US soccer rumors of changing back age groups?

[Anonymous]

[quote][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous]It will be switched back. Money is the driving factor. Numbers are low.[/quote]

Kids always left in middle school. Kids interests change in middle school. Lots of activities lose kids then. Every blackbelt daycare factory loses 95% of their clients at middle school too. Every gymnastics and dance school suffers the same fate.

Basketball and volley ball lose 80% of their elementary age players. Interests, size and more play a far greater role than a participation cutoff date.

Soccer suffers more from clubs like Arlington and Loudoun fielding 6+ teams deep through U13 and kids who don't move up get bored. Clubs are not losing players at the top to other sports they are losing kids on B, C and D teams in middle school because kids tend to see it for what it is, garbage play and they recognize their own limitations.

Thinking a soccer club should be 4+ teams deep at 11v11 is insane for travel level soccer. No kid teenager is giving up 3-4 nights a week to be on the 4th team unless they truly love playing. No age group cutoff will ever solve that. [/quote]

Six month age groups will solve some of that. It would cut the number of lower teams in half. It would keep more kids on the A team. So, not true. [/quote]

Six month age groups will solve some of that. It would cut the number of lower teams in half. It would keep more kids on the A team. So, not true.[/quote]

A kid who is on the July through December team knows they are on the B team no matter what you want to call it. The "older" team at every age group will always be perceived as the A team. The July/December team would never win a game against the Jan/June team in a scrimmage. You would actually lose kids faster than ever before.

Being a small kid and being placed on a younger age A team is better than being stuck on a July/December team through HS.

College coaches are still going to be drawn to larger players and will scout those teams predominately.

At some point the kids have to learn to fly on their own.

[/quote]

I know it is DCUM's mindset that everything is survival of the fittest so your dream is to drive out the weak kids, but a governing organization has an interest in having kids continue to play. In smaller nations where they actually train the kids they have instead of constantly looking to find better ones and casting others aside, they have had success in actually developing players and a soccer culture.[/quote][/quote]

I'm for finding a better solution and said what I think the better solution is. 6 month age grouping through elementary school and bio banding beyond.

If size is the issue then it is easier to designate a percentile in size during middle school that allows for change as the player grows and changes. But two 6 month age groups per birth year through 9th grade is unnecessary and overly complicated.

The game gets competitive in middle school and kids simply make the team or they don't but it will be based on differing factors by then because the system was more inclusive at the youngest ages and more developmentally tailored. If kids STILL need a helping hand then bio banding is a better instrument and more precise and flexible than maintaining a seemingly more and more arbitrary cutoff as they get older. Parents bitch now about trapped 8th graders imagine not being able to play with your friends through middle school because of the half of year you were born. You attend the same classes everyday, eat lunch together but have to play on different teams because one is born in June and the other in July?

[Anonymous]

^^
I'm for finding a better solution and said what I think the better solution is. 6 month age grouping through elementary school and bio banding beyond.

If size is the issue then it is easier to designate a percentile in size during middle school that allows for change as the player grows and changes. But two 6 month age groups per birth year through 9th grade is unnecessary and overly complicated.

The game gets competitive in middle school and kids simply make the team or they don't but it will be based on differing factors by then because the system was more inclusive at the youngest ages and more developmentally tailored. If kids STILL need a helping hand then bio banding is a better instrument and more precise and flexible than maintaining a seemingly more and more arbitrary cutoff as they get older. Parents bitch now about trapped 8th graders imagine not being able to play with your friends through middle school because of the half of year you were born. You attend the same classes everyday, eat lunch together but have to play on different teams because one is born in June and the other in July?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:^college coaches are looking at 16-18 year olds. I ready said to combine the teams at U16.

Soooo, you want to through a newly formed team together right at recruiting age? LOL

Look, I get it, your kid is born in the second half of the calendar and is likely on the smaller side. Changing the cutoffs will not make your kid any better or increase his opportunities. Being on the "younger team" is not the same as being on the "A Team" and playing in a even more diluted environment. And what is worse, is this is essentially your personal Rube Goldberg solution to a very small problem, even by distribution sample size standards.

The best soccer nations in the world do not even do this and they have the numbers to support it.

Look, you don't get it. My kid has already comitted to a pretty darn good program. Yes, she is a later month birthday.The vast majority of Sept - Dec kids were pushed off the top team during the age change. My kid survived. She was one of the very few.

This doesn't effect me...but it is the right thing to do. Favoring the early bloomers or the older kid before things have a chace to even out is a awful and stupid method of developing and identifying talent.

[Anonymous]

[quote=Anonymous]
The game gets competitive in middle school and kids simply make the team or they don't but it will be based on differing factors by then because the system was more inclusive at the youngest ages and more developmentally tailored. If kids STILL need a helping hand then bio banding is a better instrument and more precise and flexible than maintaining a seemingly more and more arbitrary cutoff as they get older. Parents bitch now about trapped 8th graders imagine not being able to play with your friends through middle school because of the half of year you were born. You attend the same classes everyday, eat lunch together but have to play on different teams because one is born in June and the other in July?


