Arlington Red team vs Arlington DA

[Anonymous]

RantingSoccerDad wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Arlington DA is pre-HS. It doesn’t matter yet. She can quit DA if she wants to play HS down the road.

Frankly, I think DA is a gimmick and don’t like 4 practices per week and large rosters.

But I assume the majority of her current red team will do it and if she wants to stick with them she does it unless you all band together and say f@ck it.

Once DA and ECNL begin kids get separated. Trying to keep the team together just does not work past U12 as this is a transition year. Your "band together" comment sounds like many parents who's kids made friends though Rec and also wanted to keep them together when they look into going into travel.

You will need to determine what it is important to your daughter. DA or ECNL are college showcase leagues primarily. If your daughter wishes to play in college then you should look into which league can provide a proven pathway as well as the best fit for your daughter. IF she is primarily interested in the social aspects then it is likely that neither league is a good fit and perhaps regardless of the team makeup playing on Red might be the best choice.

But DO NOT try and convince parents to choose one or the other just to keep the team together. To do so would do a tremendous disservice to all involved. All of your daughter's teammates at this point, just like when leaving Rec, must choose what is in their best interests based on their long term goals not short term comfort or compatibility.

Ok, coach. We will all commit to traveling out of state every other weekend. Thanks for the tip.

Not so sure. Our team of top players all have said f*ck it to stuff as a unit and there really wasn't much they could do except cut their best 15 players in the age group...which they did not.

Some times it takes a village to stand up to the horseshit that has become US Youth soccer.

You are my new hero.

Look, I speak with former women's national team players all the time. They played because it was FUN. They played other sports. They played with friends.

Sure, the rest of the world has advanced in technical skills. So is the best solution to put everyone on airplanes every other week? How much technical skill do you develop at 35,000 feet, anyway?

I've also spoken with DA people, and I get what they're trying to do. Lots of training. Centralized planning. OK.

But I have not spoken with anyone who thinks you HAVE to go along with the DA approach to fulfill your potential as a soccer player and a human being. We have, and will continue to have, multiple pathways.

Put another way -- if Mallory Pugh can be one of the best players on the national team a couple of years after playing high school soccer, how are you going to tell 15 families they have to give up everything else to go to the DA?

PP. Agreed. I played with some of those women. I'm telling you--our parents would have said 'NO WAY' to every weekend out of state travel. They certainly took us to many away tournaments and plane trips to Regionals/Nationals, etc. But-I can just picture the dads from my team if somebody told them we were going to regular season games 4-5 hours away. I can tell you where they would have told them to stuff it.

There was one league. Pro/rel. All the best teams in the DMV were in this ONE league. We also were sponsored by Patrick (remember them?) so we didn't even have to pay for cleats, uniforms or bags. Our travel coaches were former pro players that weren't even paid back then.

I just cannot understand how they are getting away with this crazy shit today. Why are parents spending $8-10k for soccer a year? And, then, afraid to open their mouths because they worry about their kid being black-balled. This mentality is so wrong.

There were a lot more people back then that did things out of love for the game. It's big business now. People are throwing $ directly into the trash can. This travel up and down the Coast is not making better players. It's just not and it's foolish to think it has value.

Mia Hamm, Kristine Lilly, Michelle Akers, Julie Foudy, etc. People cannot say that their quality was not as good-- if not better-- than a lot of the women today. They certainly weren't doing this crap.

When is this revolution going to happen? We just basically voted in more of the same. It's a disgrace. If my kids didn't love the game--I certainly wouldn't be steering them into it because I absolutely hate what has become of the sport. Instead of making the sport more inclusive, we are going in the opposite direction.

But--US youth soccer has a captive audience. Parents are buying into this stuff without questioning it.

When will the revolution happen? I am still waiting. Do we need the women to fail to qualify for the World Cup also and our Men two more times?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

RantingSoccerDad wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Arlington DA is pre-HS. It doesn’t matter yet. She can quit DA if she wants to play HS down the road.

Frankly, I think DA is a gimmick and don’t like 4 practices per week and large rosters.

But I assume the majority of her current red team will do it and if she wants to stick with them she does it unless you all band together and say f@ck it.

Once DA and ECNL begin kids get separated. Trying to keep the team together just does not work past U12 as this is a transition year. Your "band together" comment sounds like many parents who's kids made friends though Rec and also wanted to keep them together when they look into going into travel.

You will need to determine what it is important to your daughter. DA or ECNL are college showcase leagues primarily. If your daughter wishes to play in college then you should look into which league can provide a proven pathway as well as the best fit for your daughter. IF she is primarily interested in the social aspects then it is likely that neither league is a good fit and perhaps regardless of the team makeup playing on Red might be the best choice.

But DO NOT try and convince parents to choose one or the other just to keep the team together. To do so would do a tremendous disservice to all involved. All of your daughter's teammates at this point, just like when leaving Rec, must choose what is in their best interests based on their long term goals not short term comfort or compatibility.

