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Posted by
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April 20, 2016 |
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Aaron Nielsen
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@ENBSports
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The USL is a few weeks in and it is already providing some interesting stories for the 2016 soccer season. The league is somewhat hard to follow with their new site design (courtesy of a web company many soccer leagues seem to be adapting to), and without clear or easily accessible scores, box scores and statistics. They are thankfully still showing all their games live on Youtube, and I have had a chance to watch many including most games with MLS-affiliated clubs.
Players making an impact, and strong performances so far include New York Red Bulls’ Brandon Allen, Philadelphia Union’s Fabian Herbers, Vancouver Whitecaps’ Daniel Haber and LA Galaxy’s Arieal Lassiter, who are players who could be playing with their first team opposed their respective "B" teams. There have also been a few positive surprises such as Swope Park Rangers (Sporting KC) and Canadian Mark Anthony Gonzalez leading the league early in assists.
Outside of a few new foreign signings, most players in USL I have been following for a number of years. Some are local, such is the case with Gonzalez, who played with Sigma FC located just outside of Toronto. Many have been monitored from afar by following their careers from high level academies and youth leagues, to most of them in University. This is the case with Allen’s four years at Georgetown and Herbers’ three years at Creighton. Gonzalez also played four years at Evansville before signing with Swope Park Rangers as a free agent. So naturally, my awareness and expectation of players now in USL is different than the average fan, and maybe to the MLS and USL clubs themselves.
On ProspectXI, we ranked player’s potential before going pro and for many of them did individual scouting reports. In many cases, how the 2016 MLS draft played out, and players playing in both USL as well as some who are already playing MLS, are comparable to the those we also liked on ProspectXI either by displaying very good skill sets or achieving success in either the youth or college ranks. There are a few exceptions. On the one hand, at ProspectXI our scouting range seems to be larger than what most MLS teams consider, so we ranked players playing at smaller NCAA Division 1 schools, as well as lower division colleges.
In our opinion, this led to some good sleeper picks. For example, the Portland Timbers taking Neco Brett 40th overall in the 2016 MLS Draft, who has impressed with his time already, and is starter for Timbers 2 with talk of potentially breaking into the first team after a strong performance with the club in preseason. Brett is Jamaican, and did have experience with the youth national team as well as playing Jamaican Premier League games with Harbour View and Portmore United before joining a smaller D1 school Robert Morris. After acclimatizing in his freshman season, Brett would score 42 goals in 54 games in college.
Brett was invited to the MLS combine, which gave him time to show off his skills, and as mentioned, was drafted. However, others who had strong college careers were not as lucky. They might play PDL or NPSL this summer in hopes of eventually getting an opportunity with a professional team, although for most their soccer careers are over. Historically, most players drafted come through the combine and that is true with players who also play NASL and USL soccer directly from college, which basically means only 4-5% of graduates get a fair shot of signing with a pro club. In comparison, I've worked in both Baseball and Hockey, and comparably almost all players in the same age group are scouted regularly prior to the draft and any combine/workout done before the draft is not in place to identify talent, but to answer some final questions the team might have regarding the player.
There has been one exception to the rule, not only in terms of non-combine invites being drafted, but also players not ranked highly in our own rankings. That exception is players who clubs think have exceptional athletic talents, and despite an uneventful college career, thinking these players can still make an impact on a MLS team. I've always been tentative about these types of players in my own analysis, as I naturally rate academy and college soccer a lower level of soccer to Pro and MLS soccer, and if a player has difficulty producing or performing against weaker opponents, it’s difficult seeing him excel at a higher level.
Historically, in terms of the success of the MLS Draft, I have been proven right as most of these "outliers" have not been able to make an impact in the MLS. They usually are cut before the season starts, or may play a few games in MLS before their contract expires. Outside of not giving a more proven player the same opportunity, most clubs have not been hurt by these decisions. However, some of these "uber-athletic" players have created enough of a reputation to be drafted early on, potentially costing the club who ended up picking them.
An example of this was the Montreal Impact signing another Jamaican forward in Romario Williams third overall in the 2015 SuperDraft. Williams also played for the Jamaican youth program, however, he did not have the same success at University of Central Florida, who had one of the worst records in college during Williams time at the school. Williams did score 18 goals in 51 career games with UCF, although only scored 7 goals (3 penalties) his final season for a team who only won three games. Williams only played seven minutes last season and is currently on loan this year with USL club Charleston trying to re-establish his career. Meanwhile, Montreal could have drafted Fatai Alashe, Tim Parker, Axel Sjoberg or Cristian Roldan instead, and these are players who are making an impact with their MLS side.
The issue, especially if you are not following the player closely, is you can be manipulated by the player’s skill, and in the case of Romario and many other players it is their speed. A comparison this year is New York Red Bulls II player, Derrick Etienne. The son of a former professional player and already playing with Haiti’s U23 side, Etienne was regarded as one of the top prospects before attending Virginia last fall. The winger failed to make a huge impact during his freshman season in NCAA D1, scoring only two goals and adding one assist in 17 games, mostly used as a sub. The Red Bulls still gave him a homegrown contract this winter to leave school, and if you have seen the first two NY Red Bulls II games, you can see why people are in love with his soccer ability.
The issue with Etienne is, despite great speed and ball control, he has difficulty in providing the final product. Used on the wing in a 4-2-3-1 formation, Etienne outclassed both Toronto FC II and Louisville full-backs he was up against, although almost every time he beat his defender he tried to shoot from a bad angle sending a wayward shot into the stands. He has no assists and has taken five shots, all missing the net. In comparison, his teammate Allen has three goals, already hitting the net with six of his seven shots.
It is early in the season, and to fair it is still early in both Williams, who is 21 years old, and Ettienne’s career, who is only 19 years old. However, history shows that similar players don't become smarter or adapt, and instead an MLS club will either replace the player with another young hopeful player or a foreign player with a more proven track record. Meanwhile, players such as James Moberg, Eric Verso, Jessie Klug or Mael Corboz, who was also given an homegrown contract by the NY Red Bulls but was cut before the season (now playing with Wilmington in USL), all consistently scored and provided assists during their time in successful NCAA Division 1 programs, but have not been given the same opportunities as a pro.
Scouts have and will tell you that many players who have been successful in college don’t have the athletic ability to replicate this success as a pro, and for many this might be the case. Although there is a development issue in the Canadian/American game that players like Etienne also do not have the pitch awareness to match their skills and have purely relied on this athletic ability to make it this far.
If we want MLS to be primarily played by Americans and Canadians, we need to create a league that fits the skills of our players or develop our players better and only pure athleticism or skill on the ball isn't the way of doing this.
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Aaron Neilsen is a co-founder of Prospect XI (Prospect Eleven), a scouting network and online magazine dedicated to tracking/highlighting young players that refer to as "prospects" as well as their development pathways both within North America and worldwide. Follow PXI via www.prospectxi.com or on twitter @ProspectXI.
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