Eric Wynalda scored 34 goals for the US National Team, 33 in 90 starts (.367 per start), plus 1 more in 16 substitute appearances. The 1994 World Cup game against Switzerland is a reasonable capsule of what he did for the national team -- put us on the scoreboard even though the US wasn't creating much danger. However, in the past couple of years, the US has routinely created good chances for its forwards. Since the start of 2002, our starting forwards have tallied 31 times in 42 games ... dividing by 2 starting forwards per game, that's a strike rate of 0.369 goals per start. That's pretty remarkable -- our average starting forward is putting up numbers that are essentially identical to the output of our best goalscorer ever. After adjusting for substitute appearances, McBride, Mathis, Wolff, and Razov all have better strike rates than Wynalda did. McBride in particular is interesting -- he now has 25 career goals, but more notably, 17 have come in his 24 career starts against Concacaf opponents (0.708 goals per start). IMO, he's still a longshot to pass Wynalda (Steve Sampson's fault), but if he continues to tear up our region, he could come within striking distance.
There was a period of time where I thought that McBride had cooler hair than Wynalda. I was wrong, he didn't.
Given the era that Waldo played in, I think you can make a case for him as best US striker ever. Of course our caliber of opponents is probably higher now than before, so you have to factor that in. I'd say it's between Waldo and McHead right now.
Strike Rates under Arena Razov 0.43 Wolff 0.42 McBride 0.39 Mathis 0.38 Moore 0.36 Donovan 0.35 Stewart 0.29 Kirovski 0.16 Stewart's numbers, and to a lesser extent Donovan's, are presumably dragged down by playing more often in the midfield. So what I take from this table is that from a goalscoring perspective, it hasn't really mattered who plays at forward, as long as it isn't Kirovski (though perhaps MLS will turn him around). These numbers are computed as: Goals Scored ------------------------------------- Starts + 0.2 * Sub Appearances Razov: 6 goal, 12 start, 10 sub Wolff: 6 goal, 12 start, 12 sub McBride: 19 goal, 48 start, 3 sub Mathis: 11 goal, 26 start, 14 sub Moore: 7 goal, 17 start, 12 sub Donovan: 15 goal, 42 start, 7 sub Stewart: 11 goal, 36 start, 11 sub Kirovski: 5 goal, 29 start, 7 sub