Club of the Year Nominee: Minneapolis City SC

Sometimes we take things for granted. Not because they aren’t important, but because they become such a part of our everyday routine that they blend into the background: your favorite pair of shoes, the pillow that you’ve used enough to fit perfectly to your head, the handle of your front door. The things that just fit. The things that work. They are the things that make life normal when things are great, and make life bearable when things are falling apart. We rely on these things to the point that we ignore their craftsmanship, excellence, and perfection. Why? Because we see it every day, like a security guard standing next to a Van Gogh, it loses its meaning. But every once in a while, maybe we should stop and admire the beauty of that thing we take for granted.

If you open the back of a 19th century watch, you can watch the tiny gears click back and forth, the interlocking switches and pulls, the mechanism that tirelessly pulls the hands around the dial, doing its job without complaint or protest. The machine works not because it was easy to construct, though it might lead an uninformed person to think that. It’s actually the opposite, it takes hours of planning, years of practice, and centuries of accumulated knowledge to construct that tiny watch you hold in your hand. Nothing you hold was done by accident, it took trial and error to eliminate any needless movement that might throw things out of balance. Without previous models you couldn’t hold a piece of functional perfection. And of course it’s easy to take it all for granted, because the past fades in memory till we forget it ever was different than it is now. But there was once a time when people looked into the sky and tried to guess how much daylight was left.

The reality is that great clubs require a tremendous amount of effort to exist and then, to overcome the real hurdle, keep existing. We can take it for granted, but the heavy lifting must continue under the surface for the club to maintain their social media, to compete this season, and to be back next season. That effort should be recognized and no club embodies this effort more than Minneapolis City SC.

The list of accomplishments for MPLS City this year is ridiculous: opened a physical club shop, revealed some of the hottest kits in grassroots soccer, clinched their second straight conference title, won a playoff match, had street artists Kamp Seedorf (Amsterdam) create team murals (and a slick one of Prince, as well) all over the city, announced the creation of UPSL side to foster the development of their youth players, maintained one of the best social media presences in the game, released complete financials to allow clubs to mirror their success, this list is insane. But when I asked Dan Hoedeman, club co-founder, what he was most proud of this year, this was his response:

“I take the most pride in the response when Isaac "Goose" Friendt was injured playing in a game for DePaul University this fall and then, due to complications with his surgery, he almost lost his leg. It is terrible what happened. But when we found out, we rallied (with the soccer community across the country) to help raise money for his family. He's been involved with the club in a staff role. The players, volunteers, and everyone closed ranks--as they should have. And he is fighting every day, re-learning to walk, getting mobility in his leg again. He was a fantastic player. Probably our first fan favorite. I'm proud that he's a Crow and hope that if I ever face the adversity that he has and is facing that I will respond the same way, with his strength--and that I will have people around me who close ranks around me the same way, too.” That is the sort of person Dan is and it’s the kind of thing that makes MPLS City such a great club. The fundraiser is still ongoing.

The ties between the club and the city are so strong because of a particular and unique approach taken in staffing the team. “We set out to start a community soccer club. As former players, we saw the soccer scene from that perspective and we saw a huge issue facing American, and especially Minnesotan, players (because of no Division 1 soccer program here, for example): very limited chances as you got older to play in a high-performance environment. Creating a high-performance environment for local kids is something we set out to do. So if, like NAIA and NCAA (and other top NPSL and USL2) teams are now doing, we instead brought in a bunch of academy rejects from Europe and South America then we wouldn't be fulfilling our mission. Potential wins aren't worth abandoning the chance to do something meaningful. Personally, I am completely baffled by the idea of a community team that doesn't include its own community.” In true Dan fashion, he offered a caveat, to be sure no one misunderstood. “In this politically charged climate, I like to make explicit that by "local kid" we merely mean someone who is here in Minnesota without us recruiting them here (and housing or otherwise financially supporting them being here). Doesn't matter when, how, or why you got here as long as the why isn't ‘just to play for Mpls City.’ We love when people move here--half of our founding group are transplants--and we want to be suitably open while also serving the community.”

I won’t lie, when I read the way Dan talks about his club, I think they deserve your vote. There’s something to be said for a club that focuses on taking care of its own community, that strives to embrace the changes of the world without compromising its beliefs, that never takes its attention from the players it develops. That’s the approach MPLS City has taken and whether you take them for granted or not, they will be there next season because of all the moving parts, pulling together to complete the task at hand.

