Dual nationals who could suit up for the US.

The issue is really aggressively pushing guys to switch when they are nowhere close to Mexico National Team (or the USMNT). And because you have to file a switch by pushing guys to do so, you are locking them in when there's not even an opportunity in sight.

Mexico is pushing guys like Mendez or Ledezma to switch, but they aren't really being offered an opportunity. Neither is close to playing for the Mexican national team and neither would have any chance of going to the World Cup. It's all about locking in guys now in case they develop for later.

The same goes for Ochoa btw. He's not close to either national team and it's not as if he's getting some opportunity the Mexican National Team that was being denied to him with the USMNT.

At the end of the day I'm not a fan of pushing players to make a decision before they are actually at the point where they have to. Especially when it comes to guys who are genuinely undecided (as some players just know from the very start who they want to play for).

 

They were courted. They were asked, "hey, why don't you switch to Mexico?"

That is what people around here call "predatory."

As I said, I don't think the word "predatory" belongs in the discussion. It's playing the game. And, the U.S. would be stupid not to play the game.

But, if "predatory" is a thing, what Mex is doing is that.

 

Its called recruiting.

And as for the latter argument, that's like saying that it was perfectly fine to drink five bottles of vodka and drive down Mulholland Drive afterwards because I didnt end up dead. Somebody else can post the term for that form of fallacious reasoning/argument, ex post facto, whatever, I dont know, they screwed up, badly, and the screw up didn't end up hurting them. That's not called quality recruiting or quality scouting, that's called "lucking out", and it isn't a plan of any sort, it's asinine bull----.

This isn't the 1970's, it's the 2020's, Ohio State, Georgia, Clemson, Alabama etc win because they know how to recruit and have a system in place that works. All those teams know if the player picks a different hat, they put their best foot forward and lost, no questions or self-recrimination, you can tell this when a recruit like Justin Fields is fumbled, and snapped right back up by Ohio State, rather than say, the University of Washington. We need to recruit in that fashion.

I know Berhalter isn't doing that, but at least I'm confident that Berhalter is representing the US fairly well to players and giving them a genuinely honest and good approach, I can live for now with his methods because he's managed to hook so far the biggest targets we have been after (Dest and Musah) and the losses thus far have been second tier and third tier players and not really on him in the way the Gonzales loss was partly due to incompetence from us (luckily it didn't hurt us).

 

A healthy Ledezma is a guy I think can force his way onto the team. Players like Tyler Adams have sang his praise as has Gregg.

 

I don't believe that Mexico did anything predatory as far as Gonzalez is concerned. Arena was on his "there are players in MLS who play his position" point to prove and did not attempt to even contact Jona. Rongen then totally destroyed any trust that the player might have had by lying about contacts with his parents and then demeaned them by suggesting stereotypical language barrier nonsense.

We handed the player to Mexico on a platter. Berhalter does not do that and pays serious attention to connecting with and recruiting players. Musah, Dest, and Pepi speak to those efforst.

 

Again - did I single out Gonzalez? I don't think I've mentioned him specifically, or even tangentally.

If there is such a thing as "predatory," then enticing a switch for a guy that's not near helping your full NT ..... that's as predatory as it gets. It would be much more predatory than capping a guy that has been in the system their whole career - which people are calling "predatory."

But, I think that "predatory" is thrown around wayyyyyyyyyyyyyy too freely.

I'd cap Mendez, Ledezma, Slonino, and Gomez in an NL match in a heartbeat. That's not predatory. That is determining who is legitimately in your pool so that you can direct resources their way, or not.

 

See I wouldn't cap a player like Mendez in the Nations League because I don't think he's particularly close to the full national team or to making the World Cup. I don't feel the need to force such a decision until that happens, but also there's other players I'd rather see instead.

I think for someone like Mendez his time to decide may come next summer post World Cup during the Nations League and Gold Cup where it's very possible we may have a less than first choice roster.

Slonina I also think doesn't seem like he's quite ready to be the starter. I'd much rather he be playing with the U20s.

I think if Ledezma were healthy he may have been in during qualifying. I'd call him to camp just to see where he's at.

Gomez is the most interesting one in that he's maybe not quite ready but he plays a position of real need where we have no backup behind Jedi.

 

My definition of predatory would be capping a player that you are fairly certain won't get a chance with your NT just to prevent another NT from getting the player.

I think the way to handle it is the way Klinsmann did with Tesho Akindele after Tesho won MLS ROTY. Call him in, evaluate him then tell him the honest truth about his chances of featuring for the NT. In Tesho's case almost no chance. Some were upset but IMO, that is the way to look out for the player.

I don't think any of the players you listed need to be capped anytime soon. Way too many players ahead of them on the depth chart.

 

Jermaine Jones was a predatory cap tie? Good lord, go back to the Mexico board. That isn't even a good troll. It's just dumb.

