This is the time to move back to school year age groups

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:It is thick. DA parents freaking out. The entitlement cracks me up. No they are not going to make a change because the EX DA people are worried about their kid making ECNL. There are many age groups and it has all worked out. You don't change back and forth every few years and no my kid didn't benefit is not part of the elites who are fighting about a new way to game the system.

Why would DA parents care? This is all about the u littles. Being a year older vs everyone else is great at u9-u12 at u15 does not matter as much.

School year would be fine for U13 and under. Maybe the top U12/U!3 academy teams would still use birth year. Would make it difficult for promotion/relegation within club though. I don't think it matters much for U13 and older.....but if not on a top team, then being a social butterfly with classmates likely has a lot of importance. The 8th to 9th grade transition is a problem if middle school and high school soccer are different seasons. But ECNL started bending the rules this year and allowing a couple of these older 8th graders to play down on a U14 team during each game in the Spring.

That ECNL rule was in place last year. Basically it allows 8th graders who are on U15 teams to play the high school part of the year with the U14s. This is due to the ECNL schedule aligning with high school soccer.

Similarly, U18/19s were allowed to play show cases with the U17 teams (as ECNL only allows the U18/19 teams to play 1 showcase).

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:It is thick. DA parents freaking out. The entitlement cracks me up. No they are not going to make a change because the EX DA people are worried about their kid making ECNL. There are many age groups and it has all worked out. You don't change back and forth every few years and no my kid didn't benefit is not part of the elites who are fighting about a new way to game the system.

Why would DA parents care? This is all about the u littles. Being a year older vs everyone else is great at u9-u12 at u15 does not matter as much.

They don't. ECNL dad is a little nutty and it's coming out all over this forum.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:It is thick. DA parents freaking out. The entitlement cracks me up. No they are not going to make a change because the EX DA people are worried about their kid making ECNL. There are many age groups and it has all worked out. You don't change back and forth every few years and no my kid didn't benefit is not part of the elites who are fighting about a new way to game the system.

Why would DA parents care? This is all about the u littles. Being a year older vs everyone else is great at u9-u12 at u15 does not matter as much.

School year would be fine for U13 and under. Maybe the top U12/U!3 academy teams would still use birth year. Would make it difficult for promotion/relegation within club though. I don't think it matters much for U13 and older.....but if not on a top team, then being a social butterfly with classmates likely has a lot of importance. The 8th to 9th grade transition is a problem if middle school and high school soccer are different seasons. But ECNL started bending the rules this year and allowing a couple of these older 8th graders to play down on a U14 team during each game in the Spring.

That ECNL rule was in place last year. Basically it allows 8th graders who are on U15 teams to play the high school part of the year with the U14s. This is due to the ECNL schedule aligning with high school soccer.

Similarly, U18/19s were allowed to play show cases with the U17 teams (as ECNL only allows the U18/19 teams to play 1 showcase).

It allows for 2 to play each game. Our club had 6 so they got to play every 3rd game.. There is no good solution for trapped players other than going back to Aug-July.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:DA is dead. Clubs are reforming anyhow. Birth year groups are problematic (conflicts with other sports, fall birthday kids getting caught in dead times, off-cycle from other big sports).

It never worked well anyhow and should just be changed.

You’re an idiot

She was bummed that her kid, who was once older than everybody else, no longer is. Somebody has to be the youngest. Why was it okay when it was other kids but not when it's yours?

OP here. Nope. My kids are college-bound teens (not DA players) who have been in conversation with coaches. That's why I know it's problematic. Changing age groups won't impact DC at this point. What I mostly care about is college recruiting and the fact that large groups of kids have dead training zones.

It is bizarre to me how many people claim birth year works well. I think you just must not have kids interested in college play.

With schools potentially phasing out scholarships for non revenue generating sports, no one may care about college recruiting in a few years.

[Anonymous]

I think the only people who don't understand how school year would be better are either Jan-Mar parents or have rec-level players who aren't looking at college play.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:DA is dead. Clubs are reforming anyhow. Birth year groups are problematic (conflicts with other sports, fall birthday kids getting caught in dead times, off-cycle from other big sports).

