It’s official. That tryout with Bayern Munich has turned into, at least, a temporary job in Europe for Landon Donovan.
I wish him well.
This is a fairly critical point in his career. Not because it will determine whether he makes a nice living out of soccer (he already has). Nor because his status as “best American-born player in the game’s history” is up for discussion (because it’s not).
But because how this turns out will shape how he is remembered. Whether or not that is fair (and it’s not).
The silly people who project their expectations onto him are, apparently, a significant minority of U.S. soccer fandom. If not a majority.
They are the ones who have agitated for him to “go to Europe!” “Prove yourself against the best!”
As if all the elite-level play he has turned in for the U.S. national team — for almost a decade — meant nothing. His stated desire to be part of the American professional league and try to help it succeed? Forget that, too. “Shut up and get on a plane, Landycakes!”
It’s weird. It’s as if some American soccer fans themselves need to be validated that, yes, the country can produce world-class talent, and all of those guys, every single last one of them, has to go to Europe to prove it to a skeptical global community. “See? Here’s another one! Like Claudio Reyna and Brian McBride and all the keepers we keep sending you!”
So, now, Landon has done it. It’s his third try at the Bundesliga. The first was when he signed with Bayer Leverkusen as a 16-year-old kid, homesick and depressed. The second when they essentially forced him to return.
Each time he came back home to SoCal. And the bellowing from little people who don’t have to live his life got louder. “He can’t cut it! He’s soft! He’s mentally weak!”
Well, I hope all of you — and you know who you are — are happy about this.
Donovan “owes” no one anything; the suggestion he somehow owes himself, or the sport, or somebody, X number of years running around Europe is just ridiculous.
Why could he not live his own life and be the official star of the Los Angeles Galaxy and Major League Soccer? Now he has been hounded back to Germany and is presumably alone; his wife, Bianca Kajlich, is a co-star in an ongoing CBS sitcom. His family is in Redlands. Sure. Go to Germany. It’s easy for everyone else to say.
He is dealing with northern Europe’s winter, which includes days about seven hours long and month after month of lousy weather. And for what? So he could shut up the idiots who call him Landycakes. It isn’t for the money, because Landon is less about the money than any athlete I’ve ever known.
What I hope happens?
Landon tears it up. He wins a place in the starting 11, at Bayern Munich. He scores goals and the team does well. German fans cheer him.
And then, end of the season, he does whatever he really wants to do — up to and including leaving for California.
That would be the ultimate “take that” moment from Landon to the chunk of twisted soccer fans who have dogged him throughout his remarkable (and underappreciated) career. He went over to the country he said he hated to play in the exact same league “he couldn’t hack”, stood out. And left.
I would love that.
Whatever he chooses to do, I wish him well. There goes America’s best player, and for as long as he is gone, MLS just got that much more irrelevant.
6 responses so far ↓
1 Galaxy fan // Nov 21, 2008 at 7:12 AM
Paul, no doubt some of the fans have been ridiculous in their criticisms of Donovan, and they deserve your scorn. But hounded him back to Germany! He has always done exactly what he wanted, more power to him, and now he has the desire to play soccer at a higher level. He’s done his stint with the Galaxy, he’s done his best and he’s helped MLS, but the team hasn’t come together & he’s not getting any younger. If he’s been forced to Germany by the naysayers then I’m sure he will have little success & will be back soon. To me he seems as if he wants that level now. We’ll see.
2 Ian // Nov 21, 2008 at 7:37 AM
While I’m surprised he went to Germany, Bayern is actually a nice opportunity for him. They need help up front, since Lukas Podolski has asked to be sold back to Cologne and Luca Toni and Klose have both missed time this season. Also, Landon seems to do better with people he knows, and it’s obvious he and Klinsmann have a good relationship. Also, he can play out wide if Ribery or Schweinsteiger take a rest day.
So I see him getting first XI time more often than not if he can just play hard.
You and I had a discussion about Landon going to Germany the first time when he signed the Leverkusen contract. I don’t know if you remember it. At the time, I said, “it will either be outstanding for US Soccer or it will be an amazing flop because he’s too damn young.” You were looking more at the shades of gray.
My problem with Landon since he came back is that the love of the game he showed in 2002 (in MLS and on the national scene) has been replaced by a hard, cold, seemingly me-first person. His skill has never been in doubt, but I still question his motives. I don’t fault him for the mistake he made at 16. But he brought the expectation on himself.
And so I hope he finds what he’s looking for. I hope he kicks ass in Germany and gets to stick around long enough to play in the Champions League. He’s the best product of his generation, but like it or not, he’s now set himself up for a has-to-make-it loan period.
3 Dennis Pope // Nov 21, 2008 at 10:06 AM
The new, seemingly tougher, persona he’s groomed as of late is exactly what he needs to succeed in European soccer, where every player is a mercenary playing for a pirate.
I like PaulO’s idea of playing one season, playing well, and walking away. There’s a certain guterall correctness to that scenario, albeit unlikely.
I think he’s in Europe to stay. At least the next five years, anyway. After his stay at Bayern, he should look at opportunities to play in La Liga or Serie A. There’s no doubt in my mind he could play in either. The EPL may be a stretch, as Donovan himself has said:
“I don’t see myself making runs at John Terry.”
4 Damian // Nov 21, 2008 at 5:43 PM
I’m happy for Landon. Ecstatic, selfishly, because I’ve always wanted to see him perform and succeed at the highest level of club soccer, and this loan represents the best and most high-profile club an American has ever played for, even if it’s only for 3 months. Landon is once again a living pioneer of sorts in American soccer. The first American to play for a European superclub. Whether the motives of fans and onlookers are to watch him succeed or fail, the masses of American soccer fan will be paying attention, and those are the kind of points of interest we need in growing soccer here.
