Age pure??

db10 wrote:

bwgophers wrote:I don't understand the necessity for the change, and no one has been able to give me any kind of tangible argument for why birth year vs school year age limit provides any kind of developmental benefit.  All it does is switch which birth months will have the advantage during the pre-teen and teenage years.

Now, with that said, there are already select sports in NTX that go by birth year, and not school year, and (GASP!) even split their divisions on 2 year cycles vs. a single year cycle.  The girls all seem to do just fine in those sports.

The first couple of years of the transition will be a bit of a headache, but the world won't come to an end because of this.

So does this mean all the late birth dates essentially lose a year of soccer? If you're a late date 04 you'll magically become an 03?

Maybe it means my spring academy aged dd gets 'held back' and cant go 'select' when she otherwise would have! The outrage!!

Unless a fall dd sits out, they dont lose anything just may have different U# attached to her.

So fall b'day will still be able to play club soccer their sr year?

When I played as a kid in the 70's and 80's, our soccer association in NTX used birth year.  As a late year birthday, I played with guys from the grade above me who had Jan - Aug birthdays.  I was on the same team from rec youth through select in the North Dallas Classic League.  Sometime after that, it went to school year.  Now as a Dad with a DD late year birthday, I have the same concerns as most parents with late year birthday kids, mostly concerning the prospect of losing an entire year of soccer with the change and potentially having the team blow up at the beginning of her senior year, and having to scramble to find another team for the last year, when there aren't many teams to choose from.  This change will definitely push some kids out of the game when their teams blow up.

SD69 wrote:So fall b'day will still be able to play club soccer their sr year?

Yes. They combine with the year younger.
Come to find out, this is the apparent "supergroup." This also makes the most sense. There is too much of an age difference effect at the younger ages to form an 18 month supergroup (rumored to have been Aug'05-Dec'06). So they'll move it to the backend when the kids are 17 years old and the age difference is basically irrelevant.

Once this calendar year change happens, I expect to see a bigger gap between the haves and have-nots.

Sho'nuff wrote:Once this calendar year change happens, I expect to see a bigger gap between the haves and have-nots.

Certainly this will benefit the big clubs with dozens of kids at all ages.  Depth across all age groups will make it easy to reform teams and not really miss a beat competitively.  Unfortunately, I can see the scenario whereby smaller clubs without such depth struggle.

timmyh wrote:

SD69 wrote:So fall b'day will still be able to play club soccer their sr year?

Yes.   They combine with the year younger.
Come to find out, this is the apparent "supergroup." This also makes the most sense.  There is too much of an age difference effect at the younger ages to form an 18 month supergroup (rumored to have been Aug'05-Dec'06).  So they'll move it to the backend when the kids are 17 years old and the age difference is basically irrelevant.

Which also means, if your dd's birthday falls in that range, she will have to find a new team to play with her senior year.

timmyh wrote:

Sho'nuff wrote:Once this calendar year change happens, I expect to see a bigger gap between the haves and have-nots.

Certainly this will benefit the big clubs with dozens of kids at all ages.  Depth across all age groups will make it easy to reform teams and not really miss a beat competitively.  Unfortunately, I can see the scenario whereby smaller clubs without such depth struggle.

That's exactly what I'm thinking.

Here's hoping my tiny August 04 (she's one of the smallest on her 05 team) hits a growth spurt before she gets moved up to the 04's. :-)

So how do the leagues handle this, especially the select leagues with qualifying? Do ALL the teams have to requalify that year? Or only those teams with X number of player changes? It could make for some interesting games especially if a team loses half their players. Teams will be completely reshuffled. I'm not against it just wondering about the logistics of it all.

refer to what LHGCL pulled off this year because of all the rain outs... expect something of similar nature to occur.

I'm curious what the parents will do who have kids with Aug-Dec bdays. Say on Aug 04 playing 05 right now, will they wait until 2017 to make the change to 04 or transition in 2016?

gohuskers wrote:I'm curious what the parents will do who have kids with Aug-Dec bdays.  Say on Aug 04 playing 05 right now, will they wait until 2017 to make the change to 04 or transition in 2016?

Thats a very good question, and IMO a tough one to answer.

Move asap and you spend a season on a squad that in a years time WILL be ripped apart and the coach may move up to the next older age division or not...

Wait and let the dust settle and try out for the newly formed squads...

either way you shake it, tough question...

gohuskers wrote:I'm curious what the parents will do who have kids with Aug-Dec bdays.  Say on Aug 04 playing 05 right now, will they wait until 2017 to make the change to 04 or transition in 2016?

sounds like a great poll question

Well, the Aug-Dec 04's just signed contracts, so we can't do anything until next June 2016 at the earliest. I have no idea what I am going to do. Probably wait for the dust to settle and figure it out. This is one of the times it's helpful to belong to a big club. They will hopefully help us in the shuffle. At this point we just need the information, so that we can make an informed decision. I'm guessing the clubs will make the call on when we should switch.

Age change is happening for ALL ages, and likely as soon as 2016. This looks pretty official.
http://www.michiganyouthsoccer.org/AssetFactory.aspx?did=4305

"US Soccer has announced a change in the classification of age groups from the School Year (August 1-­‐July 31) to Calendar Birth Year (January 1-­‐December 31). Teams will no longer be referred to or registered as U19, U18, U17, U16, etc. but rather by Birth Year. (E.g. 1997, 1998, 1999, 2000, 2001, 2002, 2003, 2004, 2005, 2006, etc.)"

