Scuffed | USMNT, World Cup, Yanks Abroad, futbol in America - #334: The World Cup roster — our picks and Berhalter prediction

Episode Date: November 7, 2022

Our World Cup roster episode. First Greg and Belz go over Berhalter's locks, then we each give our 26, then we project who Berhalter will call up. ----Scuffed is an ad-free podcast. Support that and get exclusive episodes (more than 50 this year) by signing up for our Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/scuffed Skip the ads! Subscribe to Scuffed on Patreon and get all episodes ad-free, plus any bonus episodes. Patrons at $5 a month or more also get access to Clip Notes, a video of key moments on the field we discuss on the show, plus all patrons get access to our private Discord server, live call-in shows, and the full catalog of historic recaps we've made: https://www.patreon.com/scuffedAlso, check out Boots on the Ground, our USWNT-focused spinoff podcast headed up by Tara and Vince. They are cooking over there, you can listen here: https://boots-on-the-ground.simplecast.comAnd check out our MERCH, baby. We have better stuff than you might think: https://www.scuffedhq.com/store Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

Welcome to the scuff podcast where we talk about U.S. soccer. Hey, this is Bells. I've got Greg with me. We're going to go on record with who we'd each like to see in the 26-man roster. And then I'd like us to project who Berhalter is likely to call up. So kind of like a dose of reality after we fantasize for a little while. Man, even fantasize is putting it too strongly. Yeah. Although I will, I do want to say right off the bat, I feel very strong. strongly about all 26 positions. I don't think there's any wiggle room here. These are the 26. And there's no, and mine are. I don't know about yours. There's really no room to improve it. The roster is coming out Wednesday at 5 p.m. Eastern time, 4 p.m. Central. Greg. Thank you.

You're welcome. Greg Burhalter is going to do it on ESPN and there's kind of a big to do. We'll have a, we'll have an episode out later that night. I think, yeah, I think that's an important point. The important point is the opposite of the one you just made, which is that like it's kind of after the first 12, what, 12 or 15 players, it's kind of, uh, okay to be ambivalent, right? Yeah, I think it's okay to be ambivalent. I also, you know, want to, want to caveat that with like, they're going to be mediocre players on this roster. No matter what shade of mediocre you prefer, like, you want some mediocre guys in this.

Everyone listening has some guys in here that they want who are pretty mediocre soccer players relative to like whoever's going to be literal. the rosters of the World Cup knockout teams, we're fielding mediocre players. So the question becomes, like, which mediocre players can fit to give us the best chance with some of our better players? And then also, which mediocre players have gotten looks in the past that doesn't require us to try to throw a brand new face, Keaton Parks, into this roster at the last. Yeah, right.

Well, let's first, I think the first thing we should do is just give the lock. who's definitely going to be on the roster. And I think most of them are people that nobody even disagrees about. But this is who we're pretty sure. We're not just pretty sure. We're very sure Burhalter's going to call up these folks. So you've got 16 names here. And I'm just going to throw out right away, even in these 16 names, we've got some mediocrity.

So even in the locks, the players we are very sure Burrhalter is going to include. We're already getting into some players who aren't amazing soccer players at the World Cup knockout level. Yeah, I'm thinking when you say that, I'm thinking immediately of Kellan Acosta. Mediocre is maybe a little strong, but not an amazing player. And Aaron Long and Dianneedlin. I think it's fair. Yeah, I think it's fair to call those three. Not people you want to rest your entire World Cup hopes on.

Right. But okay. They can come through. They could come through. You know, DeAndre Edlin has like a World Cup. assist, doesn't he, or a second assist in 2014? I don't know. He was exciting in that tournament.

There we go. Yeah. Okay, the locks are Christian Pulisic, a native of Hershey, Pennsylvania, plays for Chelsea FC. He is sort of the face of the national team for better or worse. And he's going to be on this team. He's probably going to take the penalties. He's probably going to start every game, play almost every minute. That's just how it is.

He's the guy. And we should mention, you know, people, people were tweeting over the weekend. He is not the savior of the national team. And it brought me immediately back to, you know, some of our old episodes where you, yourself said, Christian Pulisic is not the savior. We need a committee of saviors. And as we go through the rest of these names, wouldn't you say it's fair to say we have a committee now? Oh, this is a fantastic committee.

