The league’s Homegrown initiative has expanded in lockstep with the growth of the Development Academy’s viability as a producer of pro-level talent. But which teams tend to use it better than others? And how is each MLS team approaching the rule as a whole? Let’s find out.

I went on a relatively exhaustive journey through all 19 MLS side’s Homegrown histories to extrapolate the nutrient rich developmental soil each side’s been tilling – or not, based on past practices. You’ll notice, for instance, that no team’s had more Homegrown players play more minutes than D.C. United. And San Jose’s number is just a shade behind. Just a shade.

A couple notes. The players marked inactive are no longer in the league, and a few players moved to different clubs within MLS after signing initial Homegrown deals (Tristan Bowen, Josue Soto, etc). I’ve counted all of those players’ minutes with their home club – provided they moved within MLS – to give their developer credit for pushing along a pro player, regardless of where those minutes were counted (though most all played the entirety of their careers with their home clubs). This also only applies to players who signed Homegrown contracts, and these minutes numbers are up to date as of July 16.

Without further ado, let’s dive in.

Chicago Fire

Homegrowns (4): Victor Pineda, Chris Ritter, Harrison Shipp, Kellen Gulley (inactive)

Total minutes: 1,717

Notes: Good news for Fire fans (and fans of Homegrowns everywhere). Chicago seems to have turned a new development leaf under Frank Yallop, who deserves praise for thrusting not only ROY frontrunner Harrison Shipp into the fray from the jump, but also for doling out nearly 400 minutes to Chris Ritter already. But that Pineda oversight looms large. Just 40 minutes since 2010 means the Fire share at least part of the burden if Pineda flames out as a coulda-been. The Fire are trending upward, but they have a lot of lost time to cover after going dark for far too long – not even cracking 1,800 puts them toward the bottom of the league. Before this season, that minutes total was zero.

Chivas USA

Homegrowns (5): Caleb Calvert, Marco Delgado, Bryan de la Fuente (inactive), Gerson Mayen (inactive), Cesar Zamora (inactive)

Total minutes: 3,513

Notes: Marky Delgado’s gotten plenty of play since his introduction in 2012, and he’s emerged as one of the team’s most promising young players. Calvert is young, but it’s disappointing to see him ignored on the first team since signing more than a year ago. He’s good enough to deserve at least a run-out. On a macro level, it’s puzzling that Chivas USA hasn’t racked up more Homegrown PT than this considering how many good players have cycled (and, for many, left) the academy program in recent years. Chivas USA should be among the best in the nation at producing Homegrowns. Hopefully new management stirs this sleeping giant from its coma.

Colorado Rapids

Homegrowns (4): Shane O’Neill, Dillon Serna, Davy Armstrong, Josh Janniere (inactive)

Total minutes: 4,532

Notes: Quality over quantity. The success/fail rate on Homegrowns since 2008 isn’t flattering, so that the Rapids signed two players with USMNT potential deserves heaps of praise. Armstrong (one minute) and Janniere (zero minutes), are bad misses, but Armstrong was re-signed in June, so his journey may not be over. Denver is isolated, meaning its academy teams have to travel long distances to find competitive games. That not only increases the burden on players, but it also means its pool is smaller and more focused than it would be in a broader area. That said, the Rapids are home run hitters on Homegrowns. Identifying more is next. We’ll see if the Rapids get gun-shy if they ID a player who isn’t of Serna/O’Neill quality but still deserving an HG nod.

Columbus Crew

Homegrowns (9): Chad Barson, Ross Friedman, Matt Lampson, Ben Speas, Wil Trapp, Matt Walker, Matt Wiet, Aaron Horton (inactive), Kyle Hyland (inactive)

Total minutes: 7,378

Notes: The Crew are notoriously reliant on building up a network through their academy, pushing those players onto four-year college careers to develop and then collecting them like a rake in hopes they snag a starter. It’s probably not the best system in the league, and it relies too heavily on outside factors, but it produced Trapp, so we kind of nod and accept at least its finer parts. That said, credit to the Crew for giving all the currently active players plus-1,000-minute looks with the exception of Wiet (injury) and Friedman and Walker (2014 signings, who are both on loan). The Crew’s system may not be the league’s sexiest, but it’s utilitarian and could well produce a 2018 World Cup player. Say this about the Crew: they play their kids. And the burn-out rate (22 percent) isn’t all that high, either.

