More young American soccer players going abroad...

15 years ago Alexi Lalas was a ground breaking pioneer going abroad to Italy. There were a precious few other young American players given chances at foreign clubs. Now American players are often seen as the final frontier by foreign clubs. In the US they can find talented young athletes who have the skill and can be had for bargain basement prices...often free.

There are two more young players who have decided to test the waters of foreign football. Sonny Guadarrama (Santos, Mexico) & Erik Hort (Sparta Prague, Czech Republic) are two of the American exports. Sonny is leaving his brother and Campbell University behind while Hort has been in the Czech Republic since January, 2005. They have joined the ever growing list of young Americans who decide to jump past American professional ranks in favor of foreign soccer. The difference? One went to Mexico and the other the Czech Republic. No, they weren't lured by the famous Premiership, Siere A or La Liga. They're going to leagues seen as feeders for the big boys. Wait, isn't MLS supposed to be a feeder for the big leagues?

My opinion has always been that as soccer popularity grows so will the player pool available in the country. I think we have all seen that. Every year there are new faces in college and going into the MLS SuperDraft in January. I am not someone who thinks MLS is going to die because Sonny and Erik have decided to play somewhere else. However, it does leave me to wonder...why are these kids leaving home to go to leagues that aren't the traditional high profile leagues?

These two players aren't the first to go to a second tier league around the world skipping or leaving MLS. Northern Europe has been signing young American players for a few years now. It looks like Mexico and the Czech Republic are just catching on. I wish fewer players were taking this route because I do believe MLS suffers by never having the chance to sign them. MLS needs more top quality, American players to raise the level of play. However, MLS first needs higher salaries for young players before they see more young talent staying in the US.

MLS is between a rock and a hard place on this one. On the one hand they want to raise the quality of play on the field to get more soccer fans through the gates. On the other, they want to keep a tight budget and have veteran players who have helped build the league and deserve to be rewarded. These kids are unproven talent, so why should they break the bank? Right? Additionally, if I believe my own arguement, they grow on trees and there will be a fresh crop next season.

As we've talked about here, the creation of the vertical youth development system will help some of these top talents develop within MLS and hopefully stay. (I'm still waiting for MLS' announcement on this one.) Until the league's development system is up and running for a couple years, we'll continue to see top prospects leaving the States for professional soccer abroad.

On the other hand, there is nothing saying these kids moving abroad are going to be successful. The foreign teams are taking just as much of a risk as the domestic clubs when they sign with MLS. For every DaMarcus Beasley, there is a John Thorrington. I'm sure we'll be seeing some of these guys back in MLS in the future.