Yeah. You give me this lineup. this roster of names in 2018, I'm ecstatic. That doesn't mean that you know, you can't quibble and say, well, could it be a little bit better with certain other choices? There's always room for that in any World Cup roster. But yes, it also to an extent feels like house money quality-wise because the idea was Christian Pulitzer can't be a loan savior. He wouldn't be able to do it. He wouldn't save the team if it was just him.

For us to be competitive at all, we needed a house. half dozen guys, a dozen players to emerge. And definitely players have emerged to at least put us in a competitive seat. Yep. Let's talk about some of the emerges. Number one, Giovanni Raina. Grew up in New York. I think he was born in Scotland when his dad was playing at Rangers.

Claudio Raina, you may have heard of him. He is now at Dortmund. He is perhaps our most talented player, has struggled with a lot of injuries. But he's healthy now. He scored a penalty over the weekend. he's going to be in the roster. He's probably going to start. Next up, Brendan Aronson also has emerged since we had that conversation all those years ago.

He plays for Leeds. They just had a really exciting win over the weekend. One of the most exciting soccer games I've seen in a long time. He, I think, is widely appreciated by Leeds fans and by national team fans. And he's going to get some minutes in this tournament. He's going to be on the roster. Tim Wea grew up in New York. his father happens to be the president of Liberia

and one of the greatest soccer players of all time, George Wea. He was injured. He's had some struggles with injuries too. He's healthy now. Played right back over the weekend, weirdly enough. But he's going to be on the roster. I think, I mean, it's going to be complicated

on how you apportion out the minutes, but he's going to get plenty of minutes too, I think. Yeah. And he'll be, I'm predicting he'll be a key attacking piece in our group stage success. Hasees Ferreira. I'm sorry, Bels, I'm taking it. Jesus Ferreira, who is a Colombian American.

Father is David Ferreira, former FC Dallas star, and Jesus was able to switch his nationality, I think very late 2019, early 2020 to make his debut for the U.S. in that January camp, a polarizing figure, I'm willing to say, but pretty confident that he is still on this roster. Yep. Spoiler, he's not on my roster, but he is on Burrhaler.

roster. He's a lock. He's going to be there, and I'm not mad about it. Ricardo Pepi is the next one. I think he's a lock. He grew up near El Paso, chose the USA over Mexico in, I think, a pretty dramatic turn of events. Scored three goals in World Cup qualifying. Two of them were game winners, and he's struggled at Augsburg last fall. Everybody kind of gave him, gave up on him. He got a loan to Groningen right at the beginning of the season. He scored like five goals in the first first couple months of the season. He's had a great little run of form and he's going to be on the roster.

He's, he's, we'll throw in our normal ghost stat caveat courtesy of FBRF, well done FBRF for providing Eradivisi underlying numbers now. Peppy running way ahead of his, his ghost stats here.

So we got to, we got to make sure. I mean, I don't care. I still am fine with him on the roster. Uh, but just enjoy this run while, while he's running.

Yeah. He, as he kind of always has over, well, I guess the same. Sample size isn't large enough to say always, but he tends to run over his ghost stats. That's what he did at Dallas, too. Greg's like, no, I don't want to get into this.

All right. Next up, Tyler Adams, a native of Wappinger's Falls, a hero in Leeds in Yorkshire right now. That's Wappinger's Falls, New York, playing some of the best soccer of his life under Jesse Marsh, despite their defensive porousness. Next up, Kellan Acosta, born in Plano, Texas. Kind of been a MLS journeyman for the last few years, but he's sort of the backup for Tyler Adams. As a defensive midfielder can deputize, at least in Burrhalter's eyes, as a number eight.

He's on the roster. Weston McKinney, a military kid grew up all over, including Germany, played his soccer for Shulka at age 18 in Germany before his blockbuster move to Juventus. where he has been, I think it's fair to say he has been succeeding for Juventus, even if Juventus as a team are not living up to their expectations.

From a national team fan perspective, West McKinney playing minutes for Juventus and not falling all over himself, it's a, I mean, it's a low bar to consider it a success. Yeah, it's a huge,

huge success. Next up is Eunice Musa, an English, Italian, Ghanaian American, who plays at Valencia and chose the USA, thanks to some good recruiting, I think, by the U.S. setup. And he is an extremely important player, plays as a number eight for us,

maybe as a number six, maybe in a double pivot with Tyler Adams. We'll see how that shakes out at the World Cup. But he's on the roster, and we need him badly. So Gino-Dast, Dutch-American, son of a Surinamese American father and Dutch mother, has been playing with the U.S. youth teams for a while now, dating back to the 2017, or I'm sorry, the 2019 U-17 World Cup. 2017-U-17 World Cup. Oh, there we go.

