U.S. Soccer ends development academy as MLS announces youth league https://www.espn.com/soccer/-states...lopment-academy-as-mls-announces-youth-league We heard it was rumored - now it is official. Is this a cost saving move or a handy way to minimize non-MLS academies? You discuss - I decide.
What I’d like to see happen is MLS, USL-C, and USL-1all form academy systems. Maybe you can add USL-2 in there, but I don’t know how about it’s sustainability. More so, I still want to see a legitimate u21/u23 league that counters the problems caused by NCAA soccer that’s made up of MLS and USL teams, plus a few key expansion teams in college towns. As an example, what I’d like to see the South’s conference to look like... MLS teams: Atlanta United, Nashville SC, Inter Miami, Orlando City, Charlotte USL-C teams: Charleston Battery, Raleigh FC (North Carolina FC), Birmingham Legion FC, Memphis 901, Miami FC, Tampa Bay Rowdies USL-1 teams: Greenville Triumph, Chattanooga Red Wolves, South Georgia Tormenta USL-C expansion candidates: Jacksonville, New Orleans, Greensboro USL-1/2 expansion candidates: Asheville, Columbia, Knoxville, Cape Coral, Bradenton-Sarasota, West Palm Beach, Port St. Lucie, Mobile, Montgomery, Huntsville, Wilmington, Jackson, Savannah, Columbus, Macon-Warner Robins, Athens, Atlanta-Gwinnett County, Augusta, Baton Rouge *Not counting reserve teams and Charlotte Independence who I believe will become Charlotte’s reserve team. Academy u18 league First division: 1. Atlanta United 2. Orlando City 3. Inter Miami 4. Nashville SC 5. Charlotte MLS 6. Charleston Battery 7. Raleigh FC 8. Birmingham Legion FC <9. Tampa Bay Rowdies <10. Miami Second Division +1 Jacksonville +2. New Orleans 3. Greensboro 4. Greenville Triumph 5. Chattanooga Red Wolves 6. South Georgia Tormenta 7. Asheville 8. Bradenton-Sarasota <9. Athens <10. Atlanta-Gwinnett County Third Division +1. Columbia +2. Gainesville (FL) 3. Columbus 4. Macon-Warner Robins 5. Atlanta-Peachtree City 6. Cape Coral 7. Knoxville 8. West Palm Beach <9. Port St. Lucie <10. Tuscaloosa Fourth Division +1. Wilmington +2. Jackson 3. Baton Rouge 4. Montgomery 5. Huntsville 6. Savannah 7. Augusta 8. Winston-Salem 9. Atlanta-Rockdale County 10. Tallahassee Note that the 2nd-4th Divisions will have to be more of a destination than a start. The idea is that we cover the map. I believe we could institute a regional promotion/relegation system, due to the fact this system is not driven by big business. That said, we don’t have to start with promotion/relegation. Maybe get our ducks in a row first. Then when the lower division is stable... then consider creating a pro/rel system. Now, consider a similar system throughout the country as the ultimate goal. Obviously, start with the first division, then the second division, and so forth. But when we can offer quality soccer and a pathway for kids across the country to make it to the pros... the US will make it big time.
Another way of suggesting this type of format would be all MLS, USLC, and USL1 teams form their academy system. After that, allow MLS (and USL if they can afford) teams to set up satellite academies. For example, under that hypothetical model... Atlanta United might set up academies not only in Atlanta, but in Kennesaw, Gwinnett, Athens, Peachtree City, Conyers etc. So, there might be an Atlanta United - Athens/Clarke County that forms to serve as a satellite academy team to Atlanta United. Dallas might form at FC Dallas - Nacagdoches. Who knows?
Let me add that there should be two tracks to professional soccer in the US. the first track should be the academy/club soccer track. As I laid out, I’d want to see MLS teams be incentivized to prioritize youth development and offering the highest quality of development possible. The second track is the more traditional track of school soccer. I don’t think we can neglect the importance of school soccer and improving school soccer across the country. What I recommend is advocating for a spring & fall seasons. Also offering free (or reduced cost) licensing and classes for HS coaches. No matter how we look at it... the college route will still be a viable route for some to enter the pros. I just would like it to be the catching those who fall through the cracks route.
until college is closer to club/pro soccer than t-ball is to baseball i cant get too excited about it. obviously there are exceptions (primarily foreign players coming for an education, along with plenty of raw talent), but the average prospect is (relatively) far older, worse coached- essentially at the level of a roughly 14 year old whos been in academies/club setups.
