Does MLS have a bias against short players?

Edit (12:10 am pacific, 1/29/14): Additional graphs added at bottom to show USborn players in MLS relative to US population and also Netherlands-born players in Eredivisie relative to population.

This post was inspired by a story about how Enrique Cardenas felt slighted by not being drafted into MLS speculating that he was too small. There was (as always) some decent discussion on the topic in reddit.com/r/mls that discussed whether smaller, technical players are squeezed out by MLS. MLS Analyst, Matt Doyle, is someone who I generally agree with his opinions and analysis, but our initial reactions about this topic differed – he felt that small players got a fair shake, while I felt they didn’t.

MLS PLAYERS ARE RELATIVELY TALLER THAN MALES AGED 20-29 IN THE US

It seems pretty obvious just by looking at the players on the field that they tend to be a bit bigger than the average guy. As an economist/statistician, the eye-ball test usually doesn’t satisfy me. The chart below shows the percentage of people at a given number of inches for both MLS players (listed as “active” on mlssoccer.com as of 2pm eastern 01/28/2014) and the US male population aged 20-29. It is absolutely clear that MLS players are taller than the general population. 

The height at which MLS players overtake the general population in terms of percentage of the total sample is from 5’11 and 6’0. My mind immediately thinks there’s two potential factors at play in this particular break. The first, is that MLS teams might fudge a player’s height by a tiny bit to list some players as 6’0 when they are really just under 5’11.5.  The second, is that MLS scouts have a mental propensity to think of guys under 6’ as “small” in the same way that people tend to think something priced $4.99 seems significantly cheaper than if it were priced $5.00.

NCAA PLAYERS ARE RELATIVELY TALLER THAN MALES AGED 20-29 IN THE US

Reddit user "wacksoff" suggested that the small players get weeded out earlier in the US development system than MLS. I looked at the height of all players for teams in the final 32 of the 2013 NCAA division 1 tournament and compared them in the same manner as I did MLS players in the above section. We find the same general trend of NCAA players being taller than the general population and there is again a big difference between 5’11 and 6’0. So, it seems pretty clear that the smaller players do tend to drop out before they get a shot at MLS.

MLS PLAYERS ARE RELATIVELY TALLER THAN NCAA PLAYERS

Alright, so we’ve established that MLS isn’t completely at fault for height bias. Do they share at least some of the blame? We can’t draw an official conclusion based on the data I used. This is largely because many players continue to grow into their early 20’s, so surely some of the shift from shorter players to taller players is simply due to the physical growth of those individual players. However, we can’t say for certain whether the entire shift is due to that or if MLS does indeed tend to have a bias in favor of taller players.

PLAYERS UNDER 5’9 ARE DISCOUNTED HEAVILY IN MLS

So how screwed are small players by their size? For this section I borrowed something from economics called a location quotient that is most often used to identify industries of importance for an area and is also very useful for studying demographics. It is a ratio of ratios that basically measures the density of one category in a particular area to the density of the same category in a different area. So, what we are measuring here is how much more (or less) dense players of a certain height are relative to the total population. Values less than one say that the density is lower and values greater than one say the density is higher. Players that are between 5’9 and 5’11 are pretty close to having similar densities within MLS and the general population, which means they don’t get any different treatment based on their size. Players that are 5’7 or 5’8 are at a massive disadvantage because of their height, with ratios of 0.35 and 0.61 respectively. That means a player who is 5’7 is about 3 times less likely to be an MLS player than would be expected based on the distribution of the overall population.

IS THIS A BAD THING?

This is a question impossible to answer based on the data I’ve used. Assuming technical and tactical ability are distributed normally across the US population, it makes some sense that there’s some bias toward bigger players since they should be able to simply do more things like push small players off the ball and win more headers. The extent of that bias is the real meat of the problem. Personally, I think the US soccer system discounts smaller players too heavily and instead focuses on physical attributes rather than soccer ability. This is based on my personal experience as a competitive boys U14 coach and women’s university coach. I plan to further explore the idea of US soccer discounting small players in a post to follow.

Note: US height data from the US Center for National Health Statistics

Additional interesting tidbits related to the topic:

• There was almost no correlation between average team height and points earned.
• The tallest team was Columbus at 71.96" on average
• The shortest team was Philadelphia at 70.41"on average
• Keepers were the tallest on average at 73.94" followed by defenders (72.13"), forwards (71.57"), and midfielders (70.01")

The data for "additional interesting tidbits" are for players with 200+ minutes played in 2013.

