Chris did have some good moments with the NT during the 90's, but not enough to push out the guys, two of whom you mention, who were ahead of him on the "depth chart" so to speak. The last really meaningful nat's game Chris played in was in the 0-0 tie with Mexico in the Azteca, coming on as a late sub. He had a breakaway, couple of yards ahead of the last defender, had to have been one of the freshest players on the field, and was, as has been pointed out by others, quite fast. Result could have been memorable had he scored, but he flubbed it terribly. I don't mean to sound like I'm ragging on Chris Henderson because I have all the respect in the world for him and his professional career, but at the national team level, he just didn't have enough to really make an impact.
I think that was Mike Burns who flubbed the breakaway, at Azteca by the way.But if you want to talk flubs, Harkes flubbed a million goal scoring chances.He could not finish a sentence.He had a chance at Foxboro in a WCQ against mexico in 97 and mishit the ball from 6 yards.So let's not talk bad flubs.Fukcing Waldo's wife was not the only flub Harkes had.
So far it has to be EJ. No one even remotely similar to 8 goals in his 1st 8 caps- 6 in his first 4. The other wierd ones have been mentioned. I particularly loathe the Wagner/Mason twins.
Well, not quite no one. In 1930, Bert Patenaude scored 6 goals in 4 games, the only 4 he played for the US.
I stand corrected... Bertram Patenaude (November 4, 1909 in Fall River, Massachusetts – November 4, 1974 in Fall River) was an American soccer player, the scorer of the first hat-trick in World Cup history. Patenaude's historic day came on July 17, 1930, as the United States played Paraguay in the inaugural World Cup. Bert scored in the 10th, 15th (originally ruled an own goal, but FIFA later credited the American), and 50th minute to give the US a 3-0 win over the South Americans and claim his spot in world soccer history. The dispute on the second goal led to a confusion on the first-ever World Cup hat-trick, as Argentina's Guillermo Stábile scored one against Mexico just two days after Patenaude. However, FIFA considers the American to own the prestigious honor. Patenaude played just four games for the US (three in the World Cup and a friendly against Brazil) but scored six goals (he had another one in the World Cup opener, a 3-0 win over Belgium, and two in a 4-3 loss to Brazil, the last goals an American would score against the South American giants until Preki got one in 1998). Patenaude played pro soccer in the old American Soccer League, scoring 114 goals in 158 games. He won three US Open Cups, two for the Fall River Marksmen (1930, 1931), and one for St. Louis' Central Breweries (1935), each time teaming up with Billy Gonsalves. He was inducted into the United States National Soccer Hall of Fame in 1971.
Re: Des Armstrong, I remember reading an article awhile back where he said he was very Christian and accused Bora of dropping him from the WC team because he thought Des talking religion with the other players was distracting and hurting the team. True? No clue, I wasn't there and never heard that story elsewhere. But No one refuted it, either. Take it for what it's worth. But looking back it's hard to believe a guy like Mike Lapper or Mike Burns (who didn't play in the 94 WC) made the squad and Armstrong didn't.
Is this for real? Sorry, I'm a newbie but I've gota hear about this. Is Waldo still married to the same woman or is he married at all?
nothing new-just was widely rumored at the time.I assumed people would realize I was not John Harkes nor Eric or Mrs Wynlada so I do not have first hand knowledge.
Don't get me wrong. This is one of the better USMNT N&A threads in a long while, and I salute you for the creativity in starting it. I just wanted to clarify that it's a still just a rumor.
I'm not so sure I believe the rumor about Harkes and Waldo's wife. If you read Captain for Life, John talks about how supportive Wynalda and his wife are of him when Sampson dropped him from the team and how they called everyday. If this wasn't true, with the smack Eric talks, and the questions surrounding this situation to this day (because Sampson will never say why he did it), I'd think Wynalda wouldn't have been supportive, and would have refuted it. Harkes claimed he was still good friends with Wynalda at the time of publishing as well.
Don't know if this counts as bizarre career or whatever, but I played with a guy Troy Snyder, for what we used to call just the East Penna. state team, no Olympic Development thing thrown in. He was pretty thin, but set the national scoring record at Fleetwood HS scoring more than 200 goals! over four years. Was a standout for the U.S. youth national teams, in the early 1980s, but fizzled out. Ended up playing indoors for Dallas for a whole lot of years. Think he is now working for the Reading Rage. I also think Desmond Armstrong's disappearance ranks up there along with Mike Widischmann's.
Three things can be learned from reading this thread: Thing the first is that you guys have some superb stories about guys that history just forgets. Excellent reading. 2. Ex-player is a lawyer 3. Ex-player is missing in Haiti, and has been for donkeys years. Surely by putting thing 2 in charge of thing 3, it could be solved
It was Chris; I still have the tape of that game, and I went back to doublecheck just to make sure. I am not trying to diss Chris Henderson. You are right about Harkes' misses as they happen to every player. Henderson, who was chosen by Gansler in 1990 (ignoring Hugo Perez, Brent Goulet, Frankie Klopas and Ricky Davis) did not play in any of the Italy WC matches. He was not chosen by Bora, SS or da Bruce in subsequent WC rosters. What's the debate? BTW, Chris did score three important goals for the US Olympic team in Olympic qualifiers in 1992 leading up to the Barcelona Olympics. His absolute biggest goal had to be the one vs. Mexico in Mexico City (not Azteca) when the USOT defeated Mexico 2-1. He also scored against Mexico in the home leg in Pennsylvania where the US again defeated Mexico, 3-0. His first goal had been in a 7-1 blowout of Panama, played in Ohio. I'm a little hazy on the memory of this, I think it was due to injury, but he did not play in Barcelona. The 1992 USMOT was coached by Lothar Osiander. One last thing about the supposed screwing of Waldo's wife by John Harkes. You have an inkling about Eric Wynalda's personality, right? Don't you think that EW would have gone after JH with a double-barreled shotgun had that been even remotely true? If you have ever seen Waldo and Harkes palling around together after 1998, you would be hard pressed to believe that really happened. Unless someone has some concrete information and not just hearsay and rumors.
Re Harkes and Waldo. I've seen them together in public, like at RFK chatting before a United game on ESPN2, since the alleged doodling of Waldo's wife. If it is true, and I'm not saying it's not, they damn sure put up a good public face acting like there is no animosity between them. I'm guessing either it didn't happen or Waldo was OK with Harkes tappin' Mrs. W.
A professor I know at Ga Tech http://gtalumni.org/news/magazine/sum94/zinn.html Also mentioned (w/o the cap) in the National Soccer Hall of fame site, http://www.soccerhall.org/ColinJose/InternationalSoccerLeague.htm SO he says he was capped by both the US and Israel.
Remember Waldo's MLSNET column? I could have swore at least a year ago he wrote one about this issue, where he claims it was so horrible that Harkes was dropped, regardless of all the stories from all sides. The rest of that article is doing what he always does, calls somebody out for their actions. This is not the column about Sampson joining the Galaxy; it was months before that. Probably near when he started. I think it gives a good view on how he feels about the subject: ignore the rumors, focus on the facts. Harkes was dropped, and dropping the captain is seldom a good idea.