Are you a racist if your Girls play soccer?

[Unregistered]

Cry me a river doucheface.

Nice one DRONGO!

[Unregistered]

BTW your daughter just started her high school soccer season in Tampa? I call BS. It is not Soccer season..."My oldest daughter, 15, adopted from India, has just begun her first season of high school ball."

A little fact checking lol...

Soccer conditioning has started at most schools.

[Unregistered]

Ok I completely agree that soccer needs more economic diversity. Note I'm not saying just ethnic diversity - there a plenty of poor whites not playing the sport either. Economics and race are intertwined but they don't always go hand in hand (unlike Trump I know that not all African Americans are living in dire poverty lol). But how does that make ME a racist? It doesn't. I don't "run the system." I didn't let it evolve the way it did. In fact I work on a town board that works hard to offer scholarships to anyone who needs one. But see that's a town program with budgets that have to be available to anyone who asks to see them, different cost structures and objectives. Clubs are (mostly) private entities with profit motives. Even the so called non-profits ones are mostly in name only (they're hardly saints). So yes they will set up shop where they are most likely to make money - in and around towns with money.

It's a pay to play system. Do I like it? Absolutely not. But what can I do? I can can't offer thousands of scholarships to kids in need (if I could I would). Without broad reach efforts like those undertaken by governing bodies in swimming, gymnastics etc to reach all areas of the country, little will change. MLS DA teams are much more diverse because they're free and based on abilty to PLAY not PAY. Non MLS teams are better but not nearly as diverse because it's still pay to play and run by for profit clubs. GDA will be the same - a little bit less $ to play but still out of reach financially and geographically for many families. Even if it were free, you need to have been playing at a high level to be good enough for GDA consideration. Not many players will be able to consistently get scholarships from local clubs along the way. The average for profit club gives maybe one scholarship per team.

Not free for all MLS DA programs - see below from their Q&A page:
What are the costs for D.C. United Academy players?

The total cost for Academy players is $2,800. This cost includes training gear, fees to cover coaches, transportation and meals for out of area games.

But admittedly $2,800 all in is cheap.

Also, people make choices and I have seen Hispanic and Middle Eastern families willingly sacrifice and pay for the boys but not the girls. I am not saying this is common, it was just striking when I witnessed it. I have also seen a parent drive a Jag and request a scholarship. I agree with the above about one per team and that may even be generous. I suspect it hold true for non-profits as well as they often operate on tight margins. Again, these can be outliers and there are many non-profits with the ability to offer more scholarships.

[Unregistered]

Until US soccer can find a way to mine the talent among the lower economic levels of our citizens, we will continue to lag behind.

The rich kids can not carry the game forward alone.

The lower economic levels are more likely to be immigrant families. Immigrant families are more likely to be connected to the sport through their home country.

The current system is designed to benefit paid coaches and program directors. It is not designed to maximize our talent pool.

[Unregistered]

The big Companies don't hire Blacks or Hispanics...It's just the way it is in this country, the Land of the FREE...

You're full of sh*t. Big companies DO hire QUALIFIED employees. In this country, as a matter of fact, if you are even REMOTELY CLOSE to being as qualified as a white person, you will get the job. How do I know? I'm a black man and I have a great job because I chose to educate myself.

It's people like you who want something for nothing and choose to not educate yourself while you point fingers at others thus creating the race problem. You want a good job just because of your skin color and cry when you don't get it? Get out. Get educated. Stop blaming asians, whites and others.

Your life is what you make of it. Period.

[Unregistered]

You're full of sh*t. Big companies DO hire QUALIFIED employees. In this country, as a matter of fact, if you are even REMOTELY CLOSE to being as qualified as a white person, you will get the job. How do I know? I'm a black man and I have a great job because I chose to educate myself.

It's people like you who want something for nothing and choose to not educate yourself while you point fingers at others thus creating the race problem. You want a good job just because of your skin color and cry when you don't get it? Get out. Get educated. Stop blaming asians, whites and others.

Your life is what you make of it. Period.

<mic drop>

[Unregistered]

<mic drop>

"I have a dream that my four little children will one day live in a nation where they will not be judged by the color of their skin but by the content of their character." MLK

Too bad the politicians lost sight of the dream.

[Unregistered]

Until US soccer can find a way to mine the talent among the lower economic levels of our citizens, we will continue to lag behind.

The rich kids can not carry the game forward alone.

The lower economic levels are more likely to be immigrant families. Immigrant families are more likely to be connected to the sport through their home country.

The current system is designed to benefit paid coaches and program directors. It is not designed to maximize our talent pool.

I agree somewhat but I think it is a romantic idea that there are thousands of poverty level, magical footed soccer players who would take over the DA system and make American soccer great but the reality is that the system in the US does not allow the sale of youth players and making DA free will do nothing to motivate poverty level players. It's not that expensive- $65 per week. BUT the schedule is brutal. Wake up 5:30, go to school, get home between 3:30-4:30. One- two hours to eat, do homework, then get in the car at 6-6:15 and drive 45-90 minutes, practice 1.5-2 hours, drive home, eat again, sleep, repeat. 5 days a week and then games in and out of state where they must miss school on Fridays. No girlfriends, few if any school dances or activities, non-teammate friends - you might see them once a month. No family time. No chance of a part-time job or paying for your own car/ insurance. How well do you think poverty stricken, immigrant kids and ESL parents will handle that schedule? Making the DA free will do nothing to motivate a talented kid if they end up flunking out of high school. Money is in football and basketball- scholarships in college abound and soccer is just not that popular in the US. Until clubs can earn money (major money) off the sale of a player and the player has hopes to go senior professional the system in place the only way it can work. It will never happen. Soccer ticket sales in college suck and AD's and alumni are not going to push soccer for that reason. Title 9 destroyed scholarships and decimated soccer programs across the country. Grow the love of soccer in the US- make it as popular as basketball- and you might have a chance. But Landon Donavan is no Lebron or Jordan and sponsorship/advertising hates commercial free games. It's such a multilayered problem- eliminating $2800 for DA is not going to do much, if anything, to locate and develop talent. The real issue is America just doesn't give a crap about soccer. And to be honest, most poverty level people are in poverty for a reason. Unless soccer can help them get out of that, there is no reason to instill false hope.
Change the dialogue. Let's stop complaining about the pay to play- again it's only $65 a week. Offer up some ideas about improve college programs/scholarships or enabling clubs to sell developed players, or increasing advertising revenue, sponsorships, making soccer more popular, change title 9, etc. If only my kid were 6'11........