American Breaks Down HUGE American Soccer News In American Beanie

[@Andrescortezz]

As an American, this is HUGE and I'm glad an American in an American Soccer Beanie broke the news to me.

[@alexwatkins1931]

Me too I’m surprised I didn’t see it on social media today. College soccer has so much potential to develop players, I just wish SEC teams would allow college soccer to be varsity

[@silashug3925]

almost as huge as his forehead

[@Andrescortezz]

@ as a fellow big foreheader I cannot stand for this slander

[@Trickaz94]

It's called football

[@longerhandles]

@@Trickaz94it’s called “it’s only a word”

[@benjaminguzman3428]

Finally an accurate title

[@JY-CS]

The only accurate title is Zealand Not Running

[@skrillz_14th]

The American beanie situation is crazy

[@leew6091]

I wouldn't class that as a beanie. It's a bobble hat. A beanie is a bobble hat without the bobble.

[@mesiroy1234]

No its stupoed men fogot what need to talka bout for half the video , then talk mattress insted😂

[@BorinUltimatum]

MLS Next Pro has only been around since 2022. College soccer's first season was 1958. There are 29 MLS Next Pro teams. There were 212 teams in the 2024 NCAA season in Division 1 alone. This change makes so much sense.

[@adzter96]

And the top scorer from last season Jack Lynn just retired to pursue a different career).

[@RApollos107]

It makes sense to everyone except MLS who can only think in a “how does this benefit me and me alone” way.

[@Flippityflap]

@@adzter96 he literally made pro, if u retire when u made it pro ur football heart is not in the right place, unless it's because of injuries etc. I never heard of the dude i just googled him and i see 17 appearances in the MLS for orlando, also i see in some pics he has a double chin so he wasn't eating well and looking after his body. Not cut out for pro life

[@coletripp4814]

makes sense to soccer people. Will it make sense to .ADs. Until soccer people are gifting $80 million to universities this idea my just stay an idea. Keep in mind that in took the NC'AA, and universities decades plus government intervention to force NIL to happen.

[@brybanz2085]

if anything this will help MLS in the long run by improving the quality of US born players overall

[@haydaboss231]

But that would require the mls to think for once and not just sink about profit

[@RApollos107]

MLS be like: “But we can’t be the sole beneficiary of it”

[@Tonynotsoprano]

Nah what would help mls is to not get rid of these local teams in lower divisions and have a culture of local USL soccer teams who can one day reach mls by addidng promotion-relegation

[@ethanbarlow6479]

@@haydaboss231which is crazy because if you make these options available for all local teams. You generate more popularity in the sport leading to more people watching thus generating more income down the line.

[@LilBitDistributist]

@@Tonynotsopranoprorel sucks

[@Truexfan2279]

10/10, was exactly what it said on the package

[@pheonixblue9434]

Can confirm he is American 👍

[@roninwbijtube]

What a great American he is. I came in and said: "What a great American he is" 👐

[@roninwbijtube]

Yuge news as well

[@lukeholzman]

Zealand you have to check out what San Diego FC is doing with their youth system. They’re part of the Right To Dream Academy group which is affiliated with multiple clubs around the world including Ghana, Egypt and Denmark. The goal is to create a La Masia of sorts where the kids live, go to school and train all at the academy, it’s completely free and the clubs just announced partnerships with 12 local youth teams in San Diego county to try to help spot and develop talent from a young age. Super interesting stuff but I am a little biased since I live in San Diego now

[@meatballsportstalk6297]

That area can definitely develop some talent

[@bipolarminddroppings]

in England you can literally be kicking a ball around in the park with your mates and a scout from a football team asks if they can speak to your parents.

[@_Jake.From.Statefarm_]

I mean that happens here too but just in the bigger cities and maybe not so much just at a park but they are around other local club games. As most kids that wanna play at all are in some sort of league. Either rec or club. You gotta remember the size difference and the vastness of rural cities across the US outside major cities.

[@buhddæh]

Yeah that doesn't happen here. We are way too large to be able to do that. Sometimes our amazing players coming out of high school just go to college and join frats because noone scouts where they are and its too costly to continue to try. Yall are like...... 1/1000 maybe even smaller than that.... than us.

[@buhddæh]

We are 3,937% larger. So yeah.

[@chrismeeks809]

england is the size of a small US state… not very comparable

[@KristianC1994]

@@buhddæh It doesn't happen cos your clubs didn't grow organically, as explained in the video. There are numerous South American and African players that have been discovered on the streets, because again, there's probably a local club. OP doesn't mean you're gonna be scouted by Liverpool while playing in a park in the highlands, but someone from a local club might see you and invite you to join, and from there you might be spotted by a larger club nearby, and so on. Also the UK is about 1/40 the size of the US, FYI.