[/quote]

you do realize that there will always be kids who miss the cutoff by a day no matter when you make it? It's rough on the 8th graders when most of their team is in 9th, it's great when they enter 7th already friends with 8th graders. Teams and school don't have to go hand and hand- even with school year age groups, you still have kids in public ad multiple schools and kids in private at multiple schools on the same team

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:^college coaches are looking at 16-18 year olds. I ready said to combine the teams at U16.

Soooo, you want to through a newly formed team together right at recruiting age? LOL

Look, I get it, your kid is born in the second half of the calendar and is likely on the smaller side. Changing the cutoffs will not make your kid any better or increase his opportunities. Being on the "younger team" is not the same as being on the "A Team" and playing in a even more diluted environment. And what is worse, is this is essentially your personal Rube Goldberg solution to a very small problem, even by distribution sample size standards.

The best soccer nations in the world do not even do this and they have the numbers to support it.

Look, you don't get it. My kid has already comitted to a pretty darn good program. Yes, she is a later month birthday.The vast majority of Sept - Dec kids were pushed off the top team during the age change. My kid survived. She was one of the very few.

This doesn't effect me...but it is the right thing to do. Favoring the early bloomers or the older kid before things have a chace to even out is a awful and stupid method of developing and identifying talent.

It is the right idea but the wrong mechanism. I'm sorry, but for middle school and beyond it is DUMB.

There are ways to help smaller kids that need to be normalized in the way that playing up is perfectly accepted for bigger and stronger kids. We have no similar mechanism for smaller older kids.

The two age groupings works for elementary school because of the predictability of size differences at younger ages. But as kids reach middle school birth month plays less and less a determining factor in player size. There are December kids who are the biggest kids on their team. A system that can cluster based on accurate metrics is fine as long as those groups can be reasonably predicted. Your belief that all tall middle school age kids are the oldest is false. And conversely, not all the smallest kids are the youngest by that age either. But in third grade? yeah, it is statistically probably the case. And during those years, to attract and retain kids through the 12 month calendar year is vital for a well developed player pool to draw from at the tween and teen years.

[Anonymous]

The greatest age gap in a 6 month age group is........six months.

Thats a lot better than one year.

Go look at any roster. How many Jan- Mar birth years vs Sept - Dec birth year do you see?

We are picking winners and lovers based on birth months.

How stupid are we really?

[Anonymous]

[quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous]
The game gets competitive in middle school and kids simply make the team or they don't but it will be based on differing factors by then because the system was more inclusive at the youngest ages and more developmentally tailored. If kids STILL need a helping hand then bio banding is a better instrument and more precise and flexible than maintaining a seemingly more and more arbitrary cutoff as they get older. Parents bitch now about trapped 8th graders imagine not being able to play with your friends through middle school because of the half of year you were born. You attend the same classes everyday, eat lunch together but have to play on different teams because one is born in June and the other in July?


[/quote]

you do realize that there will always be kids who miss the cutoff by a day no matter when you make it? It's rough on the 8th graders when most of their team is in 9th, it's great when they enter 7th already friends with 8th graders. Teams and school don't have to go hand and hand- even with school year age groups, you still have kids in public ad multiple schools and kids in private at multiple schools on the same team [/quote]

Yup, but this July/Dec team through middle school purgatory is a bit of a over correction for trapped 8th graders don't your think?

[Anonymous]

For the poster who keeps harping about middle schoolers....you are talking 11-13 year olds. Theyre not even close to being fully developed.

Look at your kids Senior picture vs her 8th grade picture. Its not even close.

Women athletes are not even hitting their real prime until mid 20's.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:The greatest age gap in a 6 month age group is........six months.

Thats a lot better than one year.

Go look at any roster. How many Jan- Mar birth years vs Sept - Dec birth year do you see?

We are picking winners and lovers based on birth months.

How stupid are we really?

But as kids get older that "year" gap simply stops being the advantage it once was. I mean, we stop comparing kids ages based on months past two years. The difference between a 3 month old and a 10- month is the ability to sit up and walk. But that advantage goes away quickly.

A year difference at 13 or 14 is just not as radically different as it is at 7 years old. It does not need to be accounted for artificially. We don't have such a complicated cutoff in school because frankly, it just isn't that necessary and to do so would be prohibitively expensive and complicated.

We should be as open to smaller players playing at younger age groups as we are with bigger kids playing up. A dual age band model could make that more accepting at older age groups but it is just not necessary to do dual age groups at older ages.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:For the poster who keeps harping about middle schoolers....you are talking 11-13 year olds. Theyre not even close to being fully developed.

Look at your kids Senior picture vs her 8th grade picture. Its not even close.

Women athletes are not even hitting their real prime until mid 20's.

That is quite a revelation, but the point is about actual relative size variance that is predictable at middle school ages.

For elementary age kids size can be fairly predicted by birth month but by middle school that is just no longer the case.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:The greatest age gap in a 6 month age group is........six months.

Thats a lot better than one year.

