Don't have much to say about your post since everyone else already has. I thought THIS response was most appropriate though: ^THAT more than anything is what's "lucky". Even so, having had that "luck", he has taken an opportunity that many other players would have wasted and turned in some really good performances despite playing behind the 2nd worst defense in the league. This guy is the real deal. I'm not sure if he'll ever be a national teamer, but he is going to have a very very nice career. I thought the thread title was "MLS flavors of the week" not "Cap him now"?
Big whoop. I repeat what I said before, the A-10 is pretty mediocre. Getting on their all-conference team does not impress me. 97% of their all-conference team players are not MLS prospects. It was a weak draft year at keeper. And he was only slightly better than the other keeper prospects. Well this is a flavor of the week thread for players who are performing right now and showing they are ready for the next step. If we are talking hypotheticals then any player might possibly develop into a future US player. Why are we even talking about a guy who has a 1.75 goals allowed average this season (on the team with the highest payroll in MLS)? This is absurd. Any team can get hot and go on a run in the tournament. Charlotte got to the final by playing ugly bunker ball with solid teamwork that made them much stronger than the sum of their parts. Stanfurd also just poached their coach, which shows where the talent congregates in college soccer. Sure the A-10 may have produced 1 or 2 good MLS players but on the whole they are a measly 10th in the college rankings of pro's produced. The level of competition they play against week-in and week-out just isn't that strong. You're having a laugh if you think Meara could have put up those close to those kind of numbers in one of the stronger conferences.
It bears adding that nearly all of our national team pool keepers caught a big break in one way or another. Hamid, Sean Johnson, Guzan, Perkins, and Rimando were all very fortunate to get playing time early in their MLS careers. So was Tim Howard, after Mike Amman punctured a lung. And if you go back to Meola, Friedel, and Keller, they reaped the benefits of coming of age at a time when David Vanole was our only established option. So, getting back to Meara, it doesn't matter why he's playing. What matters is how well he's paying.
Here's a question: when was the last draft year that wasn't considered weak at keeper? Also, I don't think you should hold Meara's A-10 background against him. It's hard for an A-10 player to attract pro attention, yet Meara overcame that hurdle and was widely considered the best GK prospect around. That's a testament to his quality.
The 2011 draft had McMath go #5 overall, David Bingham (who could easily end up becoming better than Johnson and maybe even Hamid) go Generation Adidas and go to SJ in a lottery, and Joe Willis the #50 overall pick currently has a 1.13 gaa through 8 games for DC and is playing so well that he is keeping Hamid on the bench.
How many keepers behind Howard do you have confidence in moving forward? We should be keeping an eye on a number of them. Is this the established rule? I didn't know that. If that's the case then there are a number of players we've been discussing that should be banned from this discussion. The majority of them are playing well, but aren't ready for the next step. He's performing right now. However, I do not think he's ready for the next step. If he continues to improve from where he is right now I think he'd be a camp cupcake guy in 2-3 years. Keel is not developing into a future US player. It's not absurd. The defense has been terrible. Meara has been the opposite. Soccer is not a game of stats. You're smart enough to know this.
A very good list of future GK options, but none of them have been lights out for any extended period of time so why are you blacklisting Meara? He is certainly behind them in experience which is a very important factor, but none of those guys stand out to me as "THIS GUY. CAP HIM NOW. FUTURE USA STARTING KEEPER".
At the time of the 2011 draft, the consensus view was that MacMath was the only worthwhile keeper on the board. It was considered a weak year for GKs. Nobody thought Willis was worth more than pick #50, and in 2010, nobody thought Sean Johnson was worth more than pick #51. Are you starting to see the pattern?
Why do you keep hammering on contextual information when primary source information, which is infinitely more valuable, is available? The only question is, has Meara played well? He hasn't been outstanding, but he's been pretty solid. Yes, NY has conceded a lot of goals, but has that been on Meara or on the defense? Do you even try to think about these questions? It's like arguing that Wondolowski isn't actually that good because he went to a DII college and then was a bench player for a long time. Yes, those typically indicate a mediocre or bad player, but these contextual pieces of information are just predictors and are washed away when we can actually watch a player.
B/c Meara's had such a short MLS career that his NCAA performance is still very relevant. And I HAVE discussed his primary source data - he has a 1.75 goals allowed average in MLS so far. Neither his NCAA or MLS performances suggest he should be in any flavor of the week discussion. If Meara strings together a bunch of performances in a row like the NE game last weekend then let's talk about him. Fair point about Wondo and I admit I didn't think twice about him when SJ signed him undrafted in 2005 but after he led the reserve league in scoring twice there was some real indicators of future success there (but he certainly didn't belong in any flavor of the week discussion until he vaulted himself up the MLS goal scoring charts during the 2010 season).
