The root cause of the problem is how we deal with youth soccer. The U.S. youth soccer program hinders international success by operating as a corporate business rather than a merit-based talent pipeline. The ecosystem suffers from three systemic flaws:
(1) The Pay-to-Play Model: Elite youth clubs require thousands of dollars annually in fees and travel costs. This economic barrier excludes working-class and immigrant communities, pricing out the demographics where organic soccer culture and passion are highest;
(2) Winning Over Development: Because clubs rely on parent tuition, they prioritize immediate trophies over long-term technical growth. Coaches favor early-maturing, physically dominant children, while smaller, highly technical "late bloomers" are sidelined; and
(3) League Fragmentation: The youth landscape is fractured into a confusing "alphabet soup" of competing organizations (MLS NEXT, ECNL, USYS). This dilutes talent, preventing the best prospects from consistently playing against one another.
While MLS clubs have introduced fully funded, free-to-play academies to scout underserved areas and bypass these financial barriers, their geographical reach is limited. The vast majority of American youth remains trapped in a system that favors socioeconomic status over raw athletic talent.
1. With two kids in this pipeline I definitely agree that pay to play is a problem. That said I think that is a chicken and egg problem. How can you fund widespread development without widespread interest in the domestic professional level of the sport? Both seem to be ratcheting up over time but parents are going to have to carry the load in the meantime. I have some optimism here.
2. My local leagues have been pretty good at forcing development over parent pressure (which is a problem both because they want results and because there is still a high percentage of them that are totally ignorant of soccer). For instance they really forced building out of the back rather than hitting it long early on despite giving up easy goals repeatedly for a year or two. That is contrasted with our the Middle School teams they've been on which assigned playing time based on size and speed alone and prioritized long balls *all the time* even though they had a very high percentage of players with great ball skills. It was extremely frustrating to see all that talent essentially wasted even if they still won the district. The contrast did put my kids' club teams in a much better light though. That is all anecdotal but I still have some optimism there.
3. The fragmentation is definitely a problem though that is still way better than not having any of that stuff. All I can remember from growing up was ODP. Even basic travel was rare in the lower mid-sized to small cities I grew up in. I'm guessing it will consolidate and streamline over time.
I feel like the root cause with current frustrations are that we're past the stage of low hanging fruit and therefore progress has slowed not because we are doing things completely wrong but because the next steps are just more difficult and time consuming.
ECRL, not quite NL. Most of my experience has been with the pre-ECNL program with the club which is still mostly within the state. My opinions may change as I further experience the genuine article. There is a competing club in our tri-city area that offers MLS Next (haven't heard of MLS Max but haven't really researched that pipeline) and GA on the women's side. I'm aquantances with some people who have kids at that club and we've played them a lot in the pre-ECNL program. They don't seem that much different in how they operate but I don't really know.
You touched on the athletic issue - really think it boils down to our best athletes not playing soccer.
Another overlooked aspect is the instincts that are developed by watching sports from a very young age. The average American knows a decent amount about football/baseball/basketball strategy and split second decisions make a huge impact. We’re a pretty “dumb” soccer country.
On the youth side, I think soccer forces a developmental choice at a young age that baseball/football/basketball doesn't. Hockey stands as the comparison.
Elite soccer development requires a commitment at 12-14. That means probably moving either within the US or abroad and foregoing playing other sports at a high level. Hockey is closest that kids are forced into a similar choice with juniors (sit down Minnesota high school fans).
Baseball/basketball/football kids can cross-train and play each sport through high school without specializing because: (1) seasons don't overlap, (2) cross training improves skills across all sports, and (3) the professional development path doesn't start until college-age. Its tough to blame an all sport star for not committing to soccer at 13/14 when they might not be sure what sport offers the best path yet. Other countries only really deal with this in the basketball context. Its somewhat unique to American youth sports and I don't know an easy answer.
This Wyatt agrees with that Wyatt. Until very recently there were no economic prospects and little glory in playing soccer. The best athletes all specialized where the opportunity lay, not in the beautiful game.
This is actually really simple. In most countries, the most popular sport is soccer, the most lucrative professional sport is soccer, and therefore the best athletes, who are good at every sport they try, play soccer.
In the US, football, basketball, baseball, and hockey are all more popular and more lucrative than soccer for men. For our national soccer team to get one of those athletes who'd be great at anything, they have to specifically like soccer enough to go into it over any of our other sports.
This is not true on the women's side, where pretty much the only sports that make money for them are basketball and soccer. So our women's team is plenty competitive. Our men's team is unlikely to ever be competitive as long as soccer is only the 5th most popular sport for men.
