Wow, USL Pro has again scheduled games on back to back days to keep their travel expense down.

http://uslpro.uslsoccer.com/schedules/2013/58092584.20136.html

Charlotte @ Dayton , June 28th
Charlotte @ Chicago Fire reserve, June 29th

That is really going to help the Chicago Fire reserve team to play a tired and road weary USL Pro D3 team just a day after they play a road game in Dayton OH.



They will have to get on a bus and ride to Chicago and play a second game in less than 24 hours. They will have to recuperate from a 90 minute league game while on a bus ride....

Brilliant Stuff Guys

http://the11.ca/2013/01/24/commissioner-nasl-does-not-want-to-be-an-affiliated-developmental-league/

Peterson said that NASL does not have an interest in being an affiliated minor or developmental league.

He warned that players who are signed to low-end entry-level MLS deals may also find their options are even more limited than before. Instead of being waived and having the chance to find work, they could end up being stashed in USL, with no hope of getting back to the top tier.

“From the MLS side of things, I can see why this good for them. Each team can have more players under contract. They can hold on to more players. But, for the players, this limits their free-market options, when they find that they have been relegated to playing for a minor-league team.”

If there is one thing the USL knows very well, it is change. They are very, very famulair with adapting to change at the USL.


Single Entity owners + 1 large hungary lion are now both in the same room for a few years...

"MLS exec: USL Pro partnership can change soccer in US"

Durbin indicated that the decisions made by MLS clubs over the next couple of years will help determine the ideal long-term model. But he was also adamant that MLS is committed to "building this lower division over the next five, 10 and 20 years."

I wonder who is more accustom and flexible to influencing big changes?

Actually the best part of this new relationship is that us NASL fans will know that the MLS and USL Pros will be busy for a years talking to each other about how each league development should happen, and how that will best benefit them because they now both share their one common goal of growth, and stability. They both have a great history of sharing stuff.

And while they talk, grow, and set new objectives, they will both get more confident and believe more strongly in their own roles.

I sure hope they both survive those many unknown changes ahead??


..................................................................................................



Now that we are done talking about leagues and teams, lets talk a bit more about the players.

We now all agree it is best for developing players to get good consistent quality playing time in a league of high quality, right?

But, it is now clear to all new players thinking about MLS that there may be a new detour direction to their future goals of a D1 contract with a clear amount of D1 playing time...?

Players and the public now know about the risks a low level player in D1 will face. They now know that they may just get de-railed through a D3 team away from the D1 team. They may end of playing for a D3 coach, D3 players, and long D3 bus rides. That may create a bit of confusion for some?

Not very many question marks in the playing time risks for a good solid player in the NASL. Not many unknown changes ahead in the stable and growing D2 NASL league.


Good bye, for now.

It's not like MLS teams are good at finding their own talent through their own draft system.

http://www.mlssoccer.com/news/article/2013/01/08/central-winger-draft-remains-undervalued-tool-mls

However, in a league that boasts only three Most Valuable Players in its history that entered the league via the draft (Jason Kreis, Taylor Twellman, Chris Wondolowski), the effectiveness of the draft as a championship-building mechanism is often unclear.

But the MLS SuperDraft isn't about finding rare gems like those players: it's about understanding the nuances of the MLS player market and generating negotiation leverage for the front office.

The major problem in understanding the draft is that there are no clear metrics to evaluate the quality of a pick. Intuitively, one would expect that the first pick in the draft would be the best available player and the second pick would select the next best, so on and so forth. But, fans know better than this, and have since before the days of Steve Shak. Each team has different needs and different understandings of how well a particular prospect would fit into their system.


While this suggests (but certainly doesn't prove) a general inefficiency of the order in which players are being selected, there is a clear value in the overall set of players that are being drafted.

Here is the 2012 MLS ranked by the percentage of total minutes played by players that entered the league via an MLS draft (in any year), along with their regular-season point total:

http://www.mlssoccer.com/sites/league/files/Pleuler%201-8.jpg

Life is filled with risks. This is what makes life, life. Somehow Americans started buying into the idea that the country owed them something.

On the flip side, perhaps the frustration of playing for D3 coaches, with D3 players and having D3 bus rides just may be enough motivation for some to refine their game even more, stay after practice, train harder in the weight room, etc. to get their butts back up to D1 and stay there. It seems as though this has worked a little in minor league baseball. Is it perfect, no, but pain can often be the thing that propels some to greatness. Just a thought.

I never said they were owed anything. Where did that come from?

Every good soccer player has teams that want him to play for them. As you get more experience you get better at picking which teams you will not play for. I think this will actually make it easier for many players to see why the NASL is a very good overall choice for better development opportunities.

I get a feeling Commissioner Downs smelled a duck in any NASL/MLS Reserves coop and that is why they stayed away. This looks like a great deal for the MLS as their reserve players get more playing experience. However, they will be doing so against third-rate players (with the exception of Orlando). USL looks pretty bush-league in my opinion.

