappropriate posts.

To answer your question about Shaw, I have seen both her and Moultrie in person. This is my opinion. They are also both professional athletes. If they are going to choose to play in the women's league, they are going to have to live with all of the benefits and consequences of that.

 

I see both sides of it I guess. there tends to be more room for consensu on these things in sports where the access to information, visual, written or otherwise, is widespread. WoSo is not like that. We dont have real professional development hurdles to clear that wean the talent somewhat before we get to the "big" club and we rarely see the players vs equivalent elite talent.

@Snow Leopard i think with some of the older players you mention the answer is YES. They did know pretty early. Partly because the universe of players was smaller and they were that talented from an early age. Others you mention were on generational teams.

Internet give us all an opinion and most of us have no idea what the basis of that is, so you just live with that .

 

OM's parents, her clubs, and many posters here have said she is and will be the greatest soccer player that ever existed. Other posters have a different opinion and have a right to post those here. If you don't like it, go away. Once a youth player enters the professional circuit they are no longer youth players and have to deal with the grown-up world, You don't get all the benefits of being a professional player but still want the protections of being a little girl. Treat these professional female athletes with respect and not like they are little china dolls that have to be protected

 

I’ve never denigrated the NWSL (that would be too easy given it’s dysfunction by enabling abusive and predatory coaches and lack of transparency on several issues) or women soccer athletes. I’m going to declare that we should leave young aspiring or professional men soccer players Christian Pulisic alone before they are 21 years old. Yes, even those with multi-million dollar contracts. They’re still kids with less than fully developed brains (FWIW, I’m a health and wellness professional with a specialty in neuroscience.) I didn’t know that Olivia Moultrie’s support system promoted her as the next Mia Hamm and better than her. I’m just not comfortable with making judgments — whether it’s praising or dismissive — about young men or women soccer players, amateur or professional before they are 21 years old and have played against more experienced and skilled older players. About European and South American Professional Soccer Leagues and their Youth Academies (Boys and Girls), they also have negative issues. But they have more financial resources and elite coaches and are great at developing their discovery players.
Just look at how far along Spanish and Italian Women’s Soccer is after a very late start compared to their Scandinavian counterparts.

 

Yes, OM’s promoters have said she is and will be the best soccer player we have ever seen and I also know about neurological brain development of adolescents - that’s why I am not in support of teenager girls going professional at any early age- just like you don’t realize the full extent of your college commitment at 12 years old, I am not sure you fully understand the decision to go pro when you are 16/17 years old. For boys it is a different game because of the potential for million dollar contracts and a financial payoff with all of this - except for a few rare situations there is not a financial payoff for the average female teenage player. I think the influence of the British coaches has made a big difference because they are not in support of the college route. College play is not an option in Europe which is why the international olayers are coming here to play in college. So it makes me wonder how many of the YNT players are discouraged from going to college by the coaches.

 

please give an example of " the average female teenage player", especially the ones getting the large payoff.

 

Apart maybe from OM's family, it seems to me that what you say of the opinions expressed about Olivia Moultrie is quite the overstatement. Was there really anyone on this thread claiming that "she is and will be the greatest soccer player that ever existed". I get it's probably ironic, but it anyway quite obviously misrepresent the aim and the scope of the debate happening here.

 

I think there has been the beginnings of a potentially interesting discussion here, about the appropriateness of on-line criticism of youth players.

Ytrs has staked out the ground that if a player turns pro, then criticism of her is appropriate, but that until then not only is criticism not appropriate but the mentioning of names of players as comparisons to the one who turned pro is not appropriate. In other words, ytrs has staked out that there is a bright line that separates the yes criticism and no criticism groups.

Others appear to have staked out the ground that no criticism of youth players is appropriate, perhaps leaving open where the line is that defines who does and does not fit within the youth category.

So, here are some questions that may complicate the discussion:

What about players that have not turned pro, but that have signed name-image-likeness contracts with agents or with advertisers?

What about players that have not turned pro, but that receive money as on line influencers where part of their on line image is as soccer players?

What about players that have not turned pro, but that have college soccer scholarships? (Four years of full scholarships these days can be worth as much as a quarter to half a million in avoided payments, for some institutions.) What if the players have played different college coach suiters off against each other in terms of how much money the schools have offered them? Are the scholarships a form of compensation and, if so, why is that different than a pro contract?
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I will confess, personally I always hesitate to critiize any player on line. Further, as to youth players in particular, I think the better approach is simply to observe and stick to the data. As in, here is what she has accomplished so far, time will tell as to how she will turn out over the long term.