D.C. United

Homegrowns (7): Bill Hamid, Collin Martin, Jalen Robinson, Michael Seaton, Conor Shanosky, Andy Najar, Ethan White

Total minutes: 19,170

Notes: Notice that minutes total? It’s the highest in the league, and nobody else is even close. No Homegrown player in league history has played more minutes than Hamid’s 8,709, which is more than 17 MLS teams. And of course there’s Najar, the first DA player to ever play in a World Cup (Aron Johannsson and DeAndre Yedlin soon followed). Those two are deserved epaulets on United’s developmental regalia. Ethan White has also logged a pair of 1,000-plus minute seasons, but he’s now gone to Philadelphia. United is top-heavy with the players it’s produced, so while you can’t overlook the development of players like Hamid and Najar (who’s a DA poster-boy at this point), United should continue to look to deepen its classes headed forward.

FC Dallas

Homegrowns (11): Kellyn Acosta, Danny Garcia, Jesse Gonzalez, Moises Hernandez, Richard Sanchez, Jonathan Top, Victor Ulloa, Bradlee Baladez (inactive), Bryan Leyva (inactive), Ruben Luna (inactive), London Woodberry (inactive)

Total minutes: 4,753

Notes: FCD loves to tout the MLS-leading number of Homegrowns the club’s signed, and while that’s nice on one level, nobody in the league has more currently inactive (TFC also has four). Further, no Homegrown in program history has played more than Acosta’s 1,416 minutes, and aside from Ulloa, there are nine players on this list who’ve played 663 minutes or fewer. FCD’s academy is unquestionably one of the country’s best on just about every level, but their products have had a puzzlingly difficult time matriculating to the senior team. Acosta is a livewire, and Ulloa may be good yet, but the pressure’s on FCD to make more out of a Homegrown tag that’s been mercurial at best here.

Houston Dynamo

Homegrowns (5): Tyler Deric, Bryan Salazar, Alex Dixon (inactive), Francisco Navas Cobo (inactive), Josue Soto (inactive)

Total minutes: 1,736

Notes: Say all you want about Dom Kinnear’s bonafides as a coach, but his program’s done almost nothing to develop players who’ve come up through their own system. Ironically, Deric was the second ever Homegrown signing, and he’s played all of 360 minutes in four years. Salazar isn’t yet a lost cause, but Houston’s track record of handing PT to academy players is almost nonexistent, let alone weak. There are a number of encouraging pieces in the Dynamo system – Christian Lucatero, Juan Flores, Matthew Dorsey among them – so one has to wonder if they’ll be given a chance when the time comes. Of the Dynamo’s total Homegrown minutes, 1,158 came from Soto after he left the team for Chivas USA.

LA Galaxy

Homegrowns (7): Bradford Jamieson IV, Jack McBean, Raul Mediola, Oscar Sorto, Jose Villarreal, Gyasi Zardes, Tristan Bowen

Total minutes: 7,228

Notes: Credit to the Galaxy for identifying the top risers in their academy and consistently shooting them contracts in recent years despite their deep coffers. Getting playing time with this team has been difficult, but as far as Homegrowns go, Zardes is up there among the best signings in league history. He’s far from polished, but as a young player with potential, he exemplifies the finer points of the Homegrown contract. Here’s another feather in the Galaxy cap – every Homegrown they’ve signed since 2011 is still with the program. That includes Jamieson and Mendiola, two 2014 Homegrowns with bags of potential.

Montreal Impact

Homegrowns (6): Maxime Crepeau, Wandrille Lefevre, Zakaria Messoudi, Karl Ouimette, Maxim Tissot, Jeremy Gagnon-Lapare

Total minutes: 2,864

Notes: The Impact academy didn’t exist until 2012, so it’s interesting the club went all in by signing five players inside a year from 2012 to 2013. In a lot of ways, we’re still figuring out how the Impact go about developing players, but that they pushed their U18 academy team into the final four this summer is a good sign. Ouimette seems to be the best of this group – or at least the one most prone to early minutes – but our sample size on how the Impact go about maturing their own players is still microscopic. They inked just one HG in the last 13 months, but a promising crop of U18s is on its way and could be ripe for the picking in the next six months or so.