Correct, I wasn't implying you did but after I read my earlier comments, I could see how it could have been taken that way.My bad.

However, it is super cool to see stories like Jay Demerit, a man who would not be denied of his dream. Certainly there is balance in it all, the partnership has to be handled with wisdom, but in my opinion there are a lot of guys at D3 level getting longer looks that they would have previously (say at a one and done LHUSOC game).

In the long run, I still see 3 or 4 teams lower teams moving up and the rest of D2 and D3 merging again and practically speaking it will all be D2. Or possibly MLS hopes NASL just 'goes away'...

Sporting KC- four players are sent down to live, train and play in D3/USL Pro Orlando on a long term loan, the rest of SKC players get no extra games because they no longer have to field a reserve team.

New England Rev- four players are sent down to live, train and play in D3/USL Pro Rochester on a long term loan, the rest of the NER players get no extra games because they no longer have to field a reserve team.

DC United- four players are sent down to live, train, and play in D3/USL Pro Richmond on a long term loan, the rest of the DCU players get no extra games because they no longer have to field a reserve team.

The rest of the MLS Reserve teams get two extra away games vs D3 USL Pro teams of which there are now only 16 of 19 MLS teams left.


So, in reality the MLS Reserve teams that are left for 2013 now have three fewer MLS Reserve teams to play against. And, while they have added two games, those two games with USL Pro D3 teams will be against weaker teams than last year.

It may be an improvement in the future, but we don't really know that yet.




Each of those remaining 16 MLS teams now have three options.

http://www.mlssoccer.com/news/article/2013/01/24/mls-exec-usl-pro-partnership-can-change-soccer-us
MLS operated a self-contained Reserve League in recent seasons, but league owners voted in November to give MLS clubs three options for reserve player development moving forward: 1) create an affiliation with an existing USL Pro team; 2) join the USL Pro with a standalone team; or 3) continue to participate in the MLS Reserve League while integrating matches against USL Pro teams.
......................................................................................................

1. MLS teams can dump most of their short term Reserve league costs altogether by just sending four or more players down to their affiliate D3 USL Pro on long term loans. This is by far the cheapest options for just about all MLS teams. It may become more expensive in the future if the affiliates gain strength and exposure and start asking for more "support" from the MLS teams??
Sounds like they have not yet worked out all the details for this option.

2. MLS teams can chose to build a full team with full time coaches, support personal, and travel expense and enter the team into the longer season USL Pro league. That would cost a lot more overall if USL Pro keeps the same amount of games and the same single table season they have this season. This would be the best option for a team that really is interested in developing their players. We have not heard any teams say they would do this yet?
Hard to see how this would work for a team in the NW when just about all of the current D3 teams are over 1,000+ miles away, that may change if a bunch of new teams spring up in locations nearer MLS clubs. That would put the USL in a risky/tricky place if those teams were not strong teams financially and failed soon after starting up? Like say... in the middle of the season which we have seen before with many USL teams...

3. If more MLS teams chose not to be in MLS Reserve league then the number of games in their own league will be reduced and their season will be "integrated" into the USL Pro league schedule. That has almost as many question on how that might work as the numbers in both leagues change in opposite directions.


We will see just how many MLS teams chose the two more expensive options to create a whole new D3 USL Pro league team, or to maintain a full MLS Reserve league team to play in their own league and be also somehow be involved into the D3 league also.

In the short term the MLS teams win, they get more options. But, in the long term the USL Pro league will win with the huge marketing pulse of brand association it can create with MLS. And they get stuff from the upper division at the same time... A good deal for them. Who really has the most to gain, an who really has the most to lose here?

It will be interesting to see how this works 6-7 years down the road when the USL Pro league has many strong teams and team owners than now and may no longer needs the four MLS players on loan every year and all the headaches that go along with the young D1 prima donnas? Where will MLS development of players image be then?

Only the shadow knows...
Seriously, who really knows what will happen in the future at this point?




We do know one thing, that MLS has admitted that they do not operate a reserve league very will and the second time around has not worked any better than the first.

More questions arise:

Maybe, we the fans of US soccer who want a stronger US MNT in the long run should be asking why this second failure of MLS reserve league development is the reality of our current top league?

Could it all have to do with the very structure of MLS itself (controlling the cost of players) and the allocation of profits around to all the owners?

Would the top US league not be better if real competition was seen between all the teams in the top league?

And that maybe one of the biggest "positive" points of a single entity third party ownership of players is that the benefits are reaped mainly by the owners and that trickle down theory is not really a benefit to all that many of the players?

Is this new D3 USL Pro affiliation program the very proof of that huge flaw in the MLS single entity plan?




All good question that will get answered with a bit more time.