Messi and Busquets in Miami

I will admit that I was surprised at the obvious difference in level of play they bought to the field.

The quality of their touch was much higher than those around them.

The margin of error on where they played the ball felt like it was about 10x tighter than the other players. That means, when they passed — either to space or feet — there was close to 100% chance their intended target was going to get the ball. With the other players on the field, good passes were more like 90% chances of completion and average passes were 60-80%, often with a little moment where it looked closer to 50/50 — where the intended receiver had to fight a little bit to make sure to get the ball.

Of course, everyone will focus on Messi’s goal. It was good. Critics may say he drew contact and made the most out of a soft foul, but the finish was still good.

Maybe seeing it can convince more Americans that there is more to soccer than the 50/50 hustle ball that we like to play.

I happened to be in San Diego when the USMNT played Panama can the Gold Cup, so I went and this is what I saw

I’m aware it was our “C-team.”

I haven’t been around soccer all that long, maybe 12 years. I don’t know much. But here’s a few things that were obvious to me…and yet I don’t hear them mentioned.

The play seemed rushed, unorganized and sloppy.

Our 1st touch stunk. It too often resulted in turnovers or 50/50 battles. I wondered why players at the national team level, even C-teamers, had such trouble settling the ball.

Two exceptions that I noticed were Busio and Mihailovic. Watch how cleanly they can play the ball and how much more opportunity that generates for the team.

Our passing stunk, where Busio stood out as an exception.

To me, trapping and passing are like catching and throwing in baseball. It’s a basic fundamental that all players need to have.

In the U.S. we seem to treat those fundamentals as something we are okay with 2-4 players having and they are optional for other positions. Not that those players can’t do those things. I’m sure against me they would be great. But, they need to be able to do those against players at that level.

I see the same for soccer teams at all levels, from U8, high school, MLS teams and even our national A team. We just don’t seem all that bothered by the unnecessary turnovers that causes and maybe we think that’s game — constant turnover, chasing and battling for the ball. That seems like a lot of action and that’s why we favor hard working hustlers.

I didn’t feel like the the players were playing in a cohesive system, which is also something players in the U.S. struggle with. We tend to play systems that suit the players, because we pick low dimensional players for most of the positions.

If we picked more dimensional players — players that can trap and pass on level in addition to serve their positional roles well — then we would have teams that could play multiple systems and adjust systems on the fly to respond to how the other team is playing, like how an NFL team might switch to the run for a bit if the other team is doing a good job of covering the pass.

I laughed when I was heading away from the game and heard Busio was the lowest rated player. Not sure what those ratings are based on. Sure, he had a detrimental turnover.

But, many other times he unlocked scoring opportunities that he didn’t get credit for because they came 4-5 passes later and did not score because our touch and creativity in the final third isn’t where it should be, either, so those just fizzled out.

But, he enabled them by playing the ball to the most open player that had the most open field to play through to advance the ball, by dribbling and passing.

If we had better players for that final third, 2-3 more goals could have been scored by the U.S. in that game and they could have won it comfortably in regular time, instead of losing in penalties.

‘Why would anyone who invested $300 million in a MLS team want to risk it agreeing to possibly being relegated?”

This is common retort of anti-pro/rel crowd.

Here’s my answer:

Because I think there a chance that by agreeing to pro/rel the value of the top division teams goes up by 10x much sooner than the will under the current system and that 2nd division teams will be at least as valuable as MLS team are today.

Now, I could be wrong. But, I’m not just guessing. I’m using what I see in other nations that use pro/rel as a guide calibrated on a per capita basis.

Anti-pro/rel’ers will say, “those teams are that valuable there because soccer is the most popular sport” as if pro/rel had nothing at all to do with soccer becoming the #1 sport.”

As a business person that have likely taken a few good risks in my life to become wealthy enough to buy an MLS team (poor people can’t buy them), that seems like a decent risk to take.

Bicycle Links

‘Shifting gears’ a bit, to post some bike links I want to be able to remember…

Oversubscribed

The subscription model has been the the shiny business object for some time.

Companies love it because canceling is more of a pain for the customer than it’s worth, so good portions of customers keep paying even if the company fails to deliver value.

But, I’m over it. It takes a lot for me to sign up for a new subscription because I feel I have enough and I know I will fall into the trap of continuing to pay even when I’m not using it.

Streaming services, for example, that try to entice me to sign up with one or two shows is a hard no. I can do without those one or two shows. I have plenty of things to fill my time.

It makes me wonder if there are others like me.

If so, it might be a good time for some of these streaming services to try selling shows again for a one-time fee and see what happens.

Also, at one point will a streaming consolidator come along allowing you to watch content from across multiple platforms?

Marketing rule: Avoid making your customers feel that you don’t have your S together

In the last week, I got an offer for a free trial subscription from a company because I bought a product from it.

I was already a subscriber.

I received an email from another company explaining how I could do my account stuff better on their app.

I already use the app and have used it for the thing it suggested.

These created confusing experiences and gave me some anxiety. In each case I took time from my busy day to double check to make sure I hadn’t screwed something up.

I shouldn’t have to. It makes me think those companies don’t have their stuff together as much as I thought.

In the first case, it would have been nice if the company recognized that I was a subscriber, thanked me for being a customer and gave me three months credit on the subscription without having to ask.

In the second case, the company could have thanked me for already using the app and given me some helpful tips.

Those interactions would have affirmed that those companies are on top of their various databases and doing smart stuff with them, rather than make me think they are using cut rate rookies.

I cringe when I hear smart folks say we just need to do what the studies tell us

The same types of studies that continuously contradict each other on what’s good and bad for us to eat or what exercise is best for us, or that we find out a few later that critical errors were made and the results were not correct, or we find out the results can not be replicated, or studies that just seem to go against our own experience of what works and what doesn’t?

Most people can learn more from a stand up comedy routine than from studies, because good comedians keenly observe and relay what is going on in the real world.

What goes on in the real world is more credible than a study.

I don’t think studies are worthless. I think they can help guide us where to look. But they shouldn’t stop with the result.

We should try to bridge what was observed in the study to what we see in the real world.

I worked for a company that changed something in a few randomly selected stores and saw a lift in sales in those stores, so they rolled it out to all stores. At first, they saw the lift in sales repeat, but then it went away.

What happened?

They used the ‘gold standard’ RCT (randomized control trial) to see if the change they made worked and assumed the results of that study were a valid predictor of what would happen if rolled out.

But, they never tried to explain why there was a sales lift in the studied stores to begin with. They never tried to bridge the results to the real world. They assumed the increased sales came out of thin air.

They didn’t. The sales came from other nearby stores.

It turns out shoppers frequent a few stores over the course of a normal week and they tend to buy stuff where they are at if the store has it. When one store has more of what they want, they buy more there. We all do.

We also tend to only need so much of any given thing, so if we buy more in one store, we tend to buy less in another. I can only eat so many apples a week. If I buy one more apple in Store A, then I will likely buy one less apple in Store B.

When all of the stores had more of what shoppers wanted, the advantage observed in the study disappeared.

Whoops.