Mls embarrassing

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Speaking of Netherlands. They have a population of 16.8 million.
Their soccer history is about the same as the US. Made the 1934 World Cup and after that not again until 1974, when we saw total football for the first time. They struggled in the 80’s (did not make ’82 or ’86 World Cup) but have since turned it around.

My question is, how come a country so small can produce world class talent like Van Basten, Gullilt, Bergkamp, Van Persie, Robben, Overmars, Kluivert, etc…and we can’t produce a single world class player, except keepers.

I’ll assume it comes to the lack of quality coaches in this country compared to Netherlands and other small countries such as Belgium, Portugal, Switzerland, etc…

Anyone want to chip in?

Netherlands are among one of the biggest chokers in international soccer. They can't ever win the big one. It was them and Spain as the biggest underachievers. Spain finally broke through so now the Dutch and the English are the biggest underachievers.

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Netherlands are among one of the biggest chokers in international soccer. They can't ever win the big one. It was them and Spain as the biggest underachievers. Spain finally broke through so now the Dutch and the English are the biggest underachievers.

I would'nt put Netherlands and England in the same boat. Netherlands may have underachieved while coming in 3rd and 2nd at the last two World Cups while the English have done "not-achieved" at all while getting bounced from the tourney.

The English would love to be as underachieving as the Netherlands. That's OK, I guess they still have bad food and women with crooked teeth. HA HA HA!!!

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In the case of soccer, height and bulk are useful to an extent, but not nearly to the extent that those attributes are to a football or baseball player. So most American athletes are much, much bigger and heavier than any world-class soccer player. A soccer player runs more than three miles per game, usually a lot more, and soccer has one of the highest ratios of time spent in active game play to game time of any sport. In a normal game of officially 90 minutes, 60 minutes or more is spent with the ball and players in motion.

This is a big contrast to football, baseball, basketball and tennis where there are plenty of breaks in the action for a player to catch a breather. These guys would have to drop 20 to 80 pounds to sustain all that running, and that would take them out of the mode of what we think of America's "best athletes"

Think of the best players in the world and throughout history. Top of my head examples: Maradona is 5'4", Messi is 5'7", Wesley Sneijder is 5'7", Pelé is 5'8". Cruyff, Beckenbauer, Ronaldo the Elder, and Ronaldo the Younger are taller at 5'11", 5'11½, 6'0", and 6'1", respectively.

That's a crowd of guys who range from below average to a bit above average on the worldwide height scale. And most of these guys are a lot less bulky than your average professional football, baseball, or basketball player.

In the end, the real question to ask isn't about "best athletes" it's about "best soccer players". And in asking that question, you have to ask why isn't Michael Bradley (5'8") as good as Lionel Messi or Clint Dempsey (6'1") as good as Cristiano Ronaldo. The answers to those questions will show the path to realizing the US's soccer ambitions.

Not really true. These athletes "Bulk up" in order to be better at the popular American sports. If soccer was the best paying and most popular sport in the US then they wouldn't need to do that.

Germany won the world cup with the average height of 73"

http://www.mlssoccer.com/worldcup/20...team-world-cup

Comparing Clint Dempsey to Cristiano Ronaldo is a joke. Cristiano is a freak of an athlete where Clint Dempsey is more of an intelligent and hard working player.

You also have to look at the huge cost of youth soccer for most parents. Is can cost upwards of $2000 a season or more. This makes it a mostly middle to upper middle class youth sport. In most other countries the elite youth soccer players are identified early and put into paid for schools and academies of the professional teams.

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Not really true. These athletes "Bulk up" in order to be better at the popular American sports. If soccer was the best paying and most popular sport in the US then they wouldn't need to do that.

Germany won the world cup with the average height of 73"

http://www.mlssoccer.com/worldcup/20...team-world-cup

Comparing Clint Dempsey to Cristiano Ronaldo is a joke. Cristiano is a freak of an athlete where Clint Dempsey is more of an intelligent and hard working player.

