Dual nationals who could suit up for the US.

Discussion in 'USA Men: News & Analysis' started by juvechelsea, Oct 26, 2018.

  1. juvechelsea

    juvechelsea Member+

    Feb 15, 2006
    I don't care too much what they say unless they sound utterly cynical. I care what they do. And one thing you need to consider is that farting around and shifting towards wanting proven 24 year olds as opposed to up and coming 20 year olds, as a choice, may create the dynamic where they then say things and make choices you view as unprofessional. It becomes a self perpetuating cycle you can then posture behind.

    You're missing my Landon point. Landon was squeezed out of BL when they were good. BL when he was first there was top 2. By the year he was loaned out they were 15th. To me a team that thinks it is set can squeeze out its future.

    From my perspective it feels wasteful and dishonest to bring up people through U20 and then have lame excuses why they can't jump to senior ball. The investment stuff sounds vaguely like welfare talk. I have a friend on one of our other Olympic sport national teams. They invest as much for their benefit as hers. If she has a rotten season -- like she is this year -- they will drop her from the training and the team for the next season. It is not a charity. You are as valuable as you are useful.
     
  2. Lloyd Heilbrunn

    Lloyd Heilbrunn Member+

    Feb 11, 2002
    Jupiter, Fl.
    Nat'l Team:
    United States
    Fabian Johnson was excellent at the World Cup in 2014.

    Were you actually watching the games?
     
  3. juvechelsea

    juvechelsea Member+

    Feb 15, 2006
    But what you're missing is Landon was brought along fast like Pulisic. He was basically an age group BL player. Pulisic had barely any BD appearances when we capped him. Like Sargent except GB forgot his number once Sarachan left.

    To me you can be forward leaning -- which is likely to confirm the loyalty you want -- or you can tell these kids to prove themselves, and you will lose some of them bored of waiting who like me know they are ready.

    And you can sit here and posture about what they owe us but what gives them the choice is our own delay. You cap some of these kids 1 game at age 18 and problem solved. But we have to act like it's a club you have to earn and be hazed into, as though the current bunch is so much more proven and worthy.

    I go beyond "camp people." Play them. Stick them out there and see what happens. Our core on this team was devastated end of last cycle and what's left is mostly unimpressive. We should be erring on the side of playing anyone new we can find, to see how they compare. In the process we would lock them in. I'm at a loss for acting like we are so great that we can fart around on capping dual nationals. We missed Russia and then looked OK in the process of finishing a mediocre second at GC. But yet we treat selection like we are protecting an incumbent set of players from a world cup semifinalist or something. We haven't adjusted our processes and biases to reflect the results we're getting. A team can be arrogant about loyalty or chemistry or where you fit, if they are already in first. We're not.
     
  4. juvechelsea

    juvechelsea Member+

    Feb 15, 2006
    I mean, it's a two way street, a team that doesn't bring in its kids and forces them to achieve mid career bona fides first, is not exactly sounding excited about the marriage themselves. I thought the "form" stuff on Sargent was silly. But implicit in throwing that sort of stuff around is a judgment, to me. You're kind of saying, not sure you're worth the effort. You're like, but they invested. And then it's stopping. You're kind of leaving out that part.

    Worse, we seem quite content to play along with odd sh*t like Julian Green can score on Belgium and France but let's scrutinize his form for excuses. Difference being JK took the risk so at least that is being done with a safety net. If you cap tie the player we can at least engage in this self defeating crap with a net underneath. That while we wait for our players to blossom into 24 year old professional no doubters, who will then have a 5 year window left, they can't go walk someplace else from frustration.
     
  5. NietzscheIsDead

    NietzscheIsDead Member+

    NO WAR
    United States
    May 31, 2019
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    Yes. Fabian has had some excellent performances with the team and some anonymous performances with the team. His professional pedigree is superior to that of Donovan, but it's inarguable that Donovan's national team contributions are far superior in every fashion.
     
  6. juvechelsea

    juvechelsea Member+

    Feb 15, 2006
    #231 juvechelsea, Aug 16, 2019
    Last edited: Aug 16, 2019
    My deal is that farting around on cap tying players and then blaming the player when they leave is fairly self serving. Anyone in the neighborhood of potentially helpful should be cap-tied. I get "losing" Rossi who has had no aspect of his pro, YNT, or senior team history here. He wanted to be Italian. But if someone is yours through U20 and you are unable to get it across the finish line you bear some of the blame. Part of your job is to win those jousts.