It never worked well anyhow and should just be changed.

You’re an idiot

She was bummed that her kid, who was once older than everybody else, no longer is. Somebody has to be the youngest. Why was it okay when it was other kids but not when it's yours?

OP here. Nope. My kids are college-bound teens (not DA players) who have been in conversation with coaches. That's why I know it's problematic. Changing age groups won't impact DC at this point. What I mostly care about is college recruiting and the fact that large groups of kids have dead training zones.

It is bizarre to me how many people claim birth year works well. I think you just must not have kids interested in college play.

With schools potentially phasing out scholarships for non revenue generating sports, no one may care about college recruiting in a few years.

As long as there is college football, there will be women’s college soccer.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I think the only people who don't understand how school year would be better are either Jan-Mar parents or have rec-level players who aren't looking at college play.

I was just reading an interview with a coach this morning stating that a big difference between training in Europe and the US is that in Europe, every top player wants to be pro and college does not factor in. Here, even though a small percentage make it to play in college, the percentage of future pros is even smaller. College opportunities matter. Why do we have to align soccer age groups with the rest of the world when the rest of the world is not concerned about college?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I think the only people who don't understand how school year would be better are either Jan-Mar parents or have rec-level players who aren't looking at college play.

I was just reading an interview with a coach this morning stating that a big difference between training in Europe and the US is that in Europe, every top player wants to be pro and college does not factor in. Here, even though a small percentage make it to play in college, the percentage of future pros is even smaller. College opportunities matter. Why do we have to align soccer age groups with the rest of the world when the rest of the world is not concerned about college?

Agree.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I think the only people who don't understand how school year would be better are either Jan-Mar parents or have rec-level players who aren't looking at college play.

How would breaking up every single existing youth soccer team make things better? Why can't you understand how disruptive and negative that would be?

How do you you think changing the birth date cutoff would poll among current youth soccer players?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I think the only people who don't understand how school year would be better are either Jan-Mar parents or have rec-level players who aren't looking at college play.

How would breaking up every single existing youth soccer team make things better? Why can't you understand how disruptive and negative that would be?

How do you you think changing the birth date cutoff would poll among current youth soccer players?

Having survived the last age group switch, I know that it sucked and can you wouldn't want it to happen again. However, from a development perspective, those in charge should be concerned about developing players not team.

[Anonymous]

Birth year is much more fair. Unless kids are playing up by choice, only a year can separate the youngest and oldest player. With all of the red shirting that goes on in this area, my son with a summer birthday, who wasn’t held back, would be playing against kids that are well more than a year older than him.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I think the only people who don't understand how school year would be better are either Jan-Mar parents or have rec-level players who aren't looking at college play.

How would breaking up every single existing youth soccer team make things better? Why can't you understand how disruptive and negative that would be?

How do you you think changing the birth date cutoff would poll among current youth soccer players?

Because “every single existing youth soccer team” is going to break up when they hit 11th and 12th grades. Why can’t you understand how disruptive and negative that would be?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Birth year is much more fair. Unless kids are playing up by choice, only a year can separate the youngest and oldest player. With all of the red shirting that goes on in this area, my son with a summer birthday, who wasn’t held back, would be playing against kids that are well more than a year older than him.

Read the thread before posting.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I think the only people who don't understand how school year would be better are either Jan-Mar parents or have rec-level players who aren't looking at college play.

How would breaking up every single existing youth soccer team make things better? Why can't you understand how disruptive and negative that would be?

How do you you think changing the birth date cutoff would poll among current youth soccer players?

I know exactly how disruptive it was. I lived through it. I also see how the new system doesn't work well, and we should fix it.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I think the only people who don't understand how school year would be better are either Jan-Mar parents or have rec-level players who aren't looking at college play.

How would breaking up every single existing youth soccer team make things better? Why can't you understand how disruptive and negative that would be?

How do you you think changing the birth date cutoff would poll among current youth soccer players?

I know exactly how disruptive it was. I lived through it. I also see how the new system doesn't work well, and we should fix it.

So you want to do it again? That ship sailed and kids have moved on. Switching back will not put your old team back together now.