[@johanjonsson2190]

This is a big eye-opener to me. I live in Sweden. As long as your "town" has more than maybe 1000 people you're almost guaranteed to have a football club there, even if it's on the lowest level. And any place with more than like 100 people has a football pitch of some sort i feel like (a flat piece of grass that is about the right size, and with a goal at each end)

[@mattpotter8725]

That's the problem in the US, the lack of a real pyramid where players can develop at lower levels and move up either with their club or to a bigger club willing to pay the transfer fee, on top of players identified at an early age as having potential who come through academies at the top for. There just isn't this, as far as I know, because each club owner owns a percentage share of the league, of MLS, which is why they have this, in my opinion, stupid draft system, which means sense if you don't care about anything outside of your league but I'm not sure if really helps create players at the level wanted to challenge the big established nations. As others have said if you've grown up loving US football, basketball, or baseball (and I guess in some regions hockey) and those who might have talent go to those sports first then soccer is left with not enough to get the country to where it wants to be.

[@Fatblue246]

@@mattpotter8725 MLS’s draft system was them adopting the league to current American sporting traditions. Essentially, prior to MLS, the highest tier of American Soccer was NCAA Division 1 collegiate Soccer, so it made sense at the time to just adopt the college football(american gridiron)model and have a “draft”. MLS also does have academies, which was mentioned in the video, they’re just one of the very few institutions in the US that do, there’s just only 32 of them and they’re only in major markets. There’s also USL in smaller markets but not all of their clubs have development programs. The US is quite large and sparsely populated if looked at as a whole, especially when compared to europe. For example if we compare Michigan to the UK, both have roughly the same amount of land, but Michigan only has 10 million people while the UK just under 70 million. Michigan is in the top 10 most populated states in the entire country as well, to give you an idea of how rural and vast most of the US is. Some states have really weird population dispersion as well, NYS is a good example of this. 50%+ of the state lives south of the Hudson Valley in the NY archipelago, leaving most of the state pretty empty and rural. There’s just a lot of barriers and differences that makes developing these types of systems difficult, time consuming, and high cost. Even sports with these developed pyramids here often have specific geographic locations they recruit from. Ice Hockey is largely recruited from the Great Lakes region and the North Eastern US. Most American baseball players are overwhelmingly from the North East/Great Lakes as well as California. So even when there is a development structure and pyramid for players to move up it doesn’t guarantee equal access to resources or development. Academy systems are also very strange to the average American and are often a hard sell. The areas where soccer was historically most popular in the US(the North East for example)often highly value academics, and sports are more looked at as extracurriculars and a vehicle to better collegiate opportunities, not necessarily the end goal itself. That is definitely a lot different these days with demographics changing, so it’s a good thing we are starting to see more of them, but it explains why the US had an overall lack of them in prior decades.

[@sehu1291]

Same in Germany

[@crungushakooter]

When and where I was growing up in America, you're lucky to string together 8 youth teams the same age from a population of 100,000, and those are all one-off rec teams. We just don't have that kind of football architecture in place. The path to pro play here is to hope your local highschool has a decent team, or a team at all, and that someone will scout you from that. It's similarly shocking to me every time I look up a player and see that they've been playing at some established team's youth academy since they were 6 or something. That's just absolutely not something that exists here

[@mattpotter8725]

@crungushakooter Here in England academies mop up a huge amount of talent, most of whose young players don't make it and get a professional contract. Because we have professional second, third, and fourth tiers players not offered professional contracts when they reach a certain age are released and some are picked up by these lower league clubs or even go into non or semi professional non league clubs (tiers 5 and lower), non league because they aren't EFL (the Football League) governed clubs. Whilst you will get some players that come through the academies, here at least, most players are bought in, and even the academies are worldwide enterprises so players coming through won't necessarily be English, and I wonder if the same is true in the US. This isn't a bad thing for the clubs, in the sense they are businesses aiming for success, but they won't on their own improve the quality of the national team. I'd love to know if MLS teams bring in players from USL teams, though because MLS is a closed shop, not just because there's no promotion and relegation, but because the league is the business and each franchise owner owns a share in the league, from what I understand there league brings in the players and they get allocated via the draft to the clubs. Maybe there are also other routes, but that system doesn't work and I don't think ever will.

[@masonpierce3086]

I go to LSU, one of the biggest (football) colleges in the US. We don't even have a men's team, and growing up I was surrounded by so many soccer fans and aspiring players. We only have a women's team and a men's club (like a small get-together group).

[@coffeyallday]

Kentucky and South Carolina are the only SEC schools with men's soccer teams. As a result they have to play in the Sun Belt

[@michaelstein7510]

@@masonpierce3086 I also went to LSU and currently teach there. Yeah, it sucks how few men’s soccer programs there are in the Southeast period. There are lots of good high school players that have to go out of state to play in college since there are so few options for men in Louisiana. A lot of guys who are good enough to play at the next level just give up. Hopefully we can have SEC men’s soccer one day, but Title IX will probably always get in the way.

[@klicclak]

It's a title IX issue. They just prioritize other sports. Would have to add another women's sport of they add a men's team

[@Flyingmonkeysftw27]

Yes the SEC schools don’t think soccer is that popular or profitable. But title-nine requires them to have women’s sports, which is why there are women’s team at all the SEC schools but no men’s soccer team. If you wanted to play soccer at a collegiate level in the south you had to go to schools like UAB in Alabama for example (from the Birmingham area in Alabama)

[@masonpierce3086]

@@Flyingmonkeysftw27 I've always thought it was a stupid rule because you don't see any men's equivalent to a women's volleyball team or to an extent cheer.

