Rob Stone: US Manager shortlist is Ramos, Tata Martino, Marsch, Berhalter, Friedel, Osorio & Vermes.

How does it help? I have two hours of my life back that I can spend rather than supporting an inept and conflicted organization?

There are plenty of other sporting options in the US that involve high quality play supported by higher ups who know what the hell they are doing.

I am voting with my wallet.

 

Whoop de ********ing doo. Can we get on with it already?

@Rahbiefowlah, In case it is not clear, this is not directed at you.

 

"Negotiations progressed in recent weeks" = they were stalled for a while. Why? Did Gregg demand more independence? A salary to match his brother's so he won't make fun of him at family reunions? Not having to ask for Ernie's approval for a squad?

 

Lol, it wasn’t unclear no worries. I mean the article is just a bland, plagiarized summary of basically public info. What a farce all around. Feels something like rock bottom for the program right now.

 

Nah, still don’t believe it.

 

He's not one of his bosses. Now, if he became CEO, he would be.

 

If you mean he's not in the chain of command above him, that's true. But all of us ex-corporate warriors know the unwritten rules of the jungle. If he fks with Gregg, Jay will have a word with his boss. That's true everywhere, but I suspect more so in the limited entry halls of Sumussls Inc.

 

That is such a trash, lazy take. He’s not getting the job because of nepotism. You can be meh or disagree on the hire but stop acting like he’s some jumped up marketing guy that has zero resume.

 

I don't think his opinion is trash or a lazy take, anymore than I believe the only reason he was hired was because his brother is corporate bigsh*t. I think it was a factor in the hiring, maybe not the determining factor, but a factor. If someone else believed it was the determining factor, I wouldn't strenuously disagree, much less call his opinion, 'trash, a lazy take.'

I was just checking O. Pareja's Wiki page and thinking 'What's Gregg got that Oscar doesn't?' Neither has international experience so I wouldn't hire either, but between the two, I'd pick Oscar. But what's the difference?

 

Did they happen to mention a year?

 

uh ohhh, here comes the deflection operation. 3 years of "jay and Gregg are not related, they just have the same last name"

Jay mingling in Klinsmann affairs despite not being his direct boss



"Over the past year, U.S. Soccer’s chief commercial director Jay Berhalter—the brother of Columbus Crew SC coach Gregg Berhalter—has started taking over a lot of the day-to-day technical director duties. Berhalter even called an important meeting in Chicago in August that did not include Klinsmann"


https://www.si.com/planet-futbol/20...soccer-jay-berhalter-jason-kreis-vieira-nycfc

 

The OP is having a fit all over the board posting that kind of stuff; he's not supporting his take with anything other than matching the two names and screaming about nepotism. It's absolute meatballery and has no basis in fact.

Given that you're freely admitting there's not difference, that sort of supports the point that he's not getting the job because of nepotism, but because he's qualified.

Maybe the fact he was an international for the US was the tipping point. Only someone predisposed against Berhalter would conclude nepotism. This isn't any different than the Bradley nonsense back in 2007-10; I know reboots are all the rage but let's not reboot that nonsense.

Looking at the resumes blind, the only standout candidate that we're aware of would have been Martino, assuming he was interested. He'd have been my choice, but to simply conclude that Berhalter is getting the job because his brother is the CEO only makes sense if you're choosing to disregard all the other information available and assume there's something nefarious going on.

I don't find it shocking that an organization that just experienced embarrassing failure went safe with a hire. Disappointing, sure, but I'm neither shocked nor angry at the hire. Angry at the incompetent process? Heck yes.

 

Berhalter's coaching resume is actually pretty shitty for coaching such a big national team. It's only a minnow mentality that would think otherwise. Holding out for so long for him means he better step the ******** up and produce a team AT LEAST as good as 2002. He better tear through qualifying with dominant soccer against the weakass field of CONCACAF.

But he won't. He'll coach minnow soccer for the minnow mindset fans with a bunch of water carriers. The AO will have their frat parties and SUM will make its $$$.

 

Pareja's only managed in MLS. Martino aside, who would you have wanted to see them bring in? I'm not even trying to defend this hire, the process was idiotic and we wasted a year, but people are acting like we literally just gave Sarachan the job.

