Get ready folks

[Offside no S]

Wouldn't she be playing on a 2028 ECNL club team if the rule change happened? She's a 2028 in high school right now. I thought teams would be formed based on what high school graduation year you are?

So that's the farce... not everyone whose birthday fits into the 8/1-7/31 limits will share a grad year. In fact, a solid number will not. This will affect more than the "trapped players" and kind of insult some kids (ones held back, etc.) At least birth year is a level playing field and is a lot less confusing.

 

[Carlsbad7]

If I ever get info that is on the not wanting to switch back side I will post that as well. So far everything I’m hearing it’s leaning more towards yes. Still some hoops to jump through before it’s finalized.

You might want to check the background of your sources before running with anything they say as facts.

The truth is that this is a highly charged topic in the youth soccer world. Also there's multiple groups and agendas at play. If you only speak to the people in a certain camp it makes it seem like that's how the world thinks. Which isn't always the case.

Here's why I don't think things won't change from birth year to school year.

1. Everything works with birth year right now. Some people might have issues but everything works.
2. Switching to school year has to be done by everyone or it doesn't work. It's like herding cats getting all the leagues to change.
3. ECNL has been very aggressive against both MLSN and GA. Saying that clubs can't have girls ECNL if they have MLSN. Or vice versa. This win at all costs mentality makes it hard to engage with other clubs on topics like switching to school year.

A couple of other things that people aren't expecting. Once the school year Pandoras box is opened you're going to get people pushing for school grade only as the grouping (not Aug 1st) and we'll be back to 16 year old freshman competing against 13-14 year olds. Another thing ECNL people aren't considering is the only 2 bargaining chips ECNL has for getting other leagues to switch to school year is $$$ and offering clubs access to ECNL. This means if school year goes through. Expect to see a whole bunch of new clubs "watering down" ECNL next season.

 

[CAZZZ]

You might want to check the background of your sources before running with anything they say as facts.

The truth is that this is a highly charged topic in the youth soccer world. Also there's multiple groups and agendas at play. If you only speak to the people in a certain camp it makes it seem like that's how the world thinks. Which isn't always the case.

Here's why I don't think things won't change from birth year to school year.

1. Everything works with birth year right now. Some people might have issues but everything works.
2. Switching to school year has to be done by everyone or it doesn't work. It's like herding cats getting all the leagues to change.
3. ECNL has been very aggressive against both MLSN and GA. Saying that clubs can't have girls ECNL if they have MLSN. Or vice versa. This win at all costs mentality makes it hard to engage with other clubs on topics like switching to school year.

A couple of other things that people aren't expecting. Once the school year Pandoras box is opened you're going to get people pushing for school grade only as the grouping (not Aug 1st) and we'll be back to 16 year old freshman competing against 13-14 year olds. Another thing ECNL people aren't considering is the only 2 bargaining chips ECNL has for getting other leagues to switch to school year is $$$ and offering clubs access to ECNL. This means if school year goes through. Expect to see a whole bunch of new clubs "watering down" ECNL next season.

ECNL can do SY itself since ECNL teams already only play against themselves. For 1 or 2 outside tournaments like Surf Cup, they can have ECNL bracket.

And SY is not equal to GY, so the max difference within a team is still 1 year. You will not see a 16 years play against 14 years.

 

[Carlsbad7]

ECNL can do SY itself since ECNL teams already only play against themselves. For 1 or 2 outside tournaments like Surf Cup, they can have ECNL bracket.

And SY is not equal to GY, so the max difference within a team is still 1 year. You will not see a 16 years play against 14 years.

The minute Surf Cup does an "ECNL Bracket" they'll lose 80% of the partipants.

Also, how will rankings work if ages aren't the same?

What you're suggesting is exactly what I said would happen from the beginning of this thread. ECNL as a business will make a bunch more $$$ by killing cross league play. Local club tournaments will suffer because other leagues wont participate in ECNL club tournaments.

 

[Derek1800]

I really hope we go back to Aug 1. It is better for the kids to play with their classmates at the younger age groups and this accomplishes that in the best way. We also need to evolve our strategy for kids born late in whatever cutoff we go with. Too often these kids get left behind by the best clubs who have the best coaches at the young age groups. I see it all the time where kids have great instincts and talent but are to small and slow due to Sept through Dec bdays.

