Stagger Soccer Tryouts

SC Soccer

Why don;t all the clubs in the area stagger their tryout times. Appears that CESA, USA, and CFC all have the same tryout times. Makes choice for parents difficult, and has to be bad for business.

It shouldn't be the parents decision,it should be the kids.

Even staggered tryouts can create difficult situations. If your child wants to try out with a competing club, and the tryout dates are staggered, the child may end up in a situation where the first club (knowing the player has started tryouts with a competing club) wants a decision from the child by the next day, before the club has even posted the selections for the rest of the teams. Some kids still make a final decision based on whether they feel comfortable at a club based on friends, or personalities on a team. It can create a lot of anxiety for a child when one club demands an answer before the child has all the information needed to make a decision.

Why not just have a single day that all of the clubs post their roster, about a week after the last tryout date? This would eliminate the need for early decision making, too. By the way, some clubs do want to have a decision on the day of the last tryout, and in my case, a club asked for a decision on the day of the second tryout of three. They didn't even tell me what team I would be on. By the way, the team that made me decide on the second day of tryouts was NOT CESA. In fact, because the coach forced me to make this decision, I quickly declined the spot on the team that he didn't even tell me if I had made. This is also a small part of the reason that I went with CESA, who were very courteous and told me to consider all of my options before joining.

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Why not just have a single day that all of the clubs post their roster, about a week after the last tryout date? This would eliminate the need for early decision making, too. By the way, some clubs do want to have a decision on the day of the last tryout, and in my case, a club asked for a decision on the day of the second tryout of three. They didn't even tell me what team I would be on. By the way, the team that made me decide on the second day of tryouts was NOT CESA. In fact, because the coach forced me to make this decision, I quickly declined the spot on the team that he didn't even tell me if I had made. This is also a small part of the reason that I went with CESA, who were very courteous and told me to consider all of my options before joining.

The simple answer to this whole thread is money. Clubs want the best players they can get to form the best teams they can becasue that will in turn draw in more players and more money. A club can not form team of say 15 players and then have 4 players say well I got offer from another club so never mind.
I think we all know at some point a club must draw line and say in order to have team we must know who is commiting so we can make a team. This is one place where little leauge has got soccer beat hands down. The assignment of "areas" to leauges makes it simple for players to know where they should play. You play in your leauge, or have to get permission to play in another leauge (not easy to do), now maybe that fact that far fewer people are making a living (or significant income) off little leauge players has somthing to do with this but "soccer club" vs "little leauge" setup does seem to be in stark contrast. (oh and do not get me wrong I KNOW LLBB has many major flaws just seems thier player rostering/assignmet works much better)

I have been in/on all sides of this problem. I had a daughter that only had 14 show for tryouts, which would have made a good team but then 1 decided not to play, and 2 left for other teams. We played with eleven players all year, no one complained about playing time.

Maybe the only time too much playing time was a complaint.

I also been on the board trying to assign coaches and create teams and you have no idea who is committing. Parents want to know who the U-13 coach is but you have no idea if you will be able to form a team or not. And as a board memebr you feel really bad when you have to disband a team because 4-5 players who committ leave. Its not as bad as it was but it still happens.

And last but not least my daughter went out for a team and then it didn't form and she was almost left out in the cold because she didn't tryout for any other club. She was lucky and was able to find a team.

BTW, Isn't Little League Recreation?

Good to see your still out there lurking Chapindad. Missed you at the CHS games this year!

Here is one example I saw happen last year. A team made it into the PL and of course had a ton of players show up for their tryouts several of which were from outside their area or had played for other clubs. Tryouts went well and the club posted their rosters which of course had a number of "new players" from outside the area. Unfortunately, the team did not get any sort of a verbal commitment from those out of area players prior to posting the roster. By the time they found out that those players had no intention of playing for the team the damage had been done, feelings had been hurt and players had committed to other teams and clubs. The result was a team that almost didn't make and had to play brutal season in the R3PL with only 11 players.