[@Nox_Desiree]

I live in the UK and to provide extra context to how easy it is to fall into a team somewhere here. I hadn't played football competitively since secondary school. After that I gave up on football a bit but when at Uni I started playing again. The team I'm currently trialling for I literally emailed the assistant manager and then just showed up to their training session one day 😭🙏🏾

[@mesiroy1234]

Iam liver cyprus And still jeuals of uk In my cotry thre is footbsl cultre But still WE HAVE only 4 ligue 2 pro ligue

[@mesiroy1234]

In my coutry richest city's have 12 pitch And others city not rich sont have evn ONE GRASS PITCH

[@itsmychannel]

There’s a comical amount of farm kids in the Midwest that if they focused on soccer rather than baseball or track would be fantastic. Had a kid in my class that would show up to soccer in gym class and would just purely naturally embarrass the kids who play on the high school varsity team. But he wouldn’t play soccer because he was on the American football team. He wasn’t that good at American football but was so damn good with his feet would have been one of the best players on our team. But didn’t care.

[@marioprawirosudiro7301]

True, but that happens everywhere. When it comes to passion, you can't just force it on people. If the guy likes American football... well, then he likes American football. Not much you can do about it, really.

[@imaratspal]

@@marioprawirosudiro7301 It's not just that, though. It's about seeing a future in using your talent to go somewhere with it. He probably saw a potential in going to college and a shot at professionally playing American Football but doesn't foresee the opportunity in Soccer/Football

[@Flippityflap]

true there are naturally gifted people who don't care for the sport or have other interests. I'm dutch and i always wanted to become a pro, i was the best of my school but not good enough to join Ajax or something or at least i was never scouted, but i remember one dude he was like a rock emo kind of dude and didn't care for football at all and never played, but he was very good during gymclass when the class played football. Hard shot, ball control, clean passes. I would'nt say he was one of the best of our class but he was definitely alright. If he played more often he could definitely become good good.

[@brianlatimer4487]

Skip to 6:50 if you want to hear the news

[@JGLFootball]

Thank you I was getting frustrated haha

[@gts1300]

4:50 tbf, there was an MLS team in Tampa for a couple minutes before it burst into flames before you went to school

[@guguy00]

The Tampa Bay Mutiny, right? Alfie from HITC Sevens was complimenting how 'Murican their badge was

[@michaelstein7510]

@@guguy00 Yeah, the Mutiny and Miami Fusion were two of the MLS original teams. Both folded in 1998 when the league went into survival mode and had to cut down the size of the league. MLS was barely holding on from 1998 to about 2005, then things picked up.

[@mattpotter8725]

Didn't Tampa have the Rowdies back in the 70-80s NASL days? Or have I been dreaming?

[@pachitoon_]

@@mattpotter8725yes but he mentioned them. The Tampa Bay Rowdies are a big historic team in American soccer but Zealand mentioned them as the USL team. They’re called Tampa Bay Rowdies but they play in St. Petersburg, FL at Al Lang Stadium

[@jeremywarren5083]

Not gonna lie, more than all the other videos, you can tell he cares about this topic.

[@loganbellina7842]

As a division 1 soccer player myself I think this is a great idea in theory but this will be a very difficult model to sustain with the budget that some of the smallest programs have. A lot of them scrape by with just a fall season let alone making the spring part of the “championship season”.

[@djsaidez271]

Hopefully they can get windfall money by being an affiliate with an MLS club or through the USSF, but more likely it’ll probably be only the biggest programs that can afford it, to be the ones that take part in this initiative From what I understand, it wouldn’t be that every single university team would switch to USL but like the top 50-100 nationwide, along with maybe a couple per each uncovered rural regional hub even if they’re not as historically successful

[@arctain1]

@@djsaidez271- if that is true, then the cracks that good players fall through will still be there - and will be exacerbated by the number of international players filling limitedly-available spots in U.S. college soccer at the (currently) top 50-75 so colleges. College programs wax and wane… make that static, and it will be a problem as programs naturally rise and fall, and will use even more international players to mitigate that natural wax and waning by filling a limited amount of spots. Nothing wrong with international players, but if the point is to help develop U.S. Soccer, this will have some negative lightly-foreseen problems

[@josepheads5589]

The reason this idea works? It would only have to find a few USMNT prospects per year to be a great success. If they could find one Clint Dempsey (Furman Paladins) every year, the USA would be a world football powerhouse.

[@ParksEndurance]

When I was in college I was part of the triathlon team. Men’s triathlon was managed by USA triathlon, not the NCAA like women’s triathlon at the time, and it was so much better managed. This would likely be a big positive step

[@aidanpearce9839]

