Anonymous wrote:I have the one token Q4 on our ECNL team, second year in a row. The only kid born after June. I can’t wait to see what she looks like when she moves down an age group!
My kid's teams
G07/08 RL... 5 Q4
G10 NL... 5 Q4
B13 RL... 4 Q4
Since we're just doing anecdotes - U12G NA Pre-ECNL competitive team and 0 Q4s (but 2 late sept Q3s)
At the younger ages it's a huge issue.
People are throwing out numbers across whole teams while ignoring where, within the team pecking order, most of the two ends of the birthday spectrum sit. By U13-15, most of the top B team players are Fall birthdays while most of the bottom A team players are the early calendar birthdays. This is what I'm seeing at my daughter's ECNL club. Having watched them over the years, the younger kids were highly disproportionately placed on B teams at U8-9. As they have gotten older, those kids have risen in the ranks relative to the field. The oldest were highly disproportionately placed on A team at U8-9, and they have fallen in ranking over the years. As kids fall, they generally hang on to the A bench until there's a very clear switch in ability with the top B kids. Likewise, the top B kids get stuck at the top of B for a while until they very clearly have overtaken many on A. Because of where they started, and their natural trajectory, the middle age groups are extra ripe for moves from B to A and vice versa in a disruption of the status quo.
My Q4 daughter made the transition from B to A at U13. I've seen some messages in this thread that show a lot of animosity toward the Q1 parents. I'm sure it seems ridiculous to most, but I get where it's coming from. Along the journey with a younger kid, there are some early developer parents who are really mean about how their kid is better than yours. At U13-14, when some of those "terrible" kids have overtaken theirs, they are whining to the coaches and club about how they did a terrible job developing their kid. They still don't acknowledge that maybe their kid was just trucking down younger kids at 10 years old because they outweighed them by 10+ pounds and the littler kids had insufficient speed and skill to counter it. Of course, there were plenty of parents who could see that the hard-working younger kid was catching up every year, and they knew to be nice to a future teammate.
PP - also it's not 10lbs more like 40-50lbs at times which is ridiculous
50 pounds difference between a January and December kid?
Absolutely for girls U12 (and playing U13s a lot for 11 v11)
I’ve seen this too, even in the same age group some girls are through puberty and some girls haven’t even started. Moving up to 11v11 this early only requires athletic ability. The field is so big in relation to the girls that technical ability and a good first touch really isn’t needed and fast/can kick far is preferred by many coaches. Many smaller more technical girls are dropped around this age because coaches prefer attributes that will win games.
Anonymous wrote:MLSNext would reduce their player pool by more than half assuming ECNL and other orgs go SY
I don’t think so. In Texas, kids (and parents) prefer to move to MLS Next third team (TX2), which is actually lower level than RL, than staying RL. Maybe even ECNL in some cases.
Completely insane. The TX2 kids I have seen are very poor.
Anonymous wrote:social scientists in years to come should really study this whole thread. The way topics shift around but always come back to the same point. The not at all surprising but still somewhat disturbing lack of statistical understanding. The straight up denial of obvious truths. This thread really has it all!
Anonymous wrote:MLSNext would reduce their player pool by more than half assuming ECNL and other orgs go SY
I don’t think so. In Texas, kids (and parents) prefer to move to MLS Next third team (TX2), which is actually lower level than RL, than staying RL. Maybe even ECNL in some cases.
Completely insane. The TX2 kids I have seen are very poor.
I think the MLSN charade of trying to sell parents on a pro-like path ends at mlsn2, even that is sketchy. Not sure if mlsn3 really is a thing but the point is the opportunity for MLSN to get the full pool of potential talent goes down massively with a different cutoff as they will alienate many of the pipeline top kids based on SY; and then have to resort to subset population based on a combination of clubhopping to chase BY RAE and the resorting of kids within their club. This subset will be not only limited but even more biased toward physically maturity rather than skill and long term characteristics. This also creates a chasm within those clubs where your SY top players will clubhop to EcNL to maintain their SY RAE and/or get frustrated that their starting role or playing time is disrupted by a less skilled but bigger faster BY player.
Anonymous wrote:MLSNext would reduce their player pool by more than half assuming ECNL and other orgs go SY
I don’t think so. In Texas, kids (and parents) prefer to move to MLS Next third team (TX2), which is actually lower level than RL, than staying RL. Maybe even ECNL in some cases.
Completely insane. The TX2 kids I have seen are very poor.
I’m in Texas and I’d put my son an RL team loooooong before TX2. I also think unless you’re on FC Dallas, Austin FC, or Houston Dynamo the best clubs are BY FAR ECNL.
Anonymous wrote:MLSNext would reduce their player pool by more than half assuming ECNL and other orgs go SY
I don’t think so. In Texas, kids (and parents) prefer to move to MLS Next third team (TX2), which is actually lower level than RL, than staying RL. Maybe even ECNL in some cases.