“I think the fact that we have a mission beyond wins and losses matters. We are here to do something good--for local players and to help the community. That is where the value really is. So when I see a former player launch his post-soccer career and know it was helped by the network he got from Mpls City and know that someone in the club was a reference, an example I use because it just happened, that is really meaningful to me and to the volunteer crew. Nobody is in this for the money. Nobody makes any money, we're all-volunteer. We do it for the mission and that keep us going.’

‘Also, and this matters too, we're super ridiculous and it's a lot of fun. It has to be fun.” 

Vote for MPLS City because we shouldn’t ignore something just because it works like clockwork. 

- Dan Vaughn

“Sustainability and Responsible Growth”

The Midwest Premier League is gaining traction as more and more relatively big name lower league clubs are announced as members. The league is a member-ran league looking to give teams a solid regional option. I had the chance to talk to Cliff Conrad, who was recently voted as the first President of the league.

The primary goal of the league, according to Conrad, is "to be a cooperating association of like-minded clubs who want to excel on and off the field, with a focus on sustainability and responsible growth.”

At the time of writing this, three teams have been announced: Union Dubuque FC, RWB Adria, and DeKalb County United [this morning Cedar Rapids Inferno was announced as the fourth club to join the MPL]. Conrad says that these three teams have been apart of discussions the whole time and emphasizes that the Midwest Premier League “will remain to be a league that does not ‘recruit' or ‘poach’ from other leagues” and will “only communicate with teams who want to be a part of what we're doing.”

This is a breath of fresh air, especially with some of the rumors of an upcoming “Soccer Warz” starting amongst the lower leagues once again. It is so refreshing to hear a league official say that they “have no intentions to start probing other teams who are happy with their league if they're interested in moving.”

The league was founded by clubs frustrated with how things were going in their current league. “We (the clubs) weren't entirely happy with where we were league-wise,” says Conrad, “Decisions being made without the input of the clubs that would have a drastic impact on how we were to operate created some disillusionment, which led to conversations about doing our own thing. Now that we're actually doing it, we've opened it up to other teams to join.”

Discussions started between “10-12 teams.” Once it got to the point of making commitments, a handful of clubs decided to wait and see what happened, while the three mentioned above have led the way in committing to the new league. “Here still exists this sort of catch-22, where some clubs won't commit until everyone else has,” says Conrad.

A big factor for these teams returning to a regional league after playing in a national league is costs. “The hope is that we can offer support and control similar to how the NPSL does, but at a much more affordable cost, closer to what the UPSL costs for clubs,” says Conrad, “Also, our hope is that through sponsorship and limiting league expenses, we'll be able to engage in some kind of revenue-sharing with our member clubs.” Conrad also pointed to the fact that “often the decisions that make the most sense for other areas of the country don't make sense in others,” specifically the way the calendar works with soccer seasons. In the Midwest, July is one of the best months of the year weather-wise. However, with the UPSL schedule, the regular season had to be finished by June. This doesn’t make a whole lot of sense.

“Another big advantage is the ability to work closely together as clubs,” says Conrad, “We’re aiming for 16 teams in year one, and the 16 of us will form a tight group who want to work together and help each other out. None of us succeed at the expense of another club, so there's no reason we shouldn't be willing to help each other out with ideas, planning, etc.” The league also has no direct affiliation with the Gulf Coast Premier League, who also runs the Great Plains Premier League.

“We aren't affiliated with them in the way that the GPPL is,” says Conrad, “It would be great to work together, but I don't think our vision or theirs includes any kind of crossover or merging into another national league. We've all decided that regional play is good enough, and I hope to see more regional leagues popping up to fill in the gaps where the national leagues aren't strong yet.”

All in all, the Midwest Premier League looks to be a great option for teams in Illinois, Indiana, Iowa, Michigan, Ohio, Wisconsin, and the surrounding area. They have the support of a national league with the affordability of being in a regional league, which will be huge for some of the clubs in that area. The league will kick off in Spring of 2020 adding to an array of new and current leagues to keep an eye on.

- Aarik Long

Hey UPSL, Ban Back to Backs

Sometimes when I write an article, I’m picking up thoughts and ideas from the twitter universe and knocking it into something that functions as an article. Sometimes, I draw from current events, maybe a big news story, something that if we ignored, we’d lose readers. But there’s another route to inspiration that is much closer to home. Sometimes, while sitting in the bleachers on some high school field, watching a club I either love or am interested in, I am struck with an idea that bounces around for a while until eventually I have to sit down and knock it out.

Notice most of the FCG fans move away from the strange group of men at this end.