COMPARISON TO NETHERLANDS

A couple people on reddit wanted to see some comparisons to other leagues around the world. I only had time to do one tonight (finding and entering this data is time consuming).

This first graph shows MLS players who were born in the US compared to the US male population aged 20-29. Clearly, the graph shows that MLS players tend to be taller than the population, which is to be expected from our findings above. The second graph is Eredivisie players who were born in The Netherlands compared to the Netherlands male population aged 20-30. We find that Eredivisie players are actually shorter than the population, in stark contrast to in the US. I will be looking at more leagues as I have time, but this small sample size supports the hypothesis that small players are at a disadvantage in the US compared to large players in the US and when compared to small players in other countries (so far only proven true for Holland). This does not tell us when exactly they get pushed out of the game, but the NCAA data above suggests it is largely sometime in the NCAA recruiting process, high school, or even earlier.

Seattle vs. Portland playoff preview

The dream match-up has been locked in. Seattle vs. Portland. Sigi vs. Porter. These are two sides who have a plethora of tactical options available to them, so I'm highlighting a few of the big ones in the build up for the Cascadia clash in the playoffs. The graphic is just my best guess at how the teams will line up.

Will Evans line up at right mid or right back?

This is the most important question from Seattle's side of the ball. When Yedlin had to be subbed off at half due to injury, Brad Evans was shifted to right back. This was the preferred option of just bringing on Zach Scott because of Deshorn Brown’s pace. Rodney Wallace isn’t nearly as quick as Brown, so I expect to see Scott start at right back if Yedlin isn’t good to go. 

Seattle’s new 4-3-1-2 is built around the attacking trio holding the ball up to allow the deeper midfielders to get forward into the attack. Evans is one of the best trailing runners in the league and Burch simply doesn’t have the acumen to make the proper runs while in semi-transition (we saw this last night on a breakaway in the second half where a simple diagonal run toward goal would have seen him 1v1 with Irwin, but he instead ran away to hide out on the left wing where he is comfortable.) If the Sounders are going to mount anything in attack, Evans has to be in the midfield, whether that means Yedlin is fit or Scott plays right back doesn’t matter.

Will Chara and Johnson sit a bit deeper to mark Dempsey out of the game?

The tactical and formation switch of Seattle is a clear message that the playmaking is on Dempsey’s shoulders as Rosales rides the pine. Dempsey was able to collect the ball all over the field against Colorado and bring other players into the attack while pulling the defenders out of their defensive shape. Portland has already shown the willingness to track Dempsey wherever he may roam as demonstrated by the tackle that separated his shoulder on the sideline last time these teams met. They’ll have to do the same again or Dempsey will exert his will on the game like was saw against the Timbers last time before the injury.

However, tracking Dempsey as he tries to find space means there will be space for Seattle’s deeper midfielders to make runs forward. Evans/Burch and Moffat will have to exploit the space left by Johnson and Chara tracking Deuce. Eddie Johnson and Lamar Neagle will have to realize their runs need to be timed off of Evans and Moffat collecting the ball, not Dempsey.

Will Portland’s wide forwards be able to pinch the field on defense?

A huge part of Portland’s success this season is the defensive responsibilities and execution of their wide forwards. They have played very wide and cut off the passing lanes to other teams’ wide players and forcing their opponents to play through the middle or send long balls (see the first half of the game vs. Colorado on 9/20 for an example of this in effect). In MLS, the trend has been for playmakers to play wide, so this tactic has cut off the supply to their opponents’ most dangerous threats. Seattle has elected to shift things central under Sigi’s new formation. The closest approximation to this attacking style is RSL, who have scored 7 goals over 3 games. However, Seattle are also more willing (and successful) than RSL to send long-balls into the corners for their forwards to chase. 

Additionally, Portland tries to cut the field in half on defense and trap their opponents to one side of the field. Seattle will have to either try to work in these tight spaces or they will have to try to open up through the middle and switch the point of attack. Seattle’s midfield plays very narrow with all 4 midfielders essentially playing as a center mid. They should have the opportunity to combine between them until they can release a fullback breaking forward or find a ball in behind Portland’s back line.

