Get ready folks

[Thatonedad]

As I've said before I prefer BY because it's what we have now and it works. But it doesn't matter either way.

What's annoying is that people are spreading rumors that may or may not be true. Then when one happens to land they say look see I was right. When they don't land it's off to another rumor.

Just to clarify I was right about everything I posted and so was the original forum poster.
Not that I’m keeping score or anything.

 

[Sike]

How has it been for playing time in 05/06 year and the 06/07 year?

Final year for the girls is a weird one. Most are already committed to a school and want to prioritize other social activities their senior year. Girls who haven't missed a game in 2-3 years are now available for less than half the games. My dd's experience this year and last year is that roster sizes are larger in the final year, but if you want to play there are plenty of minutes available with several girls missing multiple games. Getting enough players for travel games (vegas, arizona) can be a real struggle.

 

[RandomSoccerFan]

Just to clarify I was right about everything I posted and so was the original forum poster.
Not that I’m keeping score or anything.

Not to further keep score or anything, but I posted up this rumor in a new thread in July. Though it probably has been discussed many times before that, all the way back to the shift from SY to BY.

 

[Bells]

It depends on your mindset.

Around the world Club Soccer equates to Academy Soccer. In Academy Soccer the goal is to play professionally. That's it. What this means is lower level clubs are always looking for talent they can sell via transfer fees to higher level clubs. In this world BY doesn't really matter because top players are already playing up. Since everything is focused on development and selling talent to higher level clubs BY is irrelevant. Clubs stick to BY because it works and it's something everyone has agreed on. But in reality nobody cares about BY or games defined by BY.

In America school and sports are mixed and what I really mean by this is that College and Sports are mixed. In other countries College teach and that's it. Because Colleges in America mix sports with academics it changes how youth sports is approached. In America there's multiple reasons to play a sport. As opposed to other countries where playing professionally is the only goal. In America you can play sports with an end goal of playing professionally or you can play sports with an end goal of using sports to receive preferential treatment in school (ie College). This is where everything gets screwy.

College mixing Academics with Sports distorts everything in youth sports. In soccer you end up with groups like ECNL that say screw National Teams and playing Professionally we're just going to cater to rich parents. Because there's more college roster spots than National Team or Pro roster spots this means there's more parents youth clubs can shake down for $$$ as long as they stand between youth and college soccer pathways.

Basically ECNL only cares about getting players onto college rosters. Because of this SY makes the most sense to them because it works best for college recruiters.

If college didn't mix Academics and Sports ECNL wouldn't exist. With the way NCAA is losing court cases lately college sports might completely change in the very near future. This is why ECNL leadership is pushing for SY change now. In 3-5 years the entire AMATEURISM concept might get thrown out the window. Which might take youth soccer back to an Academy style way of identifying talent for college. If college are paying players for their services the only piece missing is colleges paying youth clubs for talent via transfer fees.

Now with both positions on the BY / SY debate you can see why many (including myself) would rather just keep things as they are. Everything works as is. The bottom could fall out of the NCAA candyland pathway to success in the very near future.

Everything worked as is under the SY system as well. Frankly, it doesn't matter what the cut off date is. Most kids are not playing on the national team and would rather play with their school friends...and it lines up with HS and College soccer...which is where most kids end up and prevents the issues of kids not having teams in 8th grade...or 12th. The more kids that play, the better as it builds a stronger soccer culture.

Yes, the point (overall for USA soccer) should be to develop kids professionally. But, in the USA coaches and clubs (including most academies) are focused on winning that year. Which means the bigger/older kids are chosen. It is not about development- its about winning. The focus is short term. In Europe.. youth academies look longer term, bc that is how they make money, will this kid be good when 20? That is the difference and that should be the mentality and focus of every training, game, and decision if you want to develop great professional players. That is not the mentality in the US and never will be.

So pick whatever date you want (BY or SY)..there will be always be a gap between the oldest and youngest. Personally, I think SY makes more sense as it lines up with school.

(I can guarantee all the January-March birthdays are going to freak out when their kid is no longer on the top team...bc they are competing against 'older' kids. It will be great for all the good players born July-Dec, that have been ignored the past few years. It is a great demonstration of how coaches/clubs identify 'talent').