Go look at any roster. How many Jan- Mar birth years vs Sept - Dec birth year do you see?

We are picking winners and lovers based on birth months.

How stupid are we really?

But as kids get older that "year" gap simply stops being the advantage it once was. I mean, we stop comparing kids ages based on months past two years. The difference between a 3 month old and a 10- month is the ability to sit up and walk. But that advantage goes away quickly.

A year difference at 13 or 14 is just not as radically different as it is at 7 years old. It does not need to be accounted for artificially. We don't have such a complicated cutoff in school because frankly, it just isn't that necessary and to do so would be prohibitively expensive and complicated.

We should be as open to smaller players playing at younger age groups as we are with bigger kids playing up. A dual age band model could make that more accepting at older age groups but it is just not necessary to do dual age groups at older ages.

I agree.. it does become LESS of an issue when they're fully done with puberty. However, the majority of kids with the later birth years have already washed out. They're not around. Thats my point. Make the filtering of kids later..after puberty....after things has a chance to level out

[Anonymous]

When it came time to play rec, which is based on calendar year, neither kid wanted to play without their friends. There were 2 year age groupings so my preschooler would have been with kinder and first graders. I suppose if they were really passionate about soccer they would have joined, but with so many other options they play other sports and never started playing soccer. Several younger siblings born in the fall of my oldest child's soccer team opted out as well.

Friendships for preschoolers and kindergardeners are not that deep and shift regularly. If you thought they would enjoy playing rec soccer, sign them up and they will make new friends on their team. If you didn't think they would particularly enjoy it, then their 5-6 year old school friends are not the issue. My son was so young for his grade (made it by days) that, way back when he was starting, he did not play with any of his school freinds. He met people, and still plays travel as a teen.

Now, I agree that playing with kids 2 years older could be very discouraging, as you descibe in the age groupings, and that would be much more of a problem.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:The greatest age gap in a 6 month age group is........six months.

Thats a lot better than one year.

Go look at any roster. How many Jan- Mar birth years vs Sept - Dec birth year do you see?

We are picking winners and lovers based on birth months.

How stupid are we really?

But as kids get older that "year" gap simply stops being the advantage it once was. I mean, we stop comparing kids ages based on months past two years. The difference between a 3 month old and a 10- month is the ability to sit up and walk. But that advantage goes away quickly.

A year difference at 13 or 14 is just not as radically different as it is at 7 years old. It does not need to be accounted for artificially. We don't have such a complicated cutoff in school because frankly, it just isn't that necessary and to do so would be prohibitively expensive and complicated.

We should be as open to smaller players playing at younger age groups as we are with bigger kids playing up. A dual age band model could make that more accepting at older age groups but it is just not necessary to do dual age groups at older ages.

I agree.. it does become LESS of an issue when they're fully done with puberty. However, the majority of kids with the later birth years have already washed out. They're not around. Thats my point. Make the filtering of kids later..after puberty....after things has a chance to level out

Even through puberty there are still real world variances. Those variances are just not that extreme for a majority of kids. You want to create a system that affects 100% of the kids because of the unpredictable size difference of of outliers of about 20% of the kids that make up both ends of the bell curve.

Now if birth month was a accurate predictor of size in middle school perhaps, but it simply is no longer as accurate a predictor of size as it was in elementary school. And if the concession for the small January kid is to play on the July team well, my friend, that is still Bio Banding.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:The greatest age gap in a 6 month age group is........six months.

Thats a lot better than one year.

Go look at any roster. How many Jan- Mar birth years vs Sept - Dec birth year do you see?

We are picking winners and lovers based on birth months.

How stupid are we really?

But as kids get older that "year" gap simply stops being the advantage it once was. I mean, we stop comparing kids ages based on months past two years. The difference between a 3 month old and a 10- month is the ability to sit up and walk. But that advantage goes away quickly.

A year difference at 13 or 14 is just not as radically different as it is at 7 years old. It does not need to be accounted for artificially. We don't have such a complicated cutoff in school because frankly, it just isn't that necessary and to do so would be prohibitively expensive and complicated.

We should be as open to smaller players playing at younger age groups as we are with bigger kids playing up. A dual age band model could make that more accepting at older age groups but it is just not necessary to do dual age groups at older ages.

I agree.. it does become LESS of an issue when they're fully done with puberty. However, the majority of kids with the later birth years have already washed out. They're not around. Thats my point. Make the filtering of kids later..after puberty....after things has a chance to level out

And the dual age groups through elementary can keep those late birth month kids in longer to where they do reach middle school, it can't really be sustained through middle school as a feasible cutoff.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Younger doesn't mean smaller Why is this so hard? This is common sense. Six month age groups

You haven't read the thread. Size, both large and small has been referred to in bio banding. Significantly larger kids play up and significantly smaller kids play down.

Six month age groups work fine for elementary age kids but not really beyond but bio banding can help out bridge the gap for many players.

so basically you want every club that fields less that 4 teams per age group to either fold or have to field uncompetitive teams in order to fill out rosters? Sounds greats for the Arlingtons and Alexandrias