Youth Soccer Rankings ?

[MochaRulz]

I wasn't careful in quoting, my fault. That comment was for Carlsbad7, who is convinced that the app needed to accommodate different rankings for teams that went SY and those that stayed BY. It didn't make sense when everything was conjecture. It really doesn't make sense after everything was determined and relayed by the developers quite awhile back.


Again - I'm not sure what to tell you. Pick a team. A specific team. That has the problem you describe. Post a screenshot. Let's look at it. Or just name it. And we can confirm what you're suggesting. If it's a problem with that specific team, it's an easy fix - just fix the age group if it's incorrect.

If it's a more widespread error and teams that are playing U15G (2011G right now), are being lumped in incorrectly with the U14G (2012G right now), or U12G (2014G right now), we should definitely document it and get it to support@usasportstatistics.net with enough information that they can duplicate the error and make any fixes necessary.

If SoCal has teams that are playing the age groups that they are supposed to be for 2026/2027, and is calling them that early in April 2026, then there is a real problem with how they (SoCal) have set up their schedules/naming conventions.

Right now SR is chasing a number of bugs, including the game times for schedules not taking into account time zone. They just fixed that, and in doing so they nuked the game location being displayed - so they're now re-fixing that. They (along with none of us) can't claim to be perfect, and it's an unending process to identify bugs to resolve as they're identified - but they have always been good about getting to them as soon as they can.

No worries on the confusion about the argument. Thank you for the clarification.

Here are some examples:

GotSport

All these teams are listed in U10 but are actually U11.
Most have U12 players on them as well as they have switched to SY.

Specific Examples from the above subset:
Both Strikers Teams, both LAFC teams and West Coast are all listed as unranked in the U10 2016 Bracket
Slammers, Albion and Beach are listed under U11
SoCal Reds is connected to an old team and coach that doesnt exist anymore that has been abandoned in the U10 bracket.

These examples are just looking at 1 league bracket from SoCal Spring league that kicked off last week. There are hundreds of teams over in spring league where quickly searching the names in SR i have come across easily a hundred + errors.

 

[RandomSoccerFan]

I am seeing the same thing that MochaRulz noted. All the teams are one year off according the new age group drop downs. For example, my daughter's u12 team is in the u11(2015) category. Almost every previously 2015 team would now be u12.

Yes - if your U12 team has its new results already showing up in U11 incorrectly, I see the issue. To fix any of them individually, just edit the data source to show U12 instead, and then pull it in to the U12 team. But if it is happening widely - then they need to fix the translation. It sounds like it's interpreting the April 2026 results as if it's past Aug 1, 2026. I sent Mark the details, I'm confident they'll review and adjust if there is an issue.

With so many teams completely re-formed and changed due to the age change I dont think the historical data is all that helpful and they probably should be starting from scratch.

They evidently disagree with you. Of course the situation is that some teams will barely change at all, and some teams will almost entirely change - but in aggregate, the past season information is more valuable to predict future team performance, than no data at all. And often teams prefer to keep their game history shown for many seasons. As listed in their FAQ, they decided to keep the team info together this time for tournament flighting to still be possible throughout the transition.

 

[RandomSoccerFan]

No worries on the confusion about the argument. Thank you for the clarification.

Here are some examples:

GotSport

All these teams are listed in U10 but are actually U11.
Most have U12 players on them as well as they have switched to SY.

Specific Examples from the above subset:
Both Strikers Teams, both LAFC teams and West Coast are all listed as unranked in the U10 2016 Bracket
Slammers, Albion and Beach are listed under U11
SoCal Reds is connected to an old team and coach that doesnt exist anymore that has been abandoned in the U10 bracket.

These examples are just looking at 1 league bracket from SoCal Spring league that kicked off last week. There are hundreds of teams over in spring league where quickly searching the names in SR i have come across easily a hundred + errors.

SoCal is now calling a team BU11, that was a 2016 team prior? SoCal has made a mistake. They shouldn't have done that for the Spring season. It's absurd that SR has to deal with things like this. But here we are.