    FWIW what is the point of ODP and age group, U20 etc. if we then discount those evaluations and say you start over as an adult who has to prove yourself at club? Friend of mine, in another sport, started out as a developmental player in the national residency. A year later she earned her way on the full national team. The whole point is the pipeline. Is trusting that the best kids off the U20 are your future. I know it doesn't all turn out that way, but it's like we're almost going the other end and saying, we're going to treat you like any other schlub in MLS.

    To me we need to more actively push the top end of U20 regardless what their clubs think. More to the point if we are doing our job we shouldn't obsess about what the club team thinks. We should have our own independent judgment.

    I say this because I feel like half the dynamic is this loyalty thing but the other half is that since JK got fired we have become conservative on prospects and dual nationals, with perhaps Sarachan's exception. Rather than foster and push the careers of our players, we are kind of lazily sitting around waiting to see pro results. I say lazy because any idiot can sit around waiting for other coaches to tell him it's time. It takes actual work to sort it out yourself, and is something we have previously done on Landon, Pulisic, and others. Nowhere does it say we have to wait on a club team to give you 20-30 appearances to cap you.

    Hell, that's not even how we treat Lewis, who while interesting is hardly our biggest prospect. Lewis has started 7 games and played 10 this whole season. And yet Weah, Sargent, etc., "well, but, ummm, your club form...." And it's going to start happening where what should be a deep pool, is going to get eaten around the edges if people get sick of waiting. And for what, so I can watch "proven" Zardes have 2 goals in GC (both in a single game) including none in the knockouts?

    And this matters because while we fart around and wait on the players to self-start, as opposed to give our push, other NTs are going to come calling and say they have seen enough. We should have the inside lane but are instead setting ourselves up as the most cautious suitor, who wants to see how well your boyfriend speaks of you before we will ask you on a date. And then if she was interested but by the time you pick up the phone she's moved on or cooled off, it's lame to blame her. Most of these people are in our system already and the ones we should cap already have shown promise. What are you waiting for? A loyalty pledge? Them to go ahead and score 20 goals a season and make it obvious?

    I am at a loss for how Bruce Arena's roster template got brought back. His one good world cup is the one where Landon and Beaz got brought in as kids. Most of the others he had way too many people around 30 and went off the cliff. This is where waiting on club performances leads. You wait til 24 to let them on the field and then hold on too tight when they pass 30, because you finally invested.
     
  7. juvechelsea

    juvechelsea Member+

    Feb 15, 2006
    Didn't we just try the loyalty experiment? BA was the coach who had no dual national Germans on his last call sheet after expressing concern about their loyalties. OK, experiment failed. Back to taking some degree of risk.

    FJ went off the boil last cycle, for whatever reason, and was burned in some key games. Just like Yedlin and Brooks. I really don't care if it's because his heart became half in it, he was only in it to get to a world cup once, or he more simply and less disloyally got old or out of form. We don't need to try and see what's in their heads. We don't need to parse their press comments. You call them and see what they look like on the field. Ben Sweat is likely as loyal as anything but that isn't most of the equation, is it?
     
  8. grandinquisitor28

    Feb 11, 2002
    Nevada
    This applies well to fully grown, mature adults. The brain science is already telling us our brains aren't fully prepared as males and matured until our mid 20's. You're expecting a level of maturity for teenagers and early twenty year olds that flat out isn't there scientifically.
     
  9. juvechelsea

    juvechelsea Member+

    Feb 15, 2006
    FWIW why do these loyalty-tested, form-scrutinized USMNTs look worse than we did in 2014??? I think the implication of the argument is you have to work your way onto some talent and hustle machine that plays at 110%. i have instead seen stuff like Costa Rica and this last Venezuela game which were as close to quitting as I have seen a US team. They often kind of play like entitled brats, to be honest. I want the old effort level back. Last time we had that effort level was under Klinsmann and he would bring in anyone he thought would help and even do so when they were in college or on an age group team. Funny thing, several of them are still in the pool (Morris, Pulisic, Green). Maybe they need a little competition......

    I also think that at some point basic notions of "talent" and "performance" got lost. In particular the notion that what really matters is how you look in our shirt and not if your club coach adores you. But also that there is something permanent called talent that Dempsey still has more of even if Spurs benches him.
     
  10. NietzscheIsDead

    NietzscheIsDead Member+

    NO WAR
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    May 31, 2019
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    Yes, which is why I made the remark about his parents.

    Also, these kids are held to a higher standard. They have to grow up quickly.

    I am interested to know the international success rate of those dual nationals who file one time switches after representing another country. How many caps does it actually result in and of what quality are those caps (starts vs. subs, statistical analyses, etc)?

