Nemeses: Thomas Rongen

I know I told you that I was planning on writing about Diego Maradona today, but you know what?  I'm quite often a liar.  A big, hairy, sweaty liar.  Today's addition to my ever-growing Axis of Soccer Evil is Thomas Rongen.

Now is the appropriate time to scratch your head and say "Whuuuuh?"

Have any of you seen that terrible movie The Butterfly Effect?  It's pretty much Ashton Kutcher, Amy Smart and the Fat Guy Who Stares at the Magic Eye Poster in Mallrats getting Punk'd over and over by alternate realities and space-time.

The ACTUAL butterfly effect is, quoth Wikipedia, "a metaphor that encapsulate the concept of sensitive dependence on initial conditions in Chaos Theory."  More crudely put, it's the idea that, if a butterfly flaps its wings in California, Denise Richards suddenly might find things to be much less complicated.  If the butterfly stays still, that stupid big-face gets her own show on E!.

So how does this apply in the case of, and for that matter, who the fuck is Thomas Rongen?

Thomas Rongen was born in 1956 in Amsterdam (which is in The Netherlands, you idiot).  He played defense and midfield for the Ajax B Team from 1975-1979 before joining up with the Los Angeles Aztecs in the now defunct NASL.  Rongen bounced around the US for about a decade, before retiring and settling into a coaching career.  Slowly working his way up through the ranks of MLS, he is currently the Sporting Director at Chivas USA, as well as the United States Under 20 coach.

I can see that you're still not getting it.  I'll go further.

Ignore the hair.  Neven Subotic was born to Serbian parents in Banja Luka, moved to Shomberg, and eventually resettled to Salt Lake City at the age of 11 (cities which are in Bosnia and Herzegovina ,Germany and the United States, you idiot).  Subotic played defender for the US U-17 National Team before getting a contract offer by the German club Mainz 05.  Subotic's last game for the US came in November 2006 for the U-20 team, after which he declared his intent to play for Serbia, the country of his ancestry.

Is it starting to make sense?

Subotic is really good, despite his critics, and given the US's current situation at outside back, it would really help to have him in the fold.  A lot of Americans talk shit on Giuseppe Rossi and how he abandoned the United States, but he made his decision to play for Italy at a very young age, so I can't really get too worked up about it.  Neven Subotic is a totally different story.  Something literally drove him away.

Thomas Rongen is the reason we find ourselves in this current situation.  I'm not saying he's a bad person and I'm not saying he wasn't necessarily right in what he did (probably wasn't), but the simple fact is when Subotic was left off the 2007 U-20 World Cup roster, that was the last straw.  He switched loyalties soon after.

Quoth Rongen: "[Subotic has] not accelerated over there to the point where we feel he belongs on the [U.S.] team."

Quoth Subotic:  "Well, Rongen certainly said some discouraging and false things about me. Never in my life have I heard that a high level coach publicly criticizes a player. Professional coaches do that one-on-one with the player. I find this disappointing, because a few months later after Rongen said I was not good enough for the U-20s, I played a very good season and started getting calls from various countries [U.S. included] for the full men's team. I still don't know what he saw in the other players, and what he didn't see in me."

Quoth Rongen:  "Leaving him off the squad was clearly injury related and had nothing to do with Neven Subotic, because I thought he was a good enough player to make our team and probably good enough to maybe even start."

Thanks, Rongen.  Whatever story you choose to believe, it doesn't matter.  Subotic obviously thought it was personal, and as a result, the US lost an extremely valuable asset.  Thanks a fucking ton.

Every time we get scored on this summer, I will only blame you.  You pasty bastard.