 

[TheMountie]

I really hope we go back to Aug 1. It is better for the kids to play with their classmates at the younger age groups and this accomplishes that in the best way. We also need to evolve our strategy for kids born late in whatever cutoff we go with. Too often these kids get left behind by the best clubs who have the best coaches at the young age groups. I see it all the time where kids have great instincts and talent but are to small and slow due to Sept through Dec bdays.

This is 100%. Your kid can't be considered for a top team regardless of how good your kid is in U13, unless you know the coach or director. It's the same typical prototype when evaluating in tryouts/trials, "how tall/fast/strong is he" completely ignoring the talent, skill, and potential of shorter kids.

 

[Thatonedad]

You might want to check the background of your sources before running with anything they say as facts.

The truth is that this is a highly charged topic in the youth soccer world. Also there's multiple groups and agendas at play. If you only speak to the people in a certain camp it makes it seem like that's how the world thinks. Which isn't always the case.

Here's why I don't think things won't change from birth year to school year.

1. Everything works with birth year right now. Some people might have issues but everything works.
2. Switching to school year has to be done by everyone or it doesn't work. It's like herding cats getting all the leagues to change.
3. ECNL has been very aggressive against both MLSN and GA. Saying that clubs can't have girls ECNL if they have MLSN. Or vice versa. This win at all costs mentality makes it hard to engage with other clubs on topics like switching to school year.

A couple of other things that people aren't expecting. Once the school year Pandoras box is opened you're going to get people pushing for school grade only as the grouping (not Aug 1st) and we'll be back to 16 year old freshman competing against 13-14 year olds. Another thing ECNL people aren't considering is the only 2 bargaining chips ECNL has for getting other leagues to switch to school year is $$$ and offering clubs access to ECNL. This means if school year goes through. Expect to see a whole bunch of new clubs "watering down" ECNL next season.

Again just sharing the info I get. I’m sure each club, league, academy, governing body has different feelings about this. Also I only get second hand info from a friend who can get insider info from various leagues/governing bodies. Nothing I say is a matter of fact. Just what I’m being told. I’m not trying to say school year or birth year is the best option.
Just letting people know what I hear when I hear it.

But everything that was said on the most recent ECNL podcast was told to me and some of it was posted here before hand.

Again, not saying this IS happening but I’ll say it SOUNDS like we are as close as we’ve ever been to changing back as many people at various organizations think SY is the best option for everyone from local Rec soccer up to kids in high school.

 

[Thatonedad]

The minute Surf Cup does an "ECNL Bracket" they'll lose 80% of the partipants.

Also, how will rankings work if ages aren't the same?

What you're suggesting is exactly what I said would happen from the beginning of this thread. ECNL as a business will make a bunch more $$$ by killing cross league play. Local club tournaments will suffer because other leagues wont participate in ECNL club tournaments.

These are all great questions but when you are talking about the many rather than few. Who really cares about rankings? Or surf cup brackets? As a dad with 3 kids playing soccer I get how much fun it is to look at the rankings on an app and tell people how great your kids team is but does that matter when we talking about player development?

Also if they do change to SY other teams MLSN and GA can still enter the bracket and play “up” which would make competition better. If Aug to Dec kids are better players when with their school grade? If they are not teams would just stay the same?…

But I agree it should be most of leagues switching together.

 

[CAZZZ]

These are all great questions but when you are talking about the many rather than few. Who really cares about rankings? Or surf cup brackets? As a dad with 3 kids playing soccer I get how much fun it is to look at the rankings on an app and tell people how great your kids team is but does that matter when we talking about player development?

Also if they do change to SY other teams MLSN and GA can still enter the bracket and play “up” which would make competition better. If Aug to Dec kids are better players when with their school grade? If they are not teams would just stay the same?…

But I agree it should be most of leagues switching together.

MLSN may not switch as they compete against the academy team.

