Ladies and Gentlemen, welcome back into another Happy Hour. If your week has been anything like mine, that cocktail your dreaming of right now will be the taste of freedom. The thought of staring at a computer screen for another marathon session of “Journal
of Containment Hydrology”, and “Environmental Toxicology” articles makes me want to drink enough PBR to kill a small horse. As I sat in my office at around 2am Wednesday night, I began to day dream about what the precious weekend would bring. It is quite possible that I may drink myself into a coma from the combination of sleep deprivation and sheer joy that this NSF proposal is officially off my desk. Enough about my lousy week (and alcohol consumption), let’s move on to bigger and more important things from the world of football.
Anyone who reads this site regularly knows that I was not a proponent of bringing Bradley back for a second cycle for a myriad of different reasons. All of these points have been covered in mine, and my fellow TYAC writers in previous posts. In my mind, it all boils down to comfort level. If people get too comfortable, compliancy is usually not far behind. While the French have invented some excellent things in the past (blowjobs, crepes, and Marion Cotillard), I never want my beloved USMNT to resemble anything close to the French after this past summer. I was a large proponent of hiring a foreign coach to bring some new life into a dry, almost sterile atmosphere that Bradley had created. By now your thinking, “Jesus Puck, enough already, let’s turn the page, and for Christ sake, get to the dick and fart jokes already!” While the dick and fart jokes will come soon enough, I am rehashing some of these points as new information has surfaced this week about the talks held between Sunil Gulati and Jurgen Klinsmann.
In pregame interview coverage for a Kansas City Wizards game this week, Klinsmann discussed in detail , his talks with Gulati about coaching the USMNT. Basically, talks broke down because Klinsmann and Gulati could not come to a written agreement over who would have ultimate control. While the two seemed to have agreed verbally on their respective roles in the next cycle, they could not get it down on paper. Apparently, Klinsmann was much closer to becoming the next manager of the USMNT than most people had thought. Now, it is clear that Klinsmann is a narcissistic infantile egomaniac, because if you weren’t, he might have kept this private. He should drive NASCAR, or play wide receiver in Jon Levy’s NFL, with all the other narcissistic infantile egomaniacs. But that’ not the critical point.
Why is this important? In my view there are two important reasons.
1. This proves all along what many USMNT fans thought in the first place, Bradley was Gulati’s back up pick. The same scenario took place in 2006 after Bruce Arena failed to follow our deep run in 2002, with a respectable performance in his second cycle until the one-point World Cup. Bradley was named interim head coach while Gulati took his time to piddle around and find someone else. When he was done jerking the USMNT supporters around, he stuck with Bradley. The second time around, Gulati left Bradley is limbo, who may have had the interest of European club teams not named Aston Villa that were looking for a new manager, while he tried to convince Klinsmann to take the job with a couple of handjobs and a bottle of Andre. When Klinsmann turned it all down, Gulati had nowhere else but back to his old reliable backup, Bob Bradley.
2. This news could seriously affect Bradley’s outlook going forward during this cycle. I am not trying to say that Bradley is a mentally weak coach; just put yourself in his shoes. Most of you are probably office drones, so I will break this down for you. After years of work, where you made your company, division, or whoever the fuck you work for, more money, recognition and prestige than ever before, you are given this great promotion from your
boss. Everyone at the office congratulates you, hell you may even get a shitty Wal-Mart cake in the break room. Ten minutes later, an email starts floating around the office, from the boss, talking about how he really wanted to bring someone else from the outside for your new job. That has to be a gigantic kick in the nuts. Would you really be motivated to work your ass off for that shithead of a boss? I certainly wouldn’t. Maybe you all have less dignity and self respect than I do. Someone needs to send Bradley one of those
posters you see in cubicles with a cat falling out of a tree with the phrase “Hang In There!” across the bottom.
This whole series of events over the last 4 or so months really makes me question just exactly what Gulati is thinking. This reminds me of one of the great scenes in one of the great films of our time, Major League II, where Harry Doyle, played by the incomparable Bob Uecker, breaks down managerial logic in a critical spot during Game Seven of the ALCS between the lovable Wahoo Warriors and the dreaded Yankees.
“Well, he’s gonna walk Beck to get to Parkman. Obviously Taylor’s thinking…I don’t know what the hell he’s thinking.”
For a smart dude, one that has done so much for youth soccer in the country, he has no clue how to run a job search. If Sunil was running a fortune 500 company with these types of mistakes, he would be running it into the ground. Of course, he’d still likely get a bonus paid for by federal taxpayer bailout money, but that’s another day, another website.
Enough of this shit, I need to head to the bar and pound some PBR, but I can’t leave without imparting some words of wisdom from me, a guy who knows things…
PUCK’S FREE ADVICE:
When at a crowed bar, never, under any circumstance wave money, bang on the bar, or scream obnoxiously to get a drink. It makes you look like a fucking asshole. If I see you doing that to my favorite barkeep, I will make sure that 6$ rum and coke ends up on the floor.
The quickest way to get a drink it with some solid eye contact, no shenanigans necessary.
T-Bone just walked in with a case of PBR for us to crush before heading to Shabooms.
Sorry for partying bitches.
Puck is the Pop Culture Guru for The Yanks Are Coming. He can be reached at puck@yanksarecoming.com. He also regained his man-card and joined Twitter, where you can follow his pithy insights at @PuckLovesPBR.