Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:
What about the 6 players who left? Did they move to first teams somewhere? Maybe they prefer to be starters on first teams? Were there players who played down at 14 and decided to move up to 16? That's pretty common. Did any of them move out of the area? Did any find the commute too long? Did any want to focus more on academics? Maybe they don't like the coaches... There are many, many possible reasons why they left. If some of the starters left for various reasons, the team has to replace them with others.

Not the PP poster although I love all the statistics. Really wish we could require clubs to publish this type of info to help us with club selection.

If the data is right, 70+ players out of ~130 left Paramount last year. Is there any club in CHRVA that has that level of departures? Are there any in the top 10 teams?

In statistical terms I'd be willing to bet Paramount is 3+ standard deviations away from the turnover rates at other top clubs in the region. Why do you think that is? Every club faces exactly the same challenges that cause player departures that you list so why is Paramount the outlier here?

Conversely, who are the clubs in the top 10 that consistently have a super high retention rate? Metro is better but who is the best or better? Replacing nearly half your club players seems pretty crazy. Though fits with anecdotes you hear over and over.

Running the data for all the clubs will take a bit of time, but is possible. If I can I'll pull it. In the meantime, here's Metro's stats. For equivalent comparison to Paramount, Metro North is treated like the 2s team for Metro. Treating Metro North as a 2s team to Metro travel does have some issues though, since geographically the teams aren't co-located (~40+ mile drive apart). I've included them to give a relative comparison to both Paramount and any other clubs data is presented for.

For this analysis, all 2025 Metro Travel & North teams from U14-18 were included. Metro North's 13s was included. Metro Travels 13s was not, because they did not have a 12s Travel team in 2024. There were 3 players from 2024 12-2s that moved up to 2025 13-1s. Those 3 were included in the retained #s because historically Metro North has placed multiple players onto Metro Travel.

For brevity, Metro Travel = 1s, Metro North = 2s in the data.

- Overall:
- 145 Players played for either 1s or 2s teams.
- 101 players returned from the previous year
- 44 new players were added
- Retention Rate: 70%
- Turnover Rate: 30%
- Metro's turnover was -24% below Paramount's, or roughly half of their turnover.

By Team:
- 18-1: 14 returning, 1 new
- 18-2: 7 returning, 5 new
- 17-1: 14 returning, 1 new
- 17-2: 8 returning, 5 new
- 16-1: 13 returning, 1 new
- 16-2: 10 returning, 2 new
- 15-1: 10 returning, 4 new
- 15-2: 4 returning, 9 new
- 14-1: 7 returning, 6 new
- 14-2: 6 returning, 6 new
- 13-2: 5 returning, 7 new (but could be +3 returning if they hadn't moved from 12-2 to 13-1)

Metro Travel #s (includes any 2025 player who played for Travel or North in 2024), U14-U18:
- 58 returning, 13 new
- Retention rate: 82%
- Turnover rate: 18%

Metro North #s (includes any 2025 player who played for Travel or North in 2024), U14-U18
- 35 returning, 27 new
- Retention Rate: 56%
- Turnover Rate: 44%
- Note: 13-2 was excluded from this calculator because the 3 players who moved to 13-1 create a data matching problem

Comments:
- Only 2 teams (15-2, 13-2) add more new players than they kept.
- 13-2 is a special case due to the lack of a 12-1s team, but shown above for completeness of Metro North's retention rate.

Thank you to this poster for providing us turnover info for 4 teams: Metro Travel, Metro North, Paramount 1 and 2.

Metro Travel new returning total turnover rate
18-1 1 14 15 7%
17-1 1 14 15 7%
16-1 1 13 14 7%
15-1 4 10 14 29%
14-1 6 7 13 46%
total 13 58 71 18%

The turnover rate decreased significantly in later years and reached and stayed at 7%. Either Metro Travel has found all the best players after 15, or Metro Travel is very loyal to their players.

Metro North new returning total turnover rate
18-2 5 7 12 42%
17-2 5 8 13 38%
16-2 2 10 12 17%
15-2 9 4 13 69%
14-2 6 6 12 50%
total 27 35 62 44%

You can probably say that Metro North is a typical team in the region. Its turnover rate is 44%.

I calculated the turnover rates for VAJRS teams, a top 10 club in the region:

VAJRS new returning total turnover rate
17-1 7 5 12 58%
16-1 4 11 15 27%
15-1 7 6 13 54%
14-1 8 4 12 67%
total 26 26 52 50%

The turnover rate is 50%, greater than that of Metro North (44%).

Paramount 1 new returning total turnover rate
17-1 3 11 14 21%
16-1 6 7 13 46%
15-1 7 7 14 50%
14-1 9 6 15 60%
13-1 7 4 11 64%
total 32 35 67 48%

Paramount first teams' turnover rate is 48%, slightly greater than Metro North (44%), and slightly lower than VAJRS (50%).

Paramount 2 new returning total turnover rate
16-2 8 5 13 62%
15-2 6 8 14 43%
14-2 9 5 14 64%
13-2 8 5 13 62%
total 31 23 54 57%

Paramount second teams have a turnover rate of 57%, which is 13% higher than Metro North (44%) and 7% higher than VAJRS (50%). However, Paramount’s 2s teams were all formed only a year or two ago, and newly formed teams typically have higher turnover rates.

Yes, Paramount’s turnover rates are high, but not much higher than VAJRS and Metro North. For a team of 15, a 10% turnover means 1.5 players, and a 20% turnover means 3 players. You could say that a Paramount team recruits 2–3 more players per year than other teams, but that’s not an extraordinary number.

Furthermore, I consider Metro Travel a “developed” club and Paramount a “developing” club. For a developed country like the USA, a GDP growth of 4% is considered high, whereas for a developing country like India, 4% is considered low. For a car that is behind to catch up to a car in front, it has to drive faster.

On the other hand, there are more opportunities at a developing club/country. There’s no point in trying out for Metro Travel after age 15, because they typically add only one new player each year. More new players join Paramount’s 1s teams.

