Man, I juts realized our players are so short. No wonder we suck in aerial play against the big teams. Our tallest player is like 6', and other than that our players are like 5'10 or soemthing. Cobi jones is 5' 7". I know short players can be great (maradona), but we need tall players in order to Mature our game. Maybe all our tall athletes go into other sports...
In most countries, if the general population is known for being short, the national team tends to have shorter players as well (i.e. South Korea). However, that is in the case in the USA. Our players are very short, but Americans on average aren't. The heights of players on the US national team do not represent the general population.
USA - Do you have any stats to back that up. I believe I read recently that the average adult male's height in the US is 5'9", which I think puts our team right around the US average, no?
Because when boys are 13-14, the bigger, more athletic ones start concentrating on football/basketball. I have seen some ODP teams that look like a bunch of scrawny midgets.
When our best athletes realize you can make money in soccer like in basketball, football or baseball you'll see our team growing in height and the players will be stronger too.
what kind of a moron are you? THIS IS NOT BASKETBALL! the USMNT doesn't need tall players to "mature" their game, they just need to have more ball possession which means they need more players like Reyna. We don't have enough players like Reyna.
Several of you have hit upon the answer, which should have been obvious: If you are a young elite athlete, and are blessed with size and speed, it makes no sense to pursue soccer. If you have the choice, it's really no choice at all: a first round MLS draft choice, if he's not a Developmental player making a maximum $24,000 a year, is still unlikely to pull down more than $50,000 with the hope of someday making league max of $300k or so. A first round NFL or NBA draft pick is an instant millionaire and will make more in his first year than 90% of MLS players will make in a 10 year career. I have been saying for years, and will keep on saying, that the whole problem with US soccer is that we don't get our share of the elite athletes. We don't need them all - just let us have 20% and we'll dominate world soccer in a generation.
how many good 6'4"+ outfield players can you think of? There's Kanu...and...erm....? Now either the rest of the world doesn't have tall people, or there's actually a disadvantage in being that height. You choose.
Yeah dude some peasant in Uganda gets the same level of nourishment and vitamins to grow as the average American. Bill Archer nails it, when US soccer keeps its best players and stops being a feeder league for europe, it will become truly major league and be able to tempt our best athletes from football,basketball and baseball,as well as the best of foreign talent, when that happens the rest of the world better watch out.
I have to say that i disagree with this. I don't think that it has anything to do with not being a feeder league, and a lot more to do with exposure to the opportunities there are worldwide. When people realize that not only are there opportunities to ply your trade in america, but also in leagues all over the world, athletes will see the benefit of giving it a go. this is a world-wide game. hell, a sport when you can play at a high level in many different locales all over the world ...... that's beautiful.
Jan Koller, Carsten Jancker. I would assume there's probably some good to decent 6'4"+ defenders. Center of gravity is a problem though. It's not really basketball height that's an issue, it's that the other big sports almost all universally look down on players under 5'11" or so. So soccer has the pool of 5'10" and under guys almost to themselves.
I thought the myth that Koreans are short had been dispelled a couple of years ago on this board. The S. Korean team is talling than ours in WC 02.
What an idiotic post. When our guys have world class skills, we'll go up a notch in level. If you saw the match against Holland, our lack of height had nothing to do with our inability to string passes together. That's our problem...not how tall we are.... Stop living in some dream world where we start taking athletes from the other other sports. Tall athletic guys will always play basketball...aggressive muscular types will always play football..... We need to worry about teaching the players that we are getting and let the chips fall where they may athletically....
Wow, are you stupid. Unbelievable. Name me even one player that has had resonable success (ODP at younger ages) that quit soccer because there was more money in basketball. There are several NBA players that have played soccer as youngsters, but they were always basketball-first athletes. So show me a soccer-first athlete that is tearing up the NFL, NBA, etc.