And the 2019 U-20 World Cup, yeah. Committed to the U.S. again, in a huge moment where the Dutch were after him, as he'd been breaking through at IACS. And chose the U.S. another very nice piece of recruiting. And we've got him, and he is coming back to health. We aren't sure. He hasn't played for A.C. Milan. or dressed for them in a while due to muscle fatigue.

So we're just hoping that's the old World Cup cool off that everyone's getting. And we are going to be leaning on Sergenio Dest quite a bit for either buildup in possession or attacking Verve in the final third. Yep. I'm not worried a bit about his muscle fatigue. He's fine in my book. Anthony Jedi Robinson is our lockdown left back, an English American who, I think chose to play for the U.S. kind of a while ago.

And boy, do we need him. He is really our only true left back of any consequence, and he will play 270 minutes at the World Cup, most likely. Aaron Long is going to be, I'm going to say, the most polarizing inclusion of this roster. Native Voke Hills, California playing currently, I think actually unattached. He just wrapped up a long contract with New York Red Bulls,

I think is going to be trying to be on the move within MLS or perhaps abroad. I haven't heard anything about going abroad if he has any suitors. But he is not a passing centerback. So his inclusion is based sort of purely on his defensive prowess. And we're just going to hope that if he plays, that that defense at least holds up. He's getting a lot of time with Walker Zimmerman and Greg Burrhalter in the MLS. you know, sort of the MLS only camp that's happening in Frisco, Texas right now. Hopefully all those reps will, you know, iron some things out if, if in fact, Berthelter plans to start Long against Wales on November 21st.

Should also add long as a set piece threat. So if he's in, he's given us hopefully a defensive floor and some set piece danger. Also a set piece threat, Walker Zimmerman from Lawrenceville, Georgia. also has been a bit of a journeyman in MLS, was very good for L-AFC and then got offloaded to Nashville a couple years ago and he's been great for them one defender of the year at least once I think and has been a revelation for the U.S. since last summer has been an excellent player for us at centerback for the most part and he is basically the first centerback on the team sheet at this point seems that way and it should also I also want to note here

Resurmance passing has improved in both ambition and quality. He's gotten a lot more adventurous with his passing attempts, and they have been executed for me at a pretty acceptable rate. We just need to dodge that one moment against Japan, where he played it directly to the pressuring defender, who was in on Matt Turner. Deep breaths. Matt Turner, also from New Jersey, played college soccer with the Fairfield Stags. What a pipeline. The Fairfield Stags have been for us. Oh, man.

I don't know if there's a single other. Can't say enough about the Fairfield Stags. Not sure if there are any other Fairfield Stags alum dotting any national team matches. I don't know. Probably a lot in the rest of the world, just not for the U.S. Turner started playing soccer late in life. He was excellent for New England as their goalkeeper and then got the big move for Arsenal. He's their backup goalkeeper right now behind Aaron Ramsdale.

and he plays cup games. He was hurt for a little while. He was back on the bench this weekend, which is a good sign. He's definitely on the roster. I feel like he is probably going to start at goalkeeper for the U.S. Maybe. All right, DeAndre Yedlin, who we're considering a lock. He might be the iffyest of the locks, but I think he's in.

I think Berthelter values his veteran leadership. He will be the only player on this roster. I'm 99% sure. any kind of a World Cup pedigree, any World Cup experience as a veteran of the 2014 World Cup in Brazil. He's from Seattle, Washington, played for the Sounders, made what I'm considering a surprise. He was a surprise inclusion in the 2014 roster. Made some appearances, was dangerous, seems like a great dude, which I think also helps this place. We are one of the youngest teams in the tournament, if not the youngest team in the tournament.

famously one of the two mountain boys on the roster along with Timway. Yeah. Which, again, for me, is justification enough to be on the roster. So DeAndre Edlin, I think it's safe to say he is a lock. Yep. So are we not making Stefan a lock? Is Stefan a lock or no? He probably should be, right?

I think at this point he's done enough to show that he's not going to commit a howler every game. And we do know that Greg Burholter. Just loves him. Does love him. I think that's the sense we get that's been reported by people with like close to the national team. So yes, I think we'd probably throw Stefan on here. What is that? 17 now, locks?

