"All" or Nothing

It's not too early to be thinking about the 2011 Superdraft. Last night, the Vancouver Whitecaps won a coin toss at the all star game between the two expansion teams, which means that they'll get to decide whether they want the first pick in the Superdraft or the expansion draft (or one of several other league mechanisms, like discovery ranking).

I was recently looking at some of the all-conference teams via Bigsoccer, where there are several threads with all of the year's conference awards in one place. I thought it would be an interesting exercise to look at the previous drafts to see how many of the players drafted made an all-conference team (regardless of whether or not it was the 1st team; all-freshman teams don't count) the season directly before the draft.

Looking at the past three Superdrafts, it turns out that it's really important:

	Eligible	All Conf.	PCT
2010	60	53	88.3%
2009	55	50	90.9%
2008	49	42	85.7%
Total	164	145	88.41%

Some players weren't counted due to being GA signings, and I also didn't include any below division one or independents for which an all-conference selection was impossible. Only 19 out of 164 eligible players failed to make an all-conference team right before they were drafted.

In addition, when you look back at previous years to see if those 19 players had ever made an all-conference team, it turns out that 9 of them had. Which only leaves 10 players drafted in the past three years without making an all-conference team at some point, while 93.90% did.

Here's the list of 19, with the players who'd made it at some point in bold:

2010	20	KC	Olukorede Aiyegbusi	D	North Carolina State	ACC
2010	30	SJ	Steven Beitashour	D	San Diego State	Pac-10
2010	51	CHI	Sean Johnson	GK	Central Florida	C-USA
2010	55	DC	Jordan Graye	D	North Carolina	ACC
2010	59	SEA	Jamel Wallace	M	San Diego State	Pac-10
2010	61	CLB	Othaniel Yanez	M	Louisville	Big East
2010	62	HOU	Euan Holden	D	New Mexico	MPSF
2009	16	SEA	Evan Brown	D	Wake Forest	ACC
2009	25	NE	Denaldin Hamzagic	M	Saint Louis	A10
2009	26	DC	Lyle Adams	D	Wake Forest	ACC
2009	30	CLB	Paul Gerstenberger	D	Boston College	ACC
2009	49	CHV	Jamie Franks	M	Wake Forest	ACC
2008	13	NE	Rob Valentino	D	San Francisco	WCC
2008	27	NE	Joe Germanese	M	Duke	MVC
2008	29	LA	Julian Valentin	D	Wake Forest	ACC
2008	39	KC	Matt Marquess	D	Santa Clara	WCC
2008	47	COL	Brian Grazier	M	Saint Louis	C-USA
2008	49	COL	Scott Campbell	M	North Carolina	ACC
2008	55	NE	Spencer Wadsworth	F	Duke	ACC

Johnson and Valentino were Generation Adidas players, so they were going to be drafted regardless. Another 9 were from the ACC, while Holden was the brother of a successful MLS player. Beitashour was an honorable mention selection last year.

None of the players from 2008 & 2009 are currently on an MLS roster.

All conference selections & awards:

• 2009
• 2008
• 2007