You also have to look at the huge cost of youth soccer for most parents. Is can cost upwards of $2000 a season or more. This makes it a mostly middle to upper middle class youth sport. In most other countries the elite youth soccer players are identified early and put into paid for schools and academies of the professional teams.

Freak of an athlete at 6'1" and 185 lbs?...that's the size of most high school QB's

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Freak of an athlete at 6'1" and 185 lbs?...that's the size of most high school QB's

Freak of an athlete based on speed , power , skill. Not height , weight, you idiot. There are plenty of out of shape 6'1" 185 pound losers.

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Freak of an athlete based on speed , power , skill. Not height , weight, you idiot. There are plenty of out of shape 6'1" 185 pound losers.

Just wanted to echo that Ronaldo is indeed a freak athlete, meant in the absolute best sense of the word. I'll also add imagination and quickness to his attributes. I wasn't a giant fan going into the World Cup, but I'm fairly sure he was playing quite hurt, and he was primarily responsible for Portugal beating Ghana (even though Portugal had little chance of advancing) and getting us into the knockout stage.

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Just wanted to echo that Ronaldo is indeed a freak athlete, meant in the absolute best sense of the word. I'll also add imagination and quickness to his attributes. I wasn't a giant fan going into the World Cup, but I'm fairly sure he was playing quite hurt, and he was primarily responsible for Portugal beating Ghana (even though Portugal had little chance of advancing) and getting us into the knockout stage.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hZqEj-Qyg6U

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I would'nt put Netherlands and England in the same boat. Netherlands may have underachieved while coming in 3rd and 2nd at the last two World Cups while the English have done "not-achieved" at all while getting bounced from the tourney.

The English would love to be as underachieving as the Netherlands. That's OK, I guess they still have bad food and women with crooked teeth. HA HA HA!!!

Hmmm Netherlands has never won a World Cup. I would put England and Netherlands in the same boat, both big underachievers. Although yes I would say that England are a bigger disappointment than the Netherlands though, but neither can get the job done.

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Unlike the rest of the world the best athletes in our country don't play soccer. They play sports that they can get paid more money and have more fame. Football, Basketball, Baseball. MLS has salary cap around 3million except for the couple designated players. Designated player getting paid over a 1 million playing next to player making 50-60 thousand. Until the average pay comes up it will be hard to draw top athletes.

It is slowly changing but a long ways off.

The only reason anyone thinks that it is changing is because of the announcers on TV that are telling everyone things are changing. The numbers don't mirror that sentiment.

Average attendance 2014 18,716, Average Attendance 2013 18,608 Change +0.58%

Game broadcast on ESPN in 2012 averaged, 311,000 2013 averaged 220,000, 2014 averaging 190,000.

Last years Final got 500,000 viewers 2012 got 800,000, 2011 got 1,000,000

Here is an article about MLS salaries, and then just a tid bit from it.

http://www.empireofsoccer.com/salari...quality-24859/

"The average player salary is higher, however, though this is probably artificially inflated by the high-profile additions of Defoe and Bradley. The average MLS salary for 2014 is $207,831 — up from last fall’s average of $165,066. However, in 2013, 76% of players made less than the league average. In 2014, that number has risen to 83% of the league making less than the league average.

The current MLS collective bargaining agreement — which dictates the salary cap — expires at the end of the 2014 season. With player salaries so dynamically uneven, the labor negotiations are bound to get ugly."

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if you look back at the history and dynamic of the EPL its easier to see why the national team has got worse....purely because of the lack of talent emerging into the Premier league and small numbers of English players .

when the PL first started most clubs had predominantly English squads and some lower level foreigners. As the popularity grew , TV got more and more coverage, instant success was demanded. Clubs started to spend crazy money to bring in foreign 'bigger names' pushing out younger home grown talent.

as it got more and more financially crucial to stay in the league and qualify for Europe the pressure for immediate success at any cost became silly. Leeds are a prime example of how to go wrong. additionally a lot of people put club success ahead of national success,this just caused an ever spiraling rise in spending and the 'need' for names.....so clubs kept bringing in existing foreign players rather than take time nurturing home grown players...they simply couldn't wait .