 

[MochaRulz]

SoCal is now calling a team BU11, that was a 2016 team prior? SoCal has made a mistake. They shouldn't have done that for the Spring season. It's absurd that SR has to deal with things like this. But here we are.

There is no longer a 2016 team as Spring league is the start of a new season in SoCal for all intents and purpose. For California in general State Cup marks the end of the season for most teams that are playing a non-letter league. Even the CA Cup which is contested between the winner and runner-up of the State Cup in NorCal and SoCal had the age changed to SY vs BY.

So all previous 2016 teams are now SY which is Aug 2015 to July 2016. Hence they are all U11 and not U10.

Also teams have specific open tryout windows for each age range and the youngers are earlier in the year. 90% of all 2013 and younger teams are set in stone in SoCal before the end of April. Clubs want to lock down the players and Spring League starts early April.

Here were the Open Tryout Dates for SoCal soccer for the 2026/27 season:
U7–U9 (Youngers): Officially start December 1, 2025 - Most of these teams are set and signed on new contracts by end of Jan 2026
U10–U14 (Intermediate): Officially start February 23, 2026 - Most of these are set by end Feb / Early March.
U15–U19 (Olders): Officially start April 20, 2026 - These are generally mostly set by Mid/End May

Tryout and rosters need to be locked and registered by 6/30.

Hope this helps clarify my question.

 

[RandomSoccerFan]

Here's the issue, as I'm sure you're well aware. US soccer season, across the entire country, runs from Aug 1 - Sep 30. Right now we are all in the 2025-2026 season, and on Aug 1, 2026, we all kick off the 2026-2027 season. This is when teams go up a year, this is when the calendars roll over, and this is when SR changes all of its team age designations. While a "2015" team keeps the name 2015 throughout its lifecycle, its name/category goes from U10, U11, U12, U13, all the way up until it ages out - and this happens every August. Now that US soccer is going to the SY instead of BY, team names are going to lose the birth year designation, and they are only going to be referred to as U10, U11, U12, etc. And it increments for every team, every Aug 1.

Now if SoCal wants to do something completely against the USA calendar, and keep a team "BU11" from Jan-Dec, and then switch its name in January to "BU12", instead of waiting until August with the rest of the world, well - it seems they are at an impasse. (12/1 - 11/30 for youngers,2/23 to 2/22 for inter, 4/20-4/19 for older) SR may never work correctly for them again as we all morph to the new naming scheme. It's not a bug to be fixed, it's a problem that appears inherently unfixable. Either SoCal names and categorizes their teams like the rest of the country, or they don't - and the consequences are foreseeable.

 

[MochaRulz]

They evidently disagree with you. Of course the situation is that some teams will barely change at all, and some teams will almost entirely change - but in aggregate, the past season information is more valuable to predict future team performance, than no data at all. And often teams prefer to keep their game history shown for many seasons. As listed in their FAQ, they decided to keep the team info together this time for tournament flighting to still be possible throughout the transition.

Not trying to further this argument or say one way is better or worse/right or wrong. Nor am i trying to say the devs made a wrong choice.

I am merely adding an observation from SoCal soccer League team sheets i have seen so far, most teams in the 2015 to 2019 Brackets have at least 30% players added to the roster are from the "older" portion of the age bracket. Several teams have have more than 50% of the starters that are these older players that have dropped down based on SY.

Again just an observation.

 

[RandomSoccerFan]

I realize that it's not a new issue - it's just now that the problem makes itself clear once the teams are no longer referred to by birth year. Doing it that way prior normalized the data so that it really didn't matter what season dates were, even though they were always skewed across states (and really skewed in SoCal).

 

[RandomSoccerFan]

Not trying to further this argument or say one way is better or worse/right or wrong. Nor am i trying to say the devs made a wrong choice.

I am merely adding an observation from SoCal soccer League team sheets i have seen so far, most teams in the 2015 to 2019 Brackets have at least 30% players added to the roster are from the "older" portion of the age bracket. Several teams have have more than 50% of the starters that are these older players that have dropped down based on SY.

