Avoiding the Drop

EDIT: Obviously this entire column is wrong, as Casey managed to bag a brace against Honduras. I can’t explain how that happened, but, um, my bad on that. Congrats to Casey and to the U.S., who’ve now officially qualified for the World Cup.

Let’s pretend you’re a salesman. Not just any salesman; you’re considered to be the top salesman in whatever it is you sell (this is a metaphor; the product’s irrelevant). You’re so well regarded in your industry, in fact, that you’re placed on a coalition of salesmen who also are highly regarded. You serve on this committee for many years. You serve on this committee for so long, in fact, that people stop questioning why you’re there in the first place, and stop looking at your productivity records. This is a good thing, because if they looked at your sales records and saw that, in fact, you’d never made any sales or closed on any deals, they might take you off the coalition. Because, you know, that’s how the world for pretty much everybody works; no production, no prestige.

Somehow, Bob Bradley – the manager of the U.S. Men’s National Team – doesn’t see things like this. For tonight’s non-televised match against Honduras, this is the starting lineup:

Howard

Spector – Onyewu – Bocanegra – Bornstein

Holden – Clark – Bradley – Donovan

CONOR FUCKING CASEY – Davies

Look. Casey has never scored. He hasn’t come close. Like Fuse pointed out in an e-mail earlier today, he’s our version of Emile Heskey. The problem with that is twofold: one, Heskey scores occasionally, and two, we’ve already got Brian Ching as our Emile Heskey. Brian Ching sucks, too, but at least he sometimes scores.

Casey doesn’t. He doesn’t link up, either. He is awful. Starting your worst striker in the most important match of qualifying so far is the stupidest thing I’ve ever seen, and it makes me feel like Bradley really has no idea who his starting eleven are, who his talented players are, and who he should take. He needs to be fired.

Because here’s the thing: when Heskey comes on for England, he’s not coming on to score. He’s got a very specific role to play; he holds up play, he slows things down, and lays off a nice pass to a striker. Inserting him into a match is a tactical decision. Inserting Casey isn’t; he doesn’t have the skill to perform that role, which means he’s going to be stranding Davies up top alone.

We’ll talk more next week; until then, enjoy the match (Grant Wahl tells me that US Fans might want to check out this Twitter account; don’t say we’ve never done anything for you).