USA-Mexico recap

Bob Bradley just experienced the defining moment of his time as head coach of the United States soccer team.

Forget the historic victory over Spain and the near-miss against Brazil. The 5-0 loss at the hands of Mexico in the Gold Cup final will have much larger ramifications.

This was a throwaway tournament, a series of meaningless games with absolutely nothing at stake, and Bradley treated it as such, composing a roster almost entirely filled with backups who had essentially zero international experience. The benefits, it seemed, were twofold: give younger players much-needed playing time and rest key players before World Cup qualifying resumes in August.

Fortunately, the United States is lucky enough to be located in arguably the world’s weakest region of soccer. Opening up the tournament against weaklings such as Haiti and Grenada, the Americans handled their business and gained valuable experience in the process.

The gamble looked like it paid off when the plucky backups defeated a full-strength Honduras (one of their top rivals in World Cup qualification) twice – first in the group stage of the tournament and later in the semifinals.

Right now, the United States has one objective – qualify for the 2010 World Cup. Having made the leap from global laughingstock to legitimate threat, the US national team has qualified for the past five World Cups following a 40-year drought from 1950 to 1990. A spot in the tournament is no longer hoped for, it is expected.

Despite such recent stability, there is absolutely no margin for error. Because CONCACAF (the region of soccer teams including North America, Central America, and the Caribbean) is so weak, only three teams (compared to 13 from Europe) automatically qualify. The fourth place finisher advances to a playoff against a South America team.

With the final round of qualifying halfway completed, the United States is on the correct side of the dividing line (currently in place second out of six remaining teams), their perch is a precarious one indeed – only one game separates them from the third or fourth spot. And although it seems unlikely that the United States could sink to the dark depths of the fifth or six spots, it is entirely possible to slip to fourth place, and the requisite playoff against a likely superior South American team.

That possibility, it turns out, begins with Mexico.

Mexico, current occupant of the dreaded fourth spot, hosts the United States in the next qualifying match on August 12^th. Mexico has the history (The US national team is 0-23-1 all-time in the Mexican version of the Coliseum, Estadio Azteca), but the US is coming off an incredible Confederations Cup performance and seems to be playing their best soccer in recent memory. Conversely, the Mexicans are currently on their fourth manager in the past year and missing the World Cup seems entirely too real a possibility.

And so it was under these conditions that the two teams arrived in the Gold Cup final in New Jersey: Mexico licking their wounds and looking for any kind of spark, and the United States saving their starters in eager anticipation of a legitimate shot at their first-ever Estadio Azteca triumph.

The idea was simple – beating Mexico’s top players while using backups would be the straw on the camel’s back, the submission move that would ultimately cause Mexico to tap out of the World Cup. The risks seemed to be zero – only losing a meaningless tournament, but at the same time preventing Mexico from seeing (and preparing for) the United States’ best players.

There was, however, a hitch in those plans. Unaccounted for in that equation was a loss of epic proportion – which is exactly what the Americans were dealt.

The 5-0 score was exactly as it seemed. There were no deceiving qualities, no fluke goals. It was a bloodbath. An evisceration. And most importantly, it came on American soil, in New Jersey, with a crowd so pro-Mexico that the Americans never got so much as a single cheer in their own stadium.

Bad news first: the score reflects extremely well on the Mexico team, because a large majority of those players who shredded the United States will also be playing in the World Cup qualifying match.In a span of 90 minutes, the team with the least amount of goals in the final qualifying round found the back of the net five times, or only one time less than in their last five qualifying matches combined. The fact that they scored it against a bunch of scrubs is irrelevant; confidence, creativity, and well-placed aggression were all on display in a performance that restored the swagger to a team so desperately in need of it.

The good news, however, is that the score reflects nothing on the squad that will take the field for the United States on August 12^th, because none of those players were on the field for this massacre. They will be ready to go, and this might very well be a wakeup call they needed, a well-timed message about the dangers of lost focus.

Make no mistake about it: Bob Bradley will be judged by the outcome of one very important game in a couple of weeks, and deservedly so. If resting his stars and preventing Mexico from gaining any sort of familiarity with them pays off with a historic Azteca victory (or really, even a tie), the US will gain a huge boost and simultaneously deliver a crippling blow to their biggest rival.

However, if Mexico triumphs, the Americans will see their southern neighbors only one point behind in the standings with four games left. And if Mexico can piece together a win, don’t expect them to stop. The effects will last longer than just one game, and Mexico will likely put pressure on the United States to collect big results in road games at Trinidad and Honduras.

Although the outcome has yet to be determined, one thing is certain – Bradley will be remembered by the result.

That Cinking Feeling

In the end, the real victim was Stewart Cink.

One of the most consistent guys on Tour (owning a top-3 finish at each of the three US-based majors), and someone respected greatly by his peers (including being voted onto the Policy Board by fellow PGA Tour members), Cink was expected to be an extremely popular winner when he finally broke through to win a major tournament.

And then he ran into history.

59-year-old Tom Watson, five-time winner of the Claret Jug, golf’s oldest and most famous trophy and the prize for an Open Championship victory, held the lead for a majority of the 72-hole championship, seemingly young and invincible once more.

To provide some perspective to the uniqueness of the situation, consider this: The oldest person to ever claim the Open Championship, “Old” Tom Morris (widely regarded as the founding father of professional golf), was 46 at the time. In 1867.

Watson, no longer possessing distance off the tee, found new ways to confound opponents, draining seemingly impossible putts one after the other. As others waited for him to collapse (despite holding the 36-hole lead, he was listed that night as only a 40-1 favorite to win), he held on.

Carrying him along the way was an army of the loudest, proudest, smartest, and drunkest fans in the game of golf. The Scots, who watched him win their championship an astounding five times, including once at this very course in 1977, filled the air with