The data does suggest that some level of turnover is normal, but I do think there are likely some differing reasons depending on the clubs that should be considered. I think it’s pretty widely accepted that Paramount is the second strongest club in CHRVA meaning they are taking players looking to play D1 in college and that want to play on an open level team. That being the case, for the types of players that they are designed to attract (particularly for their 1s teams) I would expect more players to stick with them year over year than say a VAJRs or lower ranked club. If a player looking to play in college leaves VAJRs, Columbia, or MOCO for Paramount or Metro Travel, the assumption is they are looking to play for a higher level team. But if a player leaves a Paramount 1s team for a team other than Metro Travel, I feel like that may indicate something isn’t great at Paramount. A lack of playing time could be one understandable reason that a player might leave a Paramount 1s team for a “weaker” club, but from reading some of the discussion in this thread it seems like a lot of starters are leaving too. Not sure if the developing club versus established club reasoning holds up.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:
What about the 6 players who left? Did they move to first teams somewhere? Maybe they prefer to be starters on first teams? Were there players who played down at 14 and decided to move up to 16? That's pretty common. Did any of them move out of the area? Did any find the commute too long? Did any want to focus more on academics? Maybe they don't like the coaches... There are many, many possible reasons why they left. If some of the starters left for various reasons, the team has to replace them with others.

Not the PP poster although I love all the statistics. Really wish we could require clubs to publish this type of info to help us with club selection.

If the data is right, 70+ players out of ~130 left Paramount last year. Is there any club in CHRVA that has that level of departures? Are there any in the top 10 teams?

In statistical terms I'd be willing to bet Paramount is 3+ standard deviations away from the turnover rates at other top clubs in the region. Why do you think that is? Every club faces exactly the same challenges that cause player departures that you list so why is Paramount the outlier here?

Conversely, who are the clubs in the top 10 that consistently have a super high retention rate? Metro is better but who is the best or better? Replacing nearly half your club players seems pretty crazy. Though fits with anecdotes you hear over and over.

Running the data for all the clubs will take a bit of time, but is possible. If I can I'll pull it. In the meantime, here's Metro's stats. For equivalent comparison to Paramount, Metro North is treated like the 2s team for Metro. Treating Metro North as a 2s team to Metro travel does have some issues though, since geographically the teams aren't co-located (~40+ mile drive apart). I've included them to give a relative comparison to both Paramount and any other clubs data is presented for.

For this analysis, all 2025 Metro Travel & North teams from U14-18 were included. Metro North's 13s was included. Metro Travels 13s was not, because they did not have a 12s Travel team in 2024. There were 3 players from 2024 12-2s that moved up to 2025 13-1s. Those 3 were included in the retained #s because historically Metro North has placed multiple players onto Metro Travel.

For brevity, Metro Travel = 1s, Metro North = 2s in the data.

- Overall:
- 145 Players played for either 1s or 2s teams.
- 101 players returned from the previous year
- 44 new players were added
- Retention Rate: 70%
- Turnover Rate: 30%
- Metro's turnover was -24% below Paramount's, or roughly half of their turnover.

By Team:
- 18-1: 14 returning, 1 new
- 18-2: 7 returning, 5 new
- 17-1: 14 returning, 1 new
- 17-2: 8 returning, 5 new
- 16-1: 13 returning, 1 new
- 16-2: 10 returning, 2 new
- 15-1: 10 returning, 4 new
- 15-2: 4 returning, 9 new
- 14-1: 7 returning, 6 new
- 14-2: 6 returning, 6 new
- 13-2: 5 returning, 7 new (but could be +3 returning if they hadn't moved from 12-2 to 13-1)

Metro Travel #s (includes any 2025 player who played for Travel or North in 2024), U14-U18:
- 58 returning, 13 new
- Retention rate: 82%
- Turnover rate: 18%

Metro North #s (includes any 2025 player who played for Travel or North in 2024), U14-U18
- 35 returning, 27 new
- Retention Rate: 56%
- Turnover Rate: 44%
- Note: 13-2 was excluded from this calculator because the 3 players who moved to 13-1 create a data matching problem

Comments:
- Only 2 teams (15-2, 13-2) add more new players than they kept.
- 13-2 is a special case due to the lack of a 12-1s team, but shown above for completeness of Metro North's retention rate.

Thank you to this poster for providing us turnover info for 4 teams: Metro Travel, Metro North, Paramount 1 and 2.

Metro Travel new returning total turnover rate
18-1 1 14 15 7%
17-1 1 14 15 7%
16-1 1 13 14 7%
15-1 4 10 14 29%
14-1 6 7 13 46%
total 13 58 71 18%

The turnover rate decreased significantly in later years and reached and stayed at 7%. Either Metro Travel has found all the best players after 15, or Metro Travel is very loyal to their players.

Metro North new returning total turnover rate
18-2 5 7 12 42%
17-2 5 8 13 38%
16-2 2 10 12 17%
15-2 9 4 13 69%
14-2 6 6 12 50%
total 27 35 62 44%

You can probably say that Metro North is a typical team in the region. Its turnover rate is 44%.

I calculated the turnover rates for VAJRS teams, a top 10 club in the region:

VAJRS new returning total turnover rate
17-1 7 5 12 58%
16-1 4 11 15 27%
15-1 7 6 13 54%
14-1 8 4 12 67%
total 26 26 52 50%

The turnover rate is 50%, greater than that of Metro North (44%).

Paramount 1 new returning total turnover rate
17-1 3 11 14 21%
16-1 6 7 13 46%
15-1 7 7 14 50%
14-1 9 6 15 60%
13-1 7 4 11 64%
total 32 35 67 48%

Paramount first teams' turnover rate is 48%, slightly greater than Metro North (44%), and slightly lower than VAJRS (50%).

Paramount 2 new returning total turnover rate
16-2 8 5 13 62%
15-2 6 8 14 43%
14-2 9 5 14 64%
13-2 8 5 13 62%
total 31 23 54 57%

Paramount second teams have a turnover rate of 57%, which is 13% higher than Metro North (44%) and 7% higher than VAJRS (50%). However, Paramount’s 2s teams were all formed only a year or two ago, and newly formed teams typically have higher turnover rates.

Yes, Paramount’s turnover rates are high, but not much higher than VAJRS and Metro North. For a team of 15, a 10% turnover means 1.5 players, and a 20% turnover means 3 players. You could say that a Paramount team recruits 2–3 more players per year than other teams, but that’s not an extraordinary number.

Furthermore, I consider Metro Travel a “developed” club and Paramount a “developing” club. For a developed country like the USA, a GDP growth of 4% is considered high, whereas for a developing country like India, 4% is considered low. For a car that is behind to catch up to a car in front, it has to drive faster.

On the other hand, there are more opportunities at a developing club/country. There’s no point in trying out for Metro Travel after age 15, because they typically add only one new player each year. More new players join Paramount’s 1s teams.

Thanks, very helpful until the rest of the clubs get posted (hopefully the original PP can do that at some point).

Any reason why you left the 18s out? According to the earlier stats, Paramount 18-1 added 11 new players and only kept 3. That makes the Paramount #s much worse than quoted.

