I think one of the Mexican journalists claimed years back that Luca de la Torre was going to switch to Spain. Didn’t happen I wouldn’t trust what they say. That guy doesn’t even have 3,000 Twitter followers.
Why are you guys always trying to find someone to blame in regards to Mexican-Americans? Kid weighed his options and has a better shot with Mexico than with US. Mexico has old keepers. Ochoa, Talavera, Cota, Orozco are all old and this will be their last cycle. They also have young keepers in Liga MX whom Ochoa can easily compete with. And if Ochoa were to make it to Europe from MLS he would be in consideration even as their main GK. With the US you already have two GK "playing" in Europe, another young GK whom GGG has called in before that still plays reserves in Europe and Turner whom performed well in GC. Plus also add that these kids and/or their parents and family grow up rooting for Mexico and "dreaming" of playing for Mexico. I won't be surprised if Ledezma, Araujo and Pepi end up with Mexico too. Not that I want to but it won't surprise me anymore.
I think too many people were already expecting Ochoa to be the future at GK due to that USSF was promoting him beyond his age group, and RSL gave him a chance to play pretty early in MLS. There are plenty of similarly (or more talented) young GK's in the system. It's a position where we don't have that many young starters anywhere in a first division, but Tomas Romero is only 4 week younger than Ochoa. Would there be such uproar if he cap-tied himself a few months ago to El Salvador? I doubt it. Romero may be the better keeper. Time will tell. Also, Ochoa is far from a prodigy. He's a pretty talented keeper, but does anyone want to tell me he's a sure-thing to be the next Howard, Keller, Friedel, Steffen level keeper that is playing in a top league and a starter level USMNT keeper? Ochoa has shown plenty of inconsistency going back years at all levels. He shows above-average talent, but he's not a sure-thing or ultra-talented. I personally believe for his level of hype, the consistency and talent level doesn't match. He's one of these kids that the Kleiban's talked up. He never played for the Kleiban teams, but the team around him runs in the same circles as the Kleiban's. He benefited a lot from the same media campaign players such as Mendez, Llanez, and Alvarez got.
Ochoa is super talented, hard to tell whether he will be at that level, but he will be way better than Steffen/Horvath and anyone else who played on YNTs since Howard.
I'm no expert on LigaMX but aren't there at least a few other Mexican national eligible keepers starting for their clubs there? Are you telling me all those young 20-25 year old keepers are inferior to Ochoa and Mexico is going to hand the kid the reigns after their Ochoa hangs up his international career post WC. That just seems so highly unlikely I can't imagine what the kid is thinking because there's going to be a ton of pressure for those "true Mexican" keepers to get the starting job over him. He's going to be a gringo on that team.
Ochoa isn’t that talented. I think you should see more of other keepers in his own age group. Don’t trust USSF so much. They don’t always pick the best players for YNT’s. A lot of it is political. He also got lucky that Rimando was retiring at the right time, and he had almost no viable competition. He didn’t earn the spot last season and they handed it to him uncontested this season. If he had to earn it, he probably wouldn’t be starting right now.
Yes, there are some young keepers in Liga MX too also playing 1st team like Ochoa. Are they better than Ochoa? I don't know. But you can tell by the call ups Tata has done, he doesn't trust young keepers as the ones they have are in their 30s. Berhalter on the other hand has called in Ochoa and Odunze both really young keepers. Maybe after 2022 Ochoa will have a shot at the MNT. On a side note, I see several comments on other media that USSF "ignores" the Latino players (even though we have Gio Reyna, David Ochoa, Paul Arriola and Lletget be part of NL and GC). What more can USSF do when at the end these players are still going to pick Mexico? Araujo, Ochoa, Ledezma, Jonathan Gonzalez, Efra Alvarez, Pepi etc have all be given or were given opportunities. If they decide or decided to leave it wasn't because of a lack of trying from USSF. You can't promise any player a spot, they all need to compete for it.
I don't trust to USSF or most other sources either. I trust mostly to what I've seen. Ochoa is exremely talented. There is a chance that he will find a way to waste his talent as he also extremely arrogant but none of our young keepers is any close.
