# Breakdown of Youth Soccer



## Wez (May 18, 2017)

Hello,

I'm trying to help my kids visualize the world of youth soccer and it's different levels of advancement.  Please respond with what you think are the appropriate percentages of kids who reach each level.

I'll start with my guess on what it looks like, let me know if you think otherwise and why.

1. AYSO - 99% of kids who play soccer, start here.
2. AYSO All Stars - 10% of the kids who play AYSO.
3. Club Flight 3 - 40% of AYSO kids will try club.
4. Flight 2 - Of the 40% who try Club, 60% will reach here.
5. Top Flight 2 - 40% of Club players will reach here.
6. Flight 1 - 20% of Club players will reach here.
7. Top Flight 1 - 10% of Club players will reach here.
8. USSDA Academy - 2% of Club players will reach here.
9. MLS Academy - 1% of Club players will reach here.
10. European Academy - .01% (.0001) of Club players will reach here.

Open to change these, this is a very rough guess.


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## Grace T. (May 18, 2017)

Think your rec stuff needs to be tweaked.  AYSO isn't the only rec league and it isn't everywhere in the country.  Even locally, for example, there's the Simi League, Laguna League, and West Valley Soccer League which aren't AYSO affiliated (if anything, they are actually more club feeders...for example WVSL is affiliated with Real So Cal).  Even within AYSO, there's the Extras/United Program besides All Stars.  Those higher level AYSO programs seem to be for parents who either don't want to commit to the club drama/expense/time or who would prefer their kid plays multiple sports.  AYSO All Stars for a lot of leagues doesn't kick in until U9, is also somewhat political (e.g. the need to put key parent volunteers on the team and/or have a representative from every team) and some kids skip over it to go straight to club.  If the AYSO has a strong Extras program, All Stars is an also ran to keep the parents happy whose kids didn't make the Extras cut.


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## Wez (May 18, 2017)

Grace T. said:


> Think your rec stuff needs to be tweaked.  AYSO isn't the only rec league and it isn't everywhere in the country.  Even locally, for example, there's the Simi League, Laguna League, and West Valley Soccer League which aren't AYSO affiliated (if anything, they are actually more club feeders...for example WVSL is affiliated with Real So Cal).  Even within AYSO, there's the Extras/United Program besides All Stars.  Those higher level AYSO programs seem to be for parents who either don't want to commit to the club drama/expense/time or who would prefer their kid plays multiple sports.  AYSO All Stars for a lot of leagues doesn't kick in until U9, is also somewhat political (e.g. the need to put key parent volunteers on the team and/or have a representative from every team) and some kids skip over it to go straight to club.  If the AYSO has a strong Extras program, All Stars is an also ran to keep the parents happy whose kids didn't make the Extras cut.


Agreed, I had to start somewhere.  Thanks for the info.


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## Mystery Train (May 18, 2017)

Wez said:


> Hello,
> 
> I'm trying to help my kids visualize the world of youth soccer and it's different levels of advancement.  Please respond with what you think are the appropriate percentages of kids who reach each level.
> 
> ...


Interesting breakdown.  I'd say from pure observation, I think your percentages are probably pretty close.  The only percentage diff I have is that I think less AYSO players try club than 40%.  But I have no way of measuring that.  

What would really give your kids the picture is to not just use the percentages but just use the pure numbers.  Here is what I showed my daughter.  Go to youthsoccerrankings.com or got soccer's rankings page (I know much of these rankings are inaccurate, but bear with me).  For her age group, look at the top 50 teams in SoCal.  And figure that most of those teams carry on average 15-18 players (olders anyway).  Do the math:  15 X 50 = 750.  So, if you're on a top 50 team, there are probably 700-800 players that are either just as good as you or better in So Cal.  In your age group.  Now take a look at the national picture.  For my DD's age group, the 50th ranked team in SoCal (is the A team on a large DA club) is ranked 312 nationally.  So that's 312 X 15 = 4680.  The best player on that team was likely a DOMINANT ayso player.  They likely are the best player at their HS too.   Certain dreams of big time college soccer.  But as big and bad as they think they are on their team, they are just one of almost 5,000 kids . . . IN ONE AGE GROUP.  Think about that.


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## espola (May 18, 2017)

Wez said:


> Hello,
> 
> I'm trying to help my kids visualize the world of youth soccer and it's different levels of advancement.  Please respond with what you think are the appropriate percentages of kids who reach each level.
> 
> ...


Some Cal South clubs run rec programs the equivalent of AYSO.  Your numbers are nonsense.


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## Simisoccerfan (May 18, 2017)

US Youth Soccer lists 3,055,148 player registrations in 2014.  This would cover almost all soccer programs in the US.  DA has 69 clubs each with 4 teams with a maximum team roster of 23.  So there will be a maximum of 6,348 DA players.  If you say soccer growth has been flat and use the 2014 numbers for 2017 then only 0.2% of soccer players are playing Girls DA.  Then you need to consider the Boys DA program which has around 10,000 players.   This would bring it up to around 0.5% of soccer players will be playing DA.  This does not include all of the kids that start playing soccer and end up quitting.  I would think only about 0.1% of all kids that start playing soccer end up in DA.


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## jrcaesar (May 18, 2017)

I like where this is heading Could be closer to this, thinking out of 1,000 Club players who start on an entry-level (tier 3/Bronze) team:

5. Top Flight 2 - 20% of Club players will reach here.
6. Flight 1 - 10% of Club players will reach here.
7. Top Flight 1 - 2.5% of Club players will reach here.
8. USSDA Academy - 0.5% of Club players will reach here.
9. MLS Academy - 0.2% of Club players will reach here.

Reduce these by one-third or so if factoring in coming from Rec programs.


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## timbuck (May 18, 2017)

I think you could also add in age groups to make it even more (or less) understandable.


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## Bananacorner (May 18, 2017)

I'm not feeling mathematical, but anyone for estimating what percent play in college using this framework?


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## jrcaesar (May 18, 2017)

Based on http://www.scholarshipstats.com/varsityodds.html, they report:
9.1% of h.s. boys play in college
10.1% of h.s. girls play in college

You'd have to extrapolate how that translates to U16+ club players.


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## Wez (May 18, 2017)

espola said:


> Some Cal South clubs run rec programs the equivalent of AYSO.  Your numbers are nonsense.


I guess you could lump all the rec programs into "AYSO / all other Rec" and instead of "AYSO All Stars" you could make that category "Selective Rec / Community Soccer"?


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## espola (May 18, 2017)

Wez said:


> I guess you could lump all the rec programs into "AYSO / all other Rec" and instead of "AYSO All Stars" you could make that category "Selective Rec / Community Soccer"?


I can only speak from personal experience.  Our club and most of the closest clubs to us all ran in-house rec programs.  One small club did not - but they were very selective and only had an A team competing at the high levels of Presidio circuits.  Our club also selected the better rec players for All-Star teams that played at season end in All-Star tournaments around the county.  There was a regular procession of those All-Stars into the competitive teams, but some good players chose to stay in rec because they were dedicated to another sport and that consumed their time and money.


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## rainbow_unicorn (May 18, 2017)

Wez said:


> I'm trying to help my kids visualize the world of youth soccer and it's different levels of advancement.


I don't think kids really care about that level of detail.  I just tell mine that there are 3 levels and which level they're playing at.  Anything beyond that and I'll get glazed eyes.


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## Wez (May 18, 2017)

rainbow_unicorn said:


> I don't think kids really care about that level of detail.  I just tell mine that there are 3 levels and which level they're playing at.  Anything beyond that and I'll get glazed eyes.


I hear ya, for my younger ones yea.  The older one is moving up the ladder and I'm trying to put it all in perspective.


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## Mystery Train (May 18, 2017)

Mystery Train said:


> Interesting breakdown.  I'd say from pure observation, I think your percentages are probably pretty close.  The only percentage diff I have is that I think less AYSO players try club than 40%.  But I have no way of measuring that.
> 
> What would really give your kids the picture is to not just use the percentages but just use the pure numbers.  Here is what I showed my daughter.  Go to youthsoccerrankings.com or got soccer's rankings page (I know much of these rankings are inaccurate, but bear with me).  For her age group, look at the top 50 teams in SoCal.  And figure that most of those teams carry on average 15-18 players (olders anyway).  Do the math:  15 X 50 = 750.  So, if you're on a top 50 team, there are probably 700-800 players that are either just as good as you or better in So Cal.  In your age group.  Now take a look at the national picture.  For my DD's age group, the 50th ranked team in SoCal (is the A team on a large DA club) is ranked 312 nationally.  So that's 312 X 15 = 4680.  The best player on that team was likely a DOMINANT ayso player.  They likely are the best player at their HS too.   Certain dreams of big time college soccer.  But as big and bad as they think they are on their team, they are just one of almost 5,000 kids . . . IN ONE AGE GROUP.  Think about that.


And I forgot to consider that I was just counting the kids on teams ranked more highly than the 50th in SoCal.  In reality, if you want to visualize how rare or common your player is, you would also include good players on teams ranked below as well, so the number is probably more like 10,000 nationally, if you've pegged your kid as good enough to play on a top 50 team in SoCal.  Probably double that number if your kid is more suited for the next tier down.   And I was just counting one age group on the girls side.  

When I did this, I thought, "Damn,  there's a lot of kids playing club soccer."


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## Multi Sport (May 18, 2017)

Wez said:


> I hear ya, for my younger ones yea.  The older one is moving up the ladder and I'm trying to put it all in perspective.


Perspective? That's a hard thing for a kid to grasp.  Are you trying to use this to motivate him to push harder or build his confidence?


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## Wez (May 18, 2017)

Multi Sport said:


> Perspective? That's a hard thing for a kid to grasp.  Are you trying to use this to motivate him to push harder or build his confidence?


Build his confidence.  He's doing fantastic in his development and progression and I need to remind him not to get too discouraged at the occasional setback.


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## Multi Sport (May 18, 2017)

Wez said:


> Build his confidence.  He's doing fantastic in his development and progression and I need to remind him not to get too discouraged at the occasional setback.


Get him the book " I can't accept not trying" by Michael Jordan.  It's a short book so he will probably read it in a single sitting.


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## Wez (May 18, 2017)

Multi Sport said:


> Get him the book " I can't accept not trying" by Michael Jordan.  It's a short book so he will probably read it in a single sitting.


Done.  Gotta love Amazon...


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## timbuck (May 18, 2017)

How old?  If middle school or older, have him do the research.  Ask for a report. And if he does a good job, offer to buy him something soccer related (depending on your budget this could be new laces up to new cleats or tickets to a game).


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