I think you are missing the point. I don’t care if every chosen player is from Del Mar or La Jolla or wherever. And most of the players in the A team and B team that were chosen absolutely deserve to be there. But if I look at it objectively from all the players that were chosen in the A team and B team and those who were not chosen you are not going to convince me that it is purely based on the most talented players. You can disagree and that is fine. Like I said it is all good. I am ready to move on.
Cod
Many people have shared your frustration over the years. The system is not perfect and there are errors made every year. Transparency is minimal.
However, it is all we have and they might have misses at the Zone level, the NTSC selections usually are harder to argue with.
Our kid was late to the ODP process and had mixed results in the beginning, but eventually found her groove and was able to make it on the national team at the Cadet and Youth level. So I would encourage the ODP newbs to not get discouraged.
Coming in for the first time as a second year Development player, you could tell that the kids who had done this successfully the previous year had an advantage due to their own self confidence and familiarity with the other kids who were returning. The coaches were also now familiar with these players. The result that first year was not ideal and we ended up skipping a year before coming back in. Looking back, I wish we hadn’t.
Below are some things we learned and share with friends who are new or considering ODP:
- Get in as early as you can and stick with it.
- ODP coaches are usually club coaches as well, so they will naturally have a larger representation of players from their club. These kids will also be inclined to pass to their friends in scrimmages, so there is an inherent disadvantage for the kids who aren’t coming from big clubs. The coaches know this and that’s why they will try to keep the field even. To our surprise, we had a very positive experience with a zone coach who came from a rival club.
- Coaches don’t get to see what every player is doing. So their perspective on a player they are not familiar with will be different from the parent who is locked in on their own kid the whole time. That’s why they encourage you to attend all evaluation camps.
- Making the “B” team is not the worse thing to happen. It means your kid gets a chance to step up and show what they can do at National Champs. We see kids on the “B” team get invited to NTSC all the time.
Another question here: what are the rules and protocol for trying out at a less competitive zone than where you live?
Joe,
Why would one do it?
Afaik, if a kid lives within Zone A but plays club for a team in Zone B, they can probably try out for either zone - just check with the coaches if it OK. But I have no idea what is the point of trying out for Zone B if a kid lives and plays club in Zone A.
Also, why a “less competitive” zone would be interested in such a kid? If they do not have enough players for a Zone team, they can always ask for alternates from “more competitive” zones, right?
Example pac zone super competitive central, PNW not so much a likelihood of making a team. Some that did not make pac made it for other zones.
I don’t think there is a rule that states you can’t. In fact, we know of a goalie in SPA that didn’t make a team and ended up getting rostered with another zone team up north.
Again, if a kid is not even an alternate for a “more competetive” zone what is a benefit for a “less competetive zone” or USA Water Polo in general to have them? A “less competitive zone” would be much more interested to develop their own players, and, in case they need extra players, could just invite alternates from “more competetive” zones. Also, at least on the girls side, CEN Red and PSW Red would beat PAC Blue. Chances are, if a kid is not even an alternate from PAC, at this stage, they are far away from a path to Olympic glory…
In the example I gave above, SPA had too many goalies whereas the other zone did not have enough. So the benefit is that the less competitive zone gets help at a needed position, which lifts the overall experience of the players in that zone, which keeps more kids engaged in the sport.
USAWP benefits because it’s another goalie for them to develop, who may not have hit his/her full potential yet.
Sure, but that SOPAC goalie went to SOPAC camps, showed some potential, and, when another zone needed a goalie, got invited. It is probably very different from, say a SOPAC player just randomly showing up at a GLZ camp, just because it is easier to get to ODP championship from GLZ. Of course, if a smaller zone does not have enough goalies, they will gladly have a kid as a goalie. But if they have at least 2 goalies already, why would they be interested?
Agree. But I was asking more in the instance of decent players not making their zone just wanting to play odp, traveling to other zones and actually qualifying. Saw this happen. Similar to goalie example
Exactly is this allowed? Precedent for a slippery slope….
The two threads here (“how the heck do kids get selected” and “can I arb the rules and commute to another zone”) both illustrate that more structure from USAWP would help:
For “how kids get selected” - the original ODP manual was very explicit that criteria were long term potential in the sport. Key word “Olympic”. But it turns out zone coaches have different incentives eg their clubs, and winning ODP natl champs games now.
Fix - USAWP could give zone coaches explicit guidance on the number of players per club, per birth year, per position, etc. A zone coach can deviate but that requires a burden of proof. USAWP could also standardize objective measures eg 100y FR from the wall no flip turns at EVERY camp, or better yet 68 challenge. (While on the topic, can we please correctly learn the Outliers lesson and stop loading up with 50% Q1 birthdays and 10% Q4 birthdays? Yes it will cost us some U16 placements but eventually build better senior national rosters)
For the “commute out of zone” - club and home address should determine zone, aside from USAWP invite elsewhere for sparse zones, or exceptional circumstances eg relocation
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appreciate all the posts here as it does seem like there is not much information out there regarding ODP process/selection. question to @NLM and everyone else, are they really loading up the teams with 50% Q1 birthdays? seems wild if true…
It is possible to make any zones’ team. Silly, but true. I think a goalie reason to commute and a field player situation would be totally different based on the numbers and needs involved. Moving on to NTSC from a weak zone is unlikely and I doubt they would reward the transplant.
Some kids are selected based on current abilities and some on potential. That alone will mystify people indefinitely as to why one kid made it and another did not. This also allows for a 13 year old to be put on cadet team when he/she can’t currently compete at that level. They were one of the best 12us in the country. Yeah, but this is 16U.
Good question for those here who have that level of detail. I think that was just rhetorical based on the book Outliers.
I believe there was only one December birthday athlete of the 42 Development boys invited to the eval camp from the PSW.
I know a number of athletes that got cut from Development and Cadet, and then made the Youth Team in high school. I always tell athletes at camps–it’s not where you start out, it’s where you finish. Adversity is a good thing–especially for this generation.
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I’ve only seen birthdays distributed publicly twice, both likely errors. But when they leak it’s fun to run the numbers.
2025 PSW Zone Teams (A+B) Quarter of Birth
Development
Q1 52%
Q2 22%
Q3 11%
Q4 15%
(1 December out of 28)
Cadet
Q1 32%
Q2 14%
Q3 46%
Q4 7%
(0 December out of 28)
Development+Cadet pooled
Q1 42%
Q2 18%
Q3 29%
Q4 11%
Hopefully USAWP is running these types of analyses for their entire dataset - but I saw a very similar pattern 5+ years ago in a different zone on the girls side. The bias is hard to address without instituting quotas for the aforementioned reasons regarding zone coach incentives to produce the best short-run zone teams.
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Wherever the age cutoff is placed, there are always kids advantaged or disadvantaged by that date. The advantage is real as a January birthday kid is 11 months older than a December kid. That is 11 months of growth, experience, etc.
You can’t fault the ODP coaches for their selections of older, bigger, stronger kids.
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