The Mixed Zone with Dave Simeone: Recent Episodes
Dave Simeone
The world of soccer and sport has never been more complex whether at the youth, intercollegiate, professional or international levels. So are the interests, relationships and stories.
The Mixed Zone was created by career long soccer coach and educator Dave Simeone to examine current issues surrounding the sport and create perspective.
The climate in intercollegiate athletics has changed from embracing challenges to excel to opting out and taking a break. Coaches are working in an environment where administrators have set the barometer without ever having competed or ever having coached or managed athletes and programming. Coaches who travel this road find it tenuous.
The NCAA along with state and federal legislatures are closer and closer becoming one in the same bureaucracy. The presidents of colleges and universities, along with their athletics directors, are not looking far enough down the road to understand that they are just a couple of steps away from being nationalized. The influence of revenue and growing that base of resources through intercollegiate athletics is the root of the problem. Once upon a time college athletics, although it had to be built on a business model also, was predicated on values, but that's changed. What were once vices are now habits...
The investment in players by clubs is costing millions of dollars with the expectation of generating millions in profits. Similar expectations are being created by confederations, national sport governing bodies, and FIFA. As a result, we are seeing more wear and tear on the sport and the players as profit replaces the sporting essence.
Within MLS a view of the effectiveness and contributions of foreign and domestic coaches. What do the numbers say and why do we keep going back to the well for all the wrong reasons?
The alliance formed between these three entities creates a national soccer conglomerate where the various interests cross over and collide.
The new definition of college sports for the fall of 2020 framed by the demands of college athletes, the vacuum of leadership from administrators and how the values in intercollegiate sport have shifted.
A focus on interpersonal interaction, values, who we are and what has influenced each of us.
Examining the various aspects of the NCAA transfer portal and how it impacts and reflects a shift in values. How the roles of coaches, athletic directors and university presidents all are part of the landscape where more and more athletes are driving the bus.
Coming out of the recent shutdown and our attachment to sport, the major part it plays in our daily life and what we take from it.
Episode 1, more to come.