The Hidden Problem Killing U.S. Soccer: Are Tournaments to Blame?

[Anonymous]

I don’t find soccer in the US to be ideal, but it is not bad comparatively. Considering there are 211 countries in FIFA and US men are ranked 16 and women are ranked 1, are we really that bad?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Lack of free play is killing youth soccer. Parents would rather pay cone drill kings than have their kid plays play pickup with their friends in a 1v1, 2v2, 3v3 or 4v4 format.

trust me I'd love that - it just doesn't exist. Kids are over scheduled and don't just hang out at the local park (and btw most of those kids strong enough play with are towns away). Even mixing AGs, it's just not part of our current culture.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:All of these arguments end up at the same place. Soccer in the US is the way it is because it's just not very popular compared with other mainstream sports. Every single one of the so called "problems" also exist in the popular sports but aren't "ruining" them. Excessive travel? Check. Big revenue tournaments? Check. As long as soccer doesn't generate the kind of revenue that football, baseball, basketball do, these dynamics will remain.

Except those other sports aren’t compared to development results in other countries. Comparing the US development model for soccer to other countries shows how broken it is. There is no comparison for the NFL. There are only a few countries that play baseball and most of those the end goal is to get to MLB. Basketball is getting bigger outside of the US but still not many countries really care about it. Plus they all use drafts and don’t develop their own players.

Our professional teams are few, poor, and spread out too far. Our national organization is disorganized and doesn’t care to really get involved in the youth game for organization and oversight. The pay to play model doesn’t reward individual player development or incentivize coaches to push players to the highest level - it looks more to a cycle of recruiting and winning to keep getting paid.

I agree but you are missing the point. It’s pay to play not because someone thought it would be a better development model, but because there isn’t another source to fund it because professional soccer doesn’t have enough money to fund it here because it’s not popular enough. If it were more popular there would be more money which would attract better coaches and athletes. Pay to play is a fine development model which could still turn out globally competitive players like it does in other sports here.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:^ and the top college basketball players only stay for 1 year of college before heading Pro—-like Cooper Flagg.

"One and done" has been around for nearly 20 years.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:All of these arguments end up at the same place. Soccer in the US is the way it is because it's just not very popular compared with other mainstream sports. Every single one of the so called "problems" also exist in the popular sports but aren't "ruining" them. Excessive travel? Check. Big revenue tournaments? Check. As long as soccer doesn't generate the kind of revenue that football, baseball, basketball do, these dynamics will remain.

Except those other sports aren’t compared to development results in other countries. Comparing the US development model for soccer to other countries shows how broken it is. There is no comparison for the NFL. There are only a few countries that play baseball and most of those the end goal is to get to MLB. Basketball is getting bigger outside of the US but still not many countries really care about it. Plus they all use drafts and don’t develop their own players.

Our professional teams are few, poor, and spread out too far. Our national organization is disorganized and doesn’t care to really get involved in the youth game for organization and oversight. The pay to play model doesn’t reward individual player development or incentivize coaches to push players to the highest level - it looks more to a cycle of recruiting and winning to keep getting paid.

I agree but you are missing the point. It’s pay to play not because someone thought it would be a better development model, but because there isn’t another source to fund it because professional soccer doesn’t have enough money to fund it here because it’s not popular enough. If it were more popular there would be more money which would attract better coaches and athletes. Pay to play is a fine development model which could still turn out globally competitive players like it does in other sports here.

You could still have a “pay” model administered by the national federation. Some structure, oversight, curriculum, established pathways, incentives for coaches to develop players and push them up. A national structure with clear “National travel” teams, “Regional travel”, and “local travel”, a spoke and wheel design with geographical local clubs feeding regional, regional feeding National. Coaches hired and overseen by the national federation so coaches are placed and paid based on ability, not recruiting and instagram. It would not be without hurdles, but it could be done and would be a massive improvement.

[Anonymous]

^hub and spoke, not spoke and wheel.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:All of these arguments end up at the same place. Soccer in the US is the way it is because it's just not very popular compared with other mainstream sports. Every single one of the so called "problems" also exist in the popular sports but aren't "ruining" them. Excessive travel? Check. Big revenue tournaments? Check. As long as soccer doesn't generate the kind of revenue that football, baseball, basketball do, these dynamics will remain.

Except those other sports aren’t compared to development results in other countries. Comparing the US development model for soccer to other countries shows how broken it is. There is no comparison for the NFL. There are only a few countries that play baseball and most of those the end goal is to get to MLB. Basketball is getting bigger outside of the US but still not many countries really care about it. Plus they all use drafts and don’t develop their own players.

Our professional teams are few, poor, and spread out too far. Our national organization is disorganized and doesn’t care to really get involved in the youth game for organization and oversight. The pay to play model doesn’t reward individual player development or incentivize coaches to push players to the highest level - it looks more to a cycle of recruiting and winning to keep getting paid.

I agree but you are missing the point. It’s pay to play not because someone thought it would be a better development model, but because there isn’t another source to fund it because professional soccer doesn’t have enough money to fund it here because it’s not popular enough. If it were more popular there would be more money which would attract better coaches and athletes. Pay to play is a fine development model which could still turn out globally competitive players like it does in other sports here.

You're saying the rest of the entire world has professional soccer funding youth soccer and that's why we're the only country where expensive pay-to-play issues exists?