Fla_Buckeye

Unabashed The Ohio State University and Cleveland sports fan spending time in OH and FL! An imperfect follower of the 10 Commandments.

[Fla_Buckeye @fla_buckeye]

@11W MAC school missing.....

[Fla_Buckeye @fla_buckeye]

@izme_josh Yet, people pour into the Texas and the USA each year by the millions....

[Sam Mahmood @TheSammahmood_]

The U.S. soccer federation is a poor return on invested capital.

I played soccer for 20+ years.

Grassroots.
Academy.
D1 college.
Pursued professionally after.

And I’ll say the quiet part out loud:

The US soccer infrastructure is broken.

In America, we treat playing D1 soccer like it is the peak achievement.

For most families, clubs, coaches, and players, the entire youth soccer machine is built around one goal:

Get recruited.
Get a scholarship.
Play college soccer.

But if the objective is to produce world-class players, D1 soccer is a terrible development path.

From 18-22, some of the most important technical development years of your career, you are preparing for a 3-4 month season built largely around athleticism, direct play, set pieces, fitness, and survival.

Now compare that to an 18-year-old in Spain, Argentina, Morocco, Italy, England, or France.

That player has likely been in a professional environment for years.

Training daily.
Playing meaningful matches year-round.
Competing against grown professionals.
Getting thousands more touches.
Learning how to solve the game under pressure.

The gap is massive.

And it shows.

American players are usually athletic.
They are usually fit.
They usually compete hard.

But at the highest levels, that is not enough.

The biggest difference is technical comfort.

We do not move the ball like Spain.
We do not combine like Argentina.
We do not play with the same fluidity, rhythm, and confidence you see from countries where the game is embedded into the culture from childhood.

That comes down to volume.

Volume of touches.
Volume of street soccer.
Volume of futsal.
Volume of unstructured play.
Volume of high-level training environments.
Volume of meaningful games.

In the US, youth soccer is expensive, overly organized, overly coached, tournament-driven, and too often built around winning games at 13 instead of developing players for 23.

Parents spend thousands.
Clubs charge thousands.
Travel teams fly all over the country.
Showcases become the product.
Recruiting becomes the scoreboard.

But the return on invested capital is poor.

We probably spend more money on youth soccer than almost any country in the world, yet the technical output does not match the investment.

That is a broken operating model.

And like any business, if the output is weak, you do not blame the customer.

You inspect the system.

The US has talent.
The US has athletes.
The US has money.
The US has facilities.

But the foundation is wrong.

We built a pay-to-play, college-recruiting machine and confused it for a world-class player development system.

Those are not the same thing.

Until we fix the grassroots layer, increase meaningful touches, make development less dependent on family income, and stop treating college soccer as the top of the mountain, the US will keep underperforming relative to its resources.

I’m not saying this to trash US Soccer.

I’m saying it because I lived it.

And if we actually want to become a powerhouse, we have to be honest about the infrastructure first.

[Fla_Buckeye @fla_buckeye]

@BernieSanders LMAO! You are a hypocrite!!!!

[Fla_Buckeye @fla_buckeye]

@bobwojnowski USA is ranked #16 in the World.
The @USMNT performed to their ranking.
They made it to the final 16.

No further.....

[Fla_Buckeye @fla_buckeye]

Consider that Soccer is not the Number 1 US sport young male athletes look to pursue. It's 4th or 5th.

And the US Men's Team ranks #16 in the world.

Not too shabby!!

#WorldCup #USMNT

[Fla_Buckeye @fla_buckeye]

@McNamaraDynasty Landon Donovan

[Fla_Buckeye @fla_buckeye]

@thescorechicago It's the 4th or 5th most popular sport in America!!!
Other countries, Soccer/Football is 1st!

[Fla_Buckeye @fla_buckeye]

Once again! The Demoncrat machine are going to oust a candidate who won their primary, so they can "appoint/anoint" the new candidate in Maine Senate race.

Just like they did to Biden and added Harris.

Main voters don't have a say!

Democracy???? NOT!!!!

#Maine #Platner

[Fla_Buckeye @fla_buckeye]

@PamelaHensley22 The crazy part about this.... I live in a Cinci suburb with tons of American flags out this past weekend. And the neighborhood is diverse. Whites, Blacks, Asian, Eastern Indian. Everyone is friendly. Just don't get it....

[Fla_Buckeye @fla_buckeye]

@RonStewart_ Because the stud American youth athletes aren't choosing to play soccer. It's the 4th/5th choice to play.

[Fla_Buckeye @fla_buckeye]

@BuckSexton Being the 16th best team in the World is not too shabby.

[Fla_Buckeye @fla_buckeye]

People need to realize that for young American athletes, soccer is the 4th or 5th choice of sports to play.

#WorldCup #USMNT #Soccer #Futbol

[Fla_Buckeye @fla_buckeye]

@REFLOG18 People need to realize that for young American athletes, soccer is the 4th or 5th choice of sports to play.

[Fla_Buckeye @fla_buckeye]

@ClayTravis My son just shared the same thing about my Grandson's club team!

[Fla_Buckeye @fla_buckeye]

@CoryBooker You backed the dude......!!!!

[Fla_Buckeye @fla_buckeye]

@BuckeyeNatty Waffle House...

[Fla_Buckeye @fla_buckeye]

@RedWavePress Why even give this network the time of day? No one watches them except for Libs/Dems/Socialists whose mind your will never change. Stop going on these shows!

[Fla_Buckeye @fla_buckeye]

@BreitbartNews I use my Real ID just fine when voting. THis is all BS!!!

[Fla_Buckeye @fla_buckeye]

@JessicaEMiranda Ohio is fine..... see details from Google's AI.