Manchester United in 99 where probably the last club to have a team of mainly British (and therein lies another issue) players.....

its no coincidence that the introduction of the Pl and foreigners saw the start of the decline of the national team.............

if the MLS goes the same way it will be even worse for the USMNT as there just isnt the same pyramid system here.

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Your mom's embarrassing.

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if you look back at the history and dynamic of the EPL its easier to see why the national team has got worse....purely because of the lack of talent emerging into the Premier league and small numbers of English players .

when the PL first started most clubs had predominantly English squads and some lower level foreigners. As the popularity grew , TV got more and more coverage, instant success was demanded. Clubs started to spend crazy money to bring in foreign 'bigger names' pushing out younger home grown talent.

as it got more and more financially crucial to stay in the league and qualify for Europe the pressure for immediate success at any cost became silly. Leeds are a prime example of how to go wrong. additionally a lot of people put club success ahead of national success,this just caused an ever spiraling rise in spending and the 'need' for names.....so clubs kept bringing in existing foreign players rather than take time nurturing home grown players...they simply couldn't wait .

Manchester United in 99 where probably the last club to have a team of mainly British (and therein lies another issue) players.....

its no coincidence that the introduction of the Pl and foreigners saw the start of the decline of the national team.............

if the MLS goes the same way it will be even worse for the USMNT as there just isnt the same pyramid system here.

Excellent post and 100% correct. I would like to add a few more things. They use to put caps on how many foreigners you could have on a team. No cap right now means lots of foreigners. Who are the owners of the top clubs in the EPL? A Russian, Two Americans and an Arab. They could care less about the English National Team. They spends big bucks on their club to win League titles and Champion's League Titles. They aren't in it to develop English players.

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Im the author of that post.

actually the no limit isn't true...and to be fair I only realized that this morning after reading about Chelsea.

of a 25 man squad for the EPL and CL 17 can be 'foreign' and 8 have to be 'home grown' . The definition of home grown appears wooly as apparently Cesc Fabregas counts as home grown...go figure

even so those 8 could be bit part players and just appear in the league and FA Cups , a main squad of 17 is enough...

its no coincidence that the advent of the EPL saw the slow decline of the NT and as you rightly say owners , and to be fair even fans, are so club orientated that the NT takes second place .

these days the bigger leagues La Liga , EPL and serie a to a lesser extreme its all about who has the biggest cheque/check book. they buy players without a thought of their nationality. its one of the reasons the Dutch do so well, their own league , minor in comparison, is a feeder for the bigger leagues and thus a lot more of their home grown players get to play at a higher level. the number of foreigners in the Dutch Football League is a lot lower AND all the better Dutch players get sold to the big clubs..................

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I love this post. The only reason the US made it through to the knock out stage was Mr. Tim Howard period. It's either 5 or 6 players on the US team were born in foreign countries. They might be US citizens but not born here. So what does that say about us soccer. US needs to look at the youngsters and develop them at a young age. Most young club teams only look at one thing, the score board and not how the team and individuals are developing. The winning part of a club team is what parents look for. How many wins do the team have, how is the team ranked, not how are the kids and the team developed. This in my opinion is where the US lacks.
MLS is a JOKE. If anyone saw the games against the overseas clubs. If you watched the games and watches the players, passing, dribbling, stopping the ball, kicking and control of the game. Not the score of the game and if you still think that the MLS is close to the BPL in quality, skill and coaching level you are F@#kn crazy. Like one poster said, the MLS is in mid season and BPL hasn't even started. The MLS should be running circles around them. Some of the MLS players looked slow, lost, not very skilled and winded. There's a reason some overseas players come to MLS to play, well where else would they go and play passed their prime? Don't get me wrong there are a lot of very good players in MLS. Comparing MLS to BPL is like comparing a Ferrari to a smart car. USA isn't or in my mind never be a soccer nation.