Alexi Lalas

I found him to be insufferable, pompous, and incredibly arrogant for no reason. Why is he “the voice of us soccer?”

I’m switching from FS1 to Telemundo just to avoid listening to him. This guy has some serious issues with his hatred towards this group of players. I guess he’s salty because they have better training grounds and staff than he did when he was playing, but guess what? SO DOES EVERY OTHER NATIONAL TEAM. I feel like he’s hoping the USMNT fail so he can rant about them again even though he never played for a club that wasn’t mediocre af

This is not a new thought. He was God-awful in 2006 and 2010. I know Alexi Lalas is somewhat of a cult figure, but he makes ESPN's World Cup coverage unbearable. Every time he criticizes a world-class player, or smugly dismisses players 10x his caliber, I want to punch him in the face. He's so arrogant. It's almost as if he thinks he was a Maldini. The guy would struggle to make the current U.S team.

Armed only with my sharp wit and the mutant gene I am here to answer your questions. AMA.

First point to the trolls who are going to say "bUt ARe THeY wROng???" Yes we underperformed this year. Yes the writing was on the wall long before this tournament. No, it is not because these professional athletes who have trained their entire lives at the highest level magically "don't want it enough" because of "brand" or "social causes." It's not because they had "big mouths" and were already looking ahead to the final or whatever else was going on in Beerensteyn's fantasy world. Plenty of very thoughtful articles are out there talking about the concrete reasons the USWNT got knocked out the tournament. You can look them up.

As for the bad faith arguments...

The way the US approaches soccer training is prohibitively expensive, as most of us know. At least $5,000 in dues for a travel team on top of the out of pocket travel costs for a family. It's no secret this means that the men who make it to the national team did not necessarily get there on talent but on ability to pay. Alexi Lalas went to an extremely expensive preparatory school (the tuition for day students is as much as my tuition was for in-state university). He is the son of a high ranking professor and an accomplished writer. This is a man who spent his whole life getting handed what he wanted and likely being told in the less competitive world of the US men's soccer pipeline that he was a lot better than he was. For his decade in the game his greatest achievements are a few MLS awards when the league was fledgling. He has less than a hundred caps for the USMNT, less than 10 goals for the team, and never even sniffed the round of 8. He is not one of the greatest soccer players of all time and not even one of the greatest American soccer players of all time. He's a terminally average player whose biggest contribution to the attention on the sport was how crazy his hair and beard looked in the 90s. He's been forced to stay relevant by covering women's soccer (which I'm sure in his brain is painful) and now he has the chance to do what he always wanted: use his podium to bash and criticize (queer and outspoken) women who hold opposite political ideology and disguise it as sports commentary. His claims that the team is "polarizing" that their "politics, causes, stances & behavior" has made them unlikable and contributed to their failure this year is the most hack attempt at a culture war argument and should be enough to keep him from ever commentating on another professional sporting event.

As for Carli Lloyd, it's been no secret for a few years now she (not entirely of her own volition) was in an extremely toxic environment where for over 10 years her entire life was nothing but soccer to the point where she was estranged from her family. I feel for the abusive situation she found herself in but that has made her extremely bitter and resentful to the players who did not give up everything and managed to have similar success. Even if she's on the other side of that time period in her life and cut ties with Galanis, the mindset is still there and she desperately needs those 12 years to have been for something. If you can achieve the success she had while having a loving family and friends and own businesses and have active social causes, then she unnecessarily wasted a huge chunk of her life. She needs her narrative--that the current team is unserious and too focused on activism and branding--to be the truth. She also needs to believe this team could not possibly be the same without her on the pitch. That all that work she put in could not possibly be replicated without huge personal sacrifice. Criticizing Carli Lloyd is not "telling a woman to be quiet" as some of the bad faith defenses of her have made it out to be. It's Lloyd who is incredibly guilty of that for criticizing her own teammates' off the field efforts for social progress in what can only amount to a "shut up and dribble" mentality.

It's not shocking that these two fail to touch on the actual reasons for the knock out that reputable sports journalists have discussed (the inexperience of Vlatko, the injuries, the lack of chemistry between two generations). To them this is not a momentary blip that can be rectified by a few more years of training, it's proof that "wokeness" is destructive, that focusing on anything other than the disciplined craft of your sport is a weakness (Carli going immediately from soccer to participate in weird ass military propaganda survivalist show is incredibly on brand), that there is only one brand of patriotism and anything else is treason. They're pointing to intangibles which can't be quantified, throwing stones at an empty throne and calling themselves brave. For fans of this game, all this noise is also proof that women, queer folks, POC folks, and other marginalized groups are only ever allowed to participate in the world if we are exceptional. The second we stop being that, the cockroaches come out with endless takes and contrarian "don't shoot the messenger" bullshit.

He kept mentioning that he wanted them to lose. I'm not sure why he disliked them but he wasn't shy about it.

LALAS, COMMENTATOR FROM FS-1-THE-ONE-FOR-FUN, WANTS US ALL TO KNOW THAT OUR TRASH TALK HAS BEEN GIVEN EVERYTHING, BUT WE ARE SIMPLY SOFT, TATTOOED THOUSANDAIRES.

ON TO THE GAMES...