I think you over-estimate the “home field” advantage for the US. Remember that while the games might be on US turf, fans of the opponent usually dominate the crowd - often overwhelmingly so - anywhere outside of Columbus or St Louis.
I had the same thought, but it looks like our home field advantage is derived from actual results, not just a guess. Which is interesting. My guess would be that other teams are often flying from different time zones, which messes them up; that probably won’t be a major World Cup problem, since they will have time to acclimate.
If so, for the purposes of the WC, you’re right: we have been taking advantage of jet lag, and that won’t be in our favor. But all that’s a guess.
Soccer is also one of the last sports where dual nationals (under FIFA/IOC rules) might trend away from the USA. In the 2000s you had two world class players who could have played for the US but did not. Guiseppe Rossi was born and raised in Teaneck, NJ, but had 30 caps for Italy. Neven Subotic grew up in Salt Lake City after his family fled Banja Luka, Bosnia, but he chose to play for Serbia (he played for USA in the youth ranks).
This is a big part of international soccer and sport. France could probably field 5 or 6 quality teams - one for France, and five others using nothing but french-born players playing for like Algeria, Senegal, Tunisia, etc.
The US is improving in this space, but lets be real, when a player comes up that can play real minutes for a top ten ranked country, those players pass on the US right now.
The other issue is simply coaching at all levels. The shortlist of american coaches that have found success at the top five leagues is very short. Like basically matarazzo. Thats it. I would argue that coaching, far more than player talent, is why the US lags in player development.
That's like asking "Why isn't Rugby in the EU as big as the NFL?" The ball is similar, but the sport is very different. NFL salaries are out of this world and teams are very valuable, independent businesses. If you have the skills to play NFL receiver or MLS striker, you go for that NFL $.
So that’s two structural reasons as hypotheses for why the US men’s national soccer team has not fared better in World Cup from 2000 onward:
1/. Our most promising players for the most part stay in the states for their essential formative years, and are rather notably under developed compared to the genuinely elite academies in Europe and South America
2/. The coaches selected to lead the US men’s national team have over the last 7 World Cup cycles, with the exception of Juergen Klinsmann and now Pochettino, consistently created teams centered on scoring midfielders rather than making any smart bets on strikers/#9s who have a chance to pick apart a defense.
I don't have a citation, but I had read that prior to the Great Depression soccer was the third-most-successful professional sport in the USA, behind baseball (natch) and boxing.
The predecessor to the NBA wasn't founded until after WWII, and the NFL had only been around for about a decade when the Great Depression hit.
At its founding in 1920, the NFL consisted of only 14 teams, only of which two exist today. Even after WWII, the league only consisted of 10 teams, 9 of which exist today (Cards, Eagles, Steelers, Commanders, Lions, Packers, Rams, Giants, Bears). The NFL more than doubled in size between 1950 and 1970, with the acquisition of the AAFC, the AFL, and 5 expansion teams (Colts, Cowboys, Vikings, Falcons, and Aints).
Many football teams had to play in off-season baseball diamonds, and many basketball teams had to play in de-iced hockey rinks.
What killed professional soccer in the 1930s was the Mob and its attendant corruption, and that didn't do boxing any favors, either.
Interesting that the PELE chart seems to bear this out, too.
The central ownership/franchise set up answers a long-standing question that I've had, which is why aren't soccer teams more heavily marketed. I live in Austin, a US city where soccer is the only professional sport team, and I can barely tell you when the season starts/ends, don't know any major players, and have to go out of my way to buy merch or watch a game on TV (I'm not even sure the games are broadcast on tv...?).
Compared to growing up in Kansas City, every family had magnets on their fridge with the Royals and Chiefs schedules that were mailed out en masse, there were lifesize cutouts of major players next to displays of merch at basically every store in town, and of course games were broadcast during prime watching times on network television.
I've always felt like, Americans would probably love to watch soccer, especially given the short game time, but most of us don't know where or how.
I live in England now and (many) kids here spend all their free time playing soccer. American kids are doing that more now than they used to but much less of it compared to here (even around NY). Playing in school/clubs isn’t enough to compete with that. A note though: by “kids” I mean boys. Girls playing for clubs is very common here now (don’t think it was 20 years ago) but “kickabout” playground and park games are still almost exclusively boys (even around famously progressive/inclusive towns like Brighton, where I am now).