    I would expect that dual nationals who file one time switches are less successful than their counterparts with similar opportunities.
     
  11. Lloyd Heilbrunn

    Lloyd Heilbrunn Member+

    Feb 11, 2002
    Jupiter, Fl.
    Nat'l Team:
    United States
    While I'm glad you recognize Fabian had some excellent performances with the national team, considering your statement that I responded to, was that he was one of the "players who do well at their club, but never translate that well to the national team)."

    I didn't even comment on Donovan.
     
  12. juvechelsea

    juvechelsea Member+

    Feb 15, 2006
    #237 juvechelsea, Aug 16, 2019
    Last edited: Aug 16, 2019
    Off the top of my head:
    Jermaine Jones
    Tyler Boyd
    Fabian Johnson
    AJ
    Julian Green

    Saief is one of the few who switched and played but didn't flourish. But he's netted some caps, and for probably a better team than where he started.

    J. Gonzalez is the only one I know of who switched and didn't get capped for it.

    The self serving logic flaw in your argument is to frame it in terms of the team they are leaving. Essentially, "couldn't be any good because he dumped out of Germany." Framed by our needs and performance we have actually done quite well by that. You're arguably suggesting someone who goes to the world cup and dominates should reframe their career as a German loser. You're basically assuming your conclusion and framing it in terms of the elite teams.

    Plus you assume they fall down where in about three of those cases they arguably "fell upwards." Rather than being small fish in a big pond, they were big fish in a small pond pulled up to our pond.

    I also think you overlook that this sort of device is likely to be used by the talented and ambitious. The device presumes a binding cap from the Old Country, which are not just handed out in cereal boxes. You then have to risk that to switch. People doing that will have some mix of talent, ambition, and most importantly, assurances. You may then register some sort of "less successful" career judgment relative to a high standard you create, but to me Boyd could retire now and he'd be a US international who scored some goals. Just like the people who talk down Julian Green who has a knockout round goal on Belgium, and a goal on France the month before they won the world cup. By objective standards most people would retire and call that success. You can try and paint that as a loser choice but relative to their German cap history it's success. To most people if they leave team x's bench for team y and get started every week and score goals, success. Other than the snobbiest of snobs it's not going to be, "but you could still be fighting for minutes at Dortmund, loser." By that framing any downward switch would be deemed a loser switch regardless of actual practical outcome. Who cares if you make the Hall of Fame in the new country, dozens of caps, world cup goals. Effing loser.
     
  13. grandinquisitor28

    Feb 11, 2002
    Nevada
    I don't know how that would tell us much of anything about our particular situation. Why would Germany care about Fabian, or Julian when they have better in house? Ditto CCV and England? One could go on and on. I think Dual National switches aren't something you can learn hard and fast rules about, because the nature of a switch is different depending upon where you are.

    Rossi always wanted to play for Italy even if his formative years were in the US.

    Jones played for Germany, but switched to the US when they ejected him out of the program.

    Zelalem: I have no idea why he went with us. I just feel bad for that ACL that occurred at the worst possible time for him.

    Fabian couldn't make the German team, so we were his backup. Ditto Chandler.

    Our Latin American Dual Nationals are much more complicated business: Whereas in most cases, a one time switch is all about being rejected by your 1st choice program, and filing it to get a chance at a national team career, that is absolutely not the case with Latin American dual nationals for us.

    You've got:
    #1: Growing up fans of El Tri if your Mexican-American, means being an El Tri fan above the US, period. I've been at 50ish schools at this point in the last 20 years, and as I've previously mentioned, in all those years, I've met one 1st or 2nd generation Mexican-American student who was USMNT ahead of El Tri. One.

    #2 You've got their family which nearly always wants them to represent El Tri.

    #3 You've got their friends which are usually a blend.

    #4 You've got the current political situation which is an epic s show reminiscent of the 1880's anti-Asian American movement's that got the Chinese Exclusion Act passed, and the Gentlemen's Agreement with Japan signed, you got the 1920's era anti-immigrant movements which shut down immigration out of Europe to a trickle, and now this (and I'm aware of previous efforts to send Latin-Americans grabbed off the street back home on trains in the 20th century and the Know Nothing Party's antics in the mid 19th century, and the work of the KKK in the 1920's etc) which is just one more ugly iteration of it. While I'm shocked at how little it's been mentioned by players, if at all, it beggars belief to think that some of this, especially after El Paso, isn't on a given players mind. Some argue in favor of a more strict, you've got to bleed for the shirt etc, well, after the past couple of years, I don't know how that argument doesn't carry with it, some ugly undertones.