Also, Paramount is unique among all the comparison clubs listed above that it actually has 2s teams that practices at the same facility. VA Juniors doesn't offer 2s, and Metro Travel/Metro North are separated by an 1+ hour drive. If a player leaves VA Juniors, their only option is to bring a new player in from another club or move someone into a different age group. Paramount has the option of moving players up -- even if it chooses not to do so.

Paramount 1s turnover rates should probably be compared to MVSA, MD Jrs, MOCO, Columbia and LEVBC -- all clubs with 2s teams at ages up to U15/16. We know MVSA is low -- a post on another thread said they average 2 new players for their 1s, 2.5 for their 2s and 6 for their 3s last year, at least in U13-U16. I don't think MD Jrs had any 1s team with more than 4 new players coming in between U13-U16.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:
What about the 6 players who left? Did they move to first teams somewhere? Maybe they prefer to be starters on first teams? Were there players who played down at 14 and decided to move up to 16? That's pretty common. Did any of them move out of the area? Did any find the commute too long? Did any want to focus more on academics? Maybe they don't like the coaches... There are many, many possible reasons why they left. If some of the starters left for various reasons, the team has to replace them with others.

Not the PP poster although I love all the statistics. Really wish we could require clubs to publish this type of info to help us with club selection.

If the data is right, 70+ players out of ~130 left Paramount last year. Is there any club in CHRVA that has that level of departures? Are there any in the top 10 teams?

In statistical terms I'd be willing to bet Paramount is 3+ standard deviations away from the turnover rates at other top clubs in the region. Why do you think that is? Every club faces exactly the same challenges that cause player departures that you list so why is Paramount the outlier here?

Conversely, who are the clubs in the top 10 that consistently have a super high retention rate? Metro is better but who is the best or better? Replacing nearly half your club players seems pretty crazy. Though fits with anecdotes you hear over and over.

Running the data for all the clubs will take a bit of time, but is possible. If I can I'll pull it. In the meantime, here's Metro's stats. For equivalent comparison to Paramount, Metro North is treated like the 2s team for Metro. Treating Metro North as a 2s team to Metro travel does have some issues though, since geographically the teams aren't co-located (~40+ mile drive apart). I've included them to give a relative comparison to both Paramount and any other clubs data is presented for.

For this analysis, all 2025 Metro Travel & North teams from U14-18 were included. Metro North's 13s was included. Metro Travels 13s was not, because they did not have a 12s Travel team in 2024. There were 3 players from 2024 12-2s that moved up to 2025 13-1s. Those 3 were included in the retained #s because historically Metro North has placed multiple players onto Metro Travel.

For brevity, Metro Travel = 1s, Metro North = 2s in the data.

- Overall:
- 145 Players played for either 1s or 2s teams.
- 101 players returned from the previous year
- 44 new players were added
- Retention Rate: 70%
- Turnover Rate: 30%
- Metro's turnover was -24% below Paramount's, or roughly half of their turnover.

By Team:
- 18-1: 14 returning, 1 new
- 18-2: 7 returning, 5 new
- 17-1: 14 returning, 1 new
- 17-2: 8 returning, 5 new
- 16-1: 13 returning, 1 new
- 16-2: 10 returning, 2 new
- 15-1: 10 returning, 4 new
- 15-2: 4 returning, 9 new
- 14-1: 7 returning, 6 new
- 14-2: 6 returning, 6 new
- 13-2: 5 returning, 7 new (but could be +3 returning if they hadn't moved from 12-2 to 13-1)

Metro Travel #s (includes any 2025 player who played for Travel or North in 2024), U14-U18:
- 58 returning, 13 new
- Retention rate: 82%
- Turnover rate: 18%

Metro North #s (includes any 2025 player who played for Travel or North in 2024), U14-U18
- 35 returning, 27 new
- Retention Rate: 56%
- Turnover Rate: 44%
- Note: 13-2 was excluded from this calculator because the 3 players who moved to 13-1 create a data matching problem

Comments:
- Only 2 teams (15-2, 13-2) add more new players than they kept.
- 13-2 is a special case due to the lack of a 12-1s team, but shown above for completeness of Metro North's retention rate.

Thank you to this poster for providing us turnover info for 4 teams: Metro Travel, Metro North, Paramount 1 and 2.

Metro Travel new returning total turnover rate
18-1 1 14 15 7%
17-1 1 14 15 7%
16-1 1 13 14 7%
15-1 4 10 14 29%
14-1 6 7 13 46%
total 13 58 71 18%

The turnover rate decreased significantly in later years and reached and stayed at 7%. Either Metro Travel has found all the best players after 15, or Metro Travel is very loyal to their players.

Metro North new returning total turnover rate
18-2 5 7 12 42%
17-2 5 8 13 38%
16-2 2 10 12 17%
15-2 9 4 13 69%
14-2 6 6 12 50%
total 27 35 62 44%

You can probably say that Metro North is a typical team in the region. Its turnover rate is 44%.

I calculated the turnover rates for VAJRS teams, a top 10 club in the region:

VAJRS new returning total turnover rate
17-1 7 5 12 58%
16-1 4 11 15 27%
15-1 7 6 13 54%
14-1 8 4 12 67%
total 26 26 52 50%

The turnover rate is 50%, greater than that of Metro North (44%).

Paramount 1 new returning total turnover rate
17-1 3 11 14 21%
16-1 6 7 13 46%
15-1 7 7 14 50%
14-1 9 6 15 60%
13-1 7 4 11 64%
total 32 35 67 48%

Paramount first teams' turnover rate is 48%, slightly greater than Metro North (44%), and slightly lower than VAJRS (50%).

Paramount 2 new returning total turnover rate
16-2 8 5 13 62%
15-2 6 8 14 43%
14-2 9 5 14 64%
13-2 8 5 13 62%
total 31 23 54 57%

Paramount second teams have a turnover rate of 57%, which is 13% higher than Metro North (44%) and 7% higher than VAJRS (50%). However, Paramount’s 2s teams were all formed only a year or two ago, and newly formed teams typically have higher turnover rates.

Yes, Paramount’s turnover rates are high, but not much higher than VAJRS and Metro North. For a team of 15, a 10% turnover means 1.5 players, and a 20% turnover means 3 players. You could say that a Paramount team recruits 2–3 more players per year than other teams, but that’s not an extraordinary number.

Furthermore, I consider Metro Travel a “developed” club and Paramount a “developing” club. For a developed country like the USA, a GDP growth of 4% is considered high, whereas for a developing country like India, 4% is considered low. For a car that is behind to catch up to a car in front, it has to drive faster.

