Our U23 pool is filled with guys who are frikkin' HUGE!!!

Wow.. That team might be taller than the German senior squad.

 

Never really thought about it. That is truly amazing!

 

I have seen Knox Cameron, Nate Jaqua and Jason Thompson all up close and in person.

I am 6'3", 230# and my 17 yr old son is 6'3", 190#.

With both of us standing next to the guys named above, Cameron and Jaqua are very big -- not just tall, but huge shoulders, very well built. Jason doesn't seem that big -- I would never have guessed he was 6'1" before you listed this.

I think this is a sign of the progress that soccer has made in this country. Not that long ago, all of these guys would be playing tight end, outside linebacker or free safety in football or would have been playing basketball. It's no longer the case where soccer is predominantly the good athletes that were too small for football.

 

Question

Does this mean that my on-track-to-be 6' 2" son had better treasure his days in the midfield why he still has them?

 

Well Sandon is using a liberal definition of the under 23 pool.

Cameron, Simek, the Thompsons, Whitbread, Marshall and Cochrane are long shots for the team.

Interesting point though.

 

Re: Question

John,

My 6'3" son played attacking mid up through U14. At U15 (he was 6'1 at that time), he moved to a top level team and they moved him to outside back where his size could help the defense but his attacking abilities and speed could be used attacking up the flank.

This season (at U17) he has been splitting time between center back and outside mid -- depending upon whether the coach goes with a 4-4-2 or 3-5-2.

On his ODP team, he splits time between center back and striker -- generally playing the first half at center back and the second half at striker.

In college, he's very likely going to be a center back.

The long and the short of what I'm saying is make sure that although he's playing midfield that he develops good defending instincts and skills. It will make him versatile and valuable.

 

Future Development

Kev -

Don't get me wrong, I'm delighted that he's playing midfield.

When you have a big, fast kid, he usually is put as forward or sweeper on a U-Little team. Personally, I think that midfield is better developmentally than either position, since it involves both offense & defense and -- I would argue -- a more difficult and complex task of decision making. (At the younger ages, playing forward and sweeper primarily means chasing down a lot of balls.)

And my kid loves it because he gets to run all day and is constantly in the fray.

However, I suspect that his future lies where your son has gone -- to the back, or possibly up forward as a physical presence.

 

just a minor note, i think it's pretty optimistic to include whitebread in the US player pool. i highly doubt this kid wants to play for the US. i'd love it if someone can tell me different.

 

You'd definitely think this would be the case -- but you never know with those EPL Gods -- er, Managers -- Everton/Moyes is already whining about Rooney being called into too many games this summer.

 

I have not seen all of those guys play, so to some extent this is uneducated, but I don't think any of those guys are simply good enough for the Under 23 team which will be led by players of the quality of Donovan, Beasley, Convey, Martino, Buddle. It's a long way from USMNT caliber down to college or EPL reserve/youth teams.

And yes Conor Casey is not a long shot, though he may slip out of the starting lineup with Buddle's emergence.

 

His knee injury earlier this year makes this moot. But one more addition for completeness:

Roger Levesque 6'2", 175lbs
http://gostanford.ocsn.com/sports/m-soccer/mtt/levesque_roger00.html

 

I'll agree to a certain extent. However, it's one thing to be 6' plus and it's another thing to be 6' plus AND a good athlete. If a player isn't agile or quick/fast, it's basically akin to having a statue out there....Lateral agility is huge in soccer.

 

Its kind of funny how Gray and Levesque are guys people calling huge, because they match up almost exactly with me in height and weight when I was in good shape. The thing is that I have an incredibly fine but athletic bone structure and had a pretty low body fat % so its not like there was much other than muscle and vital organ on me, and there is no way I would consider myself to be a huge or powerfull guy. I was still a decent athlete at least.

Anyways, my point being that these guys are probably all still too small for football, and probably lack the amount of upper body strength that would let them excel in baseball or basketball. Not that they arent good athletes, just that they still would qualify as "too small" for elite level in other sports.

 

Soccer huge, remember, it's all relative to the sport. We're not competing against track stars and Rick Smits.....

 

Nah, got that, my point was that even "soccer huge" guys are the bottom of the size barrell for most american sports. So its not that we are competing with these other sports, just that some closer to borderline size guys are probably reading the handwriting on the wall and making the correct call on which sport to choose.

I bet at least a couple of these guys pursued soccer more heavily because it was more friendly to their build.

 

I was at 21 WC games in Korea. The thing that struck me most about Germany (I saw their games against Paraguay, the US, and Korea) was how big they were compared to the three teams they played.

 

This is true. My hope for the future is that we can get these types of athletes into picking soccer at an earlier age, instead of splitting their time with other sports. Most of the guys we have that could play football, did play football or basketball or baseball, etc.....Jason Thompson ran track in high school, Chris Albright played football, etc. It can't have helped their development much IMHO.

 

Sandon I agree with you but I think your missing a couple of the advantages of being smaller and why soccer has guys in the 6+ 170ish, size range. Playing 90 minutes with no breaks makes soccer much more an endurance sport than others, and carrying around an extra 20-40 pounds just to out muscle someone generally doesnt offset the extra fatigue you have from having to lug that muscle around. It may sound strange, but look at most 800-1600-3200 meter runners and youll see they conform much better to the size and weight ranges for soccer than the sprinters do.

A lot of the guys you listed are tall but relatively slimly built for an American athlete, meaning they are a compromise between size, strength and endurance. Now it could be these guys have the potential to bulk up if put into a D1 football program, but I also think theyd have a hard time of it.

Personally I think whats happening is that guys that 20 years ago would have eventually run into size issues are now realizing that they have a better option for their talents. Basketball is actually moving to more of a 6'2" and above sport (starting where soccer tends to leave off), so in reality opportunities for those guys is closing. So in a sense soccer is competeing with pointyball and other sports, but its not a competition thats going to effect the talent pool for those sports at the highest levels because these guys are still to low on the size envelope.

 

Am I the only one that is glad that that Cam guy isn't around?

 

All other things equal, mixing in some height -- and presumably aerial prowess -- on the team *is* an advantage. Isn't it the rule of thumb that something like 1/3 of all goals at the top levels of the game are scored on corners and other set pieces?? Buddle and Jacqua have got to scare every opposing keeper on corners. And I don't think I saw Marshall beaten to a single header in his Freshman year of college.

(follow up: I have that 1/3 figure in mind, but can't for the life of me recall where I heard it. Does anyone know of a reliable source of such stats?).

 

you get bonus points for the random rik smits reference.