News: ESPN: Interim Coach to be Named this Weekend

Gulati. Or was that a trick question?

 

Wow, on Tab's part. Why does he think he deserves the job full time?

 

I doubt this name is on the table, but Richie Williams (aka ABMOD, aka Ritchie) has filled in as interim coach for the Red Bulls several times and has done a great job. Never understood why he wasn't considered for the top job, but nevertheless he has coached an U-xx team, and he is currently on the usmnt staff. He would be a safe choice for the interim job and won't cause controversy when the next coach is named.

Note: ABMOD is an acronym for Ankle-Biting-Midget-Of-Death

 

This is how Colin Trevorrow ended up directing (and then no longer directing) a Star Wars movie.

 

Yeah, that's an excellent observation and comparison. I'm always impressed how far we get on (mostly) talent alone.

For me, it's just difficult to watch how much more disciplined and organized England is with players at the same age. They still had understandable problems which were mostly age/experience related. However, the US had the same age/experience problems AND mental/organizational problems.

The players can have all the talent and individual skill in the world, but it is meaningless for many of them if they can't play the ball out of pressure, be organized on set pieces, maintain shape positionally, execute a high back line, etc... These are areas where high coaching standards absolutely make a difference and help youth players be ready for professional roles.

At 17 years old, most of those players should be able to play different positions and understand what is expected of them. The fact that roster adjustments led to us looking like pick-up team is a coaching problem. Unfortunately, being behind tactically will prevent many of the players from getting meaningful time sooner at the professional level.

 

At times, I'm beginning to wonder if getting US Soccer to accomplish anything is Mission Impossible. Too many different interests in US Soccer don't seem all that interested in effecting any kind of change and are more interested in protecting their own personal fiefdoms.

It's sure starting to look that way. Sadly, it looks like soccer simply missed its opportunity in the USA to be a major sport and will never ever be able to catch up with the rest of the world.

 

That's no less true in any other country. It's probably more true in a lot of them.

In other countries there is a massive financial incentive to have a hand in producing pros of value in the marketplace. In the United States, for a variety of reasons, there is much, much less value to be derived from doing so.

Change the incentives and the results will change.

 

We really underestimate how tough it is. I also become emotionally attached like everyone at times.

The whole situation is like a startup company. You start with a low number of employees that end up working very hard early. All of them care and work as a team, but as the company grows at a more rapid rate the scale begins to outpace their skill or experience. All of the sudden these employees that worked well in the initial stages are being appointed for roles they may not be prepared for, but believe they might deserve. No harm on them for all the work they put in and loyalty shown, but in truth they have no experience scaling a company or managing at a enterprise level complexity.

While it's awesome to be apart of starting a company, the transition can lead to unqualified people being in positions that end up hurting the company and force leadership to make cold, hard decisions after things falter. A lot of startup companies lose a majority of those initial employees after scaling for a number of years. It's similar with US soccer because many of the candidates we talk about were a part of the initial growth phase, but the sport is growing too fast and the customer's are demanding better quality than they might be able to provide. Honestly, I feel bad because many of these coaches and leaders have worked hard in the initial stages and care deeply about the sport, but the sport is out growing their qualifications.

US Soccer is hitting the level where it really needs someone who can manage new variables and is detached from the Cinderella romance of the last 30 years. Allowing unqualified people to remain in charge would not be advisable for any organization that has ambition to reach the scale of a nationwide institution. If this premise is correct, then even hiring Eric Wynalda or Landon Donovan could be a disasterous move when looking for enterprise or governing level decision making. Unless they both have a MBA, law degree, or some equivalent experience hiding somewhere I don't know about.

 

So, in other words, without changing the incentives, USA soccer will be, at best, an also-ran?

 

That's the way I see it.

It's possible that sheer population and interest in the game could push us beyond that, but not with the coaching mediocrity and not to the very top.

It's embarrassing that a system with the kind of resources we have produced the men's national team we've seen over the past 2-3 years.

 

Ya know, we talk a lot of about the anti-competitive model/system here and its affects on players/teams.

Often left out is our anti-competitive model/system applies to our coaching too.

 

I think this is exactly right. I look at the LA Galaxy and see how unambitious they are in hiring.

But this is also incredibly hard to fix. We haven't even had professional academies that long. England has a wide variety of academies, jobs there pay pretty well, and everyone is competing to get the few jobs at the top, which likely lead to prestigious and remunerative careers. And still, for a long time, England had a reputation for not being very good at it.

 

Perhaps a new president would be willing to break up this old boys network.

 

Sarachan or Hackworth aren't remotely qualified for the full time job, which is exactly why either one is who you want as interim. You don't want an interim coach who would be an unqualified but plausible candidate for the full time position, that's how you end up promoting an unqualified interim if they put together some good results (which frequently happens under interims especially if promoted from inside the organization, as players rally around them). We could beat Portugal 10-0 with Sarachan or Hackworth as interim coach and they're not getting the full time job. Thus, both are far safer choices as interim than Ramos.

 

The incentive in England is to produce English stars; the incentive in USA is to sweep good players under the rug to keep them stuck in MLS at low salaries.

 

That's why MLS makes such an effort to get so many of our good players to return from Europe to play in MLS. To stick them with low salaries.....

 

I get what you're saying, and I understand it. But I think both would actually get a crack if the team played well, and won by a few goals. Sunil wants to prove things don't need to change, and I would not put it past him to hire either one until 2019 and thats a nightmare.

We both know they are not qualified but does the people doing the hiring? Id just rather get someone with a job already who knows that it's only 1 game possibly a Jan camp. If they set those parameters publically I won't mind Dave or John nearly as much.

 

What, Kenny Arena has too much pride for an interim tag?

How ridiculous is it that Bruce's right-hand man would be bandied about as temporary replacement when he was supposed to be one of the biggest contributing voices on the staff that ultimately got us ousted from World Cup qualifying. If he had ideas and leadership, you'd think they'd have been on display when it mattered the most. Bob was there and should have been expected to knock some sense into Bruce too. Anybody who was part of those last two staffs should be persona non-grata at this point.

Tab is being ridiculous if he wouldn't accept an interim manager position when that's not even close to being above his pay grade at this point and if he killed it they could just take the tag off. He's the most practical choice both ways for this responsibility, and while I wouldn't project to stick with him, I'd like to give him the chance to be evaluated j

 

I tried to make this point in the youth development thread, this might be the most corrosive aspect of outmr insular uncompetitive system, if the coaching alone were competitive and there were qualified watchers watching the watchers it would probably be the one area with the most potential to really change our system.

 

He thinks he would be no worse than Juergen. He may even be right. He thinks being just as effective as Juergen is a good thing. He is very very wrong.

 

Let's say you're a good coach.

Why would you want to join a failed program with a reputation as cliquish & stuck in the English 70s?

It's not like you couldn't get a much better job, coaching better players, in a system that actually works, for an equivalent or higher salary.

So at this point is not so much who we can afford, but more who wants to come.