Not saying one way or the other is right or wrong. I can understand the argument on both sides. Just throwing this out there as one reason why a team/club would want some sort of verbal commitment.

how do various clubs extend spots to players?

i know cesa (coaches)and bridgefa calls each player to extend a spot to get an acceptance before posting the team's roster.

I guess there's no easy way to do this, but just to throw out another opinion, maybe it would be best for the premier league teams to have "decision days" before the other clubs in the age group. I do realize that this could bring up a whole other set of issues, but it seems like tryouts should be held first for the teams who have the most players that would rather play for that team before any other one. (and PL teams are in very high demand).

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The simple answer to this whole thread is money. Clubs want the best players they can get to form the best teams they can becasue that will in turn draw in more players and more money. A club can not form team of say 15 players and then have 4 players say well I got offer from another club so never mind.
I think we all know at some point a club must draw line and say in order to have team we must know who is commiting so we can make a team.

Sure that's valid, but does that really change things if the player declines the 'offer under pressure?' Does that infer that there is someone just as good waiting in line for a spot?

The club should just offer a position at the same time they do for everyone and wait until the deadline for acceptance is over. The pressure tactics may get them a player but does it benefit them when these issues are brought out for anyone to see? My opinion, it's bad PR.

I definitely agree with you, "dhunter." And, as a matter of fact, sometimes pressuring kids leads to them picking another team. This tactic can easily backfire, and is normally only used when the desperate club is under pressure to get more players for monetary reasons. I do agree with what "the chief" says that club is all about money, even though most are non-profits.

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I definitely agree with you, "dhunter." And, as a matter of fact, sometimes pressuring kids leads to them picking another team. This tactic can easily backfire, and is normally only used when the desperate club is under pressure to get more players for monetary reasons. I do agree with what "the chief" says that club is all about money, even though most are non-profits.

Yes even a non profit has to earn a few dollars to keep the lights on. The problem with club structure is these "non-profits" are in competion for kids because getting the "best" kids means getting more good kids and in turn more kids will follow leading to growing club and growing coffer$

"BTW, Isn't Little League Recreation?"

Yes I believe it is, but I was more focusing on the territory assigment concept that they use. Club are in such competion with each other right now that the one losing out are the players. How many kids are on the wrong level team because the "local" club wars make it hard for parents to figure out where thier kids should be playing.

Perhap the state level org should assign territory for the rec level play to clubs with some sort of charter. Equal cost and requirements then over time we could grow the system to where club were more territorial with the highest level team becomeing a union of top performing clubs in an area (assuming region play would take more quality players than might exist in some clubs. Idea is rough but the skeleton is there.

I will be back to the CHS games. I have been dealing with other family issues and my boy's karate is taking up most of my time. If you think soccer can suck only try being on the traveling karate team. The US Open will cost me $200 just my child to enter.

I only asked because in Recreation you can have 5-10 teams in a league playing eachother in a given terriroty where you will probably have one maybe two traveling teams. So if you have a terrible coach in Recreation you move to another team in that grouping the following year, where club you could get screwed if you did teritory based teams and I think the competition between the clubs is a good thing, a free market is always better in the long run. HS sports is just like what you are saying and my daughter got stuck with an abusive coach for 4 years before he was fired. If it wasn't for some great club coaches she would have quit by her Junior year.

I don't think the system is perfect but I can't think of a better way to do it and if a club does think of a better way I am sure they will use it to their advantage.

One last note, I have sat on three different boards involving soccer and money has never been a driving factor for recruiting and retaining players. It has always been about increasing the club size so that economics of scale could allow the affordibity of better training. Such as being able to hire a full time DOC that has the sole intention of training the club players, or building lights for fields so players can train in the dark, or aquire more fields so that players are not training on top of eachother, the list goes on. I do not know a single board member that makes money from being on the board. Most boards members donate a lot of time and then turn around and pay the club to train their children the same fees as everyone else. Saying that clubs only do it for the money is just pure lazy and requires no thinking.

