[ColoradoTree]

[quote author=Boston Card link=topic=17658.msg205853#msg205853 date=1507775868]
https://projects.fivethirtyeight.com/glo...-rankings/

According to this ranking system Horvath... is not there.  The highest MLS club (Toronto FC) is 171st in the world.  Atlanta is next at 281.

BC

Yeah, 538's club ranking system is a classic example of "some data: better or worse than no data?" You can maybe compare North American teams to South American ones because Mexican clubs play in both North and South American competitions. European teams play each other all the time. Asian teams, the same. But the only times American teams play Asian ones in a competitive format is during the Club World Cup, a horrendously small sample size.

538 tries to make up with it with its use of Transfermarkt, a German site which somehow assigns market values to virtually every player in the world. I'm not sure how it determines its market values...but it's not a mark-to-market system. I can think of several examples of MLS players (either transferring in or out) being valued below the actual factual transfer fees paid for them.

So basically I have no idea what to make of the system. I can say with a lot of confidence that MLS is improving relative to its North American competitors. Mexican teams are probably improving relative to South American competitors. Aside from that? Shruggie.

Now, what does that mean for the eternal unsolveable Europe v. MLS debate? Not much. Like most debates it's probably more posturing about overly broad categories than anything else. It doesn't make much sense to head to a bad club in MLS...or Europe. The question is so situationally dependent that (IMO) the debate is a bit silly.

I don't think "American players playing in MLS" has much to do with the failure to qualify. The U.S. trotted out three players who are excelling in European squads currently, and left one on the bench. T&T trotted out...zero. As a pure question of talent the U.S. is top three at worst, and that's being conservative. Talent isn't a qualification problem. (It is a "win the World Cup" problem, if that's your jam.)
[/quote]

Well said.  The U.S. has more than enough talent on the current roster to qualify with no trouble.  That it couldn't speaks to problems outside the talent development sphere.  (That said, problems obviously exist in the talent development sphere, .)  To me, that suggests that either our coaches failed to set the right tone, or our players are irredeemably uncoachable.  I don't think it's the latter. 

You're right, the talent problems we've been talking about (and that seem to be the bigger focus of the various postmortems I've read) shouldn't be necessary to qualify, though they'd make qualification easier, of course.  And to me, it's less about winning the World Cup than it is cracking through to that next echelon where it doesn't seem outlandish to think that we could.  Prior to this debacle, it felt like we'd settled into a place where we expected to get through the group stage and could maybe hope to win a game in the knockout round if we got a favorable matchup, but we recognized we couldn't reasonably expect to go any further than that.  I'd be perfectly content if we could get to a point where the thought process of a quarterfinal against a top European or South American club isn't, "they have no shot," but is instead "the odds are certainly against them, but if certain things fall into place for them, they're good enough to capitalize on Team A's mistakes and steal a result." 

[ColoradoTree]

[quote author=Boston Card link=topic=17658.msg205853#msg205853 date=1507775868]
https://projects.fivethirtyeight.com/glo...-rankings/

According to this ranking system Horvath... is not there.  The highest MLS club (Toronto FC) is 171st in the world.  Atlanta is next at 281.

BC

Yeah, 538's club ranking system is a classic example of "some data: better or worse than no data?" You can maybe compare North American teams to South American ones because Mexican clubs play in both North and South American competitions. European teams play each other all the time. Asian teams, the same. But the only times American teams play Asian ones in a competitive format is during the Club World Cup, a horrendously small sample size.

538 tries to make up with it with its use of Transfermarkt, a German site which somehow assigns market values to virtually every player in the world. I'm not sure how it determines its market values...but it's not a mark-to-market system. I can think of several examples of MLS players (either transferring in or out) being valued below the actual factual transfer fees paid for them.

So basically I have no idea what to make of the system. I can say with a lot of confidence that MLS is improving relative to its North American competitors. Mexican teams are probably improving relative to South American competitors. Aside from that? Shruggie.

Now, what does that mean for the eternal unsolveable Europe v. MLS debate? Not much. Like most debates it's probably more posturing about overly broad categories than anything else. It doesn't make much sense to head to a bad club in MLS...or Europe. The question is so situationally dependent that (IMO) the debate is a bit silly.

I don't think "American players playing in MLS" has much to do with the failure to qualify. The U.S. trotted out three players who are excelling in European squads currently, and left one on the bench. T&T trotted out...zero. As a pure question of talent the U.S. is top three at worst, and that's being conservative. Talent isn't a qualification problem. (It is a "win the World Cup" problem, if that's your jam.)
[/quote]

Well said.  The U.S. has more than enough talent on the current roster to qualify with no trouble.  That it couldn't speaks to problems outside the talent development sphere.  (That said, problems obviously exist in the talent development sphere, .)  To me, that suggests that either our coaches failed to set the right tone, or our players are irredeemably uncoachable.  I don't think it's the latter. 

You're right, the talent problems we've been talking about (and that seem to be the bigger focus of the various postmortems I've read) shouldn't be necessary to qualify, though they'd make qualification easier, of course.  And to me, it's less about winning the World Cup than it is cracking through to that next echelon where it doesn't seem outlandish to think that we could.  Prior to this debacle, it felt like we'd settled into a place where we expected to get through the group stage and could maybe hope to win a game in the knockout round if we got a favorable matchup, but we recognized we couldn't reasonably expect to go any further than that.  I'd be perfectly content if we could get to a point where the thought process of a quarterfinal against a top European or South American club isn't, "they have no shot," but is instead "the odds are certainly against them, but if certain things fall into place for them, they're good enough to capitalize on Team A's mistakes and steal a result."