3:20 A couple hundred bucks??? I live in Southern California and here If you want to play club you’re paying thousands of dollars. It’s a money making system. The clubs don’t care about developing players they just want to make money. There are hundreds of clubs in the area and they’ll have parents who can afford it (cause where I live tends to be pretty affluent) and these parents don’t care about development. They want to win or have their kid on the best team. There are so many different leagues around and no central system for development. The league my club is in have 4/5 different tiers and in each year you could have the same club have different teams. Like a flight 1 team a flight 2 and so on. And there is 15-20 kids all playing a couple thousands bucks that’s $100000 right there just for one age group. And the ages range from 5-18 and sometimes younger. Another issue here is a lot of the high school coaches are also club coaches. But those coaches barely get paid by the school and their club team is their main source of income. So why should they care about the high school team. My high school team is probably the worst example of this, cause the head coach is also the head coach of a branch of a club in our city so if you want to play varsity you have to play for his club essentially. I know many talented players who didn’t want to play for him cause of this. Last year was my senior year and on JV we had 9 seniors including me, which was 2 e than the amount of seniors on varsity. A varsity team that won state(since California is big it’s split into sections and we won our section) but someone like me who has given 4 years to the program doesn’t get a ring and players on varsity who barley played get a ring it’s all so stupid. That same coach makes $330,000 dollars a year from the club. This is how fucked up the American youth soccer system is I have not even begun to go over a lot of what’s wrong with everything. These clubs want your money and don’t care about the player at all. I know many people who “play” on a high level team cause they can afford it. We discard so many talented players cause they aren’t playing in top level academies. The team that won state last year only 1 player went on to play college and he’s only playing JUCO. Sorry for the long rant but it needs to be known that clubs don’t care about developing players, they are a money making scheme. If someone asks you to join their “second” team with the chance to play with their higher team, they want your money. Hope this is a help to some of my non American friends or even Americans who don’t know the whole picture of how bad the youth landscape really is!

[@michaelstein7510]

@@aidanpearce9839 I think he was specifically referring to the league fees for men’s recreational leagues once players are too old after the U18 level. A couple hundred bucks is about right for that. Sadly, as you said, the cost is much higher at the youth level. Hopefully we can fix that long-term.

[@8bitrocketstudios]

I had "friends" out here in CA who didn't give a rats ass about soccer, but worked for and ran "Soccer marketing companies" basically pay to play clubs that "marketed" themselves to parents of kids in order to sign them up for win at all cost mediocre squads. They made money from fees and local hotel deals for tournaments. Soccer was not their business. Fleecing parents of hopeful was.

[@colehollander5823]

I agree the system is messed up, and many people use it just to make money, but a lot of talent shines through more than you think. I played for a team in high school that has never had a winning season. I didn’t play club at all and had zero accolades or awards and still ended up getting scouted and played in college.

[@djsaidez271]

@@colehollander5823ok but that is high school soccer and not club academies, at least with school sports you have more of a chance to get in by sheer talent as opposed to pay to play

[@OhJustSomeRandomGuy]

The grass can't grow roots when you're bundling it up to make hay the instant it sprouts. I used to think it was nuts when parents would go off on coaches not playing their kids. Now, it's like, no, I totally get it, man. Why did I drive my butt out here and pay $50 in cash to watch my kit sit the bench for $7500 a season!?

[@testertesteb4915]

0% Drugs 0% Women 0% Guns 100% USA USA USA 🇺🇸

[@YungBoulKash]

Hey I just recently started getting into soccer and I really enjoy this channel w/ a personality like yours cover more about American soccer news 🙏

[@423vol4]

I wish the SEC would add men’s soccer. The university I went to (Tennessee) doesn’t have a men’s team despite being in one of the powerhouse conferences for athletics. Hopefully with this schedule change and a potential move to semi-professionalism it can eventually happen

[@matthewanderson171]

If college soccer leaves the NCAA and partners with USSF it could happen for the SEC and Big 12. Neither conferences have teams due to the NCAA’s 1:1 men’s and women’s sports rule

[@mitchellb4551]

@@matthewanderson171 that comes from a federal law called title 9, I doubt that getting out of the NCAA would stop that or at least would require a lawsuit to reset

[@matthewanderson171]

@@mitchellb4551 Just thinking they might treat the USSF aligned teams similar to club sports. Most of those schools have mens club soccer teams

[@Weedmen337]

All the good SEC schools play in the Sun Belt.

[@adzter96]

As an Orlando fan, it feels like we do better in the draft than anyone else and most teams don't care about it at all. Daryl Dike (now at West Brom but unfortunately has had injury issues since going to Europe), Duncan McGuire (really good MLS striker in the past 2 seasons, would've been loaned to Blackburn last year if not for them messing up paperwork), Richie Laryea (didn't do much with us but eventually went to Forest and plays for Canada a lot), Cyle Larin (now playing for a decent team in La Liga), Kamal Miller (plays for Canada), Chris Mueller (scored 2 in 2 games for the US but regressed when he went to Scotland) got drafted by Orlando, we drafted someone last year called Tsukada who was with the B team last year but played against Atletico Mineiro a few days ago and looked really good).

[@MagicalEmma6]

I’m from Idaho, and if you’re familiar with the NWSL or the Mexican women’s national team, you’ve probably at least heard of Maria Sanchez, who’s also from here. She basically had no opportunity to play organized soccer until high school, demolished goal scoring records in the state, and still was only recruited by a local university because she only played for her high school. She tried out for the Mexican national team and made their world cup roster at 19, and was key in getting their first gold at the Pan American games 8 years later, after which she signed what was at the time the richest contract in NWSL history. The fact that such a player can be missed entirely by this country’s development system is nothing less than an absolute travesty.