 

My take is that this is a relatively anonymous on line board. And a well-behaved one at that. We're rarely really critical of anyone here. This is not twitter or facebook and I doubt anyone we're talking about here is going to see anything we're commenting on.

I think anyone who is putting herself out there -- be that having her own twitter account boasting of her achievements, an NIL agreement, a pro contract for goodness sakes -- is fair game.

 

CP Thomas,
I think it’s time to contact Santa Clara University’s Markulla Center for Applied Ethics for their counsel on the these issues. NCAA Division I College Football is currently debating these moral and ethical issues.
“Is college football headed in the wrong direction? SEC coaches answer.
www.al.com
Updated: Jul. 27, 2022, 8:31 a.m.|
Published: Jul. 27, 2022, 7:00 a.m.
Personally, I hate the increasing commercialization and professionalism of NCAA Division 1 Sports. My answer is: If their behavior is immoral, unethical and unlawful. You can also criticize at will if these young men and women violate the mission, vision, and values of their respective colleges and universities. For example, you can criticize these athletes if they represent benefactors who employ slave labor to manufacture their products. Therefore, until colleges and universities classify athletes as employees with salaries and benefits and a collective bargaining union of college athletes is created, e.g. College Women’s Soccer Players Association, these issues will remain persist. The only winners are attorneys. It’s always the attorneys and their exorbitant billable hour fees that wins. ☹️
Let’s create an OSINT to investigate these NIL Collectives similar to Bellingcat or New York Times OSINT, internet citizens that investigate misinformation in all media so we can help these athletes from falling into moral, ethical, and legal quagmires.

 

I prefer to assume that they will see it. Putting yourself out there is part of what creates the financial opportunity. This issue is complicated by many factors, but the reality is no one is doing the game any favors by highlighting positives and ignoring the rest.

 

Not sure I understand your question. Aside from rare examples like Moultrie and Rodman, the younger players that would skip college and go directly pro are not getting million dollar contracts.

 

With the salary structure as is, there is no incentive to skip College if it is an option unless you are getting well paid to do it. All the examples right now are of players who have built some level of notoriety first. Younger players that could skip college on ability alone ( ie could play in the league) wont, so its a moot point.

 

I think an argument can be made though for special talents like high end U20 National team players to skip college. It is basically what Trinity Rodman did. She got her first contract started earlier and quickly proved herself. Having a great first season in the NWSL got her paid very well. Obviously if she was just a roster filler type player, she would be on league minimum and it would have been roughly the same pay as a full ride at her college. I think Jayden Shaw will be another example of a young player seeing a significant pay day early in her career.

Another thing to consider ... if playing professionally gets them with the USWNT faster than playing in college would (like it seemed to do for Trinity), they will make serious US Soccer money now with the equal pay agreement.

 

Even taking the goal out of it, Shaw is twice (or more) the player Moultrie is. Wow. And she hasn’t been training at the pro level for 3 years.
She’s special.

 

I have watched both of the U20 World Cup group play games, and haven't been super impressed with Moultrie. I get she is still young, but there other names I would call out before I got to Moultrie on that roster.

 

Development is a much longer process than the news cycle. Debating the success or failure on a game by game basis is unfair. Its a team game and performance is collective.

 

Uh, no. Sure it's a collective performance, but you can still stand out if you have game. Nike hype be damned, the OM we saw last night is the OM she is. You can only Instagram your way to greatness for so long.

 

Moultrie did quite well in the first game, and the announcers in the Netherlands game said so. They especially pointed out her trough-ball assist

the second game was a collective failure of a very immature looking u20 effort. Poor passing through the midfield and not marking players in their own third doomed them. Positioning by the keeper on two of the goals was also poor. It turns out that soccer is more than running fast.

there isn’t any US player you can point to as having had a great game against the a Netherlands.

 

Are you saying you think they all just had a bad game? I think this is just the quality of their play when they are faced with a true competitive opponent. Up till now they have mostly played teams that were not very strong.

 

Ghana red cards played a part. They are all immature. Precisely why looking at Thirns performances and going overboard is as unfair as being too critical now. It’s a long process