    After you look at it this way, to me, it just strikes me as immaterial and not helpful. The cases of German-Americans who picked us after Germany passed on them isn't applicable. Nor are most other European Dual National situations which have usually been based upon being passed over, and so going with the next best option. For Mexican-American players the issue is infinitely more complicated. You have a culture in 1st generation homes and often 2nd generation where El Tri is everything, you also have the friendships which may make it more complicated, and then you've got the politics. For those that are really scientific, maybe they also take a look at current trend lines, and note that while Mexico appeared to hit rock bottom in 2014 (needing us to send them to Brazil in Injury time of Matchday 10) while we hit in 2018, a geologist like approach digs up evidence that our youth national teams have equaled or bettered Mexico's performance at an international tournament level, 3 cycles in a row. Basically, the analytics of it suggests that we are the better bet, if you're looking to join the side that has the better future.

    Look under Mexico's hood? There's substantial evidence that for now, they may have peaked with the kids that represented their youth teams in the 2007-2015 era, right as we were hitting rock bottom, and now the exact reverse is happening. Twellman used a really silly data set to suggest that we are winning the dual national battle (I think 4-1 or something in terms of toss up players) between 2008-2017 or thereabouts, and as I mentioned elsewhere, that data set wasn't helpful at all because the USMNT's potential one time switch Mexican-American Players produced by those youth national teams circa 2008-2014 weren't good enough by and large to break through into the worst USMNT in nearly half a century in 2017. They were basically, bad prospects, period. Why would Mexico be fighting for guys that were on the periphery of a well and truly horrific downtrend USMNT circa 2015-2018? As mentioned by bshredder, we got virtually nothing from our 1990-1995 generation of players, so not very surprisingly, Mexico didn't go after our dual nationals, when they were quite bad, and when their own youth national teams were making the finals of multiple tournaments and even taking Gold at the 2012 olympics.

    Mexico didn't need our dual nationals before because most of them were demonstrably mediocre, and their national team at the youth level was running like a well oiled machine just as ours was going off the rails. Now though, Mexico's U20's have been defeated by the U20's in back to back Concacaf U20 tournaments, and outplayed in back to back U17 tournaments (the US would lose in extra time in both 2017 and 2019, but in both games, the US were largely dominant, unable to finish off Mexico in '19, and choking away a goal lead in the dying minutes in '17). Our performance in both tournaments has also either been equal, or better for three straight cycles at the U20 level, and at the '17 U17 tournament (got a bad feeling for the U17's this time around, as we drew the group of death for the second time in 3 U17 World Cups).

    Not surprisingly as Mexico's Youth Development system has started to sputter, and ours has woken up with a roar, they've suddenly developed a keen interest in our players. Twellman's take, and that of other people that we're fine, we're doing everything right, we're good is ludicrous. The historical trends were a byproduct of us producing god awful players and Mexico unsurprisingly being disinterested in adding the greatness of Joe Corona's and Daniel Cuevas. Now we're producing players that top clubs in Europe are fighting for, and good clubs in Europe are interested in. Mexico unsurprisingly is trying to take advantage of the chaos and instability of the Fed and the program, and the leadership vaccum to try and sweep up as many switches of players as possible. Who knows if they win over the players to switches, but pretending that time spent with our program trumps all is just silly.

    Subotic and Gonzalez pulled one time switches in part due to inept handling of communication, a problem that is currently still an issue. We are lucky as hell we didn't lose Llanez after idiot Hackworth didn't call him in for the U17 WC, and could still lose him. Players file switches for all kinds of silly reasons not taking into account more serious issues like familial ties and heritage, peer pressure, and the current horror show nightmare that is American Politics w/regards to the immigration of non-white people. We've never been more vulnerable, and we've also never produced such quantity of such level of quality in terms of Latin-American and Mexican American players. We should be 10x more vigilant than normal, and yet it seems as if we're the least vigilant we've been in ages.

    We should be worried, and we should be running our recruiting program like Saban ran the Tide's, Urban ran Ohio State's, and <I'm not going to try to spell it's> ran Duke Basketball. Instead it's like we're being run by late period Bobby Knight, if you subtracted 50% of late era Bobby Knight's talent and heightened his deranged irascibility of said late years.
     
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  14. NietzscheIsDead

    NietzscheIsDead Member+

    NO WAR
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    May 31, 2019
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    I disagree.

    A player who wants to play for Mexico should decline a US call up. Be a man. Go for what you want...don’t settle for something else.

    I don’t want a player who isn’t man enough to commit to chasing what he wants.

    If you feel like Mexico is your thing, go and get it.
     