[@minecraftjunky2001]

The MLS has single-handedly set US soccer back decades in pursuit of maintaining their monopoly on mediocre soccer games that even American soccer fans barely watch

[@ntw3002]

Not as though it was thriving before. Previous US leagues failed fast, and grassroots soccer wasn't there and probably wouldn't ever have been

[@kristophermckenney4156]

Wow. This is just blatantly incorrect. MLS is far from perfect, but "US soccer" was definitely in much worse shape before the MLS.

[@minecraftjunky2001]

@@kristophermckenney4156 Doesn't change the fact that they consistently refuse to cooperate with any other leagues and insist on clinging to the NFL model, rather than forming a legitimate pyramid which would allow the development of a system of lower leagues where less known American players can advance their careers. Their business model actively hinders the development of American players, sorry if that bothers y'all but it's objectively true

[@destroyersand]

Some USL teams already work with universities as well. The Colorado Springs Switchbacks regularly talk with local youth clubs and universities in the city to see if some players might be able to get a chance to play at a high level. I don't know how in depth it is, but I've talked to some coaches at the Switchbacks as well as UCCS and both have said that they're at least having conversation with each other about developing the city.

[@andrewwilliams641]

Zealand looks like he's going to cry when he started ranting against MLS Next Pro, bro is COMMITTED

[@pjnlol8516]

11:45 The reason why athletes go to college is that they at least have something to fall back on if they aren't good enough to be pro, or if they suffer a career ending ending event.

[@vongunnar]

American breaks down major news in American soccer in HUGE beanie

[@michaelstein7510]

This is great news. I’ve hoped something like this would happen for a long time, since it seemed like such an obvious pathway for development. If Clint Dempsey grew up in a Nagodoches, Texas trailer park, think how many potential kids like that are out there who might need this as their path to the professional game. This will really help the men’s national team and continue to strengthen the women’s team, as well.

[@coffeyallday]

3:39: Closest semi-big city to me is Lexington, Kentucky. They got a USL League One expansion team a few years ago, and before they even played a senior game, they already had a youth system in place

[@GravelordWrust]

RAYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYLAN GIVENS.

[@leonaruo7269]

6:30 to skip to the point

[@liceafilms]

Thank you

[@ryan_alexander]

As a Canadian who never played soccer (because my parents insisted that "Canadians play hockey"), this is absolutely fucking huge. If I had this avenue available to me when I was 7, 10, 14 and wanting to quit hockey, I'm 100% certain that conversation with my parents would have been easier if I could say "look, I can go to Notre Dame or Michigan, play well, go to MLS and maybe parlay that into Europe"

[@marrrrss]

9:50 “could you do it on a cold night in colorado?”

[@toiky9476]

😂😂😂😂😂😂

[@giuseppelarocca2930]

My high school coach was a local painter, who’s son was on the team lmao Shows you the level of soccer we are dealing with in the USA lmao

[@theoutsiderjess1869]

The women are the only reason the Us is in the convo at all

[@GuitarReader]

US men play in World Cups and sometimes win matches. That alone is part of the conversation.

[@lint138]

The bigger MLS gets , the more its motivation seems to be: control all of US Soccer. Rather than: grow US Soccer.

[@Sigurd-r5]

My dad was a centre forward for his factory team and a scout from WBA offered him a trial after seeing him play. This was in the late 1950's, WBA were a first division team in those days. Scouts are everywhere in the UK!

[@mexicorolls]

UPSL has tons of clubs popping up they are taking a lot of more local guys and giving them a chance to shine. Many have gone on to go up to USL/MLS

[@jeremysandoval2321]

Love seeing so much USL chat in the comments. SUPPORT YOUR LOCAL CLUB IF YOU CAN!!! REDLANDS FC!!! UP THE ORANGE!!!! 🍊

[@Tilly-lo6uq]

Hello from across the pond(UK) I have been saying this for along time about Football (Soccer) we have a word for what you are missing Grassroots take my home town it was 1of the 12 founding members of the English Football League in 1888 and in 1962 they where forced into resignation from the league and fell in the non league and when i started to watch them back in the late 70s they where about maybe 6 or more leagues away from what was back then Division 4 where they are now ❤

[@liceafilms]

As an American high school soccer coach, this sounds like a good thing for public schools too. Hopefully it leads to more schools taking soccer seriously and a higher level of play.

[@chrissao_502]

I really hope that if the university teams jump, they jump to a preexisting league, USL1, hopefully. That would help L1 clubs exist with a regionalized schedule and no more cross-country travel for a D3 league.

[@michaelstein7510]

That would be a great idea and save lots of money. Hopefully it’s not just D1 college soccer, as well. Let’s hope it’s D2, D3, and NAIA programs getting involved with these changes, too. This could really be a turning point in American soccer development, especially on the men’s side. It would really stabilize the lower levels of the pyramid, too.

[@thatissomeBS]

If they get down to NAIA and even NJCAA, that's 1,400 men's soccer teams. There are also schools that have a women's team but no men's team that could potentially start a team. That's enough to build out a whole, giant pyramid, concluding at the USL Championship. If that happens the MLS might be forced to partner up (and hopefully go full pro/rel). And then if they're able to have youth teams as well, that would be great, as many high schools don't offer soccer unless there is a very large enrollment. There would be a team within 30 miles or so of probably 98% of the US population if that happened. If this happens by 2030, the US wins a world cup by 2050.

