I shared Jose Francisco Torres' tale with my SI.com readers.
I tried to add some new elements by making a comparision between Torres and Michael Orozco as well as Edgar Castillo. Orozco of course is with the US and Castillo with Mexico. Torres may become the next Orozco, the next Castillo or just a solid league player with no international prospects.
Torres, Orozco and Castillo of course are all part of a large untapped talent base across the US, and that's also an underlying theme of the story. I didn't get into it but we all know there are many Mexican-Americans like those three out there waiting to get found.
Perhaps I'll explore that theme in the coming weeks and/or months. For now, I wanted to get this out there.
6 comments:
What kind of player is he? I'll be keeping an eye for him to get call ups to the senior team in the future.
Paul Gardner, World Soccer's New York correspondent, has been screaming about this for years. In the 1994 edition of his classic The Simplest Game, he uses the word "racism" when describing US Soccer's relationship to the Latin community.
It's not racism, it's $$$. And a number of other things.
If young Americans of latin ancestry want to get into the club/college/pros track, they need to be able to pay for it. It's the same in Mexico, but in Mexico the cost is way less.
Over here, you put your kid in a decent club system, you're a soccer dad driving around in a Mercedes. Not to say it's not expensive in Mexico, but its far more reasonable, a working kid could afford it.
I dated a girl once, used to drop a couple of grand every summer on soccer camps. That kind of training you can get for $50 in Mexico.
I think SI used the wrong picture. That's "Chaco" Jimenez and not Torres.
I think MLS and US Soccer can not just fixate on the Latin talent base. I've seen this on some MLS youth development websites, where they state a focus on looking on "Latin" players. Thats all well and good BUT! If the coaching is style of MLS teams do not match up well with the style these players play it will not work well. Castillo was not picked by MLS or US Soccer scouts because they didn't like his style. But there is another issue to be considered. There are also a huge base of African players and Carribean players to be tapped into. We seem to focus on all the over looked Latin players and that discussion is valid but the reason they haven't been discovered is because they play different game. But we can't ovrelook the Afrian and Carribean talent in this country when discussing the need to scout the local talent in our backyard.
Great article, Luis. I knew nothing about Torres until Superliga 2008, I think he's better now than any other left sided midfielder we have for the 2010 cycle, except for Damarcus Beasley. (Not considering Eddie Lewis, b/c he's up there in age and on his way out.) Part of that is because the US really can't go more than 2 deep at ANY position except defensive midfielder and center back. Who are our other options? Convey is hurt half the time and Torres is probably better anyway. Holden, Mapp, Davis, Bornstein? Please. And Rogers is a forward in a 4-3-3. Torres should be capped for the NEXT qualifier, simple as that.
By the way, I love your blog...the content is the best out there...bar none. But you guys have to do something about the generic blog look.
It's horrible, man.
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