Ok, coach. We will all commit to traveling out of state every other weekend. Thanks for the tip.

Not so sure. Our team of top players all have said f*ck it to stuff as a unit and there really wasn't much they could do except cut their best 15 players in the age group...which they did not.

Some times it takes a village to stand up to the horseshit that has become US Youth soccer.

You are my new hero.

Look, I speak with former women's national team players all the time. They played because it was FUN. They played other sports. They played with friends.

Sure, the rest of the world has advanced in technical skills. So is the best solution to put everyone on airplanes every other week? How much technical skill do you develop at 35,000 feet, anyway?

I've also spoken with DA people, and I get what they're trying to do. Lots of training. Centralized planning. OK.

But I have not spoken with anyone who thinks you HAVE to go along with the DA approach to fulfill your potential as a soccer player and a human being. We have, and will continue to have, multiple pathways.

Put another way -- if Mallory Pugh can be one of the best players on the national team a couple of years after playing high school soccer, how are you going to tell 15 families they have to give up everything else to go to the DA?

First of all, DA clubs don't fly all over the country every weekend. You play regionally in the mid Atlantic and can go to two national showcases every year at the older ages.

Second, the fifteen girls on Arlington red can stay on arlington red for all I care. There are hundreds of girls in the area who will gladly take their place.

See, the last line says it all. There is always somebody else that will take a spot. That's also why Clubs can field 6 teams even when they don't have the field space or resources. There's always somebody they can backfill with.

[Anonymous]

I love how a simple question for this thread of "Subject: Arlington Red team vs Arlington DA - Thoughts on pros and cons?" allows all you nut jobs to jump in and chime in with the same crap you spew on the ECNL vs. DA thread. Advice - answer someones question with a thoughtful answer. Give them helpful information. Dont sit around and banter the same crap from another board. Get a life.

[Anonymous]

Are these 15 girls the 04 Red team?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I love how a simple question for this thread of "Subject: Arlington Red team vs Arlington DA - Thoughts on pros and cons?" allows all you nut jobs to jump in and chime in with the same crap you spew on the ECNL vs. DA thread. Advice - answer someones question with a thoughtful answer. Give them helpful information. Dont sit around and banter the same crap from another board. Get a life.

Some of us did. STFU jerk.

[Anonymous]

I think the DA vs ENCL debate has taken over the whole soccer board and filtered into this one.

[Anonymous]

To be fair—I thought I was on the DA ENCL thread when I posted. Oops.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I love how a simple question for this thread of "Subject: Arlington Red team vs Arlington DA - Thoughts on pros and cons?" allows all you nut jobs to jump in and chime in with the same crap you spew on the ECNL vs. DA thread. Advice - answer someones question with a thoughtful answer. Give them helpful information. Dont sit around and banter the same crap from another board. Get a life.

Some of us did. STFU jerk.

If you gave good information, then you would not have considered yourself a "nut job" and therefore would not be defensive regarding your comment. So, you must be on the ECNL / DA thread as a "local". No normal person would post STFU Jerk if they felt they gave good information to the question. They would feel good about the post and not internally feel they needed to defend the "nut jobs" from being called out. There are many good psychologists for you to see in NOVA to get help for insecurity complexes.

[Anonymous]

^^^ And thanks from all of us for your helpful post!

Ok, is there really a team in Arlington trying to resist GDA? This whole tangent is not even plausible IMO.

[Anonymous]

Does Arlington Red 05/06 really have 15 on roster? I thought 12 esp at 06? So that would mean maybe not all Red players make it to the DA?

[Anonymous]

15 on Roster must be 04s. Crazy notion to resist. Has to be one upset parent who was "lied to" by another who said their DD would stay Red.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Does Arlington Red 05/06 really have 15 on roster? I thought 12 esp at 06? So that would mean maybe not all Red players make it to the DA?

Well, 05 currently plays 11v11 so yes, at least 15 kids.

06 play 9v9 so 15 is not unreasonable and they of course will be 11v11 next year as well. But since they are all gonna stick together and just play as Red and not join DA because they are a special group and all......

[Anonymous]

If the question is should the 04 girls red team stay in USYSA competition or shift over to the DA, that's actually a tough question as I assume the team has set their sights on winning a National Championship.

I honestly don't know what I would do.

They definitely get exposure to college recruiters through the National League and the National Championships if they make it.

On the DA side, you are probably looking at a more manageable weekend schedule since you won't have CCL and Region1/State Cup/NCS games occupying every weekend. You still get two excellent showcase events where practically every college will have recruiting staff at. The draw back is that the DA National Championship is new.

[Anonymous]

I should also add that winning a USYSA National Championship is pretty prestigious and would put you in good historical company, but the truth is the competition level isn't what it was 10 years ago before ECNL came along and started to draw top teams and talent out of the competition as the DA is also doing.

[Anonymous]

State Cup isn't prestigious anymore either. The best teams in the State don't even participate it in.

It used to be different when every good team in the State vied for it. As a pp noted, National Championship is the same these days.

It's watered down.