I feel bad for you that you even thought that was interesting in any way.

 

lol

 

So I see you've been drinking the new batch of Kool Aide the El Tri content fan pages have been peddling I remember when this list was going around as "the next big thing for El Tri". Now most of these kids are nobodies.

Top 10 🇲🇽 U21 Prospects with @Jovenesfutmx ⤵️

🇲🇽 José Juan Macías
🇲🇽 Eugenio Pizzuto
🇲🇽 Efraín Álvarez
🇲🇽 Marcel Ruiz
🇲🇽 Johan Vasquez
🇲🇽 Alejandro Gómez
🇲🇽 Eduardo Garcia
🇲🇽 Gerardo Arteaga
🇲🇽 Roberto Alvarado
🇲🇽 Carlos Higuera

So much talent here. 🤩

Who is missing? 🤔 pic.twitter.com/zMaqNf8GN9

— Football Wonderkids (@fbwonderkids) May 12, 2020

Im sure these "fresh batch of youngsters" will still be around signing contract extensions in liga MX at age 25. These MX fan pages thirst more these days about Mexican Americans then Liga Mx prospects, Not the attitude of a fan base that has their own exciting domestic prospects.

 

You’re obviously trolling, but…

I think a lot of people thought Castillo was the solution to our LB problems that plagued the team for several cycles. He had a good couple seasons for Leon(?) Santos(?)…then got called up for us but never really looked international caliber. Then dropped off the map. People were REALLY excited around here and then quickly not.

 

Lol, 2 of those guys played in a World Cup, and the third was a locked a starter for us when he filed that switch

 

This whole nonsensical "predatory capping" discourse has to stop. Every nation is doing the same thing. Fans are accusing other nations of doing exactly what their own federation is doing. Recruiting aggressively those players in their diaspora and player pool. People apparently think players are naive and don't know what they're doing. Players have a general understanding of where they sit in a player pool. Players know there's no guarantee of future opportunities if they switch allegiances. Do people really think Tata Martino promised Julian Araujo or David Ochoa a regular place? Of course not, the players still have to earn that right.

The players CHOOSE which team they want to play for. Maybe the harsh reality that some USMNT fans can't accept is that these players are CHOOSING to play for another nation. And we were really aggressive with Jonathan Gonzalez, Julian Araujo, David Ochoa. All of them were playing up an age group with USYNTs. Hell, Ochoa and Araujo were two of the youngest members of our Olympic qualifying team (along with Tessmann). Nobody can say the USSF or USMNT/USYNT staff didn't provide them with opportunities. They just chose another direction. What are we supposed to say if Jonathan Gomez chooses Mexico? We called him up to the senior USMNT when he was playing in the USL. People act like he's already Cafu. Mexico and the US are fighting over a prospect that could go either way. He could go the direction of Jonathan Gonzalez and fall off the planet or become a fixture on the international stage. The same can be said for these other young players like Caden Clark, etc.

 

I have stated this same thing for years. And it has nothing to do with soccer. Where does your allegiance lie? The problem is too many think that forcing an adult to choose their citizenship makes them shun some other country they are tied to. Nonsense. Deciding to align your citizenship with country A does not mean you are shunning country B at all. But this whole dual citizenship stuff drives me crazy.

 

But anyway, we dodged a couple of bullets on Puerto Rico's Nations League team. Brandon Servania, for instance, isn't listed. His brother is.

These aren't "dual-nationals" as they're all American citizens. But Puerto Rico went very young on this roster of USMNT-eligible players.

'01 Rodolfo Sulia,'01 Beto Ydrach, '01 Jaden Servania, '01 Alec Díaz, '03 Colby Quinoñes, '03 Parker O'Ferral, '03 Brian Flores, '03 Wilfredo Rivera, '03 Leandro Antonetti, '04 Jeremy de Leon, '04 Ian Silva, and '05 Diego Rossi.

 

Its just going to get worse and worse and worse as we improve and our player pool continues to expand. People will drive themselves insane stressing about every young dual-national. There are only so many opportunities.

MOST of these youth dual-nationals choosing Mexico over the USMNT....................will never be good enough for either. See Gonzalez, Jonathan.

Who was that young left back from California that USYNT fans were freaking out about after he chose Mexico? Oh, Edwin Lara. After playing at Pachuca, he's now playing for San Diego in the USL.

Alex Alcala. One of the younger dual-nats people talk about. Now at the Galaxy academy, with some sort of agreement to move to Manchester City. He's like 5'1." Come on people...................use your heads.

 

Lara actually did a one-time switch back to the USYNT set-up.

 

Ummm... ok, it's not a troll. It's just that you have no idea what a predatory cap tie is, apparently.

We didn't convince Jermaine Jones to come play for the US simply to keep him away from the Germans or to stash him away in case we need him some day. That'd be a predatory cap tie.

