Let me give you a hypothetical. What if the 06 blues ecrl coach and most players move to pats? That team plus a few other good players would make them immediately competitive in ecnl. There is plenty of talent in oc.
ECNL Expansion In Socal SW Division
- Thread starter Royal26
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Why move to Pats? Same reasons as people move to any other team. Maybe you like the coach. Maybe practice is convenient. Maybe you have a friend on the team. Maybe you want more playing time. Maybe your current team has a toxic parent culture.
OC has enough talent. Benches might get a bit thinner. More kids will get playing time. Solar will have an easier time winning their five thousandth championship. And life will go on.
Nextbigthing
SILVER
There is plenty of talent if you want to finish in the bottom half of the table.
If that's your take then I'm going to guess you haven't seen them play and the bottom half of the ecnl sw play. They wouldn't beat koge, surf, legends or blues, but they'd give everyone else a game.
To be clear, I don't think adding pats makes ecnl better. They should've adding a team in another geo. I'm just providing an example at one age group of how pats could compete next year. There is plenty of talent, especially with the families from north sd willing to make the drive to the gp (crazy, but true).
Parents in North SD drive to GP because Surf and now Sharks are the only ECNL options in San Diego. Unless you want to drive to the Rebels which is nearly impossible with traffic. Ironically with traffic GP is only a 15 minutes more than the Polo fields during the summer.
Some do for sure, but we all know families that have been doing that drive since u-littles before ECNL or DA were even available to them.
The bigger question is North County SD is HUGE + always has a lot of talent why isn't there a local option?
We all know the answer to this. It's just unfortunate.
There was, but US Soccer managed to F it all up.
What Pats getting ECNL does for the girls is it allows for the players that would otherwise not receive playing time on Slammers Koge, Slammers FC, Legends, Blues and even SD Surf to be on the field for college scouts and coaches to see play. That may very well help them receive an opportunity to play soccer in college. Thus, I am all for it. Anything that helps the girls is something I am all for.
oh canada
GOLD
There are a lot of dumb parents out there, some of whom regularly post on this forum. I can't imagine willfully subjecting my child to that treatment, all for the sake of winning a few more games than another team.
Just be sure to add the cost of future therapy sessions for your dd if it happens. Of all the things I've heard from opposing sidelines over 10+ years and 3 kids, nothing comes close to the personal insults and mental abuse from that sideline.
oh canada
GOLD
Agree. Competition is good. Choices for players and families are good. Gone are the days where two clubs in OC and one club in SD control all player pathways.
oh canada
GOLD
Agree with @Goforgoal , you might consider that some Sharks girls read these posts too. But, I know, it feeds your Surf ego to put down teenage girls. Comments like yours usually come from parents with kids who warm the bench.
The idea of being on a sports team and not playing is insane and I hope we see a shift in kids/parents accepting that in the future.
Playing college soccer is not all it seems to be. Its a good fit for a few, but not nearly the number of teens playing on top teams for this reason. These clubs/leagues are selling a dream that isn’t achievable or the right path for most of its customers.
The youth are starting to realize that there is more to life than performing, achieving and competing and that doesn’t guarantee joy and happiness.
Youth should be playing soccer, and other sports, because it brings them joy, not merely as a means to an end. Parents will appreciate that in addition to joy, it provides character building. If it also provides opportunities that are a good fit
For the player, that’s just a bonus.
So many people/organizations profit from families engaging in the relentless pursuit of that D1 scholarship that they've made it almost impossible to resist.
keeprunning
BRONZE
Another ECNL team SMH… if everyone is special, no one is.
The purpose of a league is to arrange interesting games, not to make parents feel special.
sounds like a GA parent
SoccerFan4Life
PREMIER
Baker is an ahole! Are parents that desperate to follow him regardless of how he treats the girls? Never mind the question. It’s a resounding yes!!
When you really unpack what’s going on in these top leagues (ECNL, MLS Next), their whole marketing strategy is dependent on fear. Fear of not keeping up, fear of missing out, fear of not being enough (via my kid), fear of my kid not being special. Remove the carrot of a D1 scholarship or college admissions leverage and all the time and money these leagues require seems extreme to just have your kid play a team sport. I’m not sure the leagues would exist as they are today if college sports suddenly went away.
Even if you and your kid are the outlier and are participating out of love for the sport and not based on an end goal, the platform you are playing within is still rooted in the capitalization of fear. Kind of spoils the whole experience.