It's obvious you REALLY want this to happen as almost every one of your 20 posts reference this age pure thing. I realize that it will happen, in the next couple of years, but am unclear how if they will Dribble older girls teams to change or if they will be grandfathered in. Nothing you have shown the forum has shown what US Soccer is going to do. This Michigan soccer doesn't shed any more light than the boys classic league email that went out last week. They also contradict each other. Personally I think we'll wait until US Soccer, NTX Soccer, and US Club Soccer clarifies how they will handle the many questions going age pure have brought up. Right now they have shown us very little.

I preferr it does not happen to my DD.  Would absolutely love for her squad to be grandfathered in.

I just dont see it happening.

SD69 wrote:It's obvious you REALLY want this to happen as almost every one of your 20 posts reference this age pure thing. I realize that it will happen, in the next couple of years, but am unclear how if they will Dribble older girls teams to change or if they will be grandfathered in. Nothing you have shown the forum has shown what US Soccer is going to do. This Michigan soccer doesn't shed any more light than the boys classic league email that went out last week. They also contradict each other. Personally I think we'll wait until US Soccer, NTX Soccer, and US Club Soccer clarifies how they will handle the many questions going age pure have brought up. Right now they have shown us very little.

Some men just want to watch the world burn.

Soccerfan79 wrote:No, I actually dont prefer it to happen for my DD.  Would absolutely love for her squad to be grandfathered in.

I just dont see it happening.

Are you timmyh?

SD69 wrote:

Soccerfan79 wrote:No, I actually dont prefer it to happen for my DD.  Would absolutely love for her squad to be grandfathered in.

I just dont see it happening.

Are you timmyh?

no, phone reading at the stoplight leads to bad forum posting. lol

Frankly I don't believe this will happen.
I know, head in the sand, blah, blah blah
First, even the big clubs will be hard pressed to accommodate a wholesale shift of 50% of their kids from one age bracket to the next older.
Teams that stay together can't just play up, they will have to go back to QT. IMAGINE the howls around that!
Second, 98's are the oldest group. Their younger 97's are going to be allowed to stay. So the teams are full. Where are the younger 98's being forced up going to land? All established teams are full.
Third, ECNL teams are built on school years. Too much at stake.
Every single team will be tuned on it's ear.
When the logistics behind this are considered, I predict wholesale calls for grandfathering all existing teams. There is no way North Texas Soccer could manage all that will be involved.
Teams are going to lose revenue, teams will fold. Livlihoods are on the line and for what? Where is the benefit to this?
At least superficially they're telling us they're all about developing the girls. So how will this accomplish that?
Now let's talk about how this plan will negatively impact ALOT of people...
Copy this post. It won't happen, it may occur for future select teams but I'm predicting grandfathering...

SD69 wrote:It's obvious you REALLY want this to happen as almost every one of your 20 posts reference this age pure thing. I realize that it will happen, in the next couple of years, but am unclear how if they will Dribble older girls teams to change or if they will be grandfathered in. Nothing you have shown the forum has shown what US Soccer is going to do. This Michigan soccer doesn't shed any more light than the boys classic league email that went out last week. They also contradict each other. Personally I think we'll wait until US Soccer, NTX Soccer, and US Club Soccer clarifies how they will handle the many questions going age pure have brought up. Right now they have shown us very little.

Actually, I don't. For me the argument that the social benefits of playing with classmates and the ability of college coaches to watch a single team rather than multiple for a class outweigh the gains expected for the national teams.

You're right that I am really interested in it, though. Selfishly, my DD's November birthday means this will definitely affect her.

I throw in the substantial detriment to 1/2 of girls who want to play in their Senior year that would have to find new teams, or not play club soccer their Senior year.

Also, I believe that smaller clubs and independents will be impacted substantially more. Large clubs have a pool of teams a coahces so shuffling of players would be doable (not easy, but doable). Smaller clubs and independenst may not ahve coahes available at both age-groups impacted by the split of a team.

My guess is that some of the Indy's would do what some have already done regarding City FC (cityfcacademy.com). Now yes, that's for combined teams to compete in NPL...but if age pure is implemented and no grandfathering allowed some of the smaller clubs may have to combine/share teams and coaches to survive.

Big clubs may indeed have the edge depending on implementation. For instance, FCD has 10 '03 teams. 'Feet only has 1. Imagine the potential impact to that team and there are plenty other small clubs just like Feet.

SickofSilliness wrote:I throw in the substantial detriment to 1/2 of girls who want to play in their Senior year that would have to find new teams, or not play club soccer their Senior year.

Also, I believe that smaller clubs and independents will be impacted substantially more.  Large clubs have a pool of teams a coahces so shuffling of players would be doable (not easy, but doable).  Smaller clubs and independenst may not ahve coahes available at both age-groups impacted by the split of a team.

It might not be so bad your senior year . Players should have a good idea of where they are going and or signed.

Zizou wrote:

SickofSilliness wrote:I throw in the substantial detriment to 1/2 of girls who want to play in their Senior year that would have to find new teams, or not play club soccer their Senior year.

Also, I believe that smaller clubs and independents will be impacted substantially more.  Large clubs have a pool of teams a coahces so shuffling of players would be doable (not easy, but doable).  Smaller clubs and independenst may not ahve coahes available at both age-groups impacted by the split of a team.

It might not be so bad your senior year . Players should have a good idea of where they are going and or signed.

I would be very good for an athlete to rest for half year and prepare for the college life.