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  15. deejay

    deejay Member+

    Feb 14, 2000
    Tarpon Springs, FL
    Club:
    Jorge Wilstermann
    Nat'l Team:
    Bolivia
    This is never the case for the NTs or the players. There is always a feeling out period where the player and the NT sees how the relationship develops. A dual player that goes too hard for a national team can screw up his NT future. See Rossi and Bunburry.
     
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  16. NietzscheIsDead

    NietzscheIsDead Member+

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    May 31, 2019
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    Those are the inherent risks.

    You either believe in what you can do and go for that goal or you hedge your bets. A national team is not something to hedge your bets with. This is not a club team we're talking about. There are other people involved...the entire country you represent. Positioning oneself as a mercenary may work well for oneself (as it does for a military mercenary), but it doesn't do well for the people you represent.

    It should be a careful, deliberative process with a final decision made the first time that one chooses to perform in a game for that country.

    I think that exploring through camps is perfectly reasonable, but getting out there for that national anthem and wearing the crest means something. If it doesn't mean anything to you, then that's a good indicator that this is not the right program for you.
     
  17. Clint Eastwood

    Clint Eastwood Member+

    Dec 23, 2003
    Somerville, MA
    Club:
    FC Dallas
    We as fans can't judge the loyalty or commitment of one of these dual-nationals.
    The USMNT staff just has to call the players up, and figure out what their motivations are. Throughout the history of the program, many of these foreign-born dual-nationals have fought for the jersey with pride.

    Every story is different. I know that we as fans want to put everybody in a neat folder entitled "dual-nationals" but it doesn't work. Every story is unique. Tyler Boyd's background is different than Cameron Carter Vickers' background, which is different than Kenny Saief's background.

    Who are we to judge what a players' motivations are from a distance?
     
  18. NietzscheIsDead

    NietzscheIsDead Member+

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    You don't judge people by their motivations, you judge them by their actions.

    All of these guys are competitive. How do we know? We judge them by their actions and behavior.

    How many of them have professional integrity? That's a more difficult thing to have.

    How many of them fight for their nation with passion and love for their people? Those are also more difficult things to have.

    Those are the things that literally define a national team...representing and fighting for the people who make up that nation.

    A national team is not a club team.
     
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  19. Clint Eastwood

    Clint Eastwood Member+

    Dec 23, 2003
    Somerville, MA
    Club:
    FC Dallas
    18 year old playmaker already getting first team minutes for Argentinos Juniors in the first division of Argentina. Born in Argentina, moved to Miami as a youngster. Then his family moved back to Argentina where he has pursued his soccer career.

    Miljevic isn attacking midfielder that can play centrally or out wide. Centrally, just for the U20s this upcoming cycle he's in competition with Taylor Booth (Bayern Munich), Blaine Ferri (Greuther Furth), Thomas Roberts (FC Dallas), Gianluca Busio (SKC), Danny Leyva (Sounders), and others.

     
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  20. SCSAutism

    SCSAutism Member

    United States
    May 9, 2017
    Says here hes eligible for the US..
     
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  21. Scotty

    Scotty Member+

    Dec 15, 1999
    Toscana
    No, he was born in Miami.
     
  22. DHC1

    DHC1 Member+

    Jun 3, 2002
    NYC
  23. Clint Eastwood

    Clint Eastwood Member+

    Dec 23, 2003
    Somerville, MA
    Club:
    FC Dallas
    These kids do switch back and forth between Mexico and the US at the youth levels with some regularity. They explore their options like they should.

    Overall, USYNTs do a very good job with retention and recruiting of dual-nationals. We lose the occasional one and folks freak the eff out like we've lost Lionel Messi. [See Gonzalez, Jonathan] The other FCD youngster on that U17 roster, Ricardo Pepi, is also a kid that chose the US over Mexico (he'd been in Mexican youth camps). He's probably considered the better prospect.

    To be fair, Carrera only recently obtained his citizenship. So Mexico had been his only option. His brother, Antonio, is considered a good goalkeeping prospect in his age group.

     
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  24. NietzscheIsDead

    NietzscheIsDead Member+

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    I don't credit the USSF, I credit the player and his parents. These decisions should be made irrespective of the people who are in leadership at the moment...they are decisions for 5-10-15 years down the line.

    Maybe I'm wrong here, but it seems like the USMNT youth set up is a much better pipeline into European football. Dallas' youth program alone will get you intimately acquainted with Bayern scouts.
     
  25. NietzscheIsDead

    NietzscheIsDead Member+

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    Love, love, love this. Congrats to the Carrera family.
     

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