17 locks that leaves nine spots remaining. Do you want to go first on who you want, who you want outside of those locks on the roster? So, yeah, let's go. I'm going to go position by position. That's fine, yeah. We've got Turner and Stefan in. My preference would actually, no, I'm not going to do it. else. I'm not going to do the nine I want in addition to those because I'm not going to try to

predict Burrhalter's nine with his life. So you're just going to do 26 of your own? I'm just going to give my own 26. Yeah, fair enough. Okay. Yeah, I'm good to do that. So my 26 that I'm going on the record for does not include Stefan. And it's not necessarily because I think he's going to be a howler guy, but he does have some howlers in him. Even the game where he got, he made the championship team of the week, which people were, you know, happy to post. He still got run down by a forward and had the ball taken off of his foot and it just happened to deflect directly off of the forward just wide of the post for a goal kick like for me given stephen's history that's like disqualifying like if he still hasn't been able to knock it off with that stuff like he's just not going to be the guy

especially when he doesn't provide much of much if any of a shot stopping edge anyway so my keepers are turner horvath and johnson i think horvath is just a better goalkeeper to be the backup i think Johnson is a fine number three to carry. So I've got Turner, Johnson, Horvath. Okay. I have Turner, Stefan, and Horvath, but this is one where I don't particularly feel, I don't feel anything about it. I think it should be Turner starting the games.

And if Johnson is there over, Stefan, that's fine with me. I guess the issue is Stefan okay with being like a goalkeeper who shows up and doesn't play? We don't know that he's not. No. No. No. No, for me, it's just, I think Horvath is better. And again, I've had Johnson pegged as my three, number three man for a while, regardless

of who ends up winning the backup spot Turner. And again, just praying that this is how Burrhalter sees it, that everyone else is fighting for backup behind Turner and not that Perhalter just still has kind of that little crush on Stefan and won't replace him. Yep. And if he doesn't, if he doesn't replace Stefan, then we'll just hope that Stefan puts three good games together, which he's more than capable of doing. That's very generous of you.

Three adequate games together. All right. Let's go to centerback then. All right. So I'm only bringing four, and I'm not bringing Chris Richards, which even in my group, like, it's, you know, I'm hearing people say you have to bring Richards just in case he's ready for the third match. But this isn't a dude who's like been playing and now is hurt and might just come back

from a little two weeks off. the guy hasn't played soccer since August. So he's not fit. His body's not going to behave the way he wants. And even if he gets medically cleared for that third group stage game or any game in the tournament, for me, you can't just throw a guy into centerback. That position in particular who just is not playing any kind of soccer. Like even John Brooks is at least playing every day.

He's playing competitive soccer within Benfica's training program. He at least is playing. Richards is not even playing. I can't, I'm not, I wouldn't bring a spot, bring him just because even if he does get cleared, I still wouldn't trust him to use in any kind of a must win game. So my centerbacks, uh, are, I'm just bringing four, uh, all healthy. And that's Zimmerman, uh, Tim Rheam, Cameron Carter, Rickers, uh, Mark McKenzie. I'm not, I wouldn't bring long, even though I think he's considered a lock at this point. I just don't think he adds enough, uh,

in possession. And I don't think his defensive floor is so amazing that it allows him to sort of bypass some of these other options. All right. Well, I can't really disagree with any of that. I mean, it's, for me, it's, it's, it's, it's Reams Zimmerman and Carter Vickers for sure. And then, you know, I, I guess I feel like it's a toss up between a not healthy Richards along and a McKenzie. But, um, I don't think any of the, you know, unless Richards is miraculously healthy, which I guess is, you know, theoretically possible. Yeah, he could play, right?

They have a game, do they have a game midweek? If not midweek, they, there's still a game on the weekend. If he gets in and looks sharp, then I guess I'd reevaluate. That'd be after the roster's announced. Yeah, yeah. But, you know, Burrhalter may know something we don't know. So, I mean, yeah, there's a huge caveat on Richards and his health, but I would bring him, Reim, Zimmerman, and Carter Vickers. Just because I don't even, I don't think Longer's McKenzie should really play.