Again just an observation.

Right - but even if the rosters were 100% new across the board, and the only thing that stayed the same was the name of the team - the game data for that prior team is *still* a better predictor for how that team would be expected to perform vs. its peers, than no data at all. Keep in mind all of this is built to predict the outcome when one team entity plays another team entity. The better it is at doing that, the more "accurate" it is in terms of ranking teams by their strength (likelihood to win). And as games continue to be played, the ratings will continue to track towards current performance.

 

[MochaRulz]

Right - but even if the rosters were 100% new across the board, and the only thing that stayed the same was the name of the team - the game data for that prior team is *still* a better predictor for how that team would be expected to perform vs. its peers, than no data at all. Keep in mind all of this is built to predict the outcome when one team entity plays another team entity. The better it is at doing that, the more "accurate" it is in terms of ranking teams by their strength (likelihood to win). And as games continue to be played, the ratings will continue to track towards current performance.

I dont disagree in general. Like i said was just pointing out an observation given SoCals premature change

I think after a year of the change the predictor aspect will balance out but i can see a lot of situations where a team filled with Aug / Sept birthdays plays a team filled with December birthdays of the following year because the club decided to keep BY in prep for MLS HG. This doesnt even take into account if the team is playing up an additional year.

Again i dont think there is a One size fits all solution nor one that i better than the other.

 

[MochaRulz]

I realize that it's not a new issue - it's just now that the problem makes itself clear once the teams are no longer referred to by birth year. Doing it that way prior normalized the data so that it really didn't matter what season dates were, even though they were always skewed across states (and really skewed in SoCal).

There is one part i partially disagree with you on this and your previous statement. The SR app breaks down the rankings by State. No reason the logic cannot be written/tweaked based on region. This would potentially help balance weighting/results for teams across states playing each other as tournaments held over this summer would be featuring California teams that are technically an age group older against teams from other states.

 

[RandomSoccerFan]

I got a response from SR. The unfortunate reality, is this is by design. They've reviewed it, and there is no bug in translation. SoCal jumped the gun on the age group change, and even then it is being inconsistent. They are currently actively correcting SoCal team ages so they are accurate.

They also said that 49.5 states have gotten this right, and if things get too out of control they might just take SoCal out of the system and restart them on Aug 1.

By my understanding of the situation, it sure does look like the same problem would occur again even upon restart.

 

[RandomSoccerFan]

There is one part i partially disagree with you on this and your previous statement. The SR app breaks down the rankings by State. No reason the logic cannot be written/tweaked based on region. This would potentially help balance weighting/results for teams across states playing each other as tournaments held over this summer would be featuring California teams that are technically an age group older against teams from other states.

I'm not sure I understand (or if you understand). Game data is put into brackets based on its age designation. Teams are then made up of this game data that's pulled together when SR (or a user) determines that it's from the same team. There is a single pile of thousands of thousands of teams. Which can then be sorted/ranked/displayed in any way, including by state.

There is no (and can be no) maintainable logic to first determine where game data is being taken from, identify the sanctioning body, and put it in different brackets depending on what geography that particular game data is from and what the season dates might be for that age group. It's pretty out there to assume that one could even be developed.

 

[RandomSoccerFan]

OK - I think there's been some miscommunication. I know there has been on my side. First - SoCal has confirmed with SR that they are going to be using Aug 1 to July 30 birth years like everyone else. They just evidently chose to name the teams wrong this season, and they also haven't been consistent about it. SR was told they did this so they will not have to issue new player cards in August.

SR's support team is going to be overwhelmed with this silliness for the next few months.

I misread the different tryout dates / tryout calendar, to represent the season dates. The SoCal season dates remain uniform, Aug 1 - July 30.

There will definitely be ongoing glitches, even in the fall, as teams that call themselves various things play in different tournaments, sometimes even playing up from their "normal" age group. So it will certainly take some effort by those maintaining their teams in SR to make sure that the data grabbed is consistent, and adjusted when necessary.