A lot going on off the field with that kid that we weren't aware of. The biggest disappearing act since Jesse Gonzalez (who as far as I can tell fell off the face of the planet after not actually being charged with anything).
The biggest issue of evaluation of the U17 team is that people focus on results too much. It's immaterial that the U17 team didn't do well in the World Cup. It really shouldn't have mattered then in terms of projection (obviously, we all like to see our team win). There's a decent amount to learn about players at 16, 17. Nothing is guaranteed and things can change, but you can get a good view of what their skills are, where they are athletically, and some sense of their tactical knowledge. We also need to adjust a lot for the age of the player -- players improve massively from 16 to 17 in many cases, often because of physical maturation. And allow for the fact that a lot of development is going to happen afterwards. It's probably a better indicator to be holding your own at a year younger at this level than playing well a year older. I know that seems kind of insane but it is true in almost every sport. As a point: a year later, and Gio Reyna was on the USMNT. That said, if we just ignore results, it is interesting just how many of the big prospect names on that U17 team have actually panned out pretty well. Reyna, Busio, Scally, Pepi, Bello were the largest hyped field players going in. Note that all but Busio were actually 16 -- people downgraded a lot of these guys for poor performance but they were all 6-12 months younger than a lot of their competition. There were valid question marks then, but each of them showed something that was projectable. Carleton did as well. Tons of skill, a lot of swag, and like Busio from that above list, the question mark was how much athleticism. Turned out work ethic was another, which is something we aren't going to see in a WC. U17 teams rarely turn out this much National Team talent -- I think this one is getting helped a bit by the lost generation, but it still has given us a very good group for a U17. But we never should have been turned off by bad results. It was a young team overall, but with most of its talent being very young as well, with a ton of the talent being distributed to wide players and goalkeeper and very little in terms of spine. We played a LB at CB, and struggled to find any kind of midfield strength -- Kayo was the only guy there with strong athleticism and Leyva was the most skilled ... and again, a 16 year old.
Nope. Kayo, Leyva, Saldana, Dietz played the more defensive CMs. Tayvon Gray was on the team but as a CB. The team was playing a decent number of converted CBs (like Kobe Hernandez Foster) and was simply not great behind Busio in the middle. No one really played incredible well, but the team was just weirdly strong on the outside.
Alex Mendez is a favorite of mine. He can hit the ball six ways from Sunday with his left foot. I’d love to see him get some burn.
too bad he has been so poor during his career so far at literally everything else but his agent has a hilarious twitter game so there is that.
I don’t understand the need for USMNT followers to divide into camps that advocate or denigrate players. Its much more enjoyable to ride the ebbs and flows of careers alongside the player rather than to get mad at things someone has no control over.
Knocking on the door 23 Note: Not including well-integrated players who were not selected (i.e. Ream, Brooks). Also, not counting injured players (Reyna, Dest, etc) or recently returned from severe injury players (ie Morris, Ledezma) GOALKEEPERS 1. Brad Guzan 2. Gaga Slonina 3. Tim Melia HM: Bill Hamid, Ethan Horvath, Jeff Dewsnup, Alex Rando, Alex Borto While Turner and Steffen are fighting for number one. Guzan and Johnson are fighting for number three... Meanwhile, Horvath has destroyed his career with his move to Nottingham Forest. Melia is there as a warm body. If we get into an oh crap situation, he probably is the most likely to fill in and not crap his pants. That said, I should emphasize, he’s simply a