 

[Carlsbad7]

Everything worked as is under the SY system as well. Frankly, it doesn't matter what the cut off date is. Most kids are not playing on the national team and would rather play with their school friends...and it lines up with HS and College soccer...which is where most kids end up and prevents the issues of kids not having teams in 8th grade...or 12th. The more kids that play, the better as it builds a stronger soccer culture.

Yes, the point (overall for USA soccer) should be to develop kids professionally. But, in the USA coaches and clubs (including most academies) are focused on winning that year. Which means the bigger/older kids are chosen. It is not about development- its about winning. The focus is short term. In Europe.. youth academies look longer term, bc that is how they make money, will this kid be good when 20? That is the difference and that should be the mentality and focus of every training, game, and decision if you want to develop great professional players. That is not the mentality in the US and never will be.

So pick whatever date you want (BY or SY)..there will be always be a gap between the oldest and youngest. Personally, I think SY makes more sense as it lines up with school.

(I can guarantee all the January-March birthdays are going to freak out when their kid is no longer on the top team...bc they are competing against 'older' kids. It will be great for all the good players born July-Dec, that have been ignored the past few years. It is a great demonstration of how coaches/clubs identify 'talent').

I'm on the other side of the coin (BY) but I agree with most of what you said. In the end it doesn't matter either way the top players will be playing up a year or two and BY or SY doesn't apply.

I like BY because it's what we have now and it works.

The thing with SY is that no matter what safeguards are put in place (Aug 1 cutoff as an example). There will be parents who find ways to "redshirt" their kids so they're 16 year old freshman. There will also be private schools that specialize in letting kids start a year late in school so kids have an advantage in sports.

 

[CAZZZ]

I'm on the other side of the coin (BY) but I agree with most of what you said. In the end it doesn't matter either way the top players will be playing up a year or two and BY or SY doesn't apply.

I like BY because it's what we have now and it works.

The thing with SY is that no matter what safeguards are put in place (Aug 1 cutoff as an example). There will be parents who find ways to "redshirt" their kids so they're 16 year old freshman. There will also be private schools that specialize in letting kids start a year late in school so kids have an advantage in sports.

Dumb head. The change will still be one year. They just moved from 1/1 to 12/31 to 8/1 to 7/31 to better align grades. In this case, a 16-year-old freshman will have to play on the Junior team.

 

[Carlsbad7]

Dumb head. The change will still be one year. They just moved from 1/1 to 12/31 to 8/1 to 7/31 to better align grades. In this case, a 16-year-old freshman will have to play on the Junior team.

Ok (dumb head), just wait.

Just like now where you have "trapped" players parents lobbying to play with kids in their classes at school there will be "redshirt" parents using the same logic.

Coaches will want players that are older but in a certain grade on their team. Clubs won't want to deal with the hassle of figuring out which kids in which grade should be playing up because their parent redshirted them.

 

[Bells]

Ok (dumb head), just wait.

Just like now where you have "trapped" players parents lobbying to play with kids in their classes at school there will be "redshirt" parents using the same logic.

Coaches will want players that are older but in a certain grade on their team. Clubs won't want to deal with the hassle of figuring out which kids in which grade should be playing up because their parent redshirted them.

It is still based on DOB...just meant to line up with SY. Will still be some kids that it doesnt line up with their SY..but far fewer.

 

[RandomSoccerFan]

As discussed ad nauseum - the final rule, whatever it turns out to be, doesn't have to be exclusively grade based, or exclusively age based. As only an example, basketball uses school year, but augments that with rules that the kid has to be born after a certain date, in addition to their grade. This means that no, you can't have a 15 year old 6th grader on a 6th grade team.

But it does certainly add some necessary complication, because now the player has to be in a certain grade, and also has to be a certain age (or younger). This is where it often falls apart in basketball, because not only do different tournaments/leagues have different cutoff dates, from Aug 1 to Sep 15, but they also have different rules for holdbacks. So in some cases an eighth grader can play on a seventh grade team, if they meet the cutoff for seventh grade age. But if they are actually in 7th grade, they don't have to meet the 7th grade age, and can be as old as 8th, or sometimes even 9th grade age. And complicating all of this, is that in almost all cases - nobody really follows these to the letter, and kids of ages/grades that they probably shouldn't be are on the court all of the time - it's just something that you either get used to and tolerate, or are continuously annoyed at the perceived cheating.

