US soccer rumors of changing back age groups?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

The inherent problem is bias and prediction long term how a players will develop and grow over time. But, at each stage, yearly selections, year after year, the selections, based on the actual information in front of the coaches is usually right. When there are mistakes, of which there are many, it is due to prejudice, bias, impatience and inexperience and the inequitable distribution of quality resources. B team kids get a B team coach and on down the line. The coaches are assigned these team to learn or based on their own coaching experience. That is the biggest fault in our system. The kids that need more specifically qualified coaches for their stage of development simply are not provided them and they fall further behind.

If there is a problem with the system it's because a player slotted U9 will likely occupy that slot with a given club. The top kids on a second team may be marginally better than the bottom kids on a first team, but most area clubs will not swap them, especially if the difference is marginal. There is a reason that a lot of kids end up leaving their club in order to move up.

[Anonymous]

Six month age groupings doubles the participation.

Yes or no?

Greater numbers is a good thing

Yes or No?

Allowing kids to fully develop before adults determine their worth is good thing

Yes or No?

Now, I said this before and I will say it again. Go to any ECNL or DA roster and I guarantee you that 70-80 percent of the players are of the higher graduation year and with Jan- June birthdays. That means just about all the Aug - Dec kids have been discarded. I bet you can guess why.

Do you see that as a favor flaw?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Six month age groupings doubles the participation.

Yes or no?

Greater numbers is a good thing

Yes or No?

Allowing kids to fully develop before adults determine their worth is good thing

Yes or No?

Now, I said this before and I will say it again. Go to any ECNL or DA roster and I guarantee you that 70-80 percent of the players are of the higher graduation year and with Jan- June birthdays. That means just about all the Aug - Dec kids have been discarded. I bet you can guess why.

Do you see that as a favor flaw?

how does it double participate? Do you really think there are kids who don't play travel because of their birthdays? Most clubs won't cut U9, they'll just form evermore teams to house everyone who is willing to pay

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

The inherent problem is bias and prediction long term how a players will develop and grow over time. But, at each stage, yearly selections, year after year, the selections, based on the actual information in front of the coaches is usually right. When there are mistakes, of which there are many, it is due to prejudice, bias, impatience and inexperience and the inequitable distribution of quality resources. B team kids get a B team coach and on down the line. The coaches are assigned these team to learn or based on their own coaching experience. That is the biggest fault in our system. The kids that need more specifically qualified coaches for their stage of development simply are not provided them and they fall further behind.

If there is a problem with the system it's because a player slotted U9 will likely occupy that slot with a given club. The top kids on a second team may be marginally better than the bottom kids on a first team, but most area clubs will not swap them, especially if the difference is marginal. There is a reason that a lot of kids end up leaving their club in order to move up.

Top B team kids versus bottom A team kids is always debatable regarding which is better, playing time or practicing in the "better environment" of the A team.

The reality is, kids are closer in skill at these areas then the top 5 kids on the A team are to their teams bench players.

And while there are many ways to tweak and improve the system for better development, lets not lose track of the fact that for 95% of those that play, it is just an activity. It is a bit foolish to develop a system around what birth month has the highest chance of playing pro.

This is first and foremost a recreational, extracurricular activity. There are certainly pathways for higher level of play but an entire system does not need to be overhauled in order to be developmentally optimized. Another reason why dual age groups per calendar year beyond elementary school would be fruitless. Most kids that just want to play will play and they will seek the highest level they desire to play. The soccer experience for 90% just needs to be fun not optimized.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Six month age groupings doubles the participation.

Yes or no?

Greater numbers is a good thing

Yes or No?

Allowing kids to fully develop before adults determine their worth is good thing

Yes or No?

Now, I said this before and I will say it again. Go to any ECNL or DA roster and I guarantee you that 70-80 percent of the players are of the higher graduation year and with Jan- June birthdays. That means just about all the Aug - Dec kids have been discarded. I bet you can guess why.

Do you see that as a favor flaw?

how does it double participate? Do you really think there are kids who don't play travel because of their birthdays? Most clubs won't cut U9, they'll just form evermore teams to house everyone who is willing to pay

Please follow.....