 

[SuperSoccerStar]

And SY is not equal to GY, so the max difference within a team is still 1 year. You will not see a 16 years play against 14 years.

please explain how this works to me. So if your kid was held back and is in 8th grade right now and should be in the 10th grade how exactly would that work? If you tell me that they would be on the 10th grade team then the whole argument to change to grade year so these kids could play with their school friends just went out the window.

 

[SuperSoccerStar]

I really hope we go back to Aug 1. It is better for the kids to play with their classmates at the younger age groups and this accomplishes that in the best way. We also need to evolve our strategy for kids born late in whatever cutoff we go with. Too often these kids get left behind by the best clubs who have the best coaches at the young age groups. I see it all the time where kids have great instincts and talent but are to small and slow due to Sept through Dec bdays.

What level of play are these great kids being left behind because they were born Sept thru December?

So are your saying a player with "great instincts and talent" is too small and too slow and they are being left behind? What does that mean? They are not making the top team like ECNL for example because they are a 2010 player right now that is in the 8th grade?

So your telling me that a player is on 2010 ECRL team then if the rules change being the older kid on the 2011 age team would make them bigger and faster and they would then be on the 2011 ECNL team? I don't buy it.

Changing all this around for these "trapped" players is absolutely ridiculous. I think there are parents out there who have kids that are "trapped" and they are just excited for the rules to change because they will get an extra year of soccer and they are going to be able to move down a year in club and they think it will be better for their kid and increase their chances for whatever glory they are trying to obtain.

I guess you could count out any involvement in the national level system then because they are birth year based and there's no way (unless your a unicorn and you would already be in the pipeline) that this "trapped" player that just moved down a years level of team would then make the 2010 camp that's full of players that are on the club teams that are a year above them.

At the end of the day life isn't fair. We cant just keep changing the rules because of it.

 

[Thatonedad]

What level of play are these great kids being left behind because they were born Sept thru December?

So are your saying a player with "great instincts and talent" is too small and too slow and they are being left behind? What does that mean? They are not making the top team like ECNL for example because they are a 2010 player right now that is in the 8th grade?

So your telling me that a player is on 2010 ECRL team then if the rules change being the older kid on the 2011 age team would make them bigger and faster and they would then be on the 2011 ECNL team? I don't buy it.

Changing all this around for these "trapped" players is absolutely ridiculous. I think there are parents out there who have kids that are "trapped" and they are just excited for the rules to change because they will get an extra year of soccer and they are going to be able to move down a year in club and they think it will be better for their kid and increase their chances for whatever glory they are trying to obtain.

I guess you could count out any involvement in the national level system then because they are birth year based and there's no way (unless your a unicorn and you would already be in the pipeline) that this "trapped" player that just moved down a years level of team would then make the 2010 camp that's full of players that are on the club teams that are a year above them.

At the end of the day life isn't fair. We cant just keep changing the rules because of it.

I think the trapped players are just icing on the cake for people who want to change back. As many of them never wanted to change in the first place. Also there was a study done which has been presented to all major soccer governing bodies on the effects of RAE since going to BY and the data shows it has gotten worse since the change.

So if RAE has gotten worse and you have all these issues that wouldn’t be as prominent if SY was in place why keep birth year? This is not me advocating just giving you some insight.

The people pushing for change are selling this as what’s best for the majority not what’s best for ECNL. It just happens that GY works better for ECNL platform as well. People saying we don’t want to change because it will mess up my kids team won’t be good enough to stop the momentum created.

US Club wants real reasons with evidence and data that shows birth year is better for the majority in the US which has not been presented as far as I know.

 

[CaliR1]

Sorry...new here so can someone explain to me what this change means? If cutoff is July 31...does that mean that kids born after July 31 is going to replay their division or do the kids born before 7/31 get bumped up?

 

[watfly]

I think the trapped players are just icing on the cake for people who want to change back. As many of them never wanted to change in the first place. Also there was a study done which has been presented to all major soccer governing bodies on the effects of RAE since going to BY and the data shows it has gotten worse since the change.

So if RAE has gotten worse and you have all these issues that wouldn’t be as prominent if SY was in place why keep birth year? This is not me advocating just giving you some insight.

Why would RAE be worse under BY vs SY? Or what was the reason that the study stated for the difference? I thought MLS Next was going to solve RAE with Bio Banding?