reserve. Slonina is the future of the program. Sooner than later, I want to see him get brought in to train with the big boys. RIGHT BACKS 1. Aaron Herrera 2. Kyle Duncan HM: Bryan Reynolds, Brooks Lennon The assist king, Aaron Herrera has earned a call up... especially while other right backs have stalled. There’s been rumor that Guatemala want him, but I think he has a legit shot to compete for the 23. That should keep him in our camp. Meanwhile, Kyle Duncan is another legit right back who should get a winter camp call up which who knows what happens after that. One who was not mentioned but had a stellar season is Brooks Lennon. On the other hand, Bryan Reynolds’ career is on life support to thanks to Jose Mourinho. Hopefully, Reynolds gets a good loan and get his career back on track. CENTER BACKS 1. Cameron Carter-Vickers 2. Matt Miazga HM: Henry Kessler, Donovan Pines, Erik Palmer-Brown, Lennard Maloney, Jonathan Tomkinson, Justin Che I included only CCV and Miazga on this list because center back is the only position on this team that needs to arguably grow smaller than larger. That said, Miazga was on fire, being on the La Liga team on the month recently. But he’s been benched... which is a bit odd. And Carter-Vickers has locked down a starting spot for legendary Celtic. LEFT BACKS 1. DeJuan Jones 2. John Tolkin 3. Kevin Paredes HM: Andrew Gutman At the start of the year, I would have taken anyone with a pulse at left back. This year, we’ve had three very promising players emerge out of MLS at the left back position. From a potential standpoint, we should all be hyped for Tolkin and Paredes, but DeJuan Jones who is still very young (would have been Olympic eligible) had a breakout season, and it would be a sin if he didn’t even get a look. He’s got the size, speed, skill, and tenacity to be a solid international fullback. DEFENSIVE MIDFIELDERS 1. Christian Cappis 2. Tanner Tessman 3. Johnny Cardoso HM: Chris Durkin, Leon Flach, Moses Nyeman, Josh Atencio, Jack McGlynn, Taylor Booth Cappis has been banging on the door. And he should get a call up sooner than later. Tessman might be sneaking into the equation.... but it’s too soon to tell. It’s too hard for me to know to include Johnny or not... the South American leagues are always difficult for me to gauge. I would like Gregg to call in regardless because I know Internacional is one of the top clubs in the Western Hemisphere, and Johnny has been playing a lot for them recently. PLAYMAKERS/WINGERS 1. Luca de la Torre 2. Konrad de la Fuente 3. Djordje Mihailovic 4. Niko Gioacchini 5. Matthew Hoppe 6. Caden Clark HM: Paxten Aaronson, Paxton Pomykal, Alan Sonora, Julian Green, Jonathan Lewis, Alex Mendez, Cole Bassett, Samuel Shashoua, Diego Luna, Dante Sealy It’s almost criminal that De la Torre wasn’t included. He’s been on fire. Meanwhile, Matthew Hoppe has hit a rough patch. Niko Gioacchini has done alright but he’s not broken out either. On the other hand, Konrad has been playing regularly for powerhouse OM, and it’s sinful that he wasn’t included. Djordje has his best ever year in MLS. Clark and Cowell seem to regaining their form. Pomykal is finding his groove. Sonora was hot, the last time I checked. But Green has been frozen out. And the rest are the on outside looking in. CENTER FORWARDS 1. Daryl Dike 2. Cade Cowell HM: Haji Wright, Benji Kikanovic, Malick Sanogo How was Dike NOT included? That’s almost criminal. Cowell is a really talented player, and it should only be a matter of time before he’s a mainstay.
I don’t understand the point of denigrating the players. They’re just human beings, doing their best. As a fan of our National team, I’d like to see all these guys thrive. I will admit, I especially like to see guys succeed when they show traits I admire in life: humility, commitment, a sense of honor, and an orientation towards something bigger than themselves, etc. I admire countries like Denmark in how they support their team. It’s about unity.
agreed! Mendez has just started his team's last 3 matches in the Portugeuse first division FWIW hardly a "bust" at this point!