Completely insane. The TX2 kids I have seen are very poor.
I’m in Texas and I’d put my son an RL team loooooong before TX2. I also think unless you’re on FC Dallas, Austin FC, or Houston Dynamo the best clubs are BY FAR ECNL.
I totally agree! But I know a kid that just moved from an RL team (a good one, too!) to join the TX2 team of an MLSN club (not any of the academies you listed). I recall a few other stories like this last season as well.
I think people like saying their kid is in an MLSN club. And the kids like it as well.
Anonymous wrote:Where I am from almost all kids start playing Rec which is grade based. When they out grow that then switch to the BY competitive system. That would then mean the Q4 kids would now playing competitive would be playing against kids that have been playing soccer a year longer than them usually, in school a year longer definitely, in addition to being youngest, which all adds up.
Not that they ever would do it or could survive in our current system, but they should have 6-month teams, especially at younger ages. I think it would enhance development and reduce the effects of RAE. It sort of exists now with how clubs have a/b teams, but that system loses far too many from the b team who lose interest as the perception of support and resources always lie with the A team.
SY should help some with retention, how much is hard to say. But what we need is for kids and more importantly parents to view the B and C teams as an opportunity and a motivator. Soccer development, like most everything in life, is a marathon and a roller coaster; embrace it.
Why are we trotting out the retention canard again?
The data doesn’t support that theory. Retention is cyclical and the issues hurting youth sports retention are found in all sports, including the multitude of sports that were always SY.
Retention is the driving reason for leagues switching back to school year.
True, most people believe the data (and logic) supports this, but a few don't.
Believing is not the same as being correct. Lots of things seem right. This is one that is very clearly not evidenced in the data, but sounds right.
And just because a logical argument can be made, doesn’t mean it is correct. Logic is not categorically true.
Anonymous wrote:Where I am from almost all kids start playing Rec which is grade based. When they out grow that then switch to the BY competitive system. That would then mean the Q4 kids would now playing competitive would be playing against kids that have been playing soccer a year longer than them usually, in school a year longer definitely, in addition to being youngest, which all adds up.
Not that they ever would do it or could survive in our current system, but they should have 6-month teams, especially at younger ages. I think it would enhance development and reduce the effects of RAE. It sort of exists now with how clubs have a/b teams, but that system loses far too many from the b team who lose interest as the perception of support and resources always lie with the A team.
SY should help some with retention, how much is hard to say. But what we need is for kids and more importantly parents to view the B and C teams as an opportunity and a motivator. Soccer development, like most everything in life, is a marathon and a roller coaster; embrace it.
Why are we trotting out the retention canard again?
The data doesn’t support that theory. Retention is cyclical and the issues hurting youth sports retention are found in all sports, including the multitude of sports that were always SY.
Retention is the driving reason for leagues switching back to school year.
True, most people believe the data (and logic) supports this, but a few don't.
Believing is not the same as being correct. Lots of things seem right. This is one that is very clearly not evidenced in the data, but sounds right.
And just because a logical argument can be made, doesn’t mean it is correct. Logic is not categorically true.
Retention? Or ease of recruiting? or trapped players? or BY was not improving YNT as intended?
Anonymous wrote:MLSNext would reduce their player pool by more than half assuming ECNL and other orgs go SY
I don’t think so. In Texas, kids (and parents) prefer to move to MLS Next third team (TX2), which is actually lower level than RL, than staying RL. Maybe even ECNL in some cases.
Completely insane. The TX2 kids I have seen are very poor.
I think the MLSN charade of trying to sell parents on a pro-like path ends at mlsn2, even that is sketchy. Not sure if mlsn3 really is a thing but the point is the opportunity for MLSN to get the full pool of potential talent goes down massively with a different cutoff as they will alienate many of the pipeline top kids based on SY; and then have to resort to subset population based on a combination of clubhopping to chase BY RAE and the resorting of kids within their club. This subset will be not only limited but even more biased toward physically maturity rather than skill and long term characteristics. This also creates a chasm within those clubs where your SY top players will clubhop to EcNL to maintain their SY RAE and/or get frustrated that their starting role or playing time is disrupted by a less skilled but bigger faster BY player.
Why would mls be stuck with less skilled players? I see the argument they sort of cut the potential talent pool in half by an age cutoff divide. But wouldn’t the skill be equally distributed between the two groups wanting an age advantage?
Anonymous wrote:I have the one token Q4 on our ECNL team, second year in a row. The only kid born after June. I can’t wait to see what she looks like when she moves down an age group!
My kid's teams
G07/08 RL... 5 Q4
G10 NL... 5 Q4
B13 RL... 4 Q4
Since we're just doing anecdotes - U12G NA Pre-ECNL competitive team and 0 Q4s (but 2 late sept Q3s)
At the younger ages it's a huge issue.
