Ok, it is a little early, seeing as the current cycle is not yet over. However, we, as a group need to start working together more to return the National Team to dominance. To that end a number of online editable documents have been created.

I ask that the USA managers that are active on the forums spread the word to other managers and ask them to get involved. The online documents will allow us to better coordinate our efforts and help the National Team Manager do their job. No one person can really do it all, so everyone is asked to pitch in.

Lastly, I ask that everyone take this effort semi-seriously. Yes, this is a game, but we are going to have to have some teamwork to be the best we can be in the World Cup.

The documents are available at the following link:
https://drive.google.com/#folders/0B5TahhcNWoaOSXgzLS1oclFwTlk

Respectfully, mm2ss.

P.S. If we can get a decent response, I will ask for this thread to be pinned so that the link is readily available. Also, I will send the link to everyone in III.5 today, and I will foward them to everyone in my division II league once the season rolls over.

Many many thanks joeblocho44. That is the kind of initiative that will allow the US team to regain its' rightful place atop the winners podium!

joeblocho44 wrote: mm2ss wrote: Many many thanks joeblocho44. That is the kind of initiative that will allow the US team to regain its' rightful place atop the winners podium! This is really an excellent idea, having a shared document that everyone can access and update, as oppose to leaving it just up to the coach to keep track of everything.

I think this is a good idea, but I also think that we should have some group discussions to set the position by position minimums. Also, with everyone having access to add players, this criteria by position will be even more important to get established. It may be simple now, but when hundreds of players are added, then we need some kind of review to eliminate those that are not meeting the min standards. Personally, I think the min stds are too low right now. We want the best of the best and beyond that, we want teams with US players to know what the standards are they need to build to for consideration.

Another point is once we have min stds agreed on, we need to lock that so it is not edited by whoever wants to. Some things to discuss for sure, but it's a great start

PHI 21 wrote: Gatr22 wrote: joeblocho44 wrote: mm2ss wrote: Many many thanks joeblocho44. That is the kind of initiative that will allow the US team to regain its' rightful place atop the winners podium! This is really an excellent idea, having a shared document that everyone can access and update, as oppose to leaving it just up to the coach to keep track of everything. I think this is a good idea, but I also think that we should have some group discussions to set the position by position minimums. Also, with everyone having access to add players, this criteria by position will be even more important to get established. It may be simple now, but when hundreds of players are added, then we need some kind of review to eliminate those that are not meeting the min standards. Personally, I think the min stds are too low right now. We want the best of the best and beyond that, we want teams with US players to know what the standards are they need to build to for consideration. Another point is once we have min stds agreed on, we need to lock that so it is not edited by whoever wants to. Some things to discuss for sure, but it's a great start The only thing I would worry about with this is that at some point, we may have a dearth of players for certain positions that don't meet standards, particularly if we set them too high. I've not messed with googledocs much, but I know excel pretty well. If googledocs does work like excel, it shouldn't be too hard for the NT manager to sort the players to bring the best to the top for easier viewing. I just think it's better to have too much to choose from when there's an easy way to sort through it, than risk not having enough to choose from. Of course, if googledocs doesn't allow sorting, then ignore this.

Google docs is 100% the way to go. Initially, it's a good idea to keep the doc open to anyone to edit as they'd like. But, of course, at some point, we're going to have to throw up some restrictions and limit who can see the doc, I suppose. But, y'know, there's nothing that says we have to.

I know making our NT prospect stats public has been a controversial topic in the past, but I personally don't see a problem. But, I guess, if enough people complain about their player's stats being public, we'd have to make some adjustments.

Gatr22 wrote: Issue 1: Sure you can sort, by a skill, but picture 200, 300, maybe over 500 players at some point and a myriad of different positions they are bpos'd for, what good will sorting be? Anyway, the standing manager can use as he/she likes. Issue 2: With any one being able to access, what stops someone from coming in and deleting a bunch of stuff or adding bogus entries, changing the min requirements or any other editing that can be done by anyone? I'm not sure the answer to this, unless you set the docs up for approved access only. Issue 3: Doesn't matter to me, but I'm sure there are managers out there that don't want the entire game to have access to their player development numbers, skill numbers, etc. Issue 4: I've reviewed the min standards and I don't think they are adequate for what the WC level demands. Perhaps I don't know what I'm talking about, but I've been here for some time and spent the last 4 seasons in the TD, so possibly I do. I'll leave that open for discussion. I'd be happy to have a skype chat or something along those lines with whoever is interested in participating to establish these stds and then lock that section, if possible. With all that said, my knowledge of google docs is limited, but I do have extensive excel experience, so it won't take me long to understand the ins and outs. Let's keep the discussions moving forward. I do think this is great for the US WC going forward

Issue 1) I am hopeful (naive?) that the prospects that get listed would meet the agreed upon standards. Secondly, so long as folks use standard tags on the positions, you can sort by position, a particular stat, etc.

Issue 2) Valid point, currently I am counting on people being honest and lazy. Honest folks wont be adding in bogus entries or deleting entries. Then, considering it appears that most people do not use the forums, I am counting on people being too lazy to go to the work of looking up the link in the forums and then going to sabotage the documents. We can however always remove the link in the forums and then simply pass it on to people that are considered trustworthy.

Issue 3) Valid point, and it does remain voluntary. A manager that does not wish to publicly post stats could as an alternative post the player name and ID number so the national team manager could scout the player and determine if the player would work. To safeguard the information the manager could then just ask that the stats not be published in the documents.

Issue 4) The currently listed numbers are just placeholders really. I was advised that the minimum would by 15 in key skills, so I started with that, then for the BPOS/Talent entries I used Spilling the Beans and bumped everything up by half a star. I am hopeful that a more experienced manager will edit and fine tune the standards.

I have skype and team speak, so if a channel is implemented, I'll be willing to join in.