I spelled out all of my thoughts on US Soccer here and now I feel a little validated by Geoff Cameron’s comments. Maybe he supports Trump’s travel ban or maybe he’s got a more nuanced view, either way, I’ve learned not to expect similar political views from my favorite athletes. And Geoff Cameron isn’t even one of my favorite athletes. But he is on the US Men’s National Soccer Team and he’s an American in the Premier League, so, he deserves some respect. At the beginning of his essay, he might come across as a little bitter over not having played in the fateful Trinidad and Tobago game in which the US failed to qualify for the World Cup, but it’s brief and as he goes on he starts to make a lot of sense.
He calls out a few things that I agree with. Americans need to play in Europe. Hiring Bruce Arena after firing Jurgen Klinsmann was a step backward. Our privileged, suburban, “silver spoon,” youth soccer culture needs to change.
I’ve long felt that the problem with America and soccer is a cultural one. Americans can’t accept it if they aren’t the best. We are either the best at something, like basketball, democracy, jazz, or putting a boot up Saddam’s ass, or we are going to fix the fact that we are not the best at something like our space program, brewing beer, or imperialism. We’re either the best or we’re going to be. To admit that sending our players to Europe is the only way for us to improve our emerging talent would be to admit that the MLS is an inferior league and probably will be for the foreseeable future and, as Americans, we can’t do that. I think we desperately need to.
As Cameron sees it, this is the view of the US Soccer establishment, that sending players to Europe is disrespectful to the MLS. He takes a different view. He calls moving to Europe from the MLS, “a celebration of the system. Nobody is more proud of having played in MLS than me. The Houston Dynamo launched my entire career. They got me to the Premier League.” He then says, “It should be a huge source of pride to send a 20-year-old American kid to play in the Bundesliga or the Premier League. Even better if they came up in MLS for a few years.”
That comment smacks a bit of PR spin but I still think that it’s valid. Boca Juniors and Ajax – among many others – are both storied clubs whose stars go on to bigger European clubs. You can be a soccer institution and have your players leave for other clubs. Those two things are not mutually exclusive.
Our American exceptionalism creeps into the average American sports fan’s conception of soccer. You hear it all the time. “Can you imagine if our best athletes from the NBA and the NFL played soccer? We’d be amazing.” I used to agree but now I think that it reveals at the very least a misunderstanding of but more likely a complete lack of respect for soccer. Do you know what no one ever says? “Can you imagine how good the NFL would be if our best NBA players were in it?” or vice versa. No one says that because we know that the best possible players are already there. We know that they’ve played that sport their whole lives and bled for it. When we say, “We just need to have our best athletes play soccer and then we’ll be amazing,” we’re essentially saying, “Look we’ll be the best when we get around to it. Our best athletes are otherwise engaged at the moment but we’ll be with your shortly to dominate.”
Cameron says of the Premier League versus MLS, “It’s not just the level of ‘quality’ that’s elevated overseas. It’s more than that. It’s a whole mentality. In the top leagues in Europe, it’s just … ruthless. And not just in training camp. Not just when you’re trying to impress a new manager. Every. Single. Day.” He goes on, “At Stoke, sometimes we have a few of the academy kids come and fill in during practice if we need some extra bodies, and we can usually tell within the first five minutes — seriously, within the first five — whether or not the kid is going to make it as a pro. There’s a certain mentality. A certain look in their eyes. A certain demeanor when they take a really hard tackle. You can recognize it almost instantly.”
In America, we don’t have that hunger for soccer and I don’t know how we can get it. I don’t think it’s adding a new celebrity owned expansion team to another city. And for the time being, it can’t be a strong showing in the World Cup that inspires kids to play. I think we need to engage different communities – rural and inner city – in the sport somehow.
Tomorrow the US Soccer Federation elects a new president. I don’t follow the politics of US Soccer at all but my friends are intrigued. Perhaps with the right selection, it could be the start of a new era.
Maybe but for now I’m more excited to see a player like Cameron play for Stoke rather than for the US National Team. The real problem, though, is that right now I don’t even have the choice.