People are throwing out numbers across whole teams while ignoring where, within the team pecking order, most of the two ends of the birthday spectrum sit. By U13-15, most of the top B team players are Fall birthdays while most of the bottom A team players are the early calendar birthdays. This is what I'm seeing at my daughter's ECNL club. Having watched them over the years, the younger kids were highly disproportionately placed on B teams at U8-9. As they have gotten older, those kids have risen in the ranks relative to the field. The oldest were highly disproportionately placed on A team at U8-9, and they have fallen in ranking over the years. As kids fall, they generally hang on to the A bench until there's a very clear switch in ability with the top B kids. Likewise, the top B kids get stuck at the top of B for a while until they very clearly have overtaken many on A. Because of where they started, and their natural trajectory, the middle age groups are extra ripe for moves from B to A and vice versa in a disruption of the status quo.
My Q4 daughter made the transition from B to A at U13. I've seen some messages in this thread that show a lot of animosity toward the Q1 parents. I'm sure it seems ridiculous to most, but I get where it's coming from. Along the journey with a younger kid, there are some early developer parents who are really mean about how their kid is better than yours. At U13-14, when some of those "terrible" kids have overtaken theirs, they are whining to the coaches and club about how they did a terrible job developing their kid. They still don't acknowledge that maybe their kid was just trucking down younger kids at 10 years old because they outweighed them by 10+ pounds and the littler kids had insufficient speed and skill to counter it. Of course, there were plenty of parents who could see that the hard-working younger kid was catching up every year, and they knew to be nice to a future teammate.
I agree that age is one of many factors... I just think it is a bit overblown. Kids develop at different ages. My January birthday developed very late, my December birthday very early, etc. etc. Every NL and RL team I look at at our club has anywhere from 2-6 Q4 players, I understand this is not comprehensive, but I am sure it's not uncommon. No matter when your child is born, put a ball at their feet early, train with them, put them in competitive environments with good coaches, ensure they train on thier own as they get older, foster a love for the game, if they have any talent all will be well.
That's way too naive.
Kids aren't motivated to train or train harder or keep playing when there told there are not that good compared to the older kids and stuck on the second or lower and are stuck at the less glamorous positions. So other sports find them and they quit soccer or keep it as gig work.
Team just demoted all 5 Q4s for next year. (Club is run by morons who have gone in the opposite direction to prepare for the age change.) You think that fosters love for the game?
I couldn't disagree more... many kids are motivated in these difficult circumstances... I've seen it many times. When appropriately challenged and encouraged, I've seen my own kids rise to the occasion. Don't be so dismissive.
I've also seen Q4s more developed than Q1s, and vice versa. Don't sweat this stuff...
Get your kids on the ball early, train with them when they are young, get them in competitive environments and on competitive teams, prioritize individual training as they get older, foster a love for the game... if they have any talent, all will be well.
Unfortunately we all suffer from bias and our eyes don't see enough samples to properly evaluate. That is why science and research is needed. And the science says you are incorrect.
The science does not say that... the science says that more Q1 and Q2 players make and stay on the top teams than Q3 and Q4 players. The science also says that there are SOME Q3 and Q4 that make it. So, if you want your Q3 or Q4 kid to be one of them... "Get your kids on the ball early, train with them when they are young, get them in competitive environments and on competitive teams, prioritize individual training as they get older, foster a love for the game... if they have any talent, all will be well."
The science sure as heck says that your opinion isn't fact because of your small n.
You are right, players and parents should just give up if they are Q4 (or Q3 starting next year) ... what is your point? I acknowledge it is more difficult for those players; my point is that there are things that can be done to combat the statistics.
"Your right [then I will add things that you didn't say]" Well done.
Fair enough maybe, I figured you were the person I was going back and forth with before... whether you are or not, I was responding to the general tone of the discussion. Somehow as part of this discussion people are trying to paint me as a person that doesn't agree with the general stipulations of RAE, that is not acurate. My point from the beginning has been that proactive players and parents can mitigate the impacts of RAE by putting in the work. This approach will benefit your children both inside and outside the game...
Person 1: Hey, here's some data that Q4s with a school year cutoff are nearly three times less likely to be on top club teams.
Person 2: What are you crying about? You should have foreseen this when your November-born kid was 6 years old and "mitigated" it by training him/her twice as hard as the kids born earlier in the birth year.
Is that about right?
Nah, not right... I never took the "what are you crying about tone"
What I said was... "No matter when your child is born, put a ball at their feet early, train with them, put them in competitive environments with good coaches, ensure they train on thier own as they get older, foster a love for the game, if they have any talent all will be well"
It's not about training 2x as hard, it's about starting early and being consistent. It's worked for me and mine, take that for what it is. Or don't, it's all good.