[@docquanta6869]

For those that are unaware, USL1, the third division, isn't regionalized at all right now and has pretty brutal travel expenses. That said, having college, basically U23 teams play adult professionals would be a bit odd.

[@carverbrauchle891]

I'm sorry to possibly burst bubbles, but I doubt how real this is. I have found nobody talking about this when, if true, it would be a massive shakeup to the college athletics landscape. College football and basketball make a billion dollars collectively, and those sports still haven't broken away from the NCAA. Yet college soccer, which makes no money at all and operates at a loss, will? Also, what do the colleges get out of this? They wouldn't do a move like this for non-financial reasons, so what's the incentive? The complete lack of any other coverage on a big story like this makes me feel like this is fake news. Although I'd be happy to be proven wrong.

[@michaelstein7510]

@@carverbrauchle891 I think the writing is on the wall that the NCAA is on its last legs. With the way college football is heading, the NCAA might not survive 10 more years or at least it won’t be involved in football, which has outgrown the old NCAA model.

[@Bowleskov]

The strange thing is, I laid out almost this exact plan in response to another video on another channel. But what I had difficulty getting Americans to understand was they needed to think Regionally rather than nationally. Anchoring Semi pro teams at Colleges, of all types, is such an obvious solution to how to replicate an American version of European Club culture. A New York State League has a far better chance of gaining amateur or semi pro players in a sustainable way than a Team that regularly has to go 1000 miles for a road game. There is every case to argue the MLS in a European context is a Super league in such a structure. And there would be scope for development sides to compete in those state leagues. But Soccer as with most pro sports in the US is treated as a TV product rather than a local entertainment product and I do think that is the major shift in vision any semipro league structure will have to make and in "underserved markets" they could be the scale of Baseballs minor leagues.

[@mrbismarck]

As a kid in England there were so many teams available you could pick different ones for different days of the week. I played for my school on Wednesdays and then two different teams on the weekend - one on Saturday afternoons and one on Sunday mornings.

[@adamr922]

Yesterday I walked out of my front door, crossed the road and saw my local team win their last 16 tie in the FA vase, they're now 2 wins from a trip to Wembley and it happened 50m from my house.

[@ocrowbeatz5109]

- note. this is not a hate comment not even gonna lie, i remember your videos used to kind of irk me for some reason few years ago. no clue why but i would skip them. to be fair i was in Highschool and jaded - just like we all were. 22yos now and this was a really refreshing outlook from a serious fan who cares about the sport. earned my sub.

[@MathewBallardTheOne]

Louisville City FC of the USL has a solid academy. They’ve transferred one to Europe on a record fee, his brother to ML$ for a record fee, and another who didn’t come directly out of their academy, but did foster his development for a couple years before he transferred to Europe.

[@vortexathletic]

How would a full professional-length season work for an amateur club like the USL L2’s Vermont Green, as a lot of their players play for the Vermont University Catamounts during autumn?

[@GuitarReader]

Not sure.

[@austinedeclan10]

The thing with other places is if there's no team, you start one. You find a field and start one, you start one in your school, in you university, in your pub. In other countries football clubs are just that. Clubs. Some clubs get popular, then get sponsored because of that popularity then become actul professional sports teams. If there's no football team near you and you really wanna play, you start one yourself. Some teams even split into two because they have more than enough player to to form new teams and everyone needs someone to play against and that's how you get your derbies

[@derdude6139]

when i was young and played in germany every club of the league was in an half our radius every little village had a team

[@TheJonBob]

What does the beanie think about this

[@hard_reset52]

FREEDOM RAHHHHHHH (probably)

[@karipuustinen1221]

Being from Europe and having played NCAA soccer myself, I see this as actually making a big difference to the level of play in the US. If you compare a college freshman from US to one from abroad, in 95% of the cases the one from US has played significantly less soccer because of the seasonality of sports in the high school system. If US really wants to improve their level, they can’t afford majority of their players playing for about 40% of the year when the rest of the world is playing for about 90% of the year.

[@BloodRider1914]

Watching this in Canada right now

[@ryanfisch7047]

If MLS shifts I think that will greatly stall the growth of soccer in the US.

[@LinkandTatl]

If this is true - this would be huge for soccer in the US. I coach at a local youth academy where i live, and had heard some rumblings of these changes. All we have is MLS Next; and very few of talent gets scouted while many others who have the potential / physicality and desire to get better, will really never get that opportunity. Glad to hear some good news and hopefully all players will get a even playing field.

[@loutboyxoxo]

His forehead has been concealed 😞😞😞

[@willkelly5474]

If this happens, it will be amazing for US Soccer. Unfortunately we’re also just waiting around to see how MLS ruins this

[@ThaGamingMisfit]

Anyone esle thought for a second Zealand was wearing a CCCP beanie?

[@kylecorman7859]

Would be a huge shift in the landscape of American soccer. May also see the spread of Men’s varsity soccer at some schools that don’t have the programs today.

[@nosignature.]

I pray that this goes through with the USL. This is so exciting. I went and searched multiple USL leagues and found some teams local to me. Just sucks that I can't find much for Pennsylvania Rush or LVU. Granted, I did a quick 5 minute search and didn't dig too deep if at all

[@terryem05]

I totally agree. I really hope this happens but i hope that they do not tie themselves to a MLS team. I would rather America just get to a point where we can have a real and serious promotion and relegation set up and this would be a great reason to push for that.