We played him 69 times and in a World Cup. We recruited him in all good faith to play a major role on our team and he did.

There's nothing predatory about that. What's predatory is convincing someone to make a permanent commitment without any real intention to play them or to give them a chance to compete; you're just accumulating talent or keeping them from an opponent.

Efrain Alvarez, David Ochoa, and Jonathon Gonzalez all got a token game and then disappeared from the radar. Perhaps the FMF was really 100% up front that they had no real shot, and that the token game was just that. But I seriously doubt it.

 

I think the closest thing we've had to a predatory cap-tie (or at least one that sort of seems that way in retrospect) was Teal Bunbury.

Even Edgar Castillo started in a Hex qualifier and appeared as a sub in several others.

 

I believe he had 18 caps. Eighteen! I'm not talking about guys who had a clear chance to perform, to compete.

I'm talking about guys who clearly were never in the plans, and were stashed either "just in case" or to keep them away from other teams.

I think people are delusional if they don't think some of these players are misled as to their chances or opportunities. This happens all the time in recruiting -- you can sit in a room and say "you will have a chance to compete, but no promises" and "I can see you doing X, Y, and Z" and "we'll bring you in" while thinking "I'll give them a game but this player is not nearly good enough any time soon."

 

I would note #1 that I do think Ochoa has a chance, Araujo will be a part of the pool, and that other guys like Gomez probably would be if they joined, just like Flores who just chose them over Canada, and there are more on the way.....I think part of the problem for Mexico this cycle is they have an older coach that prefers vets to young prospects mistakes and upside, if we switched sides, something I wanted in '19, we'd probably have a better more consistent team, but also a situation that would lead to far more tearing out of hair while El Tri would be playing a much younger side in terms of average age for the 23/26 etc. However because of the coach, you're seeing caution and so an older team and fewer caps for the switches.

I absolutely think this isn't the same across feds because different countries have different attitudes towards the concept of a dual nat, and different pools. Brazil and France literally can't care about this, the pool is simply too large, while countries in CAF, and Concacaf must care about it because so many of the players move around so much due to family needs and situation. No doubt we are going to lose more and more guys, what intrigues me the most, though, is the incredibly odd thing that the US seems to be producing nearly as many legit senior team prospects as Mexico itself lately, and that Mexican youth prospects seem to be stalling out more often than in the past.

When you think about all the quality prospects of Mexican-American heritage coming up here vs Mexico, it does look, like something that should be deeply alarming for an El Tri fan. Why is the slow down happening? Not sure, but its definitely happening and they're going after guys in a way I don't believe I would have seen 10 and especially 15-20 years ago.

Hopefully the US continues to have more and more success going forward and is just more attractive as a result for youngsters coming up the next decade born here but of dual nat status, but it will take time, I do believe, at least for kids out west, the pull of El Tri is just massively difficult to push aside, as per usual all my students I talk soccer with are El Tri first, and just curious about the US, rather than fans. Maybe another pratfall for El Tri in '22 and US success could change that, and hopefully that happens but El Tri's easy draw for the group stage anyway says yet another repeat of R16 and out is in the cards.

 

I mean, sure. There are plenty of legitimate recruiting situations -- I think Flores is one, Araujo is one, etc.

I have no idea what Mexico said to Ochoa, or Gonzalez, or Efrain Alvarez. They might have been perfectly honest with them. We will never really know.

But it's the <100 minutes of unimportant game time in a single token camp right after conversion that is a hallmark of this kind of shit. It's the guy who tells the girl he loves her so she'll sleep with him, then he never calls her again. It's her choice, but it's still shitty. And now imagine that she can't date anyone else ever again -- because this is basically a permanent choice.

Perhaps Mexico is 100% above board and these kids just will do anything for even the slightest chance at El Tri. Totally possible.

But that token game ... it just reeks of a recruiter implying a real chance, then following through with the letter of the promise but not the spirit. Are we really to believe that they thought Alvarez was good enough for the GC but then realized in camp he can't compete? For a team with no offense?

As for some of the other arguments here:

1. A player like Araujo or Tyler Boyd or whatever are getting/got chances. There's no red flag there.
2. Yes, it's the player's choice and many will make it with full understanding, great. I have no issues with that. But it is delusional to think 18 year olds don't get caught up in the moment or can't be misled. A con man can steal someone's life savings through the mark making a choice; it doesn't make it ethical.
3. This isn't about me worrying about losing players. I think I've been pretty clear that while many of these guys may end up being talents (Araujo, Slonina in particular), that's great for them, and we'll find someone else to cheer for. I just hate the lying and deception that comes with recruiting, especially considering the permanence of the choice.

By all accounts, Mexico gives the hard sell. When Berhalter talks about experiencing both sides and following their heart, the mouthpieces of the FMF claim we don't give opportunity and seem to push heavy for conversion.

To claim these are the same seems ridiculous to me.