NT managers come from middling or poor club careers all the time. Gareth Southgate was...not good at Middlesborough. Joachim Low was in charged of a collection of minnows before being the Germany assistant.

Also, we don't have the roster to tear through anything right now. There's no top end talent in the front six apart from Pulisic.

 

The problem has been that both Klinsmann and Arena turned out to be bad political choices. Just too divisive. Hence the different candidate. Again, the guy bridges a lot. More than other coaches. I don't see there being some sort of grudge and Berhalter being shoved down people's throats. At least not to the people that are part of the USSF organization.

 

So here are the highlights of Stewart's requirements for new coach:

It seems like he's looking to avoid repeating the mistakes of a previous regime, rather than looking forward to what the US really needs.

That's exactly what got Bruce Arena into trouble isn't it?

 

The hire is about what we could have expected. I think most folks understand.

Most of the frustration seems to understandably come from the fact that we could have made this hire a year ago. There's been zero sense of urgency. We waited for the results of the USSF presidential elections. Then we took forever to hire a technical director. Then we took forever to hire the head coach. In the end we seemingly made the easy and safe hires at both technical director and coach. WHAT TOOK SO LONG!?

There was actually a hiring freeze at the USSF that even led our USYNTs down a precarious path. For a while there we had no full-time U17, U18, U19 or U23 coach. We don't have a full-time goalkeeping coach at any youth level, boys or girls. Olympic qualifying is approaching quickly. We have had NOT ONE U23 camp or match since our failure to qualify for the 2016 Olympics. No coach. Zero games. We're now less than a year away from the qualification tournament. Insane.

 

Well right there if I am your boss, you'd be fired. Everybody knows Frosty has a button nose.

 

The delay in the search was due to the real, nitty gritty negotiations needing to happen around the Berhalter Thanksgiving table.

But they were fighting over who would host.

 

Good post; I don't disagree with any of it. This has been handled terribly from the jump and if this is what people are ticked off about, I'm right there with them.

 

Southgate and Low are products of overall better soccer systems (and they inherited teams of hungry, talented stars). Honestly, to compare them to Berhalter as you do is sophistry of the highest order. I'm disappointed that someone fell for it.

(Interestingly, when Low had to coach a generational transition, he failed. When he got to coach a team of rising fantastic players, he did really well. Hold onto a coach too long....)

 

Berhalter is an ex-international with playing experience in the world cup and a big 4 euro league, as well as domestic club success.

In almost every nation, that qualifies you for being that particular NationsN NT manager position. I mean it happens everywhere.

Berhalter has done fine as an MLS manager.

I'm just glad we have a freaking coach.

Btw his wiki states he's the USMNT manager as of today.

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gregg_Berhalter

United States Men's National TeamEdit
Gregg Berhalter became the head coach of the USMNT on November 29, 2018

 

My point has nothing to do with the comparative talent levels of England and Germany's player pool compared to ours.. If anything, THAT is sophistry. My point is that international managers often don't have great club resumes, and both of them are illustrative to that point.

 

I get not wanting another divisive coach on purpose but nothing about the current team suggested it remains an issue where that is the priority concern. It could be revived with the wrong choice but this is basically 3/4 new players and a new coach so the politics of last cycle verge on irrelevant. Donovan is retired, Cameron aged out, the older Germans disappeared, the coaches got canned.

My thing is if you break it down, Berhalter is less successful than the other possibilities (except Friedel), basically lives off one season years ago when he still didn't take the title, and that this whole "bridge" thing would objectively be all he could sell. If he then gets the job maybe "bridge" is being overemphasized, and as I suggested, maybe we're hiring a coach to fight a war that no longer exists. Other than Pulisic not being available this cycle has actually seemed like the players get along as a unit.

Granted, we don't want this bs flaring back up again, but I think that could be addressed as a tertiary issue behind actual soccer ideas and success. Or by ground rules or contract terms. Thou shalt not stir the pot on this issue or we will fire you for cause. Voila, we can return focus then to winning and a coach who addresses the needs of this young team.

I mean, thus far I am very underwhelmed by how the team has done in the Europe-US "bridge" tenure of Stewart as GM. There is no sign that tapped into any special grasp of where we need to go. Symbolism is not changing how the team plays on the field.

 

and no official announcement yet. How do they know its official?