re: The pay-for-play debate

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This is false as frick.

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It's not that false. There are guys who are starters in the NFL who didn't start playing football until recently. There's all the basketball tight ends and several defensive ends. Oneyata for the Saints started playing football five years ago. He's solidly in an NFL d-line rotation.

Same with basketball, at least for shot blockers/rebounders. Even some perimeter guys, Giannis didn't start playing basketball until his teens. He might be the best player in the nba in a few years. Olajuwon didn't start playing until he was 17. And these are all-nba type talents, not just serviceable players.

Athleticism is not nearly as much of an equalizer in soccer as it is in other sports, both because of the unnatural skill, doing stuff with your feet, and because in-game intelligence is so important in soccer. In football probably about half the players on the field at any given time can be micro-managed by the coaching staff almost every play, or at least every series. Basketball too, it's not that difficult to tell a guy to go stand by the rim and block shots/rebound. Having in-game intelligence helps a lot, but it's not nearly as important as in soccer