No matter what anyone’s opinion of how Rapinoe handles her personal and business affairs, it’s obvious that she is still very much in the plans for Vlatko. He and Rapinoe are close from his days coaching her in the NWSL and I do think she is a good teammate and leader within a group that hasn’t lost a match since when again?
Randy Waldrum vs USWNT Wednesday
- Thread starter Sean Miller Fan
- Start date
Your response is fantastic, but I hope that we can focus on the fact that several of us are having a good, in-depth USWNT discussion and not focus on the one close-minded troll who knows nothing about international women’s soccer and how much it has grown.
They're catching up but slowly. And there will still be a huge lack of depth. I mean they could only have 16 teams at the World Cup because of the lack of depth and the fear of a bunch of 8-0 matches in the group stage
There are plenty of quality teams on par with US.
not any more. Plenty take it serious and have been. Just because the depth of the pool of teams is not as deep, doesn’t diminish the accomplishment. It may not be Men’s World Cup depth, but it’s deeper than Olympic and world championship ice hockey.
The upcoming women’s Olympic tournament is deep, which is impressive considering the lack of spots for top Euro countries because of UEFA’s wonky Olympic qualifying process (based off the previous WC finish). That means the world’s 2nd-best team, France, isn’t in the field. Same with Germany (arguably 3rd best), Spain, Norway, etc.
I would say 6-7 nations are legitimate gold medal threats, with the US certainly leading the way. There are no “rec league” nations in the USA group. Sweden is arguably the USWNT’s kryponite having recently played to a draw and knocking the US out of the ‘16 Olympics. Australia is a dark horse threat and features one of the 3 or 4 best women’s players in the world in Sam Kerr. The “weakest” team in the group is New Zealand, who are ranked a respectable 22nd in the world. Really the only weak team in the Olympic field is Zambia, which surprisingly won the Africa qualifying.
My predictions:
Gold - USA
Silver- Great Britain
Bronze- Australia over Japan
Medal Contenders - Brazil, Netherlands, Sweden, China
Competitive but never win anything- Canada,
No shot at medals but can take points - New Zealand, Chile
No shot at being competitive- Zambia
Last edited:
Zambia surely is a rec team. Their entire roster play in the Zambian league, who I would be surprised if they paid anything more than gas money.
Leave it to you to focus on Zambia. Breaking news: most African and Middle Eastern nations are decades behind the developed world in providing women opportunities. Stop acting surprised. What you are wrong about is that most federations in the rest of the world have established women’s programs and the depth of competition is getting better and better with each major international tournament.
The fact remains that when the USWNT plays, the poorest people in the stadium are the 11 women they are playing against. Most of these women are semi-pros, having to work real jobs to pay the bills. The US women are real pro millionaires who are obviously full-time pros playing mostly against women who have to go work a real job after training. The USWNT winning games does not impress me in the least.
I don’t see why salaries matter one bit to this discussion, but FYI the two highest paid players in the world are from Australia (Sam Kerr) and Norway (Ada Hegerberg). In fact, 6 of the 10 highest paid players in the world are non-American. National team players with club teams in England and France are much-higher paid than NWSL players in the US. So when the US steps on the field against France or England, those women are most certainly not “the poorest people in the stadium.”
Last edited:
It matters because your girls are beating semi-pros. Its pros vs semi-pros most of the time. I am sorry to break this news to you diehard USWNT fans but they are beating girls who have to work regular jobs to pay the bills.......and they want paid as much as Pulisic. That's GD hilarious.
Wrong. The majority of opponents on the USWNT calendar are full-time pros. You are just flat out wrong. There are a few examples of nations that are not all pros, but those are the exceptions nowadays.
Freaking Iceland had a dentist as their head coach in the Euros in 2016. Trinidad and Tobago which the US men play regularly (and famously lost to in 2017) have “rec league” players comprising 1/3 of their roster (look it up, they do). Not all men’s national teams are the same either.
Hopefully we can get this thread back on track and continue the solid USWNT talk.
Last edited:
Yes, many of those island nations are rec teams on the men's side. Never said they werent.
My guess is there are maybe 5-6 women's national teams in the world that field an entire roster of full-time pros (defined as someone who receives an income from playing soccer that puts them in a "rich" or at least "upper middle class" category). Some 24 year old player making $25K for Norway but still living with mom and dad because that's not enough money to support herself doesn't count as a full-time pro
So by your logic (which only focuses on how much someone is paid and not by the time they invest in their sport) you must also believe that a Double-A baseball player who on average makes less than $10k per year despite playing 140 games on top of spring training and year-round conditioning isn’t a “full time pro?” I mean, they only make $10,000 so they can’t be a real professional, right?
I think you have this backwards. In the big competitions, the US women are facing competition that is on an equal level as them in most games. The team in the bottom of a group is usually a cupcake. But you have that in men’s soccer too. The only difference is men’s soccer has the depth to have 3 times the groups in a big competition. It doesn’t make navigation through the tourney any harder. In a World Cup, a men’s team and a women’s team still have a couple challenging games in group play, and then every game in the knockout rounds are tough.
In friendlies, they may run up against teams that need to fill some of their roster spots with women who are playing collegiately in the US and have some connection to the country they play for.
I’ll compare the US women to Canada hockey. They aren’t competing against 30 legit countries like men’s soccer does…but they are certainly competing against a good 10 or so competitive nations. Now that I think about it, that’s more impressive than any team winning a major ice hockey tourney.
If someone is only making $10,000/year then they are obviously not a full-time pro otherwise they would be homeless.
I would say a majority of minor league baseball players are semi-pro players since their baseball income puts them in the poverty category.
