Philosophy shift might see Union give roster occasional college try
Alejandro Bedoya hadn’t yet made the move that would elevate his college career when he felt sure that his professional future lay somewhere other than MLS.
This was in 2006, when Bedoya was being scouted to play soccer in Europe after two standout seasons at Fairleigh Dickinson. He would finish his eligibility on a bigger stage at Boston College.
Then, the path to the pros diverged for Bedoya. He could either be drafted into MLS, where starting salaries were low and professionalism was still blossoming, or he could test his fortunes in Europe. A trip after his junior year to visit former BC star Charlie Davies, then playing for Hammarby in Sweden, sealed Bedoya’s decision.
“I wanted to play, and I thought Sweden was a good step for me to do that,” Bedoya said recently. “I didn’t want to sign in MLS, even though I was going to potentially be a top draft pick because I had heard about other players signing longterm deals and MLS holding them back from signing abroad because of their contract terms and their asking prices for some players.”
Bedoya’s journey to pro soccer belongs to another era, before most MLS clubs had cogent academy systems and a defined pathway to the first team. There were fewer markets with MLS clubs (or high-level USL clubs) operating developmental infrastructure, so Bedoya could skip through hotbeds like his native South Florida and North Jersey unaffiliated with any MLS club.
Things have changed considerably, as seen in the
Union’s current roster: As of the close of the primary transfer window in May, the Union had the fewest players in MLS with college experience. Bedoya was one of just five former college players and only two outfield players, with former West Virginia defender Jack Elliott. They’ve since added Drexel grad Chris Donovan, and all three Union goalies — Joe Bendik (Clemson), Matt Freese (Harvard) and Andre Blake (UConn) — are college products.
While Bedoya’s path to MLS was unique, so is the Union’s current roster-building approach among MLS peers. As of May, the club was tied with Toronto FC for the fewest rostered collegians with five each (with the obvious difference of Canada being outside the NCAA system). Fourteen of 28 MLS teams have fewer than 10 collegians.
The high-water mark is 20 players with collegiate experience in Nashville. New England checks in with 17, while Columbus, Minnesota and San Jose had 15 each. New England (Bruce Arena) and Columbus (Caleb Porter) are led by former college head coaches. But college soccer has become so minimized in MLS that only 10 clubs even list players’ colleges in their weekly media notes, instead opting for a more telling and Euro-centric “previous club.”
College has long presented a developmental challenge. Limiting players to a three-month fall season, with NCAA-mandated ceilings on training time, means college players lose ground on their global rivals that they can never recoup. Though the NCAA has adapted some, with modified spring schedules and summer arrangements in USL, it’s still not the pro training environment that an academy provides.
“College is changing now, but back when I was playing, you had a three-month season and that was it,” Bedoya said. “They had time limits on how much you could train as a team. The fact that there were limits on how much you can train, how is that a proper way to develop? That’s ridiculous.”
And that’s exactly why you don’t see Ernst Tanner signing many kids with college experience. To him, it’s wasted time. Instead of getting a 21-year-old who’s been through college, that roster spot can go to a 17-year-old Academy kid, betting that the Union will not only get him to a much higher talent level by the time he’s 21 but with a game that is a better fit for their system.
“Those are such vital years for players to develop,” Bedoya said. “I think you have to realize that college isn’t the best developmental tool, but for our club, we follow a specific strategy from the top down. Our academy is pretty much emulating how the first team is playing. That’s the perfect way to develop them into the way we want to play.”
“That’s what you see now in our lineup reflected in our second team,” Tanner added.
Goalies are different. Six of the last seven MLS goalkeepers of the year, a list that includes Blake twice, have college experience. Facing shots in game situations even at a lower level is more vital to them than training in a professional environment without playing.
“Maybe college is a good thing for goalkeepers in general because as a goalkeeper, you need to play games,” Bendik said. “You go to college, you’re going to play 15, 20, 25 games a season, and just to have that under your belt when you come into a first team is big. Where if you have a kid who comes into your team at 17, the first game he plays is maybe an MLS league game, that’s a lot higher than a D1 college game. There definitely are some positives in terms of discipline and game experience.”
Tanner stresses that decisions are made on a player-byplayer basis, and he expressed a respect for the educational opportunity soccer can bring. If players are borderline pro prospects but are ticketed for Ivy League educations, for instance, Tanner and the Academy coaches try to be frank about pros and cons.
What the Union haven’t done is follow the lead of other clubs, stashing players in college before signing them later. They have drawn a fine line on Homegrowns, signing them either at 18 or not at all. With some exceptions, once a player is out of the system, the Union don’t bring them back in.
Tanner sees an issue reintegrating players to the professional environment after they’ve been in college. If there’s even a chance of going to college and coming back, Tanner would generally prefer they stay in the pipeline instead.
Tanner is open to having that change. But at the moment, the identification process is working fine.
“We are following them, we are tracking them and once we are of the opinion that they are good enough to re-enter our system, we are open to that,” Tanner said.
Bendik looks at the big picture a couple of ways. The first is from a learning perspective. He grew up in New York, went to high school in Georgia and
has been a pro for a dozen years, two in Norway. He reckons he’s had 12 or more goalkeeping coaches as a pro, incorporating something from each. That diversity of ideas is important and may be absent at some academies if the instruction is stagnant.
The second is structure, which exists now in the pro pipeline at clubs like the Union. When he was young, though, that structure came via college and might still for some prospects.
“The journey for me was highly important,” he said. “These players that are going to go through academies, their journey is going to be through the professional side, it’s not going to be in the youth, which I think is most important. Being a father of three kids, the structure and stability is highly important, to be comfortable and grow as a player, and when the time is right, it’s time for them to go and explore new options if that’s what they need.”