Great post. What I don't understand is if USL firmly believes that, then why don't they advocate it? Instead they state in their rule book "teams organized by single birth or grade are suggested." That to me sounds like they are indifferent which is used. They do incrementally more harm by going on to state "if a league needs to group two years/grades together, they should limit to no more than 24 months." That's the line that the holdbacks like to use: "USL is ok with a 24 month age differential." Bottom line, USL needs to actively promote single year age brackets, period. They are more concerned with trying to grow the sport (hence the flexibility in age brackets) than they are the safety of the kids. | 