I am not as familiar with the minors like I used to be but I think the MLB club pays their top prospects very well throughout the minors. They dont want them working at Wal-Mart after the game. But they have to fill out the roster with older guys who have no chance of making the majors and those guys are just "living the dream."
You make absolutely no sense in your logic.
I have known many minor leaguers who were considered top prospects that weren’t bonus babies or on a 40-man roster and made $8800 a year. They had to figure out a way to make it work by doing hitting/pitching lessons while training all off-season because they could not work a full-time job. Some went to play in the Carribean during the winter because those 2 months paid better than a full season of minor league baseball.
There are many professional soccer players in the same boat. I know a few NWSL players who aren’t at the national team level. They make maybe $20k a year but I dare you to call them semi-pro. They are workout maniacs and train full time on their own.
How can you be a "full-time" pro and be making poverty wages?
I am sure NWSL has many semi-pro players. On the men's side, USL is probably 99% semi-pro.
I am sorry that it hurts your feelings that your girls are beating semi-pros.
SMF doesn’t respect women, this much is obvious. Certainly he doesn’t respect this one either…because she doesn’t make large bank playing soccer.
It has nothing to do with respecting women. Well, I guess I kinda dont respect the SUCCESS of the USWNT since they beat semi pros and rec teams.
They are surely great players and all that but its just a pet peeve of mine when Americans get so excited when they beat a bunch of grocery store employees and say "now why cant the men's team win like that." Because they play actual professional teams.
Last edited:
You apparently have never been familiar with minor league baseball, because minor league baseball teams have NEVER been paid anything other than crap wages. Top prospects got the big money in their signing bonuses. The amount that they actually make from week to week or from season to season is almost exactly the same amount that the backup catcher on the team makes.
The top item on Fk's early 2021 Christmas wish list:
Only $50 on the US Soccer web site!
Will Victoria’s Secret make one too?The top item on Fk's early 2021 Christmas wish list:
Only $50 on the US Soccer web site!
Some of those guys are in the 40 man roster.
Also, the top prospects could live rather comfortably on signing bonus money until they make the majors
Forget SMF and his nonsense, the 18-player Olympic roster was announced this morning. No major surprises for me. Emily Sonnett and Kristy Mewis make the team. I wish there would have been a spot for Lynn Williams, but with a short bench she is a bit too one-dimensional. If the rosters would have been larger it would have been great to get Catarina Macario a taste of a major event. Maybe I am paranoid, but I believe she can still flip back to Brazil at this point.
Vlatko Andonovski Names 2020 U.S. Olympic Women’s Soccer Team
Eleven Players Return from 2016 Olympics; 17 Players from 2019 Women’s World Cup Are Named; USA Will Play Last Two Matches Before Olympics on July 1 and 5 Against Mexico in East Hartford, Conn.
I honestly can’t root for this group. Those are the best forward options? Please…
USWNT roster for Tokyo Olympics
The USWNT squad for the Tokyo Olympics has been confirmed, with the Stars and Stripes going with a mixture of experienced stars and young prospects.
soccer.nbcsports.com
I haven't looked to see how it has changed with the changes to the minor leagues this year, but in past years basically no one below AA (which was the large majority of minor leaguers) was ever on the 40 man, and only a few guys at AA were.
For instance right now the Pirates have 43 players on their 40 man roster (guys on the 60 day injury list don't count, so you can go over 40). Of those 43 only 3 are playing at AA, and none are playing at a lower level than that.
But yeah, those players who are on the 40 man roster do get paid better. But not nearly as well as, for instance, what Bryce Washington is being paid for signing his MLS homegrown contract.
The 40-man roster players make $45k or so a year, but as you mentioned very rarely is a Single-A player on the 40-man. On a Double-A roster you probably have an average of 4 players plus another 4 or 5 minor league free agents who make a somewhat liveable wage, but the other 17 or 18 players are all making the regular salary for that level which is only about $10k a year.
A player is eligible for the Rule 5 Draft after they've played 4-5 years in the minors and are not on the 40-man roster. That, or being a September call-up would be about the only reasons for anyone at AA to be on the 40-man roster, but they've even changed the rules to curtail that now.
If you've played 4-5 seasons and are still at AA, you probably aren't a coveted prospect.
And don't they have to live with host families and work regular jobs? So yea, semi-pro.
Almost none of them work regular jobs. They train year round because they are, ya know, professionals.
Host families aren’t common above A-ball. I don’t know how some of them do it, but the promise of getting to the big leagues and making life-changing money right away keeps them going I suppose.
How is a minor leaguer making $10K per year able to not be homeless if they
a) arent living with a host family
b) arent working regular jobs
Its a tad difficult to live life on $10,000/year.
I don’t know but I have personally known hundreds of minor leaguers through my past line of work and they find a way.
That's a stupid comment, there where a lot of people taking college football seriously then, in fact in those days, it was bigger than the NFL, the same power houses you have today, ND, Michigan, tOSU, Bama, Texas, USC etc. where big time then too. The college championship was more relevant than the NFL then, The college all stars could beat the NFL champs back then. In those days, college football was probably 2nd most popular after MLB, so yeah, it's a stupid comment.
I would think that on the relatively few occasions that it does happen it would be either someone who has had some injury issues and missed a lot of time or a kid who was really raw when he got drafted out of high school and it took a couple years for him to start getting some traction.
But it would have to be a high school guy. There are no guys who were drafted out of college who are still in AA after four or five years who are any sort of real prospect. I'm not saying that you couldn't find a guy like that who ended up being a decent major league player, but that guy is going to be an outlier for sure.
Yea, they have to have 2nd jobs. You cannot live on 10K/year, especially if you arent getting free housing.