On the other hand, there are more opportunities at a developing club/country. There’s no point in trying out for Metro Travel after age 15, because they typically add only one new player each year. More new players join Paramount’s 1s teams.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:
If you look at these rankings for a while, you’ll see that this team (#211) lost players to teams ranked higher than them, took players from teams ranked lower than them, and performed better the next year (#96). This is a great achievement.

You’re saying they lost non-stars to teams ranked higher than them and took stars from teams ranked lower than them, which led to their improvement.

Then I ask you: why did the higher-ranked teams take non-stars from this team instead of taking stars from the lower-ranked teams?

Isn't what they did "doing more with less"?

Seems like a reasonable point, at least initially. Yes, Paramount lost 2 players to teams that ranked higher then them. I wouldn't agree with the characterization that they were "non-stars" at all. Both players they lost were starters. The answer to your question is that the top two teams didn't take non-stars from Paramount, they took two starters or "stars".

2 very good players leave, the team is obviously going to be worse. 2 other starters left as well to move to clubs lower in the rankings. Now there's a problem - 4 starters gone. Yet they get better the next year. I can understand why you would argue that it must be "doing more with less".

But if the coaching is so good, why didn't any of the 13-2s move up to the 1s? Why didn't any of the backups on the 13-1s take on starting roles? Why did 2 of the new starters come from teams ranked 2000+? And why did the other 2 get starting positions even though they came from a team ranked 100+ places below that didn't earn a bid last year?

The answer to these questions is the crux of this discussion. If a club is good a developing players, it doesn't preclude them from adding good players to their roster. But they don't need to rely on it as their primary improvement avenue because they have a strong set of developed players waiting to take a starting role.

But if a team has high turnover and struggles to keep its players, especially the starters, it has 3 ways to replace them:
1) Promote the backups into starting roles.
2) Promote players from their 2s team into the 1s team, either as starters or backups.
3) Add players from outside the club.

With Paramount 14-1s, #1 & #2 didn't happen. #2 didn't happen in the entire club. Not once. They had those players for 9 months in a Paramount gym that is marketed as significantly better than virtually every other club and claims they win because of training. How is it possible that in 9 months training more than 60 players on 2s teams, not a single one of them was good enough to make a 1s team? Especially when 60%+ of the 1s teams are leaving each year?

Instead, here's what happened with the 14-1s team:
9 new players come in from other clubs. At the first big tournament of the season, 3 of those new players were starting and the 4th was sharing time with another player. Less than 1 month later, the 4th was starting too. For the rest of the season it was the 3 starters from Paramount last year playing with 4 players who came in from other clubs.

No 2024 backup player had a consistent starting role in 2025.
No 2024 13-2 player moved up to take an open spot on 14-1s.
The new players came in and immediately displaced returning Paramount players.

So I'll pass it back to you. Explain how 4 players from lower ranked teams immediately become starters despite being trained outside of Paramount's "superior" training gym. Then explain why 5 more players are added from teams ranked below the 13-2s and not a single player is moved up from that team to the 13-1s.

Explain why the same thing happened with the 15-2s. And with the 7 new players into the 13-1, 8 into the 13-2, 9 into the 14-2s, 8 into the 16-2 and the 11! new players into the 18-1s.

Without those explanations, the facts point us towards believing they aren't "doing more with less", i.e. they aren't developing good players on their lower teams into great players or taking OK players from other teams and turning them into superstars. The clubs that are really doing more with less the ones that Paramount is recruiting from.

I agree with your general conclusion that Paramount isn't better at training than other CHRVA clubs and as has been pointed out, that is largely a myth that Paramount itself has perpetuated. Regarding the training at other clubs, I think there are a lot of clubs that do a good job of teaching the basics of the game and fundamentals and when first getting into volleyball, most parents are more concerned about what club is logistically convenient and in their price range and less about bids or college commitments. But when you talk about players moving from the club at which they start their club career to a "stronger" club at 13s or 14s, it is often the standout players (perhaps tall, super athletic, hard working, etc.) that are outgrowing that first club and looking to level up. And that natural development cycle has been why the clubs that strive to develop potential college players (e.g., Paramount, Metro Travel, VA Elite) didn't have teams younger than 13s until a few years ago. These clubs were able to attract the more talented players from other clubs at 13s and didn't see a need for having younger teams. Not so long ago, it seemed like VAE would take about half of the players from MOJO's top 12s team for their 13s team every season.

I think there are a few reasons that more clubs are adding younger teams with the goal of winning and earning bids. First, as club volleyball has grown, parents are more knowledgable and believe that playing at a higher level earlier will yield better long term results for their DD and clubs are responding to that demand with younger teams that are intended to be competitive. Second, as the club volleyball landscape gets more crowded (and hopefully more competitive) clubs are looking to bring as many high potential players to their club earlier to hopefully lock them in for the long term - whether that actually happens remains to be seen.

My point is that while the clubs that Paramount (or Metro Travel) are recruiting players from in many cases do a fine job or training young players, the reason the higher potential players leave their first club is because they (or more likely their parents) think that club won't be able to develop that player to their full potential which I would not not characterize as "doing more with less" either.

Anonymous wrote:
If you look at these rankings for a while, you’ll see that this team (#211) lost players to teams ranked higher than them, took players from teams ranked lower than them, and performed better the next year (#96). This is a great achievement.

You’re saying they lost non-stars to teams ranked higher than them and took stars from teams ranked lower than them, which led to their improvement.

Then I ask you: why did the higher-ranked teams take non-stars from this team instead of taking stars from the lower-ranked teams?

Isn't what they did "doing more with less"?

Seems like a reasonable point, at least initially. Yes, Paramount lost 2 players to teams that ranked higher then them. I wouldn't agree with the characterization that they were "non-stars" at all. Both players they lost were starters. The answer to your question is that the top two teams didn't take non-stars from Paramount, they took two starters or "stars".

2 very good players leave, the team is obviously going to be worse. 2 other starters left as well to move to clubs lower in the rankings. Now there's a problem - 4 starters gone. Yet they get better the next year. I can understand why you would argue that it must be "doing more with less".

But if the coaching is so good, why didn't any of the 13-2s move up to the 1s? Why didn't any of the backups on the 13-1s take on starting roles? Why did 2 of the new starters come from teams ranked 2000+? And why did the other 2 get starting positions even though they came from a team ranked 100+ places below that didn't earn a bid last year?

The answer to these questions is the crux of this discussion. If a club is good a developing players, it doesn't preclude them from adding good players to their roster. But they don't need to rely on it as their primary improvement avenue because they have a strong set of developed players waiting to take a starting role.