Like, they're just, they're just too terrifying. I also want to take a second to kind of chuckle at the way Tim Ream has been framed as an emergency call-up. I've just seen it a couple of times from people like, don't be surprised if Tim Ream gets an emergency call-up. And I'm just laughing because like the only emergency here would be that we've been calling up much worse centerbacks in the prior to windows. It's like it's like pulling the fire alarm after starting the fire. Miles and Chris Richards have been. out for a while, definitely the last two windows, Richard since the winter window, the January, February qualifiers. We've actually added a center back back to health since the last window

in Cameron Carter Vickers. So to frame RIM is like an emergency option. I feel like it's kind of just covering for the fact that RIM maybe should have been in the last two camps if he's now the guy going to the World Cup. I know nobody really vived with this the last time I brought it up, But my whole deadline metaphor where like if you have, if you have a deadline coming up and you know you got to finish something, it makes you be more pragmatic and practical. I feel like that's probably what's going to happen with Burrhalter and Tim Ream. You know, even back in September,

he could sort of like, you know, do his sort of plans and thinking and scheming and not call up Ream. But now the World Cup is coming. It's got to like, it's got to, you know, force his hand to be serious about this and call up Ream. Yeah, the experiments, the other experiments did not pan out, I guess. So the emergency is here and Tim Ream. I mean, now fully expecting to be on here in large part because so many other, like,

plugged in journalists are projecting him. And I don't think that they're just doing that based on their gut. They've got sources. They talk to people. Supposedly, yeah, you know, I mean, they do for sure. Let's do right back and we do right back and left back together since basically everybody's a swing back, except Anthony. Yes.

Yeah, this is nuts. And this is where we're going to start talking more and more about contingencies. Because I think we can definitely build like a pretty solid 11. I think we can, you know, have a couple of good pre-planned subs. But I think our roster is really going to be in danger. Like I'm expecting the Burrhalter roster to be in some contingency danger. And fullback's the first one where I think that's going to be really apparent. We don't have a backup left back.

Sam Vines broke his shin and is now out for months. I don't know if he would have made the roster anyway, but he at least was a... I'm thinking not, yeah. He was at least a true left back option. We no longer have that. So we have Jedi Robinson and Dest as the locks. The only non-Dest left back, I think, that we could play,

would be Joe Scally. So I'm expecting Joe Scali. I definitely have him on mine. My two other fullbacks are Scali and Yedlin. I'm only bringing four because I don't think with, you know, with Scali being able to play both, I don't think we need a Reggie Cannon on the roster. I wouldn't be mad if we have a full.

fifth fullback, but I just think that with Scali, uh, helping to swing both sides were covered for any contingency. Yeah. I have Robinson and Scali as my two left backs and then Dest, Shaqmore. I'm sticking with him. Sorry everybody.

I'm sticking with him. I take him over Yedlinor Cannon, but, but he's my second. And then I am bringing Canon, uh, partly for vibes and partly because, he can deputize at centerback if everybody's like really bad at centerback. That's the funny part, right? Like the center back situation is going to, if we're rotating,

it's just because somebody's just had a shocker. So we've got to try the next man up and hope he doesn't have a shocker. But we'll just keep rotating a pace. Right. If Scali's left off, would you be surprised? I'd be a little surprised, yeah. Okay. I wouldn't be surprised.

I would be baffled. and I'd be, again, contingently angry because I would hate the idea that if something happens to Jedi, we are forced to move Sir Gino Des to left back. And that's something I've kind of been harper on for a while. Like, I hate that contingency plan where you must take your starting right back and move them over to left back.

Scali would at least give you the option. Even if you did that first, you could switch Dest over there and plug Scali in as the back of right back. Scali was a little bit better than Yedlin on the ball, I think, in his last window. I don't think Yedlin has been particularly good on the ball in forever. I thought he's been hurting us. I think he's kind of a negative in possession in buildup,

whereas Scali, I think, is maybe a little bit more neutral. So we would at least have the option if Scali came in as your first right back and you move Dest over to left back. You could flip those if you want to do. If you're like, we're missing so much not having Dest over there, we can flip them and just roll the dice with Scali at left back. Anyway, that's my Scali bit. Yeah.

Yeah, I like, I feel more. confident with Scali than I would with, frankly, with more Canon or Yedlin at this point. Are you saying it right back too? Yeah. Yeah, I'm the same spot. Yeah, definitely a left back, but also at right back. So yeah, so I'll be baffled yet somehow unsurprised if Scali's left off entirely. Yeah.

Well, you know, let's hope for the best. Let's hope for the best. At the number six, now there's some, you know, it's not clear how we're going to set up the midfield, are we going to do a, are we going to have a double, double pivot, or are we going to have a triple pivot? Is it, is there all kinds of pivoting going to go on? Or is, are we going to have this sort of six, one, six and two eights that we have kind of at least nominally had for a couple years now with Burrhalter? But so we'll, we'll take it as the number six. The number six is I'd take Adams and Acosta. So would Burrhalter, I think, I don't think there's any controversy there.