The root cause of the problem is how we deal with youth soccer. The U.S. youth soccer program hinders international success by operating as a corporate business rather than a merit-based talent pipeline. The ecosystem suffers from three systemic flaws:
(1) The Pay-to-Play Model: Elite youth clubs require thousands of dollars annually in fees and travel costs. This economic barrier excludes working-class and immigrant communities, pricing out the demographics where organic soccer culture and passion are highest;
(2) Winning Over Development: Because clubs rely on parent tuition, they prioritize immediate trophies over long-term technical growth. Coaches favor early-maturing, physically dominant children, while smaller, highly technical "late bloomers" are sidelined; and
(3) League Fragmentation: The youth landscape is fractured into a confusing "alphabet soup" of competing organizations (MLS NEXT, ECNL, USYS). This dilutes talent, preventing the best prospects from consistently playing against one another.
While MLS clubs have introduced fully funded, free-to-play academies to scout underserved areas and bypass these financial barriers, their geographical reach is limited. The vast majority of American youth remains trapped in a system that favors socioeconomic status over raw athletic talent.
1. With two kids in this pipeline I definitely agree that pay to play is a problem. That said I think that is a chicken and egg problem. How can you fund widespread development without widespread interest in the domestic professional level of the sport? Both seem to be ratcheting up over time but parents are going to have to carry the load in the meantime. I have some optimism here.
2. My local leagues have been pretty good at forcing development over parent pressure (which is a problem both because they want results and because there is still a high percentage of them that are totally ignorant of soccer). For instance they really forced building out of the back rather than hitting it long early on despite giving up easy goals repeatedly for a year or two. That is contrasted with our the Middle School teams they've been on which assigned playing time based on size and speed alone and prioritized long balls *all the time* even though they had a very high percentage of players with great ball skills. It was extremely frustrating to see all that talent essentially wasted even if they still won the district. The contrast did put my kids' club teams in a much better light though. That is all anecdotal but I still have some optimism there.
3. The fragmentation is definitely a problem though that is still way better than not having any of that stuff. All I can remember from growing up was ODP. Even basic travel was rare in the lower mid-sized to small cities I grew up in. I'm guessing it will consolidate and streamline over time.
I feel like the root cause with current frustrations are that we're past the stage of low hanging fruit and therefore progress has slowed not because we are doing things completely wrong but because the next steps are just more difficult and time consuming.
Are your kids competing in MLS Next (corrected)or ECNL leagues?
ECRL, not quite NL. Most of my experience has been with the pre-ECNL program with the club which is still mostly within the state. My opinions may change as I further experience the genuine article. There is a competing club in our tri-city area that offers MLS Next (haven't heard of MLS Max but haven't really researched that pipeline) and GA on the women's side. I'm aquantances with some people who have kids at that club and we've played them a lot in the pre-ECNL program. They don't seem that much different in how they operate but I don't really know.
Good luck to your kids!
A much needed and spot-on critique of the pay-to-play fiasco. We never see the best young male prospects.
It's all about the money.
Meanwhile our women's program stays at the top. Hmm?
You touched on the athletic issue - really think it boils down to our best athletes not playing soccer.
Another overlooked aspect is the instincts that are developed by watching sports from a very young age. The average American knows a decent amount about football/baseball/basketball strategy and split second decisions make a huge impact. We’re a pretty “dumb” soccer country.
On the youth side, I think soccer forces a developmental choice at a young age that baseball/football/basketball doesn't. Hockey stands as the comparison.
Elite soccer development requires a commitment at 12-14. That means probably moving either within the US or abroad and foregoing playing other sports at a high level. Hockey is closest that kids are forced into a similar choice with juniors (sit down Minnesota high school fans).
Baseball/basketball/football kids can cross-train and play each sport through high school without specializing because: (1) seasons don't overlap, (2) cross training improves skills across all sports, and (3) the professional development path doesn't start until college-age. Its tough to blame an all sport star for not committing to soccer at 13/14 when they might not be sure what sport offers the best path yet. Other countries only really deal with this in the basketball context. Its somewhat unique to American youth sports and I don't know an easy answer.
This Wyatt agrees with that Wyatt. Until very recently there were no economic prospects and little glory in playing soccer. The best athletes all specialized where the opportunity lay, not in the beautiful game.
Edit for you: US beat Senegal 3-2 not 2-1.
This is actually really simple. In most countries, the most popular sport is soccer, the most lucrative professional sport is soccer, and therefore the best athletes, who are good at every sport they try, play soccer.
In the US, football, basketball, baseball, and hockey are all more popular and more lucrative than soccer for men. For our national soccer team to get one of those athletes who'd be great at anything, they have to specifically like soccer enough to go into it over any of our other sports.
This is not true on the women's side, where pretty much the only sports that make money for them are basketball and soccer. So our women's team is plenty competitive. Our men's team is unlikely to ever be competitive as long as soccer is only the 5th most popular sport for men.
In the US, we absolutely don’t give a shit about soccer. That’s it.
I think you over-estimate the “home field” advantage for the US. Remember that while the games might be on US turf, fans of the opponent usually dominate the crowd - often overwhelmingly so - anywhere outside of Columbus or St Louis.