Alex has chosen to play for USA national team after speaking to head coach Gregg Berhalter.He also notified the FA & U20 England coach Andy Edwards. Nottingham Forest's Alex Mighten set to commit his future to the USA?? https://t.co/0iEbRNL4jy via @MailOnline— Grant (@Grantnffc1) November 8, 2021 Looks like Alex Mighten has spoken with GGG and will switch to the USMNT nice pickup!
faster, better able to actually beat international caliber defenders and end product??? thats where I see the areas of improvement for kdlf
im pretty neutral on him. brooks, robinson, richards and zim are my four, im a big miazga guy so hes 5 but i dont want mckenzie in the team. even if i cared about ccv and/or epb that much its a waste of time- theyre clearly not in the picture. i dont know what to make of che- a decent season on a pretty poor dallas team where he couldnt get a sniff at cb...yet if bayern buys him hes world class? but really im looking at it pretty simply- this summer in the gold cup showed another cb option in mls would be a pretty helpful piece to have. theres nothing behind miles, zim and sands. i dont know where long fits in that short list, but its damn sure ahead of kessler and pines. with mckenzie proving (imo) to be a very mediocre option whos outliers go the wrong direction our cb depth isnt really what we make it out to be. so i dont have any problem with long being somewhere in consideration. ...if he walks back into the team and richards is on the bench behind him i obviously wont be as ok with the idea but brooks/robinson/richards being tier 1 with zim/miazga/sands/long rounding out the pool is ok by me. the problem though is timing. qualifiers (until qualified) arent the place to work guys back in and its hard to see him "overtake" guys and solidify the fourth spot by the world cup- at which point he will be 30. 34 isnt prohibitively old on its own but theres no qualifying for him to play the seasoned vet role in. i think he could help us out in places, but i dont know how much time you want to invest in him, you know?
Health and talent wise, he should be a factor. We cannot rule out that he was a locked starter for Berhalter before his injury. But, from a depth standpoint, I think he’s out unless something catastrophic happens. Miles Robinson is a lock. Chris Richards is now a lock. Walker Zimmerman should be a lock. I can’t believe John Brooks isn’t a lock. ...That’s it. That’s our group: Brooks, Richards, Zimmerman, and Miles. And I should note that center back is a position where chemistry matters more and you don’t rotate often. That works against Long. Now, I think McKenzie is a liability. Ream should have been dropped a long time ago... no matter how good he is for Fulham. He’s too old and slow. CCV has never been acclimated. And Miazga has fallen out of favor at Alaves, surprisingly, after a very good month there. So, it’s not outside the realm of possibility that Aaron Long factors again. But he needs to have a hell of a return. Personally, I wouldn’t bet on it.
We have to see how he recovers. I wouldn't at all be surprised if he's a national team-level player, maybe the 4th or 5th or 6th on the depth chart, a year or a year-and-a-half from now (maybe just missing the World Cup). But probably not before then. The old, not-exactly-accurate saw is that it takes 1.5x as long to get back to your previous playing level as you it took you to heal. It doesn't matter if it's exactly accurate. I means that we won't have a national team-caliber Aaron Long in the near future.
I don’t dislike Aaron Long but even at his peak I wasn’t high on him. I’m his absence I think Zimmerman, Miles and Richards are showing more than he did. Even if he regains what he once was I don’t see him playing games that matter unless there are multiple injuries.
I like Long. He was great with Red Bull for the most part pre injury. He was a perfect compliment to JAB. If he played in Europe the usual suspects would have been less critical of him. That being said the game is cruel, and that injury probably closed the window on him. I agree w u however. If u played Brooks Long had to be the guy. Miazga, Vickers, whatever the flavor of the mth was just couldn’t cover Brook’s weakness like Long could. Miles much better at it. Has to play if Brooks plays. Richards has the ability to do it also. Just needs to keep getting time. Zimmerman is what he is. Solid defender, so so passer, great attitude and leader, strong in the air. He needs a more cultured partner w him IMO. I haven’t given up on McKenzie. He has a lot of traits u want in a modern back. Just needs time. That may work against him this cycle.
I would out Hoppe at CF, but if holdup/distribution/back to the goal skills is a requirement I see why you out him elsewhere. Any ideas why Mihailovic never gets a look? Statistically he has dominated other MLSers who get multiple calls into camp at the same position, and has done so for at least two years.