But if a team has high turnover and struggles to keep its players, especially the starters, it has 3 ways to replace them:
1) Promote the backups into starting roles.
2) Promote players from their 2s team into the 1s team, either as starters or backups.
3) Add players from outside the club.

With Paramount 14-1s, #1 & #2 didn't happen. #2 didn't happen in the entire club. Not once. They had those players for 9 months in a Paramount gym that is marketed as significantly better than virtually every other club and claims they win because of training. How is it possible that in 9 months training more than 60 players on 2s teams, not a single one of them was good enough to make a 1s team? Especially when 60%+ of the 1s teams are leaving each year?

Instead, here's what happened with the 14-1s team:
9 new players come in from other clubs. At the first big tournament of the season, 3 of those new players were starting and the 4th was sharing time with another player. Less than 1 month later, the 4th was starting too. For the rest of the season it was the 3 starters from Paramount last year playing with 4 players who came in from other clubs.

No 2024 backup player had a consistent starting role in 2025.
No 2024 13-2 player moved up to take an open spot on 14-1s.
The new players came in and immediately displaced returning Paramount players.

So I'll pass it back to you. Explain how 4 players from lower ranked teams immediately become starters despite being trained outside of Paramount's "superior" training gym. Then explain why 5 more players are added from teams ranked below the 13-2s and not a single player is moved up from that team to the 13-1s.

Explain why the same thing happened with the 15-2s. And with the 7 new players into the 13-1, 8 into the 13-2, 9 into the 14-2s, 8 into the 16-2 and the 11! new players into the 18-1s.

Without those explanations, the facts point us towards believing they aren't "doing more with less", i.e. they aren't developing good players on their lower teams into great players or taking OK players from other teams and turning them into superstars. The clubs that are really doing more with less the ones that Paramount is recruiting from.

Anonymous wrote:
TLDR
Using these facts: 9 players leave the 13-1s, 2 to teams that finished higher in 14-1s, 7 go to teams that finished lower. 9 join from lower ranked teams. Of the 6 returning players, only 3 have starting spots on the new 14-1 team. 4 of the 9 new players come in and take starting spots. Overall performance goes up.

What's more likely:
That the 9 players, and especially the 4 starters that joined from lower ranked teams are suddenly developed into top players on a top team with just a few months of coaching.
Or
That most of those 9 players, and definitely the 4 starters, were already better than the players on the 13-2s team and at least as good (and some likely better) than returning 13-1s players in the same positions.

Based on the data and all the one off examples raised so far, its much more likely that the second scenario is what is happening.

I have a different view of the data you presented.

9 players from Paramount 13-1 went to:
1 MDJRS #16
1 Metro Travel #46
1 Blue Ridge #140
2 VAJRS #530
1 Paramount 13-2 #596
1 VAE #2194
1 American 15-1
1 Overseas

They were replaced by these 9 players from:
2 American #327
3 VAJRS #530
1 DYS #773
1 Metro SPW #2377
1 MOJO #2562
1 Unknown

If you look at these rankings for a while, you’ll see that this team (#211) lost players to teams ranked higher than them, took players from teams ranked lower than them, and performed better the next year (#96). This is a great achievement.

You’re saying they lost non-stars to teams ranked higher than them and took stars from teams ranked lower than them, which led to their improvement.

Then I ask you: why did the higher-ranked teams take non-stars from this team instead of taking stars from the lower-ranked teams?

Isn't what they did "doing more with less"?

Anonymous wrote:I checked another one of your claims.
...
Did Paramount really cut 3 weak players who then ended up on top teams like MDJRS, Metro, and Blue Ridge? I don’t know—but I doubt it.

As I wrote before, players leave for a variety of reasons. You can’t just claim, without evidence, that Paramount cut all those players and then replaced them with better ones from other teams.

I wasn't claiming Paramount cut the players. Without being in the tryout and knowing the offers that went out or being a parent of an impacted player there's no way to know that.

I acknowledged players leave for a variety of reasons. Every club has those same issues. We are left with why Paramount's departure rate for players is so much higher than comparable clubs. Top players leaving top teams by choice to move down to a lower level of competition is not normal at all. Double check the Metro data for proof. The other top 14s team (MD JRS) didn't have it happen either, returning 10 players and adding 3.

If players aren't getting cut from Paramount's 1s teams, then they are choosing to leave. And they are doing it to go to lower ranked teams without consistent success. I think you'd actually want to show they are cutting players, because of the alternative of them leaving of their own choice has a lot bigger ramifications.

Beyond the cuts conversation, what I was saying was: Imagine you replaced most of a good team with players from other teams. The next year the good team improves. What would you attribute that performance improvement to if you knew nothing else about the situation?

I claimed:

In reality what Paramount is doing is assembling 1 year all star teams that combine a few players from the previous year Paramount teams with the best players from the other clubs. There is no argument that those teams succeed, and you can congratulate their coaches on how they get those all stars to perform.

Obviously I believe the data supports that statement, and you don't. That's fine. Contrary to what you might believe, I'd love to be proven wrong on this one. I'd be the first one cheering if Paramount's pyramid was working to develop players from 2s to 1s and ultimately to open-level players. Its fundamentally good for volleyball in the region if clubs are capable of developing players well. Its also good if teams are winning bids outside of our CHRVA bid tournament and then going on to place well at nationals.

Remember, Paramount says that the "CHRVA region was significantly behind in terms of technical training,and...lacked the ability to [run practices] that prioritized skill development." The point of my claim was that there is no data to support the marketing by Paramount and its supporters that their training leads to player development above that of other clubs in the region. The data we do have actually seems to indicate the opposite is happening.

We have a strong correlation between the number of replaced players and the relative improvement of the Paramount team after the replacement. We don't have any data that supports a strong correlation the other way - that the training provided leads to that performance.

For your specific point on the 2024 13-1 team:
Let's add the additional data on the clubs they went to, not just say "went to other strong clubs" or "moved to 15U". Because if you want to focus on the 3 that moved "up" we should also know if the other 5 moved "down".
- 2 left for better performing teams: MDJrs,Metro Travel
- 1 left for a better performing 13s team that performed below Paramount in 2025: BRVA
- 1 moved down in Paramount to 14-2
- 1 went to VA Elite
- 2 went to VA Juniors
- 1 went to American (the 13U to 15U move)
- 1 moved out of country (exclude)

Note that the 13U to 15U move could also have happened at Paramount as well, given that their 15-1 team took 7 new players and their 2s team took 6.