MEGATRON'S BUTTHOLE FC RIDING HIGH AFTER A TOUCHDOWN OF THEIR OWN AGAINST NEW ENGLAND, WILL BE HOSTING ARREST CITY SC ON SATURDAY. BOTH TEAMS PLAY ON TURF, BOTH TEAMS ARE IN THE SOUTH, BOTH TEAMS ARE GROWING IN HATE FOR EACH OTHER. NOT SURE WHERE I WAS GOING WITH THIS, AND NEITHER IS ORLANDO.

IN THE GREAT WHITE NORTH, THE OKAY YELLOW MIDDLE WILL BE ARRIVING IN BC PLACE FOR A MATCHUP. CROSS-CONTINENTAL BATTLES LIKE THIS DO A LITTLE FOR THE STANDINGS, AND A LOT FOR THE JET LAG FOR THE VISITORS. WILL #4 IN THE BEASTERN CONFERENCE BE ABLE TO BEST #1 IN THE WORSTERN CONFERENCE? ONLY ONE WAY TO FIND OUT...

NEXT UP, IMPACT D'BAGELS WILL HOST HOT DISH FC. CAN MINNESOTA SCORE SOME NICE GOALS, OR WILL THEY DISCOVER THE BELL TOLLS FOR THEM? PROBABLY NEITHER, I'M CALLING IT A 0-0 DRAW.

OH MAN, THEN IT'S TIME FOR CLINK DWELLERS TO VISIT FRISCO FC. REMINDER FOR THE RAVE GREEN, GOTTA BEHAVE YOURSELVES DOWN THERE, THEY'RE VERY PARTICULAR ABOUT THEIR SUPPORTERS CULTURE. DON'T WORRY, "FIGHT AND WIN" IS TOO SHITTY A CHANT TO BOTHER THE CENSORS.

TOO MUCH STUFF ON A HOT DOG WILL PLAY HOST TO SOMEHOW NOT BOTTOM OF THE LEAGUE DC. GIVEN HOW HOT THE FIRE WERE EARLIER IN THE SEASON, AND HOW CRAP DC'S BEEN ESSENTIALLY ALL YEAR, IF CHICAGO DON'T COME AWAY WITH AT LEAST A TWO GOAL WINNING MARGIN, IT'S ESSENTIALLY A LOSS.

AND THEN WE HAVE NOT IN BOSTON TRAVELLING TO NOT IN MISSOURI. IF I MAY BE A BIT PARTISAN FOR A MOMENT – REVS, PLEASE DESTROY SKC'S WILL TO LIVE SO WHEN RBNY HEADS DOWN THERE ON WEDNESDAY FOR THE USOC FINAL SKC LOSE HANDILY. THANKS IN ADVANCE, XOXOX.

AH, DELIGHTFUL, NOW WE HAVE BOTTOM OF THE LEAGUE FC HOSTING WE'RE TOTALLY NOT PLASTIC FC. SUPER LATE MATCH IN COLORADO, THE BOYS IN BLUE BETTER REMEMBER NOT TO SPARK UP UNTIL AFTER THE MATCH. ON THE OTHER HAND, COLORADO'S BEEN PLAYING SO POORLY LATELY, THEY MIGHT BE ABLE TO GET AWAY WITH IT...

IS IT STILL COOL TO MAKE FREAKIN' PRINTER JOKES? HOPE SO, AS REAL FREAKIN PRINTER WILL WELCOME SECOND COOLEST CASCADIA CITY TO RIOT. CAN PETKE'S CREW SNAP PORTLAND'S LONGEST UNDEFEATED STREAK ALL SEASON? REMEMBER PORTLAND, SEATTLE INVENTED LOSING.

THE CARSON GALACTICOS WILL HAVE EVERYONE LOVES TORONTO FC PAYING A VISIT AS OUR PENULTIMATE MATCH ON SATURDAY. SINCE LAG HAS BEEN ATROCIOUS AT HOME AND TFC HAS BEEN DOMINANT EVERYWHERE, THE ONLY QUESTION IS HOW MANY RED CARDS WILL LAG COLLECT.

AND THE FINAL SATURDAY GAME IS BETWEEN THE SAN JOSE DISASTERS AND THE MILDLY MOIST DYNAMO. IN ALL SERIOUSNESS, BEST OF LUCK IN HOUSTON'S RECOVERY FROM HARVEY. IN ALL TRASHINESS, ONLY TWO POINTS AND THE RED LINE (AND DALLAS) SEPARATE THESE TEAMS, CAN'T WAIT TO SEE BOTH TEAMS THROW AWAY THIS OPPORTUNITY.

ONWARD TO THE ONLY SUNDAY MATCH! ON ESPN, FAR FROM BIG RED'S PRYING EYES AND PIERCING TONGUE, ENERGY DRINK FC WILL WELCOME I95 NEIGHBORS, BUT NOT QUITE RIVALS UNION DE CHEESESTEAK. RBNY NEED A WIN HERE TO CLIMB BACK INTO THE MIDDLE OF THE EAST'S PLAYOFF BERTHS, AND THE UNION NEED TO NOT LOSE TO KEEP THEIR COACH.

HERE WE GO, HOME STRETCH, HOPE WE GET TO FADE SOME FLAIRS THIS WEEK!

CAPS ON, FLAIRS UP, THIS GENERATION HAS BEEN GIVEN EVERYTHING, AND GET OFF OF MY LAWN