How many of his games have you watched? The thing that is most outstanding is that he looks like a keeper that already has years of MLS experience. The thing that has been missing is the spectacular saves (even though he's had some really good ones). But let's keep in mind that this is his ROOKIE season.
Im with SJTillIDie on this one. Im tired of hyping up young keepers just because they are starting when at a young age. Hamid and Johnson have shown that they aren't consistent enough to start in MLS after having good stretches. Meara starting is nice and all, but he isnt playing great enough that anyone would select him for MLS best XI. And if you arent at least in that conversation, you shouldnt be in the USMNT conversation either.
Jesus f#cking christ, I'm not trying to HYPE the guy up as the greatest thing since sliced bread and the styrofoam cooler. I'm saying he has week in and week out been very solid for a very terrible NY defense. In his ROOKIE season. That is worth something. I said similar things about Ream early on. The hype machine didn't start on him until much later.
Sure it is. His continued presence starting in NYRB's net. Just not worth anything from a USMNT perspective. The guy at least has to show he MIGHT be one of the best keepers in the league. He hasnt shown hints of that, the best thing you can say about him is he hasnt embarrassed himself.
I can't discuss him in this thread as a future national team keeper based on very early returns? Even if those returns don't have him standing on his head each week in back to back clean sheets? I honestly think he has a shot. It might be 10 years down the road, but I am 100% convinced that this guy is the real deal. And I'm not the kind of guy who goes around pimping players. I RARELY do it.
No, that's still not primary source information. You are looking at a team-based stat and applying it to an individual, then dusting your hands and saying "Mission Accomplished!!!". Did the goals scored on NY come through keeper mistakes, poor positioning, or bad defense that left the keeper out to dry? That stuff matters, but you make no attempt to distinguish. I'm not even a huge Meara fan. I think he's putting in a very respectable performance for a rookie, but GKs take so long to develop the consistency and learn the nuances of the position to the degree necessary for the NT. Often they never do. I am, however, a fan of good analysis and that's what rankles right now. Watching a player play is the most important thing and if you've watched Meara play, you'd know that he doesn't bear much responsibility for the unsightly 1.75 GAA.
1) The stats do matter and you lose credibility for throwing those out, and 2) yes I have watched a majority of NY's games b/c they are on national TV all the time and I have MLS Live. Just b/c he hasn't been embarrassing himself like Bouna Coundoul doesn't mean he belongs in a USMNT discussion.
I've watched all his games and he had poor positioning on one goal, and poor execution on one other. He could have done better and possibly saved those 2. However, in one of those cases the defense failed to clear a seamingly harmless ball, and in the other the defense left him out to dry in a 1 v 1 situation. Every goal NY has let up this season has been because of a complete team failure defensively. I've never seen a defense this bad in my life.
1. Stats are of some use in soccer when one lacks better information. Since we can watch Meara play every week, we have access to better information. We can look at all the goals that have been scored against NY and evaluate each player's role in each of them. Isn't that a better method of evaluation? You filter out all the noise associated with using a rudimentary team-based stat like GAA to evaluate an individual. You get more context. But you want to discard this method of evaluation in favor of a rudimentary statistic in which GK performance is just one of many factors. It's like insisting on using Wins and Losses to judge a pitcher in a world in which there are dozens of more telling statistics. 2. This is a strawman argument. Nobody -- nobody -- has advocated for Meara's inclusion in the USMNT in the near- or mid-term future.
I have been laboring under the impression that this was a thread to discuss USMNT eligible* MLS player performances on a weekly basis. So while its completely fair argue whether player X [Cascio, Meara, Rowe, Cameron, John] is or isn't there yet, or what they need to do to get there, it seems unfair to require on an ad hoc basis that some nebulous, minimal standard have been met in order to mention someone's name beyond having appeared in that week's game. [college conference, draft position]. Just my 2 cents. As for Meara, he is raw and inexperienced but seems to have some tough to quantify leadership qualities along with some talent. I am pretty excited that he is getting time at such a young age, as I am with Hamid, McMath and Johnson. EDIT: what he said.
Since you brought up stats and also Bouna Coundoul, i'd note that his GAA (1.13) is one of the best in MLS history over the course of roughly 100 games. Far better than Tim Howard's 1.46 over 85 games. Bouna also had one of the best save percentages of all time. Just throwing that out there.
Now, now koko . . . https://www.bigsoccer.com/forum/showthread.php?t=1370170 I have had to put on the brakes to keep from starting a thread about this guy . . . http://www.mlssoccer.com/news/article/2012/04/26/timing-poise-lead-deleon-closer-dcu-rookie-record
Should also mention Donovan Ricketts managed to have less than a 1.00 GAA over his Galaxy career in 70 league games and a few cup largely due to Omar Gonzalez's defending. The galaxy's defense was crap before Omar then got amazingly good and has been mediocre at best without Omar again. Highly underrated player on these forums. Gonzalez stats wise has been the best MLS defender for the last few years plus he is young.