Most youth soccer players start when they are about 5. In our area, nearly all the kids in town play soccer and baseball. The kids who don't start at that age mostly never play sports of any kind. At the start of the U9 season, when the kids are 8, there are tryouts for the competitive teams. About 10% of the kids are chosen for the competitive teams; the other 90% stay in the rec program. During the next 3 to 4 years some of the comp team kids fail annual tryouts and return to the rec program and some of the rec team kids get selected to join the comp teams. In our league of 1200 kids, this might number 5 kids down and 5 kids up per age group. By the time the players are 14 they are pretty much frozen into comp or rec. Also by 14 about 80% of the rec players give it up and don't play at all. From the original pool of about 30 U8 teams (420 players) it shakes out to 1 select team, 1 advanced house team and 1 rec team (maybe 50 players total)(the U8 group is U7 & U8 players). So if most of the athletic kids in town play soccer - where do the football and basketball players come from: Mostly from the kids who don't make the comp teams at U9 and also from about 1/3 of the comp players who play two or more sports. In summary - around here soccer has first dibs on the athletic kids and the most athletic of them stick with soccer until they are out of high school.
Patrick Vieira is 6'4" I'm sure if I bothered to research it I could come up with a few more. Besides which, your logic is faulty anyway. Being tall is an advantage, but not so big an advantage that you don't still need lots of skill to be a top class footballer (tall players are rarely in the top leagues at the expense of more talented players, most of the time they have talent as well). The reason there aren't that many 6'4" + footballers around is that the probability of being that tall is low. Therefore, most of the (very) few people with enough talent to become top footballers aren't 6'4"+. taller players have an advantage when winning headers, obviously, but there are other more subtle advantages. small players can be 'eased' of the ball more easily, and can be more injury prone. It also varies with position. Having all short defenders is a bad idea if the opposition keep hitting high balls into the box, with midfielders it doesn't make that much difference.
Zidane is actually 6'-2" (185cm), David Beckham is 6' (180cm), Ronaldinho is 5'-11" and Ronaldo is 6' or so, too (183cm). Some of these players are deceptively tall, (but yes, short people can play, too--Michael Owen is 5'-8"). I think we're missing the point in talking about 6'4" people, here. I've always felt the US team was a little small compared to some others--we have a lot of guys around 5'-9" and shorter. The Dutch may be a bad comparison, as they are the tallest nation on the planet, IIRC. And that wasn't our problem in the recent game, no. But, when we are basing our future on players like Beasley and Convey, we do look a little lightweight. One of the reasons Shalrie Joseph stands out in MLS midfields is his size, compared to, say, Chris Armas (effective nonetheless). Sure, size isn't everything, but it doesn't hurt. Some of the European players are deceptively big. Unfortunately, the best I could do would be a list of metric measurements, which would mean little to most of us... And of course, the English are having the exact same problem with their forward line...
Yes, the majority of great players aren't that tall - but only because the population in general isn't on average that tall (6'4'') Are you saying that because all these players aren't tall then height must be a disadvantage? If so you're wrong, and it doesn't follow logically. Certainly height isn't a huge advantage, lack of height is never going to hold back players as talented as these very much. (A bit O/T but now that you've mentioned it...) Only because a change in personnel hasn't resulted in a change of tactics. Endless balls over the top to Michael 'can't win headers, bless him' Owen and Emile 'can't do ANYTHING' Heskey was bad enough. But with Rooney and Owen we really should be trying more low balls through the centre or early crosses into the box so they can use their speed.
Wasn't there that soccer player at Notre Dame who was the Big East freshman of the year, then quit soccer to become a defensive back on the ND football team? I think he also won a U19 national title with his club team before he quit soccer.
The average white and black American male are about 5'10" the average hispanic American male is just about 5'7" and the composite average for all American males is 5'9". Chuckinca the problem with your analysis is that you live in California. The scenario where most kids play soccer growing up and the ones who can't cut it go on to play other sports does not happen in the states you have to fly over to to get to New York. It seems that there are few national team players who are from the geographical center of the United States. Most are from the coasts and the upper midwest.
cultural visibility Tall is irrelevant to the sport, but team tallness is an indicator of US soccer being a minor interest sport like lacrosse or the luge. Adu may raise the profile of soccer among US future athaletes as a sport that can deliver the big bucks. I hope he doesn't end up being totally squeaky clean. WUSA tried that, and where are they now? Soccer has too much of a nicey-nice aspect in the USA. The players who leave for Europe like Howard and Mathis are invisible to the general public. Great young athletes can make money in soccer, often with long careers. At the moment, MLS isn't attractive monetarily, but if you are great, then you can make money internationally. Maybe someday someone in USSF will count the number of pro positions and total wages paid in English-language leagues worldwide and compare it to the same numbers for the NBA/NFL/MLB. Add in the numbers for the Spanish-speaking leagues. That might open up some eyes.