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One last note, I have sat on three different boards involving soccer and money has never been a driving factor for recruiting and retaining players. It has always been about increasing the club size so that economics of scale could allow the affordibity of better training. Such as being able to hire a full time DOC that has the sole intention of training the club players, or building lights for fields so players can train in the dark, or aquire more fields so that players are not training on top of eachother, the list goes on. I do not know a single board member that makes money from being on the board. Most boards members donate a lot of time and then turn around and pay the club to train their children the same fees as everyone else. Saying that clubs only do it for the money is just pure lazy and requires no thinking.

Holdup there sparky!! Before you go name calling think about what you have read here, and the many other threads concerning clubs and issues involing money. I have never said they only do it for the money, I said that money was a underlying factor concering the decisions they make reguarding tryouts and team formation. I know many parent you spend lots of time and effort with no compensation to make thing better for thier children and who do it for the kids not the money. The same could be said of many coaches who do it fo the love of the game and kids not the small amount of money they make.
Now here is the however.... Even you in your post come out and support the statement that money is a driveing factor! Reread the quote!! You talk about how important money is for the club to grow and offer better products for the kids. Remember that your the one saying your board made decisions about growing the club for "economy of scale" but that it was not about "recruiting and retaining" that statement in itself is in conflict???
Before you attack those questioning the system as "lazy" think about what you just said because it supports the concept that money underlies most club decisions! Like I said even "Non-profits" have to turn a few dollars to exist.

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I do agree with what "the chief" says that club is all about money, even though most are non-profits.

I've seen this sort of comment before (on a number of posts)and would like to point out that not all nonprofits are created equal. It takes about ten minutes and $25 to incorporate under State law as a nonprofit organization.

It takes a whole lot more resources ($), work and effort to file for tax exemption under 501c(3) if your organization wants to benefit from tax exemption under IRS to receive charitable donations and provide deductions to donors.

In addition public charities of this nature have to file annual application under South Carolina to register as a Public Charity and this status in my mind would better articulate a benevolent mission. All charitable organizations that solicit contributions or have contributions solicited on their behalf must register prior to any solicitation activity.

Public charities/tax exempt orgs have higher public accountability and transparency through forms, reports, and most importantly an annual 990 that lists director and top employee salaries. This is why we (and many others) choose this direction despite the additional overhead and cost. To publish and share financial details about a clubs operation to avoid suspicion and unfair assertions around motive.

In South Carolina, you can search for organizations under either of these categories on the Secretary of State's website (use either corporation or charity search tools)
http://www.scsos.com/Home

Excellent information!! Best post in this thread, so far! Your point is well made that not all are equal and that effort is required to reach this level. But I must also point out that as you said it takes $ and resources (read peoples time=money) to reach this.

Still excellent info!

Chief,

Don't get your blood in a boil. I wasn't really talking about your post on that last paragraph.

I was referring to the thinking such as:

"This tactic can easily backfire, and is normally only used when the desperate club is under pressure to get more players for monetary reasons. I do agree with what "the chief" says that club is all about money, even though most are non-profits."

He/She agrees with you but makes sure to put the "all about money" and "monetary reasons". Which makes the assumption that all clubs places zero value on developing the player or soccer in south carolina. I see this thinking a lot on the boards and I think I saw a few comments in another thread saying basically the same thing.

I need to be more careful in making sure I address exact comments with names and not mash it all in one post. I read about ten posts at once and then I allow my stream of conscience to type and that mixes up my comments to multiple posts in one large post. I should try and remember to write a post for each comment.

Also my name isn't Sparky.

Sparky is a term of endearment for one getting a little ahead of the game due to a slightly zealous effort, not an insult.

I agree with your point that clubs are not "ALL" about the money and that player devlopment is a key part of what they acheive through many peoples tireless and selfless efforts.

The fact remains that there is big, very big, money out there in the clubs and some people are making a living at this while others are doing it for the sport/kids. Do not get me wrong making a living at it is thier right but I think clubs sometimes go off the path to get that DOC or really good coach.
It can be a nasty circle: need money to get good coaches, growth comes from winning (or devlopment of good player if you want), good coaching leads to winning, growth leads to better player pool resulting in more winning. At some point you have to start with one of the above and get to the others, but clearly growth and money (the result of growth) a the keys behind sucessful programs.