It Began Following the YNT
First and foremost – thanks! This week we passed, blew passed 10,000 unique site visitors to Chasingacup.com. It has been fun to watch the journey of Chasing a Cup fans and the US fan base collective grow and interest in YNT players flourish in spite of major organizational challenges and missing a World Cup.
I started Chasing a Cup a little over three years ago. I was growing tired of putting “young USMNT” into the Google search engine and seeing the same annual 2-3 articles pop up just before or after US games.
There was a surge of young exciting players DeAndre Yedlin, Julian Green, Lynden Gooch, Christian Pulisic and behind them a wealth of prospects including Ethan Horvath, Perry Kitchen and CCV. A handful of friends who were interested in US Soccer YNT and always asking me who was coming? This included a friend from college who is a scout and trains young up and coming professionals, my work manager and some friends and family.
I launched the site and began writing looking forward to the day the site might hit 100 unique visitors and I remember the first time someone I didn’t know liked my Chasing a Cup Facebook page. Well things have escalated.
The Crew
I’ve had a blast and met some great people along the way especially once I discovered Soccer Twitter! Here are some highlights:
Underdog Soccer Podcast has of course been fantastic and fun this past year. Thanks to Matty Knips (@underdogsp) & Chris Kerr (@kerrc17) and highlighted with interviews of David Ochoa & Christian Cappis. Some more special guests coming VERY soon!
#USSoccerChat launching this year has been a blast. I want to give a special thanks to AO St Pete (@aostpete) for their ongoing support here.
The crown series of late – David Kerr (@dkerr0118) series on the ’01-’05 Group
Bob Morocco (@bob_morocco) did a great piece on YNT Prospects & Understanding their Potential
Patrick Keeler (@pkeeler167) produced a very underrated piece on Germany’s impact on Youth Development
Some other fun pieces
John Roche (a.k.a. Grunt – retired from Twitter) has contributed many, but named 5 Players who needed to hit in 2020.
Scott Jorek (@Burgermeister73) My Great Soccer Awakening.
Tom DiRiggi (@BalltruisticVue) How the Climate Needs to Change on Player evaluation.
Jeff Harman (@Gifted__20) predicts the 2022 World Cup Roster
& here’s where it all began with an appropriate titled article Youth Movement and my second article on a guy named Pulisic.
Thank you
I was going through some memories as I hit 10,000 unique visitors and blew past it this week. When I launched this site, I wasn’t sure there were 10,000 USMNT fans that cared about the next generation of YNT players. Certainly there weren’t 10,000 who would find Chasingacup.com.
Now YNT players and their families are sending thank you notes, agents and MLS academies are reaching out, fans and pundits are getting into the fun. So thank you for coming and spreading the world.
Really just posting thanking each of you for reading and contributing to Chasingacup, #USSoccerChat & Underdog Soccer Podcast.
Here’s to 100,000!
