So I watched the MLS Greatest Goals…

and I must say, from 1996-2003, the MLS didn't really have that many great goals.  We had like the Marcelo Balboa bike and the Caricola banana… that's about it.  Eddie Lewis had a solid strike that scraped the iron from about 30 yards out that was spectacular, but really, there weren't a lot of great goals in the first 8 years of the MLS.  Where are the Paulo DiCanio scissors or the Ronaldinho mazy runs?

I mean, it's not for a complete lack of talent.  We've had guys who are fairly skilled on the ball and who are capable of making beautiful goals.  I'll even give you the McBride twisting volley as a very good goal… but there's really nothing that's spectacular.   People hold up the Mathis goal against the old Burn as one of the great individual goals in MLS history.  Seriously?  Watch that goal again, it really wasn't that good.  It was a direct result of poorass defending… not porous defending… poorass.  There's a reason Ryan Suarez isn't on the national team.

I don't know, maybe in the last 2+ years are when the spectacular goals have occurred and I just didn't have them readily available on DVD.  I guess I'm just saddened that for the second straight week I've been presented visual evidence of just how far the MLS has to go to equal foreign leagues.  Sure, we can maybe be competitive in the English First Division (or whatever the 2nd level is calling itself these days), but we've just got so far to go still.  I mean, New England completely owned LA on Saturday, just trounced them.  However, if you go back and watch Chelsea v. Man U, it doesn't even compare.  The level of skill and control and pacing Chelsea displayed against one of the top teams in the world was just amazing.  New England couldn't even sustain half of that level of play on Saturday yet still had a walk in the park.

I know, I'm comparing New England to Chelsea and that's not fair.  But realistically, maybe that's what we need sometimes to really take an honest look at the MLS and US Soccer in general.  Don't get me wrong, I love both things like I love a good slice of Andolini's Pizza, but let's not kid ourselves.  We all tell ourselves that MLS teams could at least stay up in the Premiership.  I don't doubt that our best league teams have the talent and speed and we may even have solid coaches, but I just don't think MLS soccer has really progressed to the point where we can keep it all together and stay competitive.

On the international level, we all tell ourselves that we don't buy into the whole "we're number 4" idea.  But I don't think I'm alone in thinking that I take a little pride in the number and really do think we're not really that far away from getting there.  I even think there's a remote chance we could sneak out of the Group of Death.  There's just something about the US being an underdog that seems odd enough that it just may work.  But even so, as close as we think we are, we're so far away.  Take a hard look at the national team.  What truly World Class players do we have?  I think we're maybe a generation (or at least 1-2 World Cup cycles) until we can say we have at least 1 World Class player on our team.

What am I saying?  I'm not sure.  I think it seems I'm a little down on the soccer thing, but I'm not.  I'm immensely excited about the World Cup.  I can't wait to have time to catch up on the 20 MLS games I've missed this season.  I can't wait to go out to a Battery game and act like an idiot.  Maybe this is how things get when your presented with evidence that your team is an underdog, that the league you follow really isn't as big as you hope it is.  Maybe this is just how you get when you realize that as far as this sport has come in the past decade, that it still has so much farther to go in this country.  Maybe this is how you feel when you realize that what you thought was great isn't, but is only going to get much better.  You're a little disappointed, that is until you realize the journey is just starting, and you've got your whole life to see how it ends.