That is one reason that the BY is clearly superior, in that it's simple to both explain and enforce. Kid born in 2012? Great - they are on a 2012 team. If the new rule is still just as simple, and DOB-only, with a cutoff of Aug 1, then it's still not terribly hard to explain or enforce - thought switching costs are certainly very high.

 

[Bells]

As discussed ad nauseum - the final rule, whatever it turns out to be, doesn't have to be exclusively grade based, or exclusively age based. As only an example, basketball uses school year, but augments that with rules that the kid has to be born after a certain date, in addition to their grade. This means that no, you can't have a 15 year old 6th grader on a 6th grade team.

But it does certainly add some necessary complication, because now the player has to be in a certain grade, and also has to be a certain age (or younger). This is where it often falls apart in basketball, because not only do different tournaments/leagues have different cutoff dates, from Aug 1 to Sep 15, but they also have different rules for holdbacks. So in some cases an eighth grader can play on a seventh grade team, if they meet the cutoff for seventh grade age. But if they are actually in 7th grade, they don't have to meet the 7th grade age, and can be as old as 8th, or sometimes even 9th grade age. And complicating all of this, is that in almost all cases - nobody really follows these to the letter, and kids of ages/grades that they probably shouldn't be are on the court all of the time - it's just something that you either get used to and tolerate, or are continuously annoyed at the perceived cheating.

That is one reason that the BY is clearly superior, in that it's simple to both explain and enforce. Kid born in 2012? Great - they are on a 2012 team.

It will be 8/1/2012- 7/31/13. It is not based on on grade level.

 

[Carlsbad7]

As discussed ad nauseum - the final rule, whatever it turns out to be, doesn't have to be exclusively grade based, or exclusively age based. As only an example, basketball uses school year, but augments that with rules that the kid has to be born after a certain date, in addition to their grade. This means that no, you can't have a 15 year old 6th grader on a 6th grade team.

But it does certainly add some necessary complication, because now the player has to be in a certain grade, and also has to be a certain age (or younger). This is where it often falls apart in basketball, because not only do different tournaments/leagues have different cutoff dates, from Aug 1 to Sep 15, but they also have different rules for holdbacks. So in some cases an eighth grader can play on a seventh grade team, if they meet the cutoff for seventh grade age. But if they are actually in 7th grade, they don't have to meet the 7th grade age, and can be as old as 8th, or sometimes even 9th grade age. And complicating all of this, is that in almost all cases - nobody really follows these to the letter, and kids of ages/grades that they probably shouldn't be are on the court all of the time - it's just something that you either get used to and tolerate, or are continuously annoyed at the perceived cheating.

That is one reason that the BY is clearly superior, in that it's simple to both explain and enforce. Kid born in 2012? Great - they are on a 2012 team. If the new rule is still just as simple, and DOB-only, with a cutoff of Aug 1, then it's still not terribly hard to explain or enforce - thought switching costs are certainly very high.

Ha, now you're on the BY train...

Wouldn't be because if different leagues had different cutoff dates that it would make the rankings app a 1000% more difficult to maintain. To address you'd need to add power rankings for different leagues which the top clubs would just manipulate by head hunting in tournaments.

 

[aong cangkol]

Everything worked as is under the SY system as well. Frankly, it doesn't matter what the cut off date is. Most kids are not playing on the national team and would rather play with their school friends...and it lines up with HS and College soccer...which is where most kids end up and prevents the issues of kids not having teams in 8th grade...or 12th. The more kids that play, the better as it builds a stronger soccer culture.

Yes, the point (overall for USA soccer) should be to develop kids professionally. But, in the USA coaches and clubs (including most academies) are focused on winning that year. Which means the bigger/older kids are chosen. It is not about development- its about winning. The focus is short term. In Europe.. youth academies look longer term, bc that is how they make money, will this kid be good when 20? That is the difference and that should be the mentality and focus of every training, game, and decision if you want to develop great professional players. That is not the mentality in the US and never will be.