Yeah, I think that's what I've got to. No, no real, uh, No real discrepancies there. Now, the number eight's, presumably we should have four of those, right? Four or a blend with some of the other positions who might deputize, and that's kind of, I think, what everyone ends up saying. That's definitely the direction the conversation's gone. You have these two plus these guys, these wingers could step in and play. So I'm going to name, but I'm going to name my four that aren't,

are definitely not going to be the four they get called up. And that is Wes, who once again has beat his recovery timeline, allegedly, and might feature sooner than expected from injury. Musa, those two are locks. This is where it gets already dicey.

I'm bringing Luca de la Torre, who is currently out injured, but he's one who I think, if he does come back in, you could probably bring him back. He's been playing. He just has been out for a couple of weeks. He's not like Richards,

who's been out for months. And then I'm bringing, I'm still bringing Eric Williamson. who would be at least give us in a 26-man roster, one more like-for-like center mid to plug in and not force us to change our entire shape and setup. In what way is he like-for-like in that? If you bring him in for an eight,

he can do a reasonable facsimile of the job that McKinney or Musa is doing. If either of those players is out and you say, all right, well, we're going to plug Eric Williamson in here. It's not going to be as good as these guys, but it will be a similar role. and everyone else will continue to do the role we're already asking them to do.

The thing with De La Torre is he might not be fit. So if he's not fit and we don't bring some kind of an Eric Williamson, some kind of a like for like, then we just don't have anything. Like we just do not have a way to maintain our shape if anything happens to Eunice Musa, suspension, injury, or Weston McKinney.

And again, Weston McKinney, for as outrageous as it is that he can come back from injury so quickly, the man still gets injured and he still misses games. So if something were to happen for it to him in this tournament, and De La Torre isn't back yet. We're just like, I don't know what we're doing. And this is one of those contingencies where I feel like we've been harping on forever.

We've painted ourselves into a real corner here with our eight depths. It might not matter. We might not need to get into that contingency plan, but it might. Yeah, the way we've painted ourselves into a corner is by not trying very many eights over the last two years. You know, it's been, it's been Sebastian Legette and Christian rolled on on occasion. And who else? Who else? I guess Williamson got tried in the Gold Cup and then he got hurt.

Gianluca Bousio. And then Kelan Acosta, we've used Acosta there a lot, which he might well be the next eight. But when you talk about the contingency plans, he's also the backup six and potentially one of our backup emergency left backs. You can't have Acosta be the answer when all of the glass gets broken. He can do something if some glass gets broken, but you can't just rely on the same guy for all of the glass. Yeah. Okay.

Well, my four-eights are going to be, of course, McKenny and Musa and then Deletore, who, like you say he's been playing. Just to be clear, he's playing in practice. He's not playing very much game time for Seltivigo, a bottom of the table team in La Liga right now. That move seems a little, it's a little bit like Richards. Why make that move right before the world? World Cup. I mean, their careers are more important than them playing in the World Cup. I get that.

Well, Luca was looking at second division Dutch football. So he had to go somewhere. That's true. But yes, point stands. He's definitely in a spot. He definitely challenged himself and maybe bit off more than he could chew for the pre-World cup months. But yes, he has not been playing in matches.

And he played somewhat poorly against Japan in September for the U.S. So that name is less exciting than it used to be, I think, for me at least. But he's going to, I'd bring him. And then, you know, there's a part of me that wants to bring Alex Mendez as one of the, as his backup number eight. But, I mean, at least, you know, he's playing every week at a good level. And, but I'm not going to bring him. It'll be Malik Tillman for me as the other number eight.

And mostly just as, like, to borrow an idea from you, just as. sort of like a roll the dice guy you throw on at the end of the game to see if he can make something happen. And I totally think that's fine. Like to bring him as that, where I start to like worry and bite my fingernails is that because we're so thin at center mid with Luca being, you know, a maybe. Like, Malik, you can't just have him there as that luxury. Like whoever you're bringing here might be the guy who has to play because McKinney's out. You know what I mean? He might be the guy who you have to start. Not as a roll of the dice, late game. We're chasing a goal. but like control the center of the park for 90 minutes as our number eight center mid.

