He probably is worrying about the same thing. I think he will probably have a press conference of some sort with Waldo and maybe sampson showing that its squashed and how much of a mistake he made. Or at least make a statement about it through writing to the press.
I've been praying for a long time that Harkes would stop commentating. If he continues I'll only want to set myself on fire more. Although...any chance we see a 3-man broadcast this summer with JP, Harkes, AND Wynalda??? I'd be okay with that...not for soccer reasons though. On the rare occasion(s) that Wynalda and Arena were in the broadcast booth I thought the unintentional comedy was off the charts...
Totally agree with RegularGuy. It was clear at the top of the show when Wynalda made a referece to a "big topic later" that they knew they were going to talk about it. It clearly was not "off the hip" statement from Wynalda but a well thought out plan given the opportunity which had presented itself with the Terry fiasco. I don't know how ChelseaMatt saw it otherwise.
JP: The US had a difficult road to qualify for the WC, following the loss in Mexico City EW: (needing to talk about himself) All American teams have a tough time in Azteca. I remember the time Cobi Jones coughed up some brown stuff at halftime. We were part of the team that got a tie down there. JH: That was a tough environment. But after gaining that draw, we flew back to the states and had a team party. I got drunk and f*cked your wife while you were brushing out 'Celo's ponytail. Ahh, good times.
You're really on an anti-Sampson jihad on this thread. I think you're being incredibly unfair to him. It was an impossible situation. All Sampson could do was make a "least horrible" kind of decision. And btw, from reports, he DID give the team some idea of why Harkes was cut.
HE'S NOT MAKING EXCUSES!!! If he wanted to "make excuses" for his failures in 1998 he would have brought this up right after the WC.
Although the Terry situation presented the perfect segue, I have to believe that Wynalda's true motivation is further revenge. Waldo is basically black-balled as a prime time commentator at this point, while Harkes is getting USMNT matches. Wynalda had to know he was putting a bullet in Harkes's hull as a commentator and, frankly, I'd be pretty surprised if Harkes's commentating career survives the official revelation. Waldo's loving it. (And who can blame him?)
OK, I posted the above before I got to this. I'm calling bullshit. You have NOT seen hundreds of work situations involving co-workers ********ing each other's wives. Unless you're counting nightly Soap Network viewings of General Hospital or something.
There's a clip floating around bigsoccer. You can find the link on the FFF thread in the television forum. When I saw that, I had the exact opposite reaction. Wynalda was pretty somber, Nick set it up...I'm 99.9% sure they decided before the show to talk about 1998. Please explain, then, why Sampson kept it quiet for 12 years. A man with "no class" wouldn't do that.
I can see where Regular Guy was coming from, but here's how I read it otherwise. Webster refers to Wynalda's experience a lot, and it is unclear whether Webster was specifically commenting on the affair or just about knowing what it's like to play on a national team in general. And about referring to a big topic, well the Terry affair is a big topic whether or not they were referring to Wynalda's similar experience. Besides, they're trying to sell their show -- they talk about big topics coming up later even when they're not planning to reveal a bombshell. I just think that Wynalda would have elaborated on it more and spoken about it less cryptically if he'd meant to talk about it all. And the fact that Sampson called Wynalda afterward to ask if he could talk about it shows that I'm not the only one who read the situation that way -- Sampson thought it might have been a slip as well -- and he knew the guy after having coached him.
Okay, you got me -- he showed class by keeping it quiet for 12 years. But right now, he's showing no class by naming all the people who knew about it without their permission. And he's still making excuses for '98 -- not putting the blame on his shoulders where it belongs.
Damn man. I wouldn't even say that about the ONE woman in question. You probably think all men are whores too, though, am I right?
Well i thnk WE ALL know that... LOL its in our genes to keep spreading the seed man! Like a flower during polination!
[ame="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=n-pdu0rO5IQ"]YouTube- @myopic [Wynalda on Harkes adultery][/ame] Webster definitely sets this up for him, and it was obviously planned.
[ Would I be surprised if it came to light that Waldo cheated on Amy before she slept with Harkes? Not in the least. He's a pro athlete and they are notorious man-whores. Nature of the beast. Just as it was no secret to those of us in the DC area that Harkes wasn't faithful to his wife and just like most pro athletes aren't faithful to their wives. If Waldo was cheating on her I don't blame Amy for stepping out as well. But Harkes crossed the line, not because HE cheated on his wife because he was doing that anyway and no one, including Steve Sampson, would have cared about that. But sleeping with a teammates' (and friend's) wife violates all sorts of man-codes and crosses all kinds of lines and is just something that can't tolerated or accepted.
It doesn't excuse Harkes, but it's obvious Wynalda is doing a little self promotion here. Also, why would Wynalda make this public knowledge leaving his kids to think his mom is a whore? He comes off as a selfish prick in this whole deal as well, with his book coming out soon and all. Better to let sleeping dogs lie. I've never been in this position, but if my wife and I ever had issues like this, the last thing I would want is my kids knowing mom or dad was unfaithful regardless of who was in the wrong.
Yeah, I was watching it live and I guess I wasn't paying that close attention to it -- I didn't catch the specific references he made until rewatching the clip, but still, Wynalda kept things cryptic and said "allegations" -- I guess watching it the first time, I was struck more by the cryptic nature of their conversation and how uncomfortable Wynalda was talking about it, and how he changed the subject. I can see now how it may have been a planned topic of conversation, but it remained very cryptic if Wynalda were trying to make a statement.
Sampson came out today in Soccer365.com and admitted there was an affair... I grew up with this team, the Ramos, Meola, Keller, Lalas, Balboa, Reyna era. It was kinda harsh to and felt really wierd to read this. This team was unified and had alot of heart, and guts.... Sometimes I feel that the Donovan, Dempsey, DMB, Gooch era are better soccer players but at times lacked the killer instinct the previous era had. But this incident trully broke the team apart. Roy Wegarle did the right thing by telling steve something was going on. I think Sampson did the right thing by most likely getting the two together and using a cooler head decided to leave Harkes out, which was the right thing to do given the nature of the situation.... Odd cause Wynalda and Samspons internal relationship would end terribly shortly there after..... I think there is still more to the France 98 disaster besides the Harkes Wynalda affair.... I mean Lalas, Balboa were removed from the starting line up.... There was a lot more going on... It would make for a intresting read to find out the complete truth.... But yeah the Harkes - Wynalda affair I think was just another incident of many that ended with the 0-3 98 world cup....