I would love to see Europe rejuvenate his passion for playing. Since the Galaxy started playing like the San Bernardino Blast the last few years, Landon often seems bored by the competition and comparatively slow pace of play and frustrated that his teammates can’t see the game the way he sees it and have the technical skill he has. Not that the Galaxy’s misfortunes are down to Landon and Becks (for a season and change), but rather the terrible team construction of Lalas and minimum-wage amateurs in defense and in goal who should not be allowed to start in a top-level league in any country.
Landon doesn’t owe this opportunity to anyone, but I believe he feels he owes it to himself, his competitive spirit and his talent to test himself against the upper echelon of Europe. MLS is not a challenge for him. I believe anyone who thinks different of my opinion here is likely exhibiting that American arrogance, that America is the best at everything. I absolutely hate that attitude. You don’t have the talent Landon has and settle for MLS from the context of being a soccer player, if you are right in the head. Magic and Jordan didn’t have dreams of playing hoops in Italy. Kobe doesn’t drive himself to be the best with aspirations of joining the D-League. This isn’t an MLS-bashing rant. This is common sense — MLS is nowhere near the profile and quality of the major leagues in European football.
I am quite sure he is doing this for himself, not because Eric Wynalda or other MLS players I have talked to in the past have said he needs to do this. Landon is quite independent, grew up to be an adult earlier than most and has made his own decisions for quite a while, since he talked his mom into letting him go to Leverkusen at 16.
No one disputes that Landon is a great, down-to-earth guy with a real heart and soul that still shines despite the celebrity status his fame has brought him. But Landon was too emotionally immature, his confidence too fragile, at Leverkusen and it was unrealistic that an American teenager would play a big role at a Bundesliga club. He is in a much better place now, his game and mentality matured and the Bundesliga not as skilled a league as it was when he was at Leverkusen. The physical game in Germany is still not the best fit for Landon — I think he would be a star in, say, an Ajax or PSV in Holland, or for a Sporting Lisbon or Porto in Portugal — but Landon’s talent is good enough to hack it with Bayern.
And because Landon’s primary weakness in his game is still his bouts with fragile confidence (it is noticeable when he has had 2 or 3 bad games in a row in major competitions), it’s healthy to grow a little bit of an ego, a swagger, a chip, which can build mental toughness and the ability to fight through adversity. Ego and having a chip don’t necessarily mean he has to become a bad guy off the field. The world’s best athletes and competitors in any sport have to have egos to be where they are, competitively. Those egos translate to confidence, among other things.
Our expectations should not be that he go there and start right away or start often. Cut him some slack. He is fighting for a spot in the lineup against teammates far better and more accomplished than he has ever had before, and no starting spot is guaranteed from week to week in Europe. Especially at Bayern. Look at Podolski, whose regular scoring sprees in the Germany shirt in major competitions don’t necessarily translate to similar succcess in the Bayern shirt. You work hard every week for that start.
Bottom line is I am proud of Landon, as a soccer fan, as someone who wants to see U.S. Soccer develop and flourish and be the best it can be, as someone who feels fortunate to have a personal/professional relationship with him on some level since he was the center mid at Redlands East Valley who was shadowed by 2 and 3 Etiwanda defenders everywhere he ran in a pre-league tournament match.
I am happy that Landon has the determination to go back to Europe, that he remained open to going back all these years because, frankly, his game and skill deserves to grow at a higher rate than what it was growing in MLS. It’s a good time for him to go. He has a wife and is settled in his lovelife, and though he is not about chasing a paycheck, he is only smart to make as much money as he can before the downhill slope of his career begins around 30; strange for me to believe he is not too far away from that number. And what’s the point of sticking around with a crappy club that has a roster that is going nowhere, wasting the prime years of your career with such a rag-tag outfit that consistently does not qualify for the MLS Playoffs, where almost everyone gets in?.
As a soccer fan, I hope he is open to sticking it out in Europe, keeping his passion for playing soccer burning vibrantly within. I don’t know what the wife would think about that, but I want to watch him on Fox Soccer Channel on the weekends as much as I can, and even maybe hold that glimmer of hope of watching him on Tuesday and Wednesday at 11:30 a.m. Pacific Time if he’s still there next season.
It’s too bad that Germany has a winter break because I was hoping to go to Munich and watch Landon play while I am in England in January. I’ll be following with pride and happiness for him.
Didn’t mean to go on for as long as I did, but Landon will always be someone I will follow with real interest. It’s not everyday your all-time leading U.S. goalscorer grows up and begins crafting his professional trade 10 minutes from where you grow up and is a subject you report on for a significant chunk of your professional career.
5 Joseph D'Hippolito // Nov 22, 2008 at 12:53 PM
Landon is more open to overseas competition now because the Galaxy is such a total mess, thanks to Lalas, Gullit and (most importantly) Leiweke. Morale is abyssmal. Any player who can escape should. Of course, Donovan might be back for 2009 (depending on the terms of the loan) but Arena has to rebuild practically from scratch.
6 Damian // Nov 25, 2008 at 3:47 PM
I’ve been meaning to note an addendum (a slightly shorter one, yes) to my initial post, after reading back my initial post to myself.
When I said Landon would be playing with the best, highest-profile club an American has ever played for, I meant to exclude goalkeepers and only include him within the rank and file of outfield players. I recognize Tim Howard won a PA Goalkeeper of the Year award with Man United and Brad Friedel’s brief stint with Liverpool. Of course, my take is also contingent on Landon getting on the field and seeing some significant time in his short loan stint, and if he were only to stay for the 3 months and not go back, then I feel that would be another little asterisk to that take as well.
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