[@Not_Sal]

Promotion and relegation is not viable in America. The owners and casual fans don’t want that, and there are a ton of logistical issues, especially issues with finances and geography.

[@RileyBurke-tz4xy]

Not only from a player aspect, this can possibly carve a stronger more professional coaching pathway aswell. Currently with it being a seasonal job it makes it difficult to retain or recruit to develop strong coaching. Yes youth clubs have some good coaching opportunities but that only goes so far. College coaching jobs should be clear stepping stones to pro level jobs like we see if football and basketball at times in America

[@insanetrickshots1]

As an American my nearest club is 45 minutes away. I love in a pretty urban city with over 75,000 people

[@Garrett24O]

As a former Nebraska resident, the real downside of the soccer landscape is that your options are slim as a male player due to Title IX. There is only one D1 school that has men's soccer (Creighton) in the state, Your only options right now are to throw a shit ton of money at joining Sporting Nebraska FC (SKC affiliate), travel ball which is more money, or moving to KC, Minneapolis, or Denver for decent development. I'm also pretty sure the USL team in the area Union Omaha doesn't have a youth academy either, just youth clinics.

[@maxl.b.m.y.g.5918]

What happens in places where it’s too cold to go year round, like the Midwest and Great Plains? Even when MLS goes to winter, it’s too cold. Also, does this take Title IX, and do the women come along?

[@Empowerhealthandwellness]

I would expect that the MLS will kill this idea long before it ever happens. The MLS is one of the most destructive entities in world football and you'll never convince me otherwise.

[@michaelstein7510]

I don’t see how these changes to the college soccer landscape would disrupt the MLS Next program in any significant way, so I think the league will be fine with it once all the details are hashed out. The MLS Next kids who are good enough at age 11-18 to go professional will go through the established academy pathway and the other kids will have their pathway through the college game. The college teams can even have direct partnerships in the offseason with MLS and USL organizations, like Zealand said. This should actually work pretty seamlessly, and it would be an amazing development for the American soccer landscape, especially on the men’s side. Since there are way less men’s college soccer teams than women’s teams because of Title IX.

[@keeperman4]

As a huge fan of the sport, I vehemently disagree about MLS being bad. I am a fan of soccer only because an MLS team was created in my home state when I was 14. There are millions of people that never would have had a chance to follow the beautiful game without MLS. Is it perfect, no. Is it fucking strange, yeah. But I, and millions of other American soccer fans, feel extremely grateful for MLS.

[@Empowerhealthandwellness]

@@keeperman4 you can feel that way and I understand that however the MLS is hardly even a football league. It’s 2 steps from the Saudi league the way the league assists in buying washed up talent from Europe. Americans watch it because it’s all you have, not because it’s a good product. The league and its hierarchy aren’t interested in football, they are interested in making money.. hence why the rules and actions of the league are made to protect the investment of owners and not the development of the sport or its players.

[@toebarrtalks]

MLS is evil, they will monopolize the game in the country and the fans will sit back and defend the millionaires doing it

[@julianbailey2749]

After the first line, I was thinking. 'So what's happening in Denmark?'

[@calholt7530]

One thing that I think was missed out on in this video Z was the the fact that organizations like “Fusion” where I’m from charge players thousands of dollars every fall and spring to play. Youth soccer in the America has gotten to be like AAU basketball and baseball where if you don’t pay the highest fee there is no chance you’re even getting looked at by colleges.

[@lukechamberlain8425]

Can you imagine a US Soccer pyramid that consists of USL AND college teams?? WOW!

[@MravacKid]

Those of us on the outside have been wondering for *years* when the US would implement a proper football league system. Here's hoping it gets going.

[@iJones2332]

Also could help higher level teams fill in injury gaps at times

[@W417on]

You and Zealand should look to manage these college clubs. Hell set up a New York league. Zealand probably has the coaching credentials, and you seem pretty knowledgeable

[@DanielSarioglu]

Z, do you play in NYC Footy leagues? I and used to ref for them and sometimes join a league

[@Numberoneiosgameplay]

I live in Montana

[@insanetrickshots1]

Rip

[@dryan3308]

Will Title IX be a factor in this new system? I know there are lots of universities that don't have men's soccer teams because of Title IX as they didn't want to have to add a comparable women's sport to match the scholarships (There are lots that have women's soccer but not men's for this similar reason as it's easier to justify cutting soccer than football, basketball, baseball, etc)

[@fitzmetzger5831]

Can you link the article? Imma get my Sport Administration Masters teacher to do a class on it

[@fitzmetzger5831]

She (a Goalkeeper) played with Mia Ham

[@jakefoden3036]

What about the open cup would they be allowed in ?

[@newsclubfan]

This is exciting - I always wonder what it'd be like if the yanks had local leagues (maybe state wide) that operated like the non professional leagues in England and Wales, where they are based around region mostly so you can get to each other's matches and develop grudges against your neighbouring communities :) And maybe the winner of a local league could get promote into a nation wide league. but yeah, as mentioned, universities are already part of the sports set up over there, I just hope there is something for them to go onto after the age of 21/22 when they're finished there. Cos non-league and lower league football is fantastic for players and communities :)

[@mob8502]

It would be nice to funnel a bunch of players from high school develop in college and take them to mls. There would be lots of potential strengthen under 18 programs and make it so it’s more like Europe. And about the d- league would be a nice funnel up to mls where mls brings up players through tiers.

