Remember Lazo Alavanja? First pick a few years back, a guy who was going to be our stud in the central midfield for years to come, the cause celebre for Burn fans everywhere? Yeah, you remember him. You also remember how we all thought that Jeffries was dumb as a board for not playing him at all, then trading him last year to Miami. Well, fast forward to 2002. It seems that his star is fallen. He's with DC United now and he's the favorite whipping boy of the DC United faithful, some of whom now refer to him as "the worst player in the league." Some United fan commentary on Mr. Alavanja. I kinda feel sorry for the guy. I broke bread with the guy when he was at The Inferno's table a few years ago at the Kickoff Luncheon. But maybe Jeffries did know what he was doing, after all.
remember who? Alavanhia? Did he play here? Just kidding! Those DC fans are probably still subliminally aching from that 40 yard bomb he had against them a couple of seasons back. It was a beauty! Red and Black Madness ps. Lazo's tagline should be: " I almost beat out Ted Eck".
you know there was about half a season when his confidence was high and he was first choice before both Deering and Eck. I still think he COULD have been great. But I suppose there are a lot of could have been greats....
Lazo got a lot of playing time last year with a very good Miami team. Ray Hudson has also given him pretty good playing time this year too. I guess Ray must see something in him he likes. Actually, I heard Jeffries offered him a chance to start at right mid and Lazo turned it down. He saw himself as a middle player. Then he goes to Miami and mostly plays at right mid. Go figure. Seems as I recall, we got two number twos for him. Wasn't one of them traded for T-Bone? If so, that made it an excellent trade right there!
I was one of those people who thought Lazo would be a star. He had size, decent speed, excellent outside shot, and ball control. He was drafted by Dir, who as we know turned out to be a decent talent spotter. The fact that he's not on the field in DC may, or may not, indicate he's not up to MLS standards. I'm not sure anyone in MLS or anywhere else would make DC look good this year. I get the feeling that Lazo is not big into practice. I don't have proof exactly, but both Dir and Jeffries seem to place a LOT of importance on "if you don't do it in practice, how do you expect me to put you in a game?" And after the initial honeymoon with Ray is now over, maybe he's gone back to his less than aggressive work ethic. On pure talent, the guy should be starting. A coach once told me that players are five dimensional. I guess he's lacking somewhere. The five dimensions? Emotional maturity, aggressive competitor, soccer sense, fitness, physical athletic ability that cannot be taught. A player has to have enough of all of them to be a pro. They can be short in some, long on others. But if you don't have the minimum of all, you won't cut it.
Actually he turned down a starting spot becasue he wasn't playing well. He felt he would be letting his teammates down with his game in the state it was. Clearly he had lost his confidence by then.