Where recruiting meets data
About
I built the tool I wish my family had.
I'm Ricky Ybarra. I played ECNL, ran ODP to the Region Team in parallel, joined a Developmental Academy, spent time in an MLS Academy, and played D1 soccer. I also finished an industrial engineering degree — which is mostly a fancy way of saying I like taking a messy process apart and rebuilding it so it actually works.
Recruiting is the messiest process my family ever went through. Startline is the rebuild — a start line for the families who never got one, all the way to signing day.
The path, level by level
- ECNLClub soccer — where the climb started
- ODP — State Team → Region TeamRan it in parallel · named all-region at the inter-regional
- Developmental AcademyThe real next level up from club
- MLS AcademyThe pro-pathway years
- D1 SoccerCollege — the level this product aims at
- Industrial engineeringThe degree that treats broken processes as fixable
- StartlineNow — building the tool my family needed
I say the ODP part out loud because ODP gets treated like a consolation prize to ECNL and academy soccer, and it isn't one. College coaches, US Soccer staff, and pro scouts are genuinely in the building from the State Team up — evaluating players who never go near a national team. The pathway is real for the families going through it right now, long before the top of it.
Recruiting in the dark
Here's the thing nobody tells you: my family did the recruiting mostly in the dark. We didn't know which schools were realistic, which ones had room at my position, or which camps were worth the drive and which were a check written to nobody. We got advice that amounted to “get exposure” and a pitch from a service that wanted thousands of dollars to hand us a spreadsheet.
We figured it out the slow way. But I kept thinking about the families who don't have a former player in the house to translate — the ones paying for hope because nobody gave them a clear read and a next step.
So I built the read
Startline scores where a player really fits, shows where there's real room on a roster, and keeps the coach conversations organized so nothing goes cold. It's the engineering version of the advice I'd give a family at my kitchen table.
“Pick the school you'd love before you pick the team. Be happy there whether or not you make the roster.”
It won't place your kid and it won't promise an offer — anyone who tells you otherwise is selling you something. And it doesn't scout or grade how good a player is — we're not evaluators. What it will do is show you where you fit, as a student and an athlete, and make sure the work you're already doing is aimed at the right schools, for a price that isn't predatory.