Will Portland’s outside backs get into the attack or sit deeper?

This is the follow up to the previous point. Last night against Colorado, Seattle clearly demonstrated they have no qualms about trying to catch a defender out by playing through the air for Johnson and Neagle to run onto in the corner. Harrington and Jewsbury will have to choose to get into the attack, which may be necessary for them to break Seattle’s defensive 8, or risk getting beat over the top.

Will Seattle’s narrow 3 defensive midfielders neutralize Valeri and Nagbe?

If Porter instructs his outside backs to play deep, that allows Moffat and Evans to stay pinched narrow and eliminate passing angles into Valeri and also clog the space that Nagbe likes to drift in to. Sigi Schmid doesn’t give much defensive responsibility to his forwards, which means Portland will have a bit of a staging area to build their attacks and find their attackers.

If Valeri and Nagbe are denied the ball, Portland’s attack won’t amount to much and they may end up just holding possession in the middle third without any penetration. This would put a lot of onus of collecting the ball on whoever ends up playing the striker for Portland.

Who will play striker for Portland?

This is probably the biggest question from Portland’s side of the ball. They have three very different options to play up top. They have Ryan Johnson, who has subpar finishing, but can try to get in behind Seattle’s outside backs when they venture forward. They have Piquionne who is their best option for hold up play while still being able to match up physically with Hurtado and Traore. They have Valencia who is more technically sound, but still has questionable decision making in a possession-based system. And finally, they have Urruti, who likes to drop into the midfield to collect the ball and distribute from there. 

Urruti may end up being the most dangerous option as Seattle’s center back pairing of Traore and Hurtado have had a lot of trouble this season staying connected when the forwards are dropping in to collect the ball. Traore in particular is willing to step very high to follow the forward and Hurtado (and subsequently Yedlin) often lags to slide over to fill the gap. A prime example of this is Kekutah Mannah’s second goal against Seattle. This leaves a lot of space for someone like Valeri or Nagbe to run into and run onto the ball to be 1v1 with the keeper.

Which coach will get it right?

Sigi has shown himself to be rather un-flexible tactically (I’m sure he’s terrible at yoga too) inside of games during his time in Seattle. Caleb Porter has shown himself to be able to make astute tactical changes, especially at half time. I’ll hazard a guess that Seattle’s new system will thrive early in the game as Evans and Moffat are able to find space between Portland’s fullbacks and wingers. I’ll also hazard a guess that Portland will make adjustments at half time to hold possession for longer spells. Ultimately, Seattle is the home team and has to get the result at home so they will go for it.

Seattle Sounders vs. Real Sealt Lake - 09/06/2013

This is the matchup I always look forward to most in the league. Both teams try to play attacking soccer and neither team is overly physical (except against Morales in this one). It often brings out some high quality games from both teams on both sides of the ball. There’s plenty of talent on both teams and solid role-players to complement their teammates. Unfortunately, Saborio was out and Dempsey and EJ were on the bench after returning from their national-team triumph.

Final score: Seattle 2 - RSL 0

Seattle’s forwards check deep to receive the ball and beat RSL’s pressure

The big story of the first half was Obafemi Martins and Lamar Neagle both checking back into the midfield to receive the ball from Seattle’s defensive third. Beckerman wasn’t able to cut off the angles to both forwards and the center backs for RSL could only hope to keep Seattle’s forwards facing their own goal.

This allowed Seattle to completely bypass half of RSL’s team and put them ahead of the ball on defense with a single pass – not a good thing for a defense. Seattle then sent their wide men streaming forward to exploit the space left by RSL’s wide midfielders would pinch in to pressure the ball. Seattle’s second goal is a perfect example of these points where Seattle’s forwards check back, RSL’s midfielder pinches in, and Seattle exploits the space on the wing.

Morales marked (and mauled) out of the game

From the start of the game, Seattle basically played to force someone other than Morales (and to a lesser extent, Plata) to beat them. Osvaldo Alonso and Andy Rose took it in shifts to always make sure Morales was pressured by two people any time the ball was played to him. Seattle’s holding mids chased him around the field, making sure he didn’t have time to pick out his passes. Even when he would drift wide to the side the ball was on, one, or often both, of Seattle’s defensive midfielders would go with him. That left a huge hole in front of Seattle’s defenders that RSL could have exploited, but failed to send the weak side midfielder or Beckerman high enough into that space to be dangerous.