I had the same thought, but it looks like our home field advantage is derived from actual results, not just a guess. Which is interesting. My guess would be that other teams are often flying from different time zones, which messes them up; that probably won’t be a major World Cup problem, since they will have time to acclimate.
If so, for the purposes of the WC, you’re right: we have been taking advantage of jet lag, and that won’t be in our favor. But all that’s a guess.
Soccer is also one of the last sports where dual nationals (under FIFA/IOC rules) might trend away from the USA. In the 2000s you had two world class players who could have played for the US but did not. Guiseppe Rossi was born and raised in Teaneck, NJ, but had 30 caps for Italy. Neven Subotic grew up in Salt Lake City after his family fled Banja Luka, Bosnia, but he chose to play for Serbia (he played for USA in the youth ranks).
This is a big part of international soccer and sport. France could probably field 5 or 6 quality teams - one for France, and five others using nothing but french-born players playing for like Algeria, Senegal, Tunisia, etc.
The US is improving in this space, but lets be real, when a player comes up that can play real minutes for a top ten ranked country, those players pass on the US right now.
The other issue is simply coaching at all levels. The shortlist of american coaches that have found success at the top five leagues is very short. Like basically matarazzo. Thats it. I would argue that coaching, far more than player talent, is why the US lags in player development.
You're usually pretty good about things like this, but should have mentioned that the U.S. Women's hockey team won gold at this year's Olympics too.
That's like asking "Why isn't Rugby in the EU as big as the NFL?" The ball is similar, but the sport is very different. NFL salaries are out of this world and teams are very valuable, independent businesses. If you have the skills to play NFL receiver or MLS striker, you go for that NFL $.
So that’s two structural reasons as hypotheses for why the US men’s national soccer team has not fared better in World Cup from 2000 onward:
1/. Our most promising players for the most part stay in the states for their essential formative years, and are rather notably under developed compared to the genuinely elite academies in Europe and South America
2/. The coaches selected to lead the US men’s national team have over the last 7 World Cup cycles, with the exception of Juergen Klinsmann and now Pochettino, consistently created teams centered on scoring midfielders rather than making any smart bets on strikers/#9s who have a chance to pick apart a defense.
I don't have a citation, but I had read that prior to the Great Depression soccer was the third-most-successful professional sport in the USA, behind baseball (natch) and boxing.
The predecessor to the NBA wasn't founded until after WWII, and the NFL had only been around for about a decade when the Great Depression hit.
At its founding in 1920, the NFL consisted of only 14 teams, only of which two exist today. Even after WWII, the league only consisted of 10 teams, 9 of which exist today (Cards, Eagles, Steelers, Commanders, Lions, Packers, Rams, Giants, Bears). The NFL more than doubled in size between 1950 and 1970, with the acquisition of the AAFC, the AFL, and 5 expansion teams (Colts, Cowboys, Vikings, Falcons, and Aints).
Many football teams had to play in off-season baseball diamonds, and many basketball teams had to play in de-iced hockey rinks.
What killed professional soccer in the 1930s was the Mob and its attendant corruption, and that didn't do boxing any favors, either.
Interesting that the PELE chart seems to bear this out, too.
And how much is the NIL for college soccer compared to football and basketball? Not sure about hockey, women's basketball and softball.
The central ownership/franchise set up answers a long-standing question that I've had, which is why aren't soccer teams more heavily marketed. I live in Austin, a US city where soccer is the only professional sport team, and I can barely tell you when the season starts/ends, don't know any major players, and have to go out of my way to buy merch or watch a game on TV (I'm not even sure the games are broadcast on tv...?).
Compared to growing up in Kansas City, every family had magnets on their fridge with the Royals and Chiefs schedules that were mailed out en masse, there were lifesize cutouts of major players next to displays of merch at basically every store in town, and of course games were broadcast during prime watching times on network television.
I've always felt like, Americans would probably love to watch soccer, especially given the short game time, but most of us don't know where or how.
When I grew up, we didn't play soccer. We played kickball, which is sort of like baseball using one's feet.
“No two members of the 26-man roster play on the same club team.” Umm, what about Pepi and Dest (PSV) and Reyna and Scally (Gladbach)?
I live in England now and (many) kids here spend all their free time playing soccer. American kids are doing that more now than they used to but much less of it compared to here (even around NY). Playing in school/clubs isn’t enough to compete with that. A note though: by “kids” I mean boys. Girls playing for clubs is very common here now (don’t think it was 20 years ago) but “kickabout” playground and park games are still almost exclusively boys (even around famously progressive/inclusive towns like Brighton, where I am now).