New England Revolution

Homegrowns (2): Scott Caldwell, Diego Fagundez

Total minutes: 7,505

Notes: The Revs are like a more focused Rapids, and you can look at their commitment (or lack thereof) to Homegrowns in one of two ways. Caldwell and Fagundez are both terrific players, and there aren’t many academies that’ve produced a player the quality of either. But given the amount of time the Revs have had to establish their developmental footprint, both the state of their academy system (fair, but not great) and the number of their Homegrowns is underwhelming. Caldwell was the captain of the first Revs academy team ever, and Fagundez is Fagundez, but the Revs have been more content to draft young talent via the draft than develop it themselves.

New York Red Bulls

Homegrowns (9): Santiago Castano, Bryan Gallego, Connor Lade, Juan Agudelo, Matt Miazga, Giorgi Chirgadze (inactive), Amando Moreno (inactive), Sacir Hot (inactive), Matt Kassel (inactive)

Total minutes: 7,153

Notes: Something isn’t connecting here. The Red Bulls are part of The Big Three in MLS development (LA Galaxy and FC Dallas being the others), but their track record of pushing along those players hasn’t been up to par. Juan Agudelo accounts for more than half of this total himself, and he’s the jewel here. Lade’s largely done well when healthy and Miazga shows promise, but where’s the beef here? Year after year, Red Bulls academy players fuel the nation’s best recruiting classes, and then nothing. Historically, the Red Bulls’ dedication to high-priced players and high-risk transfers has squeezed out its academy system, but to have two Homegrown players break 400 MLS minutes in the history of the program is unconscionable.

Philadelphia Union

Homegrowns (3): Cristhian Hernandez, Jimmy McLaughlin, Zach Pfeffer

Total minutes: 264

Notes: The Union get something of a pass – not much of one, mind you – due to their relatively young age, and the opening last September of the YSC Academy gets high marks with TopDrawerSoccer.com. Even so, the Union don’t get a pass for not giving their young kids shots with the first team. Hernandez played 26 minutes in his first season after signing before the Union benched him. For two years running. The same happened to McLaughlin, who got 17 minutes in 2012 and hasn’t played since. Pfeffer would seem to be a first-team prospect, but he’s gotten just 81 minutes all season. Union fans can reasonably expect things to improve given the systems being put in place, but the coaching staffs should answer for their developmental cold shoulder on the first team.

Portland Timbers

Homegrown (2): Steven Evans, Brent Richards (inactive)

Total minutes: 201

Notes: The Timbers’ academy system is still finding its legs, and that’s clear in the Timbers’ personnel ethos over the past few years. They’ve looked to talented young college players and mid-range DPs in lieu of a steady farm system. That probably won’t change any time soon, since the Timbers’ academy is still reliant on small pockets of talent rather than anything systemic. Richards is probably done with his professional career after a rare knee injury last year, and Evans will have an uphill climb to first team minutes. The Timbers don’t have any huge professional prospects coming up the pipeline, meaning they have some catchup to do if they hope to begin pumping out serious Homegrowns with first team potential. How big would Rubio Rubin have been?

Real Salt Lake

Homegrowns (7): Jordan Allen, Justen Glad, Donny Toia, Benji Lopez, Carlos Salcedo, Lalo Fernandez, Nico Muniz (inactive)

Total minutes: 2,237

Notes: RSL is one of the most opportunistic sides when it comes to Homegrowns, but they’re only just hitting their golden age of development now. Names like Allen and Glad will be of note in the future, and their system has some instant Homegrown offers (Lennon, Saucedo) for the future if the front office can fend off international offers from richer clubs. That said, RSL’s track record with Homegrowns could be better, but the well-stocked academy and a historic willingness to hand playing time to young talent makes this a good place to play for young players. Allen’s USMNT prospects in particular took a huge shot in the arm when he inked with RSL. That seems to be a trend.