[@ousfraton435]

should talk abt the weird rules abt joininh college teams if u get a chance. saw a british guy who went to usa for college football talking abt how he had to not play for a year before he could join the college team due to some paperwork shit while jamaicans playing for the u21 national team had no issues playing immediately as they didn’t have paperwork.seems mad counter productive to me

[@rhh3828]

That beanie ran more in the last week than Zealand

[@toiky9476]

Many colleges can hardly afford to keep their soccer programs running and so running a full season would be pretty difficult. I think instead of having these players go through the draft, colleges should be able to sell these players as an incentive for them to create quality talent.

[@rhorto01]

MLS is scared this would be a step towards P&R. They want to protect their monopoly at all costs.

[@vduk]

Are they all gonna come together and form like multiple league ranks for promotion and relegation? would be dope to see in the US of A.. GL from a Croatian

[@turnerkirby2508]

As someone who works in college athletics, this is a logistical nightmare

[@veldrensavoth7119]

*Zealand/Zealandism, Is not only Running and stretching, He is out his winter arc, he is hydrating as WELL mentally preparing for the Olympics, Because he has a brother named Adler that means Zealands/Zealandism name is ACtually KONNIG because he never TOLD us and he won’t but who cares, He’s running*

[@levi7581]

This is the first Zealandism that has been reccomended to me in 2 months, wth happened

[@TheHoldenmcgroin]

US Football needs a REAL system, not that mad as a box of frogs system it has. It NEEDS a proper pyramid style system with promotion and relegation. Oh, and a new transfer system, who the HELL understands that mess?....

[@Zedvais]

This is massive. Because i believe America has a huge potential in terms of football. In just let’s say 20-50 years now american footballers are already on a world cup level. Given great platform and they could be a major football powerhouse. It’s a shame that great players have to leave the country in order to have a good chance to develop into a great player in a first place. The likes of pulisic and reyna have to go to dortmund just to have a chance developing their talent. I think this is a step towards the right direction since college will be able to catch a wide talent pool since college students come from all over the country.

[@optimhuz]

USA! USA! USA! USA! 🦅

[@Onebadterran]

If the US did this we could become an absolute powerhouse nation

[@jutman17761]

Didn’t Bethlehem Steel have a very successful club? I assume the factory owners shut it down once it didn’t provide the company something.

[@isaiahdunham8208]

Montana mentioned, let’s gooooo! 4:09

[@Luke-x6c6u]

🦅 🇺🇸 we’re so back baby 🇺🇸 🦅

[@PiastTorun]

8:22 "assume" -> know, "stereotype" -> "fact"

[@Magnus_Magnesium]

If this happens it will almost certainly improve the US soccer system over night. Could you image Georgia Tech, Georgia, Ga State, Ga Southern etc.. all funneling under Atlanta United and AU2? What a huge opportunity for both the MLS and college soccer and US soccer. Worst case these kids get a good education in college and never play again, best case we find a bunch of Gems that would have otherwise never been seen by a scout. We don’t have to start up a continent wide academy system, just let the colleges do it, then funnel it into pro teams. Think of all the money to be paid for players out of the MLS that the MLS academy didn’t have to develop themselves.

[@Zombie1Boy]

"American breaks down HUGE American soccer news in American beanie." While also speaking American!

[@williamcross210]

A shift of calendar to include the winter would be stupid, so the ultimate triumph of the Eurosnobs. USSF is pretty much as big a shithole as the NCAA, as your videos related to GGG show. My local youth club team is already aligned with the nearest MLS team, which is 400+ miles away. This includes coaching training and their scouts taking a look at our players.

[@michaelstein7510]

@@williamcross210 It wasn’t really viable for MLS to shift its calendar until very recently with the addition of a bunch of warm-climate cities like San Diego, Austin, Miami, etc. Now the league can simply schedule games in only those cities during the winter months to avoid snow cancellations. But I agree changing the calendar just to appease Eurosnobs would have been stupid. I seen so many people over the last 10 years criticizing MLS for not playing from Dec-Feb, which was dumb, given the cities in the league at the time. Although, it would be funny to watch the players deal with a January blizzard in Kansas City. Hell, even in March we’ve seen quite a few MLS snow games in recent years.

[@ringleaders10820A]

College calendar runs from August to May. This isn't for the Eurosnobs, and even then there's no need to let rent free Eurosnob hate affect actual decisions

[@ringleaders10820A]

And USSF, as bad as it could be, is an actual soccer federation that can sanction season long play and a viable level of soccer, which NCAA can't.

[@Afurmiga]

Also you have 66.6K subs which is THE NUMBER OF THE BEAST

[@rangersking6699]

There are no big ten or ACC colleges in the dakotas, Montana, Idaho, Colorado, Utah, Arizona and New Mexico, there are also none in Vermont, NH, Connecticut, Maine, Rhode Island. They’re gonna need much smaller collegiate programs to join for this to do what you suggest