I’m a big fan and outspoken supporter of the Las Cruces New Mexico’s UPSL club, FC Grande. While I live in El Paso, I fell in love with the tiny club that formed two years ago in the small town about 45 minutes across the border into New Mexico. I made friends with the owner as he went through the process of planning and developing his idea. I’m proud to say I was at the first tryouts for the club and watched 60 young men on a dusty Las Cruces field push themselves for the chance to play for an amateur soccer side.

The first season I was at every match with a small band of supporters. We popped smoke, waved flags, yelled a lot. It was beautiful. We were drawing close to 250 fans a night that season. The local community was supporting the team and the team played well. We ended the season losing in the conference final to the juggernaut that is Sporting AZ FC, but the future seemed bright.

This season, we kicked off with a roster that added a lot of fresh talent and a new coach to lead the team. Everything felt positive. The schedule was delayed by the addition/exit of some clubs, but eventually things came together and we got the list of match dates. And here’s the rub.

While our conference is spread out, thanks to the inclusion of two clubs in Phoenix (a six-hour drive from Las Cruces) most of the clubs are clustered around the El Paso/Las Cruces area. So why our schedule included so many back to back matches, I do not understand. When I say back to back, I literally mean, one day to the next. FC Grande played matches (within two days) on 5/4 and 5/5, 5/17 and 5/19, 5/25 and 5/26, 6/14 and 6/15. That’s three times that they played matches on back to back days, sometimes with less than 18 hours between the matches. I understand that there is always logic behind the creation of schedule, but this logic is flawed as hell.

FC Grande in action against Southwest FC last weekend.

I think it’s safe to assume that scheduling comes down to several factors: 1. Field availability 2. Travel cost 3. Club coordination. There could be more, of course, but I’m applying a common sense approach to this. With a six hour drive between Las Cruces and Phoenix, I can understand the desire to schedule the matches in bunches to save money. But how does that explain the matches between Southwest FC and Las Cruces, which account for one of those long weekends?

I asked Matt Kahla, National Director of the UPSL, about how UPSL schedules are created. “The league sits down and talks with conference managers and the scheduling committee and from there we work backwards for National Champion, down to Semis, divisional playoffs, regular season.” With the delay of a club dropping out just before the release of the schedule, I can understand how the deadline of the National Playoffs could squeeze the conference calendar, but beyond that deadline, the league passes most of the responsibility to the conference itself. “The guidelines are pretty basic, teams are required to figure out their home dates and then the conference manager takes charge.” And the results aren’t always pretty, as this season proves.

While I listed some obvious factors in schedule making earlier, let’s add the UPSL’s playoff schedule as a fourth factor. Before I go on, I want to say those are all legitimate things to take into account. Budgets at this level are basically nil, so a trip to Phoenix with 20 people, hotels, food, gas, that’s a lot of money to spend. But there are other factors to consider as well.

1. Player Safety - While clubs can carry two squads, the more likely scenario is twenty players, with a decided drop off in the last five. Playing back to back matches for any player is a tough load and players without adequate rest are more injury prone. The UPSL is a training league, a chance for players to improve and move up, getting a serious injury could set them back a year or, in extreme situations, end a career. The cost to that player outweighs any financial savings for the clubs.

2. Fan Interest - I’m aware there are clubs that do not seem to care that no one is in their stands. I’ve been to some away matches where twenty people showed up and the team seemed to have accepted this as normal. However, if you’re trying to build a club with connections to the community, that is a destination for fans on a Saturday night, that becomes a fun place for families to attend, you CANNOT schedule back to back matches. People won’t sacrifice a weekend for a soccer team, particularly not families with children. FC Grande attendance has dropped by half because people won’t do two nights in a row - and why should they?

3. Player Performance - Tired players don’t play as well - they make mistakes, they make clumsy tackles, they lose their balance. It’s simply not fun for a player recovering from the night before to have to lace up and go back to the field the next night. These are amateurs and the league, its clubs, and its conference managers should be prioritizing their development.

The author, pissing off some poor kid on the field.

For the record, Matt did say that league officials “hate when we have back to backs.” So here’s a solution, ban them. Make a mandatory 48 hours break between matches, with a caveat for weather or natural disaster. Let’s do what’s right for the players, the fans, and the level of play. Let’s continue to make a league that focuses on the well being of all involved and not only focuses on the bottom line.

And one other idea that was pitched to me by Joshua Duder when he read the piece. Why don’t the bigger national leagues, the UPSL and NPSL, attempt to negotiate discounts with hotel chains? Having a discount for your member clubs would be a massive win for traveling matches. For the hotel chains, there would be guaranteed room rentals, though discounted, and for the clubs it would allow them more flexibility around scheduling and make the costs of travel more reasonable.

I’m a fan, this is what I think.