If there’s a real competition for spots at RSL next season, he’ll have his spot at RSL taken from him by a 17 year old IMO. Beavers and Delgado are also within the same realm of talent as Ochoa. Those are three guys from the same club. He’s a dime-a-dozen talent. Given every opportunity a player could be by his club team and USSF. People freaked out about Gonzalez the same way. He was a similarly overrated player without top level talent.
I want to elaborate on this point because I feel pretty strongly about my opinion. I watch a lot of these young keepers. I think I know their games pretty well. It is still very difficult to come up with meaningful differences between most of these keepers. They are almost all the same player. 6'2-6'4, they are okay with their feet because they've been working on it for years but they aren't naturally technical footballers, they are pretty sure-handed but make the occasional error, and they are capable of getting down to stop a low and hard shot or to leap through the air to tip a shot away that could've been on target. This is 80% of the young keepers that are worthwhile prospects. If you asked me the biggest difference between Ochoa and Rando or Ochoa and Lopez, I'd tell you its opportunity. LA Galaxy has three of the same young goalkeeper between Klinsmann, Vom Steeg, and Lopez. Why? Who knows, but none of them will be getting a first team opportunity. Is there a real difference between Rando and Romero? Probably not, but Romero got the first opportunity. Rando's career may suffer due to that. If you look at the best keepers in the world, they usually are elite at specific areas of the game (Neuer with elite feet/elite size/elite shot-stopping, De Gea was elite size/shot-stopping, Donnarumma is elite size/elite shot-stopping, ter-Stegen is elite shot-stopping and elite feet). Thats why a GK like Ochoa is not a player I'd be betting on as a player with big potential. The real guys with potential are the keepers who have a calling card. Opportunity does matter. It will open doors for some, and close doors for others. I don't think that should be discounted, but I simply don't understand the argument Ochoa is some ultra-talented GK. He's a very modern dime-a-dozen GK with the exact same skillset as 15 other young American GK's. There's nothing he does that distinguishes himself. You know who you can't say the same about? Players such as Pepi or Gomez. There are not 15 other young strikers with the skillset of Pepi or 15 young fullbacks with the skillset of Gomez. They have very distinct games. Ochoa does not. He's benefited from a lot of opportunities handed to him, and he still has not distinguished himself. Good luck to him, but we didn't lose a huge talent from our program. Dime-a-dozen talent IMO. Anyone that disagrees feel free to explain why I'm wrong.
I don't really care about Ochoa. We are fine at the GK position and GK come out of nowhere like Turner. I just don't want it to become a trend where we start losing all of the bigger Mexican-American talent to Mexico and their are a fair amount of bigger fish in the pipeline like Pepi, Gomez, Araujo. It is especially frustrating for players that we born in the US, developed in the US, played for USYNT are young and not ignored by USMNT.
Keeper is such a different beast from the other positions. Just consider Matt Turner. 4-year player (not even a starter) at Fairfield. So.................................I can't get worked up about losing a teenage keeper unless he's some sort of prodigy. Do I wish we'd retain everybody? Of course. Who the hell knows what the pool of keepers will be 4 years from. We likely don't even know the name of the "next Matt Turner." So I wish Ochoa well when he's playing anybody but the USMNT.
See the problem here is you assume you have some real ability to evaluate players at this level, if you really did you wouldn't be here posting things like this. The kid is good, he's been good at every level, he's not been handed things undeserved, he's clearly got qualities that coaches at every level recognize. Rando, Lopez, Romero whoever it is you want to try and compare him to have had the same chances he's had at every level to impress the decision makers yet Ochoa comes out on top. He's earned all the opportunities you're clearly very bitter about. You post a lot of great content on here and keep everyone informed with the youth players in the system but you are seriously risking your credibility here with things like "He's a dime-a-dozen talent", "don't trust the ussf", "he was lucky Romando retired".... Ochoa made a decision that's best for him and his career, not for you, not for me, not for supporters. No one should bash him.
Whether he's made a right decision remains to be seen, but Ochoa is a phenomenal talent with a floor of a top MLS keeper. Nobody like him has come from the youth system since Howard, as he is way ahead of Steffen/Horvath/Guzan track and appearance of Turner is just a random lack.