And that's where it's like I don't have any real faith that Malik is that guy right now. So it's scary. The contingencies are scary. Yeah. All right. Let's go on to the wingers, which is probably the most exciting position on the team. Wingers are great and we are covered for every contingency out here.

We've got Poulosick, we've got Raina, we've got Wai, we've got Brayah, We've got Brennan Arrinson as the locks. Those are Burrhalters guys. Universal locks. Yeah. And I'm certainly bringing those four as well. And then I'm bringing a fifth and that's Paul Ariola. And I don't feel strongly about his inclusion at all one way or the other.

If you replace him with like five other names, I'd be like, sure. I guess I feel I have the exact same five wingers. The only reason I feel more strongly about Areola than you is just relatively speaking, much prefer him to Jordan Morris. And I think Morris is really the only competition for him for that fifth spot, right? Maybe Christian rolled on. Rolled on, maybe Georgie Mahalovich. And again, those guys could also just be not playing center mids, center mid guys in place of Malath

Tillman or in my case, Eric Williamson, who I'm sure is not going. Because even after the injury to Luca was announced, Williamson did not join the MLS reserve camp or the MLS offseason. camp, I should call it. So he's not going. Like, that's not happening, even though I have him on my list. We didn't bring any midfielders to the MLS camp. The only one we brought was Christian Roldon.

And then a bunch of U-20s. They're talking about the scrimmages that we're having. And people who could go to the public ones were like, yeah, so here's how we lined up. And then we just had to use some U-20s as our center mids because we did not, did not care to have any on hand. Why? Why? Yeah, maybe Aiden, so Aiden Morris was apparently on the,

on the senior team in that scrimmage. Maybe Beralta's like, ah, screw it. Let's bring Aden to the World Cup. I mean, it could happen, right? Like, John Tolkien could sneak on as these big surprise left back because of injury divines and because of the no other left back situation. I doubt it happens.

But, but yeah, that's, that camp is a trip. All right. And then, so now we're to 23 players, each of us. I'm at 22 because I only brought four fullbacks and I only brought four centerbacks. Oh, yeah. I got a spot here. You can see what I've done. I've kept it, kept one ace in the sleeve for the striker position.

Okay. Who do you got for striker? So I'm bringing Jesus. I'm bringing Sergeant. I'm bringing Pepe. And I'm actually bringing Haji. Whoa, Greg. Big switch.

Now what I'm doing here is I'm going to respect the PFOC defenders who are saying, no, he's just been hurt. And that's why his even his ghost numbers have dropped off. Like it's not even just his he's running hot and now he's regret. Like his underlying numbers have fallen off from the start of the season when they were already pretty low. And some people are saying he's hurt. And I'm like, okay, fair enough. If he's hurt, then he's not going to be there. So then we shouldn't bring him.

So we'll bring Haji, who could still be like a change of pace striker and who is playing a lot and is getting on the end of a lot of chances. That's my big switch. All right. That's exciting. I don't, yeah, I don't know that Hajie's really that much of a change of pace. That's my, I guess that's my rejoinder to that. He's not a, he's not a physical, he's not a physical striker.

He doesn't play like a big man, you know, to use a basketball, a basketball cliche. He doesn't play his size. Yeah, he's not knocking people over the way Pfok does. Pfok is moving people around. So he's, he's a change of pace.

for me in the sense that he's out of the four I've listed. I don't think any of the other guys can like create their own chance, so to speak. Like, Hajie has tape at least. I know it's Turkey, but he's got tape of like creating goals where there wasn't a goal.

You know, we watched that Altador goal from 2010, or the Altador chance from 2010 against England in our recap. And like, Jesus Ferrer isn't doing that, right? No. No. I don't think Pepe, Pepe, peppy's muscled a guy or two. in the Dutch division, but

Hajie has a, like, several clips. He has a clip every couple of weeks. That's fair. He does do somebody. He does a couple of defenders, even the cover defender, and gets his own shot off. And that's where I'm like,

okay, well, this is where I'm calling it my change of pace. Okay. All right, well, I'm down to 20, I'm up to 23, so I only have three spots left for Stryker, and I'm taking Sergeant Pepeppy and Pfeck. And mostly Peefock

has that sort of move people, around change of pace and I just I just prefer sergeant and peppy to ferrera don't make me defend it please I don't I mean it doesn't take that much defense right like okay whatever you're gonna say Ferreira is good at sergeant can do that whatever like if you just want somebody who can pass and connect and it's technical sergeant's that so like can sergeant and peppy both play within our press yes so I don't think it's a stretch at all to say those those guys make Ferreira redundant especially Sargent who does a lot of

