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The United States Soccer Federation is hoping to recruit players from across the world by using AI to scan video footage of tens of millions of young athletes, joining some college athletic programs<\/a> that are infusing AI into their recruiting process.<\/p>\n At a Fortune event in Scottsdale, Arizona, this week<\/a>, US Soccer Federation COO Dan Helfrich \u2014\u00a0formerly the CEO of the consulting giant Deloitte \u2014 declared<\/a> that AI-assisted scouting represents a \u201cparadigm shift\u201d that will allow US soccer to \u201cscout every single soccer match that a US-eligible player is playing anywhere in the world.\u201d<\/p>\n As Helfrich tells it, AI can effectively allow scouts to be in more places at the same time. Since scouts for the US national team can\u2019t be literally everywhere, a system has emerged in which certain clubs, schools, and regions are prioritized over others, resulting in talented athletes who may be overlooked.<\/p>\n \u201cHow do you get your scouts \u2014\u00a0your humans \u2014\u00a0to all of those places?\u201d said Helfrich. \u201cYou can\u2019t. And so automatically, you\u2019re excluding 99.5 percent of people.\u201d But AI combined with the widespread availability of video footage, argues Helfrich, allows scouts to analyze the play of millions of athletes.<\/p>\n \u201cVideo becoming much more widely available for youth sports, and AI \u2014\u00a0suddenly, we\u2019re reimagining,\u201d said Helfrich, per Fortune.<\/p>\n It\u2019s an interesting prospect, especially for a sport as global as soccer. And if an AI tool helps a gifted athlete get noticed by US Soccer when they otherwise wouldn\u2019t, that\u2019s an undeniably good thing. On the flipside, building a robust talent pipeline that funnels potential stars into national team programs is a challenge that goes well beyond scanning videos from across the web. It\u2019s questionable whether the program US Soccer is using will make for a \u201cparadigm shift,\u201d or whether it\u2019s just another tool in the kit.<\/p>\n Are you a coach or athlete who has used an AI recruiting service? Are you an athlete whose career has been impacted by AI? Send us a tip: tips@futurism.com<\/p>\n The AI program that US Soccer is using reportedly trained to be able to identify certain attributes about a player\u2019s game \u2014\u00a0skill level, technique, movements \u2014 that the organization believes would suit a specific position.<\/p>\n After Helfrich\u2019s comments to Fortune, US Soccer Federation CEO JT Batson confirmed on the talkSPORT podcast<\/a> that the national team program is indeed using a \u201cpilot\u201d that leverages AI \u201cfor purposes of player identification.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cIt\u2019s something that we\u2019re in the early stages of,\u201d said Batson. \u201cBut we\u2019re excited to learn from and figure out, you know, how do we scale that so that way more kids can be truly part of US soccer, and we\u2019re supporting them in their soccer journey \u2014\u00a0whether they want to play soccer for fun the rest of their life or whether they\u2019re on a pathway to hopefully win us a World Cup.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cWe need to be able to scout way more players in this country,\u201d he added. \u201cAnd we need to make sure that way more players are a part of our pathways than currently exist today.\u201d<\/p>\n It\u2019s certainly true that talented young athletes across sports have a tough time getting seen, be it by college, professional, or national team coaches and scouts (or all of the above). And while the square mileage of the Earth versus how much time and money sports organizations can budget for recruiting does play a role in which players get a national team nod, pipeline issues also have a lot to do with more fundamental access problems<\/a>. Do young players have access to quality facilities and quality coaching? Do their families have to break the bank or drive hours away from home, if that\u2019s even an option for them?<\/p>\n AI might help national team scouts cover more digital ground in their quest to source new players. But discovery is only one part of the equation, and an algorithm that finds fresh talent isn\u2019t what gets promising young players on a field in the first place.<\/p>\n