For the players that moved up to MDJrs and Metro I don't think either of them took starting spots on those teams. Don't know about BRVA.
The other 5 departing players went to were ranked lower than the Paramount team they were leaving. In fact all of those teams were also ranked lower in 14s in 2024 as well - with some significantly lower. Same applies to the U15 move. And all of them, plus the BRVA player, played on teams that finished below Paramount 1s teams.

The new players came from these teams with their ranking last year:
- 2 from American 13-1 (327)
- 3 from VA JRS 13 (530)
- 1 from MOJO 13-1 (2562)
- 1 from Metro South PW (2377)
- 1 from DYS (773)
- 1 I can't find (excluded).

All the players came from teams ranked below the Paramount 13-1. 3 of them came from teams ranked below the 13-2, and even though the VAJRS team was ranked a bit above the 13-2s, the 13-2s placed higher than them at bids and beat them head to head in a close match. So its pretty safe to say that every player came from a team that was lower-performing than the 13-1s and most came from a team at or below the 13-2s level.

That alone is enough to make a compelling argument about where the performance improvement is coming from. Why add players from lower performing teams than your own 2s team?

Some additional data:
Paramount 14-1 regular starting lineup at USAV Nationals: MOJO, 2x American, DYS, 3x Paramount
That same group appeared to be starting regularly in the earlier season tournaments as well, although that's based on memory so it could be off.

4 of the 7 starters came from other clubs. All 4 came from clubs (MOJO, DYS, 2 American) below Paramount 1s in ranking. None of those teams qualified for the CHRVA bid tournament last year. But this year they were all starting on a Paramount 14-1s team, despite competing against players who had the benefit of at least one additional year of Paramount coaching and playing on a 13-1 team that was one of the top teams in region. Every team those players came from declined in performance. You can't conclude that the decline in performance was directly related to Paramount pulling some of the best players off those teams without a lot more data, but it directionally supports the "all-star" point made above.

For the players that left, you can safely conclude that 6 of the 8 players either didn't want to play for Paramount again or weren't invited back, especially since all of them kept playing volleyball at 14s.

And for the 9 new players coming in, you can conclude that they were good enough to make the a 14-1s team with 6 returning players and 4 were good enough to and earn starting spots. We know Paramount is heavily focused on winning. Therefore the Paramount coaching staff believed they were better than the returning players they displaced and those coaches believed the team would perform better with them playing more points. This seems to indicate that the new players had a significant impact on the performance of the team.

This looks exactly like the 15-2s that were discussed earlier.

TLDR
Using these facts: 9 players leave the 13-1s, 2 to teams that finished higher in 14-1s, 7 go to teams that finished lower. 9 join from lower ranked teams. Of the 6 returning players, only 3 have starting spots on the new 14-1 team. 4 of the 9 new players come in and take starting spots. Overall performance goes up.

What's more likely:
That the 9 players, and especially the 4 starters that joined from lower ranked teams are suddenly developed into top players on a top team with just a few months of coaching.
Or
That most of those 9 players, and definitely the 4 starters, were already better than the players on the 13-2s team and at least as good (and some likely better) than returning 13-1s players in the same positions.

Based on the data and all the one off examples raised so far, its much more likely that the second scenario is what is happening.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I checked another one of your claims.

Anonymous wrote:
2025 14-1: 96 (added 9, kept 6)
2024 13-1: 211

In summary:
Four teams added more players from other clubs than they kept from last year: 13-1, 14-1, 15-1, 14-2, 16-2
Every one of these teams improved in rank, with an average improvement of 115 ranking spots.

In reality what Paramount is doing is assembling 1 year all star teams that combine a few players from the previous year Paramount teams with the best players from the other clubs. There is no argument that those teams succeed, and you can congratulate their coaches on how they get those all stars to perform.

[You wrote somewhere later:]

Now consider this scenario: A team finishes just outside the top 12 the region last year and doesn't win a bid. This year it wins a bid. In between the seasons, the team cuts 60-70% of its returning players, doesn't promote any players from its lower team, and then replaces all of its starters with new players from other clubs. Would you claim the club is good at developing its players?

You claim that Paramount "cut" 9 players from 13-1 and added 9 "best players" from other clubs, and that this was the reason the team’s national ranking improved from 211 to 96.
...
Did Paramount really cut 3 weak players who then ended up on top teams like MDJRS, Metro, and Blue Ridge? I don’t know—but I doubt it.
..
As I wrote before, players leave for a variety of reasons. You can’t just claim, without evidence, that Paramount cut all those players and then replaced them with better ones from other teams.

Not the PP with all the stats, but I am familiar with that team and age group you are discussing. You took a lot of what was said by the PP out of context. They didn't say "Paramount cut 9 players", they gave you a hypothetical: A team chooses to cut 60-70% of its returning players, replaces its starters with players from new players from other clubs, and then significantly increases its performance the next year. They ask you, "Would you claim the club is good at developing its players?"

The general answer to this is no, you wouldn't. It doesn't matter why they left. "Cut", "too far to drive", "hated it", "not for me", are all valid reasons. The only way to say a club is good at developing its players while losing most of its team is to try to prove the players left to go to better teams or left the region completely. Your argument even focuses on this approach because that's really the only solid argument against what the stats appear to show.

Consider the fact that losing 9 players off a top 5 team in the region regardless of it they were "cut" or just quit the club is not the norm. Look at the bid teams for 14s this year: Metro Travel, MDJrs Elite Black, Paramount Cozad, VA Juniors, BAVA Waves, LEVBC, MVSA, Paramount Anderson. Leave out LEVBC because they didn't have a 13s team last year. Of the remaining teams, I think the only teams that added more players than they lost were the 2 Paramount teams and VA Juniors. Metro Travel, MDJRS, VA Juniors, MVSA and BAVA combined added about 25 players to their teams in 2025, an average of 5 per team. Paramount added 18 players to their two teams, an average of 9. When compared to other bid teams, both Paramount 13s teams are significant outliers in terms of player retention as they transitioned to U14. Why does Paramount average 2x the rate of player departures of other top clubs in this age group?

Per your own data, 3 of those players moved up to better teams in 2025 -- the other 5 moved down. For those 5 it is safe to assume a) they were cut, or b) they chose not to return to the club for any of the same reasons that impact all other clubs, including they just wanted to leave.

Regardless of the reason every other club has the same potential issues. For some reason Paramount tends to turn over many more players than other clubs of similar competitive level. It’s not just at the 14s age, it’s at virtually every age. Why?