I said, in very plain terms, to go to any ECNL or DA website and look at any team. You will see, without a shadow of doubt, that the majority of team are comprised of older players with birthdays falling between January and June. They will also have the higher graduation year. For example, Class of 2021. The very small percent of the younger kids on the team will have Aug - December birthdays and will be the Class of 2022.

80-90 percent of that team will be Class of 2022. Hence, they are older.

Do you follow? The younger kids, for the most part, have all been regulated which causes them to quit.

The younger kids that survived this regulation as typically good

[Anonymous]

*Class of 2021

[Anonymous]

If you look at the BRYC ecnl boys rosters the older age isn't the case. They just dont promote from B teams. They simply keep the same teams together from U9 on up. They are such great talent evaluators they find the top players from the start. This can be seen from the many Pros they've produced (jajajajajaja).

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:If you look at the BRYC ecnl boys rosters the older age isn't the case. They just dont promote from B teams. They simply keep the same teams together from U9 on up. They are such great talent evaluators they find the top players from the start. This can be seen from the many Pros they've produced (jajajajajaja).

+1

[Anonymous]

Since majority of kids will not go pro and will play high school and college the birth year mandate is crap.

[Anonymous]

[quote=Anonymous]Since majority of kids will not go pro and will play high school and college the birth year mandate is crap.[/quote]

Majority will only play as far as their parents are willing to pay. HS even though less quality than most clubs only has 20 roster spots most won't play HS and college less than 1% of HS or Club will play college So neither birth year nor grade year is really not a factor. Birth year keeps it as simple as possible.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:If you look at the BRYC ecnl boys rosters the older age isn't the case. They just dont promote from B teams. They simply keep the same teams together from U9 on up. They are such great talent evaluators they find the top players from the start. This can be seen from the many Pros they've produced (jajajajajaja).

That's because its a combined age group. The majority of the top kids graduated the year before which is exactly what I've been saying..

So simply look at their u16 or U17 kids

[Anonymous]

we don't have double the amount of coaches and double the amount of facilities and double the amount of referees available to have double the amount of teams

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Six month age groups

There is not a single negative to a six month age group.

Beyond Elementary school there isn't enough advantage to maintain the complexity.

Its not complex. Its very very simple.

Annnndddd...there absolutely are reasons to do this beyond elementary considering puberty isn't done until the middle part of HS.

Next

When you start combining teams, first to expand for 9v9 and then to 11v11 it is unnecessary. Dual age groups is excellent early on to make sure kids are learning the fundamentals in a more developmentally focused environment. But by middle school, frankly it is silly. Kids need to be placed based more on skill than age. We have gone round and round on this and the numbers just don't support dual age groups. The predictable size variance BASED on birth month can be thrown out the window. Genetics NOT birth month plays a greater role in size variance.

If you honestly think you could walk into a middle school and predict kids birth months with any accuracy based on size I have a bridge to sell you. You might not even be able to predict their birth year accurately in many cases.

You didn't make a reasonable argument. Most of it is nonsense.

By middle school size is more defined by individual genetics than birth month and a predictable linear growth chart through middle school.

What makes dual age groups useful in elementary school are it's obvious benefits but the predictability of implementing it properly. A kid born 10 months later than another kid will be predictably smaller at 7-8 years old.

By middle school that is all out the window because specific growth spurts as well as their intensity simply cannot be predicted in middle school based on birth month. If the intent is to have players of similar size grouped together it would fail miserably based on birth month in middle school. Do you understand this?

It not just about size. The lazy analysis is why the debate continues to happen. This is about human development...physically, mentally and emotionally. A tall well developed 12 years, while may look like a 18 year old, but is still mentally a 12 year. Why? Because physical and mental development do not go hand in hand. This is but one of 5,000 senerios.

I need you to understand this.....You should not filter kids out of a pipeline before they had a chance to develop as a human.

You see it is schools all the time. It is a FLAWED approach. Its proven to be wrong

My boys did not begin their growth spurts until the end of 8th grade. They all ended up over 6 feet, but were 5’2-5’3” in 8th grade. They eclipsed most kids after the spurt as every other part of their gave was advanced- ball skill, technique and IQ. The last piece to come in was physicality.