 

[whatithink]

please explain how this works to me. So if your kid was held back and is in 8th grade right now and should be in the 10th grade how exactly would that work? If you tell me that they would be on the 10th grade team then the whole argument to change to grade year so these kids could play with their school friends just went out the window.

Its a date range, as now, but it more or less correlates to grade year, i.e. 8/1 to 7/31. Holding a kid back doesn't change their birth date and so they fall into whatever date range correlates to their actual age, not grade.

 

[CAZZZ]

Its a date range, as now, but it more or less correlates to grade year, i.e. 8/1 to 7/31. Holding a kid back doesn't change their birth date and so they fall into whatever date range correlates to their actual age, not grade.

Agree, change to SY will solve most current 33% trapped players issue, but not the corner case like you deliberately redshirt your kids.

 

[Carlsbad7]

Agree, change to SY will solve most current 33% trapped players issue, but not the corner case like you deliberately redshirt your kids.

And I can guarantee that there will be a group of parents that say their 16 year old freshman should be able to play with kids in their grade.

And there's really no downside in ECNL allowing this to occur. Their teams will get stronger and they'll be unbeatable. If ECNLs ultimate goal is college recruitment what's the difference if 16 year old freshman play with their grade? The end goal is being recruited to play in college. Colleges don't care if high school seniors are 18 or 20 they just want players that can perform.

See how it works? Congratulations you're back to why US Soccer switched to calender year groupings.

 

[whatithink]

Why would RAE be worse under BY vs SY? Or what was the reason that the study stated for the difference? I thought MLS Next was going to solve RAE with Bio Banding?

I think you just have to look at the actual rosters and see when the kids are born - and yes, I've looked at rosters based on date as I wasn't convinced, and it was pretty much on the money, with many rosters being higher than 80%. There are books that have been written on the RAE, across many sports, and the data is conclusive that kids born in the first half of the year make up 80% or more of the players. Conversely, the kids in the 20% achieve the highest level at a higher rate, something like 70% of them versus a smaller % of the "older" kids. Basically, that's because the younger kids had to be that much better to even get on the team.

Its not a US phenomenon only, btw, but recognized in other countries also, hence the bio banding initiative which obviously fell pretty flat here.

Its a pretty big deal though as the rosters are weighted to the Jan-Jun dates and now those kids would be competing with older kids for spots for the first time ... that will certainly put the cat among the pigeons. As soon as those parents realize, if this gets announced, they are going to lose their shit.

Fwiw, for the Aug-Dec kids, its a complete cluster for college recruitment. They play with Juniors who are being recruited in their Sophomore year - U17, and then in their most pivotal year, Junior, are competing with Seniors (Aug-Jul) for spots on their team, along with the regular Jan-Jul kids, as its now U19 (U18 vanished with the BY switch).

 

[whatithink]

And I can guarantee that there will be a group of parents that say their 16 year old freshman should be able to play with kids in their grade.

And there's really no downside in ECNL allowing this to occur. Their teams will get stronger and they'll be unbeatable. If ECNLs ultimate goal is college recruitment what's the difference if 16 year old freshman play with their grade? The end goal is being recruited to play in college. Colleges don't care if high school seniors are 18 or 20 they just want players that can perform.

See how it works? Congratulations you're back to why US Soccer switched to calender year groupings.

They switched to calendar year groupings to align with FIFA. They said it at the time. It was easier for them to see the talent they want, i.e. the 0.001% or thereabouts.

 

[Carlsbad7]

They switched to calendar year groupings to align with FIFA. They said it at the time. It was easier for them to see the talent they want, i.e. the 0.001% or thereabouts.

Kind of funny the rational behind both changes was/is to appeal to a certain type of recruiter.

 

[Zeke]

Agree, change to SY will solve most current 33% trapped players issue, but not the corner case like you deliberately redshirt your kids.

Unfortunately, if we go with straight graduation year, people will red shirt academically to gain a sports advantage. Parents going crazy for sports is not “a corner case”.

Aug 01 is fine. Jan 01 is also ok. Allowing older kids in younger age groups is not ok. Just pick an age limit and stick to it.