While it’s anecdotal, the reasons I have heard for many players leaving Paramount is the club culture. Winning is the only objective. Intensity and accountability are expected at competitive clubs, but if the stories are true it goes far beyond that, with players being belittled and demeaned. The behavior I have seen on the sidelines at tournaments with certain Paramount coaches is bad enough - I can’t imagine what happens in the comfort of their facility.

Anonymous wrote:I checked another one of your claims.

Anonymous wrote:
2025 14-1: 96 (added 9, kept 6)
2024 13-1: 211

In summary:
Four teams added more players from other clubs than they kept from last year: 13-1, 14-1, 15-1, 14-2, 16-2
Every one of these teams improved in rank, with an average improvement of 115 ranking spots.

In reality what Paramount is doing is assembling 1 year all star teams that combine a few players from the previous year Paramount teams with the best players from the other clubs. There is no argument that those teams succeed, and you can congratulate their coaches on how they get those all stars to perform.

[You wrote somewhere later:]

Now consider this scenario: A team finishes just outside the top 12 the region last year and doesn't win a bid. This year it wins a bid. In between the seasons, the team cuts 60-70% of its returning players, doesn't promote any players from its lower team, and then replaces all of its starters with new players from other clubs. Would you claim the club is good at developing its players?

You claim that Paramount "cut" 9 players from 13-1 and added 9 "best players" from other clubs, and that this was the reason the team’s national ranking improved from 211 to 96.
...
Did Paramount really cut 3 weak players who then ended up on top teams like MDJRS, Metro, and Blue Ridge? I don’t know—but I doubt it.
..
As I wrote before, players leave for a variety of reasons. You can’t just claim, without evidence, that Paramount cut all those players and then replaced them with better ones from other teams.

Not the PP with all the stats, but I am familiar with that team and age group you are discussing. You took a lot of what was said by the PP out of context. They didn't say "Paramount cut 9 players", they gave you a hypothetical: A team chooses to cut 60-70% of its returning players, replaces its starters with players from new players from other clubs, and then significantly increases its performance the next year. They ask you, "Would you claim the club is good at developing its players?"

The general answer to this is no, you wouldn't. It doesn't matter why they left. "Cut", "too far to drive", "hated it", "not for me", are all valid reasons. The only way to say a club is good at developing its players while losing most of its team is to try to prove the players left to go to better teams or left the region completely. Your argument even focuses on this approach because that's really the only solid argument against what the stats appear to show.

Consider the fact that losing 9 players off a top 5 team in the region regardless of it they were "cut" or just quit the club is not the norm. Look at the bid teams for 14s this year: Metro Travel, MDJrs Elite Black, Paramount Cozad, VA Juniors, BAVA Waves, LEVBC, MVSA, Paramount Anderson. Leave out LEVBC because they didn't have a 13s team last year. Of the remaining teams, I think the only teams that added more players than they lost were the 2 Paramount teams and VA Juniors. Metro Travel, MDJRS, VA Juniors, MVSA and BAVA combined added about 25 players to their teams in 2025, an average of 5 per team. Paramount added 18 players to their two teams, an average of 9. When compared to other bid teams, both Paramount 13s teams are significant outliers in terms of player retention as they transitioned to U14. Why does Paramount average 2x the rate of player departures of other top clubs in this age group?

Per your own data, 3 of those players moved up to better teams in 2025 -- the other 5 moved down. For those 5 it is safe to assume a) they were cut, or b) they chose not to return to the club for any of the same reasons that impact all other clubs, including they just wanted to leave.

Regardless of the reason every other club has the same potential issues. For some reason Paramount tends to turn over many more players than other clubs of similar competitive level. Its not just at the 14s age, its at virtually every age. Why?

I checked another one of your claims.

Anonymous wrote:
2025 14-1: 96 (added 9, kept 6)
2024 13-1: 211

In summary:
Four teams added more players from other clubs than they kept from last year: 13-1, 14-1, 15-1, 14-2, 16-2
Every one of these teams improved in rank, with an average improvement of 115 ranking spots.

In reality what Paramount is doing is assembling 1 year all star teams that combine a few players from the previous year Paramount teams with the best players from the other clubs. There is no argument that those teams succeed, and you can congratulate their coaches on how they get those all stars to perform.

[You wrote somewhere later:]

Now consider this scenario: A team finishes just outside the top 12 the region last year and doesn't win a bid. This year it wins a bid. In between the seasons, the team cuts 60-70% of its returning players, doesn't promote any players from its lower team, and then replaces all of its starters with new players from other clubs. Would you claim the club is good at developing its players?

You claim that Paramount "cut" 9 players from 13-1 and added 9 "best players" from other clubs, and that this was the reason the team’s national ranking improved from 211 to 96.

First, let’s look at the top 5 ranked 13U teams in the region for the 2023–24 season (based on national rankings):
#16 MDJRS 13 Elite
#46 Metro 13 Travel
#140 Blue Ridge 13 Blue
#187 MVSA 13 Wahoo!
#211 Paramount VBC 13 Hannah

Paramount 13-1 was number 5 in the region.

So where did the 9 players from Paramount 13-1 go? (It is easy to find this info on Google and Instagram.)

1 went to MDJRS, the top team in the region.
1 went to Metro Travel, the second-best team in the region.
1 went to Blue Ridge, the third-best team in the region.
1 moved outside the continental United States.
1 moved from 13U to 15U in another club.
1 went to Paramount 14-2.
3 joined two other strong clubs.

Did Paramount really cut 3 weak players who then ended up on top teams like MDJRS, Metro, and Blue Ridge? I don’t know—but I doubt it.

This year, Paramount 14-1 moved up from #5 to #3 in the region, despite losing 3 players to higher-ranked teams, one player moving away, another moving up an age group, etc:
#19 MDJRS 14 Elite Black
#48 Metro 14 Travel
#96 Paramount VBC 14 Cozad

As I wrote before, players leave for a variety of reasons. You can’t just claim, without evidence, that Paramount cut all those players and then replaced them with better ones from other teams.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:
What about the 6 players who left? Did they move to first teams somewhere? Maybe they prefer to be starters on first teams? Were there players who played down at 14 and decided to move up to 16? That's pretty common. Did any of them move out of the area? Did any find the commute too long? Did any want to focus more on academics? Maybe they don't like the coaches... There are many, many possible reasons why they left. If some of the starters left for various reasons, the team has to replace them with others.

Not the PP poster although I love all the statistics. Really wish we could require clubs to publish this type of info to help us with club selection.

If the data is right, 70+ players out of ~130 left Paramount last year. Is there any club in CHRVA that has that level of departures? Are there any in the top 10 teams?