Seattle basically dared Gil, Grabavoy, and Findley to try to beat their defenders 1v1 as Seattle paid close attention to Plata and Morales. RSL’s wide midfielders aren’t known for their speed or exceptional dribbling skills to take people on, and Seattle’s outside backs were able to not only stop them, but also win the ball and play out from the back for the vast majority of the match.

Seattle finds easy outlets wide

RSL’s diamond midfield tends to play very narrow. That means there is usually some space out wide for their opponent’s midfielders to collect the ball and start attacks. Seattle was able to immediately relieve pressure after winning the ball by finding easy outlets to wide midfielders, in addition to their forwards checking deep to receive the ball as highlighted above. Having two outlets for Seattle was a problem for RSL during the first half. Seattle was able to easily and quickly transition from defense to attack and let Obafemi Martins welcome Carlos Salcedo to the league by losing him on counter-attacks on multiple occasions. 

RSL switch to 4-3-3

Credit to Jason Kreis for recognizing that Seattle’s success on the wings was due in large part to their success in finding the feet of the forwards checking back to collect the ball and cause RSL’s defense to be pulled out of shape. He decided to switch formations to a 4-3-3 to push Grabavoy central and help Beckerman limit the service to Neagle and Martins in between the defensive and midfield lines. Switching from four midfielders to three was Kreis basically saying, “fine, we’ll concede the space to your wide players to make sure we can maintain our shape.” The tactic worked as Seattle was unable to find Neagle and Martins as first options. Seattle were still able to utilize their wide midfielders as outlets, but a player is far less dangerous with the ball out there than where Seattle’s forwards were collecting the ball in the first half. Sure, Seattle’s wide mids were able to find more time on the ball out there following outlets from the defense, but at least RSL was able to transition to defense and get men behind the ball – something they weren’t able to do consistently in the first half.

A side benefit of switching to 4-3-3 was having another man in the attack. This caused Seattle to change two things offensively. The first is the outside backs couldn’t get forward as often or as far. RSL’s outside backs were no longer regularly facing 2v1 or 3v2 situations. The second is Andy Rose wasn’t able to get forward into the attack as often and provide support or a late run into the box on counter attacks.

Conclusion

In the end, Seattle’s defenders were just individually better than RSL’s attackers on the day and prevented RSL from digging themselves out of the hole Seattle dug for them in the first half. Seattle’s movement up top in the first half was the key point to this game and RSL’s formation switch at halftime was too late, as the damage was already done.

Seattle Sounders vs. FC Dallas 08/03/2013

It’s been a while. I’ve been busy developing curriculum for my club and all the things that come with my new position as director of coaching for the summer rec season. But, I’ve found some time this week to look at the tactics of one game: Seattle vs. Dallas.

Seattle’s speed beats Dallas’ too-high line

Dallas didn’t play the highest line that I’ve seen against Seattle, but it was high enough for Seattle’s forwards to get in behind. Given the speed of both Eddie Johnson and Obafemi Martins, you’d think Schellas Hyndman would know not to give Seattle the opportunity to let them try to collect a ball running at pace at goal. There have been several other times a team has played a high line against the Sounders and Seattle has simply demolished it (most notably against Toronto in 2012). Seattle didn’t abuse the high line of Dallas, just used it often enough to mix up the method of attack.

Seattle’s second goal, by Eddie Johnson, was a perfect example of a-step-too-slow Dallas backline getting caught too far up field with their defensive midfielders sitting too deep and essentially right on top of the backline. First, there was a routine turnover and distribution to a central midfielder – nothing unusual at all. What happened from here was two key things. First, Dallas’ midfielders drop off the ball and leave Brad Evans completely in control of the situation. Ferreira does absolutely nothing but lazily jog and Jacobson drops deep when he should step up and force Evans to do something – anything – so he can’t pick his pass. At the time of the turnover, Watson was practically playing as a center-back for some reason unknown to me and was too far away from Evans to apply pressure. 

Second, Eddie Johnson shows Brad Evans which run he’s going to make by positioning his body sideways to signal for a through-ball. EJ’s body positioning as soon as the ball is passed to Evans is something subtle that most people will miss as a key component to the speed of Evans’ decision. Evans’ drops a perfectly weighted ball over the top so EJ could get there and force Fernandez to make a decision to risk coming out or hope to make a save. He chooses to hold on his six (probably the wrong choice as he had a chance to beat EJ to the ball) and EJ slots it home.