Your problem here is multiple things. You don't have a clue why I post here. I could be working in some capacity within the sport either for a team, organization, or independently, but I choose not to. I purposely have chosen not to. There are many people here who post on this website who do work within the sport. Are you able to identify them as so much more knowledgeable about football than those that don't? I suspect you work in the sport, and you think you have some unique knowledge due to that. I'm sorry to break it to you, but you don't. Maybe if you were Pep Guardiola or Jurgen Klopp you could tout your credentials or talk down to others about football knowledge. You are no more qualified to opine on anything than anyone else here, so don't try to talk down to anyone. If I'm wrong, explain to me why I'm wrong. Trying to take small digs at me isn't the way to convince me or anyone here that you know what you are saying. I don't care about credibility or any view you have of me. I'm not looking for your compliments either. If I'm wrong, explain to me why Ochoa's skillset will take him to the top. What I see is a very average talent who has been given a lot. Soccer in this country is still not completely based on what you prove on the field. Certain players are given everything, others are blacklisted. Ochoa is part of the category that has been given everything, and I think once he has to compete in the world pool that he won't amount to what players such as Pulisic, McKennie, Adams, Reyna, Dest have. I said similar about Jonathan Gonzalez. I'm not tooting my own horn about that. I've been wrong many times before. That was one I happened to get right. The reason I bring this up is because this seems like deja-vu. A player who people didn't make talent-based arguments for. It was more that he was playing first team at an earlier age than most, and that he was well regarded by USYNT coaches to play up in age groups in the past. I said at the time that Gonzalez wasn't a real top talent. He lacked more than an average passing range, was undersized, and not exceptionally athletic in the ground he covered. In essence, nothing stood out. Still, certain people moaned and groaned that it was the end of the world. Explain to me why this situation is any different.
You weren't polite, so I won't be either. I think you need to reevaluate your evaluation of goalkeepers. After you said that Chicago Fire produced GK's are predisposed to be bad, I'm not sure you are looking at this through an objective lens.
Not bad, well coached limited talents. Mediocre. Especially Las who is your superstar. Your explanations about great goalkeepers and "their things" is so naive, that I'm serious about being polite by not arguing with that.
Sure, but Memo's gonna start any meaningful matches through the next World Cup, and it's not like there aren't promising young goalkeepers in Liga MX. This idea that "Turner was so good in Gold Cup it made David Ochoa walk" is what I'm arguing against.— scuffed (@scuffedpod) August 2, 2021 I completely agree with this. I think too many have a mindset that Mexican-American players would switch because we have better options than Mexico does. That might be true, but I don’t think these players think like that. They are competitors. I don’t think this decision has anything to do with the US keepers. Ochoa likely believes he can be better than all the keepers on either NT within a few years. If Araujo switches, it won’t be due to competition. The type of players who could switch for competition reasons are Saucedo or Pineda types.
I agree I can’t understand why he would think he doesn’t have a shot at the US NT. Turner showed really well at the GC, but there were also a couple situations that could have made him look worse had particular players on Mexico. He’s also close to entering his prime as a GK which means if he is our GK for this next World Cup and maybe WC2026, we’ll need someone around Ochoa’s age after. I think he’s probably preferred El Tri rooting for them growing up and/or was pressured by his family/relatives to choose El Tri. Certainly more like it’s one of these two then being worried about not getting an opportunity because there’s better chances ahead of him.
Was played up a full U20 cycle, played up a full U23 cycle with mixed results, called into multiple senior camps at age 20 (one before he turned 20) including an A-team regional final and wearing a champions medal.....then the switch happened not long after the first invitation from the opposing/losing team as a non-roster camp body. Not much more you can do there. If anything Berhalter probably gave him more opportunity than warranted. The main factor is likely he feels more Mexican and his family roots for El Tri and he grew up rooting for them. He does like the US and would have been content enough representing them, but likely always preferred/loves Mexico and was hoping all along for an opportunity. Ultimately we move on with three good young-ish senior options plus a host of youth players such as Brady and Dewsnup who have done well in USL where Ochoa played not long ago. We'll see if the USSF can recruit Romero. This young depth may be a minor factor at best for why Ochoa switched, but not the main one. Or not a factor. One more thought: it is amusing he will be the only player in their pool to touch a recent senior CONCACAF trophy until at least 2023.