The more I read about Jesus Padilla and the more I found out about him and his family, the less I believed his tale.
I've never talked to him. I've seen him play in person, at SuperLiga a year ago. And I saw him with Chivas USA two years ago, though I can't remember anything but him walking by me after a training session. But I read enough about him that I just didn't buy whatever he was selling.
First, his mom is from California. Jesus is third of six but the oldest (Jesus is the only boy) was born here in California. Next is his sister Carmen, who plays for the Mexican national team. I ran across Carmen's bio on her alma mater's Web site, the University of the Pacific in Stockton. The bio says she was born in San Jose, though Jesus said in an interview (Andrea linked to it below) that she was born in Mexico. Then, of course, Jesus was allegedly born in Mexico, while the three younger sisters were all born in California. The first birth and last three births were not contested by anyone.
I have some cousins who are born here and have had a child here, and I'm telling you there is no way in hell that they are moving down to small-town Mexico to have a child or two, then come back here and have three more. It's not going to happen. It's just not. Maybe it happens a lot, maybe not at all. I don't know. But what I do know is my family wouldn't do that, so it seemed fishy to me.
Why would his mom have moved down to Mexico with an infant to give birth to two more kids? So one of them could play for Chivas?
So we started investigating it.
And we found out the truth, and our suspicions were justified after all.
4 comments:
Luis,
You should really try to get ahold of Chivas' front office and see what they have to say about this. That would be fun.
Ok wait, so the truth is he wasn't born in Mexico? I'm confused.
This is really old news. Padilla is referred to as "el gringo" both by the media and by his mates.
What I care about is integrating this guy into the USNAT fold. It could be argued that USNAT senior team is as xenophobic when it comes to Mexican-Americans as Chivas de Guadalajara is, well at least under past regimes.
I could care less about the lies uncovered on CD Chivas, clubs regularly lie about things and website information and bios are stretched, people fluff resumes, common knowledge.
Although we would like to think the Padilla story is new and unique it is not. I know of players born in the US of Mexican heritage that have gone on to wither away as players in Mexican youth and farm systems. Heck, par for the course for all players in Mexico, that don't catch breaks or have influence.
Why this happens = new coaches, new regimes, preference for big times names from foreign nation rich in football tradition, and $$$ needed to fill seats.... etc...
Wow, this sounds alot like the LA GALAXY!
BBSC
Actually, I know a mexican family that had a tourist visa and would go back and forth pretty often. They had 2 kids born here and 3 in mexico (mex, us, mex, us, mex). I agree its pretty rare though.
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