If it were me, I’d have taken away his juice boxes and his video-game privileges, and banned him from staying out after dark, playing with the dog, and rapping. Especially no more rapping; the latter would be a throw-in for the sake of humanity.
Perhaps you have other ideas for punishing the child-like petulance of Sounders star Clint Dempsey June 16. Certainly most everyone in soccer has had a say, from the U.S. Open Cup to MLS to U.S. Soccer, which Thursday announced that Dempsey was stripped temporarily of his captaincy of the U.S. Men’s National Team for his tantrum.
I can’t wait for the Roberto Alomar Appreciation Society to issue a condemnation.
Late in the U.S. Open Cup game at Starfire won 3-1 by the Portland Timbers, Dempsey tore up the notebook of referee Daniel Radford after he booked a Dempsey teammate with a red card. Even though there was no physical contact between the player and official, the act was deemed referee assault, a most serious matter in any sport and worthy of a long suspension.
In the opinion of witnesses, including Sounders coach Sigi Schmid, the game-long dubious calls were indeed scorn-worthy, and the outcome of ending the game with seven players against 11 was absurd. But none of it was worth Dempsey’s foolishness.
“They left their hearts out on the field, and I think they got robbed,” Schmid said of his team. “It’s got to serve as motivation and fuel to do everything we can in the league, to win another Supporters’ Shield, to do well in the Champions League, and do well in MLS Cup.
“It’s disappointing for it to end like this, to force your team to play a team 7-on-11.”
Well, the episode hasn’t served as anything but a detriment. Dempsey served a three-game suspension imposed by MLS, which ends at 8 p.m. Friday when the Sounders (9-7-2, 29 points) host D.C. United (10-5-5, 35 points), leader in the Supporters’ Shield race.
Besides being eliminated from Open Cup play, the Sounders in MLS play lost 2-0 to San Jose, 1-0 to Philadelphia and 4-1 to Portland. The Sounders have won once since the end of May.
Not all, or even most, of the ineffective play is attributable to the absence of Dempsey, but injuries and national-team callups that have contributed to the slide are the setbacks standard in any season.
Dempsey’s pout was not. For a 32-year-old to revert to adolescence and invite serious consequences to his team and, potentially, the national team on the eve of this month’s Gold Cup is either stupidity or arrogance. I’d guess it’s a strong dollop of both. That was underscored by his terse tweet of apology that was quite a bit less than contrite:
I would like to apologize for my actions in the U.S. Open Cup.
— Clint Dempsey (@clint_dempsey) June 25, 2015
U.S. coach Jurgen Klinsmann would have been entirely within reason to suspend Dempsey from USMNT for the Gold Cup. Instead, he issued a grandfatherly scold and took away dessert from Dempsey’s national-team feast.
“I had a very, very good conversation with Clint about what happened during the Open Cup, but also about how we want to approach things,” Klinsmann told U.S. Soccer. “For the time being, we thought it’s the best thing to give the captaincy to Michael Bradley and let Clint focus on what he’s all about. Clint is all about scoring goals.
“We need Clint Dempsey badly with the National Team. We need him in a good spirit.
“What happened was a mistake, but it was the first red card in his career and a lot of people went at him. I think the best thing for everyone right now is to let him concentrate really on playing and doing what he does best.
“It’s his performance on the field. It’s his delivery for the U.S. National Team, and he has always delivered. He’s at 40 goals for his country and I told him I want him to score many, many more. Hopefully in this summer’s Gold Cup he becomes the top scorer in the tournament. We need Clint in a free spirit, and that’s why we decided to kind of take that captaincy and move it over to Michael for the Gold Cup and then we’ll see.”
Certainly, Klinsmann is right — Dempsey is about scoring goals. And that seems to be it, too. For U.S. Soccer to worry about his “free spirit” and not hold its captain more accountable for reckless behavior is to green-light him for more. Letting him “do what he does best” while all but forgiving what he does worst inspires contempt from anyone who cares at all about standards of professional behavior.
When Schmid, Klinsmann, Lou Piniella or any coach/manager gets tossed from a game, it rarely impacts an outcome. When the star gets blown out for weeks for no good reason, it’s a big deal. Which is why sports leagues often like to excuse nonsense like this, because to stand for something more than wins hurts business.
As U.S. Soccer did after the recent disclosures about USWNT and Seattle Reign FC goalie Hope Solo’s belligerent behavior with police upon her arrest for domestic violence against her half-sister and a nephew — behavior corroborated by the sister on a national-TV interview — the organization says, by not admonishing Solo, winning comes first, second and third, and everything else is tied for last.
Dempsey scores goals superbly. Solo stops goals superbly. They also do things that embarrass themselves and teammates and potentially compromise team outcomes because they feel no overriding desire for self-control, since U.S. Soccer allows the players to think they are bigger than the industry.
This isn’t about setting poor examples for kids. Most 12-year-olds already know what Dempsey and Solo did was self-destructively stupid. This is about believing that your responsibilities to teammates, coaches, fans and sponsors are important enough to check your feelings of invulnerability marbled with persecution at the saloon door.
6 Comments
Come on, Solo is a much bigger knucklehead. How dumb do you have to be to marry Jerry Stevens?
The problem in Solo’s case is that the charges were dropped, because the half-sister and nephew didn’t talk with the judicial authorities at the time of Solo’s arraignment. Their side of the story didn’t come out until right before the World Cup, at which point it becomes a she said-they said situation. Should you suspend someone for an officially “alleged” incident? Tough call.
US Soccer president Sunil Gulati took the “innocent until proven guilty” view when he let Solo play, which isn’t unreasonable; but booting her for a string of bad decisions also wouldn’t be unreasonable.
judicial authorities? you mean the victims refused to be deposed by solo’s defense attorney. the nfl suspended adrian peterson and ray rice for domestic violence allegations during their period of presumptive innocence. i guess fifa’s just a champion of due process.
On the other hand, Duke lacrosse lost their season on a false assault allegation. Personally, I would’ve kept Solo at home, on account of accumulated transgressions, but on a procedural basis U.S. Soccer’s (this isn’t a FIFA case) due process emphasis is understandable.
uh #fifawwc
It’s FIFA’s event, but U.S. Soccer’s responsibility on the roster. In fact, FIFa has suspended countries from tournaments for government interference in national team activities.