Birth Year Hysteria.....?

[Unregistered]

Still the stupidest idea I have seen to date. Makes no sense and only hurts fall born kids...and let's not start "but my kid was disadvantage and no one cared before."

So all the spring bourn kids were hurt before get a grip

[Unregistered]

Wait until the high school break and the 8th graders playing on the u15 team do not have a team because the 9th graders are playing high school. And then wait until next year when half of the u18 team graduates and the other half that are juniors this year will need to find a new team. This will repeat every year.

Play DA then you don't have to worry about HS season

[Unregistered]

Our club split it at the U14 age. Everyone U14 and below must play on age.

The older kids will mostly stay together, with any new players play on age only.

It makes the kids happy, but from a competition point of view, I would have preferred to just switch everybody to on age only. It would have made my kid's team stronger having the older kids play that are born the same year. Of course, this would have killed the older kids (98) teams since half of the 98s left for college...

We're at a larger club that implemented strict birth year change. The only way a girl can "play up" is if she is good enough to start on the older team. If a girl is playing up a year and good enough to beat out all the girls playing on age and start, then I say she belongs there. And I agree from a competition point of view. When you see a team of all 2001s playing next to a group of all 2002 girls there is a world of difference! I didn't see that when they were all mixed together but when you break them apart, OMG! The 2001s are taller, thicker and a lot more mature than 12-months would seem to indicate. Teams with mixed ages are going to have their hands full.

[Unregistered]

We're at a larger club that implemented strict birth year change. The only way a girl can "play up" is if she is good enough to start on the older team. If a girl is playing up a year and good enough to beat out all the girls playing on age and start, then I say she belongs there. And I agree from a competition point of view. When you see a team of all 2001s playing next to a group of all 2002 girls there is a world of difference! I didn't see that when they were all mixed together but when you break them apart, OMG! The 2001s are taller, thicker and a lot more mature than 12-months would seem to indicate. Teams with mixed ages are going to have their hands full.

Hard to believe that when such a big difference of development in girls. Some are hitting womanhood in fourth grade and some not until 15 and 16.

[Unregistered]

Play DA then you don't have to worry about HS season

DAs are supposed to be for the best players not the ones who don't want to play for poor HS soccer programs.

[Unregistered]

DAs are supposed to be for the best players not the ones who don't want to play for poor HS soccer programs.

The best players have no interest in HS soccer.

[Unregistered]

The nightmare came true, so you just deal with it.
My daughter has had to leave a team she's played with for years, leave friends she's had for years, to go to a much less talented team because that's her age group now. She loves soccer so she'll keep playing, but I can tell she's not as excited as she has been. We'll miss the parents on the other team as well, we were like a big family.
It was an idiotic idea put in place by submoronic cretins. Anyone with two brain cells to rub together would have worked the birth year age groupings in gradually, starting at the younger ages and working their way up. But that would have made too much sense.

Such melodrama.

[Unregistered]

Still the stupidest idea I have seen to date. Makes no sense and only hurts fall born kids...and let's not start "but my kid was disadvantage and no one cared before."

But those spring born kids were hurt before. You will only be able to move on if you accept that kids on the other end of the calendar were just as disadvantaged as your kids are now.

[Unregistered]

Wait until the high school break and the 8th graders playing on the u15 team do not have a team because the 9th graders are playing high school. And then wait until next year when half of the u18 team graduates and the other half that are juniors this year will need to find a new team. This will repeat every year.

Sucks for them. But when RAE kicks in there will be very few of those kids playing by this age anyways. Their numbers will represent the current few July kids that are playing now.

You see when RAE kicks in those fall kids will not be selected for the A teams in the abundance that they have been because that is what Relative Age Effect means and does. They will be relegated to the B, C and D teams and generally will not be Varsity worthy anyway.

[Unregistered]

Sucks for them. But when RAE kicks in there will be very few of those kids playing by this age anyways. Their numbers will represent the current few July kids that are playing now.

You see when RAE kicks in those fall kids will not be selected for the A teams in the abundance that they have been because that is what Relative Age Effect means and does. They will be relegated to the B, C and D teams and generally will not be Varsity worthy anyway.

The affects of RAE lessen as athletes age. More pronounced when they are younger but as they age other factors take over and it evens out (genetics, work ethic, quality of coaching, soccer IQ). You make RAE sound like "destiny."

[Unregistered]

The affects of RAE lessen as athletes age. More pronounced when they are younger but as they age other factors take over and it evens out (genetics, work ethic, quality of coaching, soccer IQ). You make RAE sound like "destiny."

No, it does not lesson with age, it becomes more and more engrained. Kids willing to put in the work can climb the ladder but once kids are selected at early ages and put into the system of better coaching, better teams, leagues, tournaments, unless they fall flat on their face their position is fairly entrenched.

But by that time the RAE kids have already benefited from nearly five years of the best available training and competition that their area has to offer. That cumulative effect does not magically disappear at 13 years old and "even out".

[Unregistered]

But those spring born kids were hurt before. You will only be able to move on if you accept that kids on the other end of the calendar were just as disadvantaged as your kids are now.

It's really not about the RAE for fall or spring born but rather they used to be together more by school year and graduate together.

[Unregistered]

Do you remember when the switch to Birth Year age groups was announced? Seems like forever ago, but there was a massive outcry and people turning over cars and burning them in the streets. Now, the new season is upon us, practices are starting up and everything seems to be OK. If you're old enough to remember, it feels like New Years Eve-1999 with the Y2K debacle. When the clock struck 12:01 AM on 1/1/2000 - and nothing happened! No planes fell from the sky, etc.

Nothing happened?

My U18 daughter ended up with no team to play on in a club that she has played for over the past 7 years.

[Unregistered]

It's really not about the RAE for fall or spring born but rather they used to be together more by school year and graduate together.

Gee, I don't know, before the birth year change my kid went to school with ZERO kids on the team. After birth year change my kid has FOUR classmates on the team.

Club soccer is not a school district thing so please stop with this narrative of playing with schoolmates. It isn't the case in many areas. There are no fewer than six different school districts represented on my kids team.

[Unregistered]

Gee, I don't know, before the birth year change my kid went to school with ZERO kids on the team. After birth year change my kid has FOUR classmates on the team.

Club soccer is not a school district thing so please stop with this narrative of playing with schoolmates. It isn't the case in many areas. There are no fewer than six different school districts represented on my kids team.

Talking about players being in same grade and graduating at the same time. The fall players will lose 3/4 of their teammates after their junior year. Where will the fall players go play their senior year?