Seattle’s fluid movement in attack

The problems for Dallas’ defensive midfield pairing weren’t just on EJ’s goal. The movement of Seattle’s attacking five (at times attacking eight) gave Dallas fits all night. Lamar Neagle and Mauro Rosales both tucked far inside throughout the night, especially when the ball was wide on the other side of the field. Martins and Johnson were both dropping deep at times to collect the ball. Brad Evans and occasionally Osvaldo Alonso were making runs through the middle. All of this resulted in Seattle actually having more players in the area of the field where Dallas’s two holding mids sat and zero Sounders players originally lined up in the 4-4-2 empty-bucket that Seattle plays. The movement between all of those players was absolutely brilliant and the understanding of positioning was surprisingly good considering how few minutes they have all played together.

Not only were Seattle creating and exploiting space through the middle of the field by virtue of players moving out of their lineup position, but they were also creating space on the wings by doing so. This meant both Yedlin and Gonzalez were able to push up into the attack with acres of space ahead of them. This was probably Gonzalez’s most-attacking game and Yedlin’s least-attacking game so far this season. I’m not sure if it was Sigi or Yedlin that recognized it, but Castillo got the better of Yedlin a couple times early. After that, it seemed like Yedlin was more reluctant to get forward than usual. 

Ferreira unable to impact the game

It’s no secret that Dallas’s offense tends to play only as well as Ferreira plays. And Ferraira just didn’t have an impact on this game. Osvaldo Alonso and Brad Evans were able to successfully keep Ferreira under control and deny him the time and space to operate as efficiently as he normally does. In fact, Ferreira’s heat map shows very few touches in the attacking half and in the middle of the field. (For more information about this phenomenon, check out Matt Doyle’s between the lines series about playmakers). The majority of his touches were on the left as the closest thing Dallas found to success was combination between Castillo and Ferreira. Ferreira had 12 unsuccessful passes and was tackled and lost the ball 14 times. Both of those stats are much higher than normal for Ferreira. Seattle effectively broke up Ferreira’s rhythm and didn’t allow Dallas to hold possession. This presented a problem because Dallas’ wingers were forced to play some defense as Seattle’s attack and movement was very positive with the Sounders’ outside backs getting forward often.

Ianni frees up Traore

Admittedly, this one is far more my own opinion than all the other stuff I wrote so far. Patrick Ianni is the best center-back partner for Djimi Traore. Djimi is a bit of a flair defender (is that even a thing outside of Brazil?) and likes to roam a bit outside of the center of the defensive line. Other partners in the past haven’t had the skill-set and positional sense to set Traore free. Hurtado is also a roaming center-back and the two of them together often just found themselves out of position. Scott holds his position a bit more, but he isn’t nearly as good as Ianni at defending while running back toward his own goal. Ianni is good at picking the correct angle of approach and is a solid last-ditch tackler. 

In this particular game with Gonzalez getting forward so often, Traore had to shift left to cover some attacks coming down the left side. Ianni was capable of marking Perez in the middle while still providing proper covering positions for Traore’s forays wide.

Dallas’ half-time sub

Hyndman realized his side was struggling and that something had to change tactically. He decided to take of Watson, who just didn’t know how to work with either the centerbacks or with Jacobson, and bring on Mauro Diaz. Diaz played much further up the field and allowed for Ferreira and Perez to have an additional body to pass to in the attack, something they were sorely missing in the first half. However, this also solidified the defense a bit more as Jacobson now had full responsibility of patrolling the midfield. He couldn’t rely on someone else and just applied the pressure in his area when it needed to be applied (unlike what happened on EJ’s goal). Seattle didn’t mount much threat in the second half, but that is partially attributable to Sigi slowly deciding to drop off a bit and protect the lead.

Conclusion

Seattle’s speed up top is going to punish high defensive lines unless the defense is playing a high-pressure system designed to eliminate time to make good, quick passes forward. Watson and Jacobson simply had no idea how to deal with Seattle’s off-ball movement and will continue to struggle against teams like Portland and RSL with lots of moving parts. Where the heck is Clint Dempsey going to fit into a Seattle attack that seems to finally have an understanding of each other?