In statistical terms I'd be willing to bet Paramount is 3+ standard deviations away from the turnover rates at other top clubs in the region. Why do you think that is? Every club faces exactly the same challenges that cause player departures that you list so why is Paramount the outlier here?

Conversely, who are the clubs in the top 10 that consistently have a super high retention rate? Metro is better but who is the best or better? Replacing nearly half your club players seems pretty crazy. Though fits with anecdotes you hear over and over.

Running the data for all the clubs will take a bit of time, but is possible. If I can I'll pull it. In the meantime, here's Metro's stats. For equivalent comparison to Paramount, Metro North is treated like the 2s team for Metro. Treating Metro North as a 2s team to Metro travel does have some issues though, since geographically the teams aren't co-located (~40+ mile drive apart). I've included them to give a relative comparison to both Paramount and any other clubs data is presented for.

For this analysis, all 2025 Metro Travel & North teams from U14-18 were included. Metro North's 13s was included. Metro Travels 13s was not, because they did not have a 12s Travel team in 2024. There were 3 players from 2024 12-2s that moved up to 2025 13-1s. Those 3 were included in the retained #s because historically Metro North has placed multiple players onto Metro Travel.

For brevity, Metro Travel = 1s, Metro North = 2s in the data.

- Overall:
- 145 Players played for either 1s or 2s teams.
- 101 players returned from the previous year
- 44 new players were added
- Retention Rate: 70%
- Turnover Rate: 30%
- Metro's turnover was -24% below Paramount's, or roughly half of their turnover.

By Team:
- 18-1: 14 returning, 1 new
- 18-2: 7 returning, 5 new
- 17-1: 14 returning, 1 new
- 17-2: 8 returning, 5 new
- 16-1: 13 returning, 1 new
- 16-2: 10 returning, 2 new
- 15-1: 10 returning, 4 new
- 15-2: 4 returning, 9 new
- 14-1: 7 returning, 6 new
- 14-2: 6 returning, 6 new
- 13-2: 5 returning, 7 new (but could be +3 returning if they hadn't moved from 12-2 to 13-1)

Metro Travel #s (includes any 2025 player who played for Travel or North in 2024), U14-U18:
- 58 returning, 13 new
- Retention rate: 82%
- Turnover rate: 18%

Metro North #s (includes any 2025 player who played for Travel or North in 2024), U14-U18
- 35 returning, 27 new
- Retention Rate: 56%
- Turnover Rate: 44%
- Note: 13-2 was excluded from this calculator because the 3 players who moved to 13-1 create a data matching problem

Comments:
- Only 2 teams (15-2, 13-2) add more new players than they kept.
- 13-2 is a special case due to the lack of a 12-1s team, but shown above for completeness of Metro North's retention rate.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:
What about the 6 players who left? Did they move to first teams somewhere? Maybe they prefer to be starters on first teams? Were there players who played down at 14 and decided to move up to 16? That's pretty common. Did any of them move out of the area? Did any find the commute too long? Did any want to focus more on academics? Maybe they don't like the coaches... There are many, many possible reasons why they left. If some of the starters left for various reasons, the team has to replace them with others.

Not the PP poster although I love all the statistics. Really wish we could require clubs to publish this type of info to help us with club selection.

If the data is right, 70+ players out of ~130 left Paramount last year. Is there any club in CHRVA that has that level of departures? Are there any in the top 10 teams?

In statistical terms I'd be willing to bet Paramount is 3+ standard deviations away from the turnover rates at other top clubs in the region. Why do you think that is? Every club faces exactly the same challenges that cause player departures that you list so why is Paramount the outlier here?

Conversely, who are the clubs in the top 10 that consistently have a super high retention rate? Metro is better but who is the best or better? Replacing nearly half your club players seems pretty crazy. Though fits with anecdotes you hear over and over.

FPYCparent wrote:I haven't followed all of the lengthy stats-driven posts, but I'll nitpick that at least two Paramount players were placed on the 17s team for the recently-completed 2025 season after playing on the 15-1 team the prior season. I do not know if the same happened on other teams, with some players "jumping" age groups. My kid played at another club this past year where she had two or three teammates that were playing "a year up." Stuff like that could muck up some club retention numbers if only looking a players staying with their age group.

Yes, playing up relative to age or down relative to grade level does happen.

All the stats included any player that was with the club the prior year and stayed with the club the next year. A U12 player jumping to a U17 team would have counted as retention for Paramount.

I haven't followed all of the lengthy stats-driven posts, but I'll nitpick that at least two Paramount players were placed on the 17s team for the recently-completed 2025 season after playing on the 15-1 team the prior season. I do not know if the same happened on other teams, with some players "jumping" age groups. My kid played at another club this past year where she had two or three teammates that were playing "a year up." Stuff like that could muck up some club retention numbers if only looking a players staying with their age group.

Anonymous wrote:
What about the 6 players who left? Did they move to first teams somewhere? Maybe they prefer to be starters on first teams? Were there players who played down at 14 and decided to move up to 16? That's pretty common. Did any of them move out of the area? Did any find the commute too long? Did any want to focus more on academics? Maybe they don't like the coaches... There are many, many possible reasons why they left. If some of the starters left for various reasons, the team has to replace them with others.

The team was ranked 11th in the region in 24. There were quite a few teams ranked above them, and recruiting better players from other teams to improve their team is expected. Replacing 6 players (including starters) in one year is not unusual for a second team ranked 11th. Yes, Metro has a core group that stays with the club from 14. But Metro is number one. There aren't many players better than their core group.

You can't be so extreme to say: you can't actively recruit new players because that proves your training is not good enough. Recruiting and training are both needed to build a better team.

I don't think that's what they were saying. They actually gave you the benefit of the doubt and included all the teams with at least half the team returning into the group where training could be the reason performance improved. When you pushed that the regional rank improved even though the national rank didn't they provided data that showed the team replaced its starters at the same rate as the rest club replaced players. Since they'd already shown the largest increases in performance came from the teams that added the most new players to their roster, the team we thought was an outlier and really did improve primarily through training was turned out to be like the rest of the club.

You kind of fell into a trap that is hard to get out of now because if you have to rely on the 15-2s team try to prove your point, you've already lost the argument. Especially since they acknowledge the 15-2 team did perform well.

You are arguing the "ends" and claiming that "but we won a bid" and regional ranking improvements prove how good Paramount is. The PP isn't arguing with you that Paramount is winning today. They are providing data on the "means" and showing that the largest increases in performance came from the teams that added the most new players to their roster.

At this point you would need to show a lot of data to the contrary convince us that Paramount is really knocking it out of the park with its training and and not just getting most of its improved performance from recruiting.