San Jose Earthquakes

Homegrowns (1): Tommy Thompson

Total minutes: 1

Notes: Before we jump on San Jose for failing to do much of anything in the developmental realm, give them props for locking up Thompson, one of the most exciting young players in America. They at least had the foresight to do that. Now, though, begins the brass tacks. Thompson was shipped off to Sacramento while the thin San Jose midfield begs for creativity, and his one minute of first team action hardly constitutes a shot. The Quakes’ academy is hardly a train wreck, and talent will continue to funnel through the Bay Area, but at least in terms of minutes served, San Jose is the worst in MLS when it comes to holistic farm-to-table development. The Quakes have to be better from the ground up.

Seattle Sounders

Homegrowns (3): Aaron Kovar, Sean Okoli, DeAndre Yedlin

Total minutes: 3,800

Notes: The Sounders are latecomers to the Homegrown game, but they’ve laid it on thick since last year. Yedlin was the team’s first Homegrown signing in January 2013, and that might turn out to be the best find in the first six years of the Development Academy. Kovar and Okoli were signed on the same day in 2014, so it’d be premature to judge, but there are far more intriguing prospects in the hopper. Jordan Morris is one, and Seattle has to be begging him to turn pro out of Stanford. Darwin Jones of Washington turned down a Homegrown offer after last season, and he’d be another huge get for the program. So while the Sounders may have turned the dial late, they’ve done it with a lot of force.

Sporting Kansas City

Homegrowns (3): Kevin Ellis, Jon Kempin, Erik Palmer-Brown

Total minutes: 1,181

Notes: Kudos to SKC for pushing Erik Palmer-Brown into the fire early and not shying when he scuffled in his first start. League-wide there seems to be some hesitation to allow young players to play through their flaws, but Palmer-Brown’s rise from the canvas in subsequent games shows it’s a valuable policy for good players. Ellis’ increased playing time in 2014 has been a positive, but Kempin’s been a no-show since he became the club’s first HG in 2010. SKC hasn’t necessarily had to be shrewd with its academy because it’s put so many resources into scouting and raiding drafts, but the shift from the latter policy to the former will determine which clubs become the top pro producers and which begin to slide back in the midst of a changing system. The signing of EPB was a good start.

Toronto FC

Homegrowns (9): Manuel Aparicio, Jordan Hamilton, Doneil Henry, Ashtone Morgan, Quillan Roberts, Oscar Cordon (inactive), Nicholas Lindsay (inactive), Keith Makubuya (inactive), Matt Stinson (inactive)

Total minutes: 10,479

Notes: TFC took some hearty swings and misses in the opening days of its Homegrown frenzy. Within a six month period, it signed flame-outs Cordon, Lindsay, Makubuya and Stinson. But TFC’s academy produced, almost immediately, two defenders who’ve to date logged more than 4,000 minutes in MLS apiece in Henry and Morgan. No other academy in MLS can say that. The arrival of big money isn’t necessarily a godsend to TFC’s academy system, but more competition could be a good thing. Hamilton is the club’s next exciting project. Is Ryan Nelsen daring enough to play the talented young striker? Time will tell.

Vancouver Whitecaps

Homegrowns (8): Sam Adekugbe, Bryce Alderson, Marco Carducci, Caleb Clarke, Ethen Sampson, Russell Teibert, Phillippe Davies (inactive), Brian Sylvestre (inactive)

Total minutes: 3,298

Notes: Teibert’s recent contract extension should hearten Vancouver fans. While the Caps’ system has had its issues in the past, it appears as though it’s turning a corner. Adekugbe’s signing was shrewd – he’s a left back with promise – while Carducci also appears to have promise. Teibert goes without saying, but names like Marco Bustos and Kianz Froese could be popping up on this list in the near future. Vancouver under Carl Robinson has shown a willingness to play young players, which is good, but its talent evaluation is still coming around. Outside Teibert, the Whitecaps have gotten 105 total minutes out of their Homegrowns. We’ll see if the team’s best single crop coming up through the ranks can change that.