Avoiding the Drop

In the past, I would have captioned this "Casey shows Davies the proper way to suck."

All that talk about Ferguson and his apology was inspiring, no? It made me want to go out and just, I don’t know…make amends. Fortunately, there are certain people that I maybe need to apologize to around here at “Avoiding the Drop”. Specifically, I’m thinking I maybe might need to apologize to Conor Casey.

See, here’s the thing. I’ve been really harsh on Casey. Amongst the things I’ve said about him:

• “There are people in my rec league more qualified than Casey at this point.”
• “Conor Casey is an awful player on the international level.”
• “Brian Ching sucks, too, but at least he sometimes scores. Casey doesn’t.”
• “…Conor Casey is the worst striker on any international team’s roster ever.”

Those are, dear reader, all verbatim quotes from earlier pieces I’ve personally written for this blog. And before you pillory me for my treatment of St. Conor of Qualification, write down the top four worst things you ever said about a player on your team. Who’s the jerk now?

Either way, apologizing is a tricky thing, especially when you maybe aren’t 100% sincere. So with the assistance of the Harvard Business School archives, I’m going to develop an apology in five parts. Let’s get this over with started.

1. Find words that are clear and accurate—not provocative.

Mr. Casey,

After watching the second half of the U.S. match against Honduras the other night, I feel that I probably owe you an apology for pointing out how awful your play has been ever since you started playing for the national team some of the harsher things that I’ve written about you on this blog.

2. Don’t apologize for the wrong thing.

In the past, I’ve been particularly cruel about the fact that you are a terrible striker in spite of the fact that you inexplicably scored twice against Honduras have not previously scored for the U.S. men’s national team, and have expressed that your continued selection in spite of this lack of production may be due to you having pictures of Bob Bradley’s “soak in the cold tub” with Bruce Arena was possibily unwarranted.

3. Consider the angle of approach.

In spite of the fact that it often appears that you’re playing for the other team – particularly with that pitiful cross from the byline in the fortieth minute against Honduras that both thefuseproject and I thought should result in your deportation - I believe that we both have the same desire: to see the U.S. soccer program succeed on an international stage.

4. Don’t think in terms of an “expression of regret.”

I regret saying those things.

5. “I want to apologize” is not an apology.

Because I‘m trying to believe we want the same things, in the future I will try to temper my reaction to the completely inexplicable fact that you started the most important game of qualifying thus far in spite of the fact that you hadn’t previously scored while there were perfectly capable and, in fact, better players left on the bench behind you your involvement on the team, and will keep in mind that you have no idea how you scored either one of those goals and could probably not replicate that feat if you tried are trying your hardest to do your best even if your best sucks 99% of the time. Therefore, I want to apologize but can’t bring myself to do it for those statements.

Eat Me Sincerely,

Magnakai Haaskivi