So pick whatever date you want (BY or SY)..there will be always be a gap between the oldest and youngest. Personally, I think SY makes more sense as it lines up with school.

(I can guarantee all the January-March birthdays are going to freak out when their kid is no longer on the top team...bc they are competing against 'older' kids. It will be great for all the good players born July-Dec, that have been ignored the past few years. It is a great demonstration of how coaches/clubs identify 'talent').

Good observation. It will not impact national team level development thus why not making it fun for the kids by playing with their school friends?
For lower level basketball, many leagues has grade 4-6, 6-8 grouped together, including mixed gender team. If you are better, will play with older kids.
Again, it does not matter for lower level.

For professional and national team development, academy or whatever elite name they want to use will be the pathway.

 

[RandomSoccerFan]

As a reminder - me <> Mark. I'm sure he's a perfectly fantastic guy, and while I'm usually pretty supportive of all of his efforts, please don't conflate someone who thinks what he's done with the app is pretty cool - and the guy that actually develops it.

I don't think the shift, if there is any shift, is as big a deal for rankings as you clearly think it would be. I think that some decisions would be needed to be made, but it's all pretty doable and not terribly complex.

I've got kids in BY sports and SY sports, and if someone held a gun to my head, I think I'd prefer BY over SY, only because of the implementation complexities of SY and how I've seen them fall down. But I'm not a particularly strong proponent of either.

 

[aong cangkol]

There will be parents who find ways to "redshirt" their kids so they're 16 year old freshman. There will also be private schools that specialize in letting kids start a year late in school so kids have an advantage in sports.

Yeah there are a couple of schools pop up in my area specialized in getting "older" middle school kids specifically to be superior in high school sports. I guess it is that important for many parents. They are not in it for scholarship at all.

 

[whatithink]

As discussed ad nauseum - the final rule, whatever it turns out to be, doesn't have to be exclusively grade based, or exclusively age based. As only an example, basketball uses school year, but augments that with rules that the kid has to be born after a certain date, in addition to their grade. This means that no, you can't have a 15 year old 6th grader on a 6th grade team.

But it does certainly add some necessary complication, because now the player has to be in a certain grade, and also has to be a certain age (or younger). This is where it often falls apart in basketball, because not only do different tournaments/leagues have different cutoff dates, from Aug 1 to Sep 15, but they also have different rules for holdbacks. So in some cases an eighth grader can play on a seventh grade team, if they meet the cutoff for seventh grade age. But if they are actually in 7th grade, they don't have to meet the 7th grade age, and can be as old as 8th, or sometimes even 9th grade age. And complicating all of this, is that in almost all cases - nobody really follows these to the letter, and kids of ages/grades that they probably shouldn't be are on the court all of the time - it's just something that you either get used to and tolerate, or are continuously annoyed at the perceived cheating.

That is one reason that the BY is clearly superior, in that it's simple to both explain and enforce. Kid born in 2012? Great - they are on a 2012 team. If the new rule is still just as simple, and DOB-only, with a cutoff of Aug 1, then it's still not terribly hard to explain or enforce - thought switching costs are certainly very high.

But its not complicated. Soccer had this system for years. It's based on the kids birth date and between 8/1 and 7/31. That correlates pretty much with grade year, so kids in the same grades generally play together. There's no reason soccer would add any complication over and above that, i.e. just go back to the prior system.

I've no idea why switching costs would be high. You pick the teams at tryouts based on the date range ... that's actually exactly the same as is done currently.

 

[RandomSoccerFan]

Yes, if it is nothing more than switching the date cutoff - then all of this discussion about redshirting, holdbacks, grade exceptions, trapped, or any other description that compares a kid to their specified grade, doesn't matter. Here is the new date cutoff, and you must be born on this date or later to be on this team; full stop. It's just that since it somewhat corresponds to school year, all of the other discussions do tend to come into play. The environment appears more complicated now than it was back when soccer had this system in place initially.

Switching costs being high means that any change like this blows up thousands and thousands of teams, with kids that have played with each other for years. Yes, at the most competitive level, kids are trying out every season and both make new teams and are cut - but that's a pretty small minority of players when looking at youth soccer as a whole. For most, there is much more continuity from season to season - while this change has a decent likelihood of blowing much of that up.