FC Dallas already is doing this throughout Texas and even into Mexico. SKC is also doing this throughout the midwest. More information on youth development going forward: https://theathletic.com/1750302/202...se-mls-and-others-will-seek-to-fill-the-void/
No doubt. It’s definitely the secondary route. But it has its benefits too. Primarily, it catches those who falls through the cracks. And it also spreads interest in the game.
im not raging against college soccer or anything, it really is just apathy. i think mls (and players) would be better served having a high school draft than...whichever of the six or sevens drafts are for college players.
...and the new version is not (I.e. MLS running youth development)? Any structure is going to be a power play. The question is whether this benefits US Soccer. No surprise that MLS wants to run as they are investing dollars (majority?) in US youth development (at least upper age groups). While I'm slightly optimistic this will be a better approach, I'm concerned on how focused MLS Teams will be on youth development as many of them can't even run their MLS-side well. While I haven't been actively involved with the DA in several years (my oldest son played on one the teams for two years), I struggled with the output into the professional ranks. It really ended up being a conduit to college soccer. The level of play was good, but there was too much sameness and were not producing outstanding players (game changers if you will). Wait and see...
As with most things where MLS and USSF have potentially differing incentives and motivations, I’m guessing that the decision benefits MLS to a large degree. How does this provide more optionality for our elite teenagers? Does it hurt their ability to go to the world’s best programs as soon as possible? Does it allow Good players players more domestic choices? That should be the priorities for the USMNT.
In a country of 315M or whatever it is, we need as many as possible involved in player development and have skin in the game. With this, we now have a fair amount fewer. Even if MLS balloons to 50 teams with 50 academies it won't be close enough to satisfying the development requirements of such a large land mass with our population.
We don't have a fair fewer involved. The other clubs aren't folding. Or at least, not because of this. They may fold because of the global pandemic going on. This is just a changing of the stratification. The very elite level looks like it will be a smaller subset of teams, and there's positives and negatives to that. For what it's worth, if you read the article on what MLS is proposing, it's likely to be a mix of MLS, USL and some non-professional sides that both play each, play local ECNL teams if they want and compete more often in international tourneys. It's actually hard to say the net effect on the players is fundamentally negative, though some will benefit and some will not. Personally, I'm fine starting to stratify based on pay to play and free to play. Pay to play is a huge barrier whose only realistic solution is professionally run academies.
From the article, it seems there were non-MLS-related pressures on the girls side of the league also. The distinction between a theory and a conspiracy theory is that the former accepts happenstance while the later reflexively insists all "evidence" supports it, even when unrelated.
there’s a sizable difference between conspiracy theory (where Palpatine is literally controlling things) and excessive influence. If MLS tilts the table so that 60% of every 50/50 decision go its way (or add 10% incremental probability in its favor to all decisions), that’s excessive IMO and wouldn’t surprise me because Garber is better at influencing than the USSF counterparts. In most instances, I’d examine whether this benefits MLS - to the extent that it does, I’d raise an eyebrow and see if USSF was able to extract some quid pro quo. there is additional evidence that MLS hired Jay Berhalter to assist it wrt this decision. Another raised eyebrow....
Definitely, but that may require some strategic subsidies, as the money for it does not seem to currently be in the system. One of the problems here is that the parents and kids never bought into this two-track concept. They wanted to play in both HS and club, while retaining both a pro avenue and college eligibility. And of course I've seen the downsides of the HS game: overwork (the reason the DA was started is that these kids were playing 100 games a year), terrible playing style, and the fact that kids whose only chance of playing at a higher level probably involved being a role player looked like Messiesque stars on HS pitches. But against this was posed the 'cultural' argument, that kids were just not all that invested in playing for their club teams, it was a purely transactional arrangement that didn't really breed desire or loyalty. We can only hope, though I think the COVID crisis is a setback for this or anything that costs money. If college soccer went to a 2-semester system, the sub rules would either go away or be ignored by most of the better programs, and I think, frankly, that college soccer would probably be played at a level as good as or better than a professional 3rd division in this country.
MLS and the pay to play Youth Clubs are the two power centers within USSF. MLS benefits from being a single entity that can throw around all of its weight while the youth clubs are, obviously, many hundreds of different organizations, are harder to coordinate and have some differences. Having the DA helped MLS by raising some standards and improving the tiny slice of participants (pro prospects) it effected. I’m not sure that the DA helped pay to play soccer get more upper middle class parents to pay full price for their kids and didn’t broadly serve the interests of all the clubs whose business model relies on that.
I suggest it happens in phases... the hypothetical model I laid out is something that’s years and years away. But I would like our planners to consider what does the end game look like? Ideally, for youth development, it’s where any player who is good enough has access to quality coaching and competition, regardless of location, economics, and politics.