I think it does quite a bit of Ferreira stuff for Norwich Pepe, I just want him to score a goal so I can repost Ricardo Pepey he's our song. Who do you think Burholters bringing

because our only locks for him were Jesus and Pepe I think he's bringing Jesus Pepey and Sergeant. Same. I think that's what we're looking at for Stryker. I think the

outrage over PFOC will die down significantly because his goal contributions have dried up. People will still stick to that, but they won't be able to say, but look at all that he's got four goal contributions and four games anymore. So it'll be a tougher sell

to spread the outrage. The outrage was always a little bit overblown, in my opinion. If you track the ghost stats, yeah, but... Well, you know, if you just watch his shots, you know, the thing is, like you watch people's shots, it does make you sort of become, an XG believer when you watch like a bunch of people's shots all at once.

It's hard to tell the difference between one, from one striker to the next. Wingers, I think Burrhalter's going to have the same five as us. That's my guess. Pulisick Aronson, Wea, Raina, and Areola. I think Jordan Morris is not going to make it. Oh, I mean, I could see Morris coming and Malick staying home from your group. And so he'd bring Morris and Areola. And the thought there again is he's willing to go light at true center mids because.

Because Raina and Aronson can play it. I mean, he played it in the friendlies in June. He played it in one of the friendlies in September against at the end of Saudi Arabia. So obviously Burrhalter will do that. And then Gio Raina, who is just a soccer savant, can play anywhere. So if you have to be like, well, I guess our contingency plan is to play this outrageously talented everywhere on the field player in the this spot and hope to get through the World Cup games.

Again, there are worse contingencies than that. Yeah. No, I think that contingency actually is nice and it has the virtue of if we do play Raina as a 10, say, McKinney or Musa is out for some reason. We have to play Raina as a 10 and then we have like say Adams and Musa behind him, say McKinney gets hurt just hypothetically. Then we're looking at Pulisicuea both starting.

Or Aronson, if that's your, you know, if that's your thing. And it has a virtue of putting more good players on the field at once. Yeah, we could totally back into that being our best personnel group. That is very possible. Yeah. All right. And then what do you think Burhalter's going to do at fullback?

Well, we know he's going to do that he's going to do Adams and Acosta as the sixes, right? Yes. What's he going to do at fullback? Oh, we're bringing Jedi and desks. I think he's bringing, yeah. Oh, we're saying he's bringing Yedlin. I think he might just bring Cannon and that's it. So three, like, I hope he brings Canon and Scali because I think he's going to bring,

I think he's going to bring Canon even if I made you take his name off the locks list earlier. Yeah. Now I'm backtracking. But my hope then is that if he brings those four, he also brings Scali. It's totally unnecessary roster construction to have four right backs with you. But if that's what he chooses to do, I'd just get. Scali on there somehow. It does seem like he really likes

Edlin and Cannon. They're like part of the quote unquote the group. And I do think he's going to bring five fullbacks, four of them being natural right backs. And then what's he going to do it? What's he going to do at centerback? Oh, man. I think, I think long's,

we already said long's a lot. The question's ream, right? He's going to bring Zimmerman. He's going to bring Long. I think he brings CCV. You know, based on the September window, I think CCV was preferred to Eric Palmer Brown. So I think CCV's in.

And then the question becomes Reem or McKenzie or both for Burrhalter, I think. Yeah. And I wouldn't be mad if McKenzie's left off entirely. I wouldn't be mad if we bring five. I don't know. I've talked myself into CCV and Zimmerman starting or Tim Ream and Zimmerman starting if we think we can cover Ream speed up with, you know, a Tyler Adams. Yeah, I've talked myself into those things too.

And then at goalkeeper, before we get out of here, he's going to bring, who's he going to bring? He's bringing Turner, Stefan, and Johnson. I feel like that's barely even a question. I barely keep Horvath on there. But I don't think so. I think he's, unless he has a talk with Stefan and has to tell him straight up that Stefan can't start and that becomes an issue, then Stefan would have a minor back problem next week and it'd be Corvath, but I think it's going to be Turner Stephan and Johnson.

Okay. Hey, short and sweet. Roster comes out Wednesday again around dinner time. We'll do an episode that night, and then, you know, and that pretty soon the World Cup is going to be upon us. Lots to talk about starting November 21st. Thanks everybody for listening. We'll see you.