 

[Carlsbad7]

As a reminder - me <> Mark. I'm sure he's a perfectly fantastic guy, and while I'm usually pretty supportive of all of his efforts, please don't conflate someone who thinks what he's done with the app is pretty cool - and the guy that actually develops it.

I don't think the shift, if there is any shift, is as big a deal for rankings as you clearly think it would be. I think that some decisions would be needed to be made, but it's all pretty doable and not terribly complex.

I've got kids in BY sports and SY sports, and if someone held a gun to my head, I think I'd prefer BY over SY, only because of the implementation complexities of SY and how I've seen them fall down. But I'm not a particularly strong proponent of either.

If in the rankings app power definitions were added to different leagues to compensate different league cutoff dates two things would happen.

First, club rankings would stratify based on league power definition.

Second, top teams from leagues with less power ranking would search out teams from higher power leagues to beat and magnify the win.

As an example. Top Hat would be able to move themselves into the top 5 every summer when they play in tournaments. Then during the GA season they'd need to blow out opponents 10-0 to maintain it.

Things quickly become a nightmare to maintain.

 

[Carlsbad7]

Yeah there are a couple of schools pop up in my area specialized in getting "older" middle school kids specifically to be superior in high school sports. I guess it is that important for many parents. They are not in it for scholarship at all.

I've spoken with parents that "redshirted" their kid. When I ask why they chose to make that decision it almost always starts with "we wanted to give our kid an advantage academically". Then later on I find out the kid is not a mental mastermind and never will be. But they happen to be bigger, faster, and stronger than all their classmates and they also just happen to excel in sports.

Just to be clear I'm not talking about kids that are held back in school for academic reasons. I'm talking about kids that started kindergarten a year later than everyone else.

I remember in HS football we had one of these kind of kids on the team. Both parents were under 5'5" but they were convinced their kid would go pro. He did well at first because he was bigger than everyone else. By sophomore year everyone had caught up to him and surpassed him in size, speed, etc. Then to try and keep the dream alive his parents took him to a doctor that prescribed steroids. By senior year he was big but not taller and likely because of the steroids his hair was starting to fall out.

This is what WILL happen if clubs switch to SY. You can try to stop the madness by defining a cutoff date like Aug 1st. But over time it won't matter and different leagues will do SY only without a cutoff date because it's just easier to implement.

 

[whatithink]

Yes, if it is nothing more than switching the date cutoff - then all of this discussion about redshirting, holdbacks, grade exceptions, trapped, or any other description that compares a kid to their specified grade, doesn't matter. Here is the new date cutoff, and you must be born on this date or later to be on this team; full stop. It's just that since it somewhat corresponds to school year, all of the other discussions do tend to come into play. The environment appears more complicated now than it was back when soccer had this system in place initially.

Switching costs being high means that any change like this blows up thousands and thousands of teams, with kids that have played with each other for years. Yes, at the most competitive level, kids are trying out every season and both make new teams and are cut - but that's a pretty small minority of players when looking at youth soccer as a whole. For most, there is much more continuity from season to season - while this change has a decent likelihood of blowing much of that up.

All the talk of redshirting etc. is just nonsense and scare mongering. None of that happened previously, so there's zero reason it would happen if they make this change. The only thing complicated about the environment now is the number of letter leagues.

There's potential for high impact on existing teams, but that's not a cost ($) thing. Fwiw, I've seen plenty of kids/parents (non elite) switch teams so that their kids can play with their school friends. Soccer to them is a healthy social experience.

 

[whatithink]

This is what WILL happen if clubs switch to SY. You can try to stop the madness by defining a cutoff date like Aug 1st. But over time it won't matter and different leagues will do SY only without a cutoff date because it's just easier to implement.

It won't happen, just because you say so. It never happened previously so there's zero reason to think it will now.

I do know parents who started their kids late or made them repeat 8th grade, but that was all to do with HS sports, never club. I've even seen parents pick a small HS for their kids because they'd likely make the team but in a bigger one they might not. None of these kids are elite and there are not enough of them for any club or org to twist a system to suit them.