No doubt, SoCal is the epicenter of U.S. soccer. This furthers my point that the DA's are failing to produce great players. What are the objective measures that really say the DA system is improving? It is a vessel that will always fill. If you had 60 DA's in SoCal tomorrow you would fill them up instantly because there are enough parents willing to shell out the time and bucks but that doesn't mean there were twice as many DA quality players that magically appeared.
SoCal and the U.S for that matter, only produce a small fraction of the talent Spain puts out because their best athletes choose soccer first over other sports. Combined with the fact that almost all the top players in the world almost always end up in Europe it is interesting how few SoCal products have played for a first division European team. Will the number go up with all of these DA's, maybe a little but nothing significant. It won't happen until our best athletes look at soccer as a viable choice before football, baseball and basketball. Maybe the sheer number of DA's will garner exposure and start attracting more talent.
If you want your kid to develop and get some college looks, sure go DA but producing world class players is not happening because it starts with selection and I truly feel the best kids aren't being selected or they simply choose one of many other less expensive or time consuming routes. Many parents have figured out the financial and happiness ROI isn't there. If their kid wanted to follow their dream of becoming a pro and they were really good, it makes more sense to go with a professional academy or European academy and not just another club that put in DA paperwork.
And yes, some of the same false pride about SCDSL Flight 1 is out there. At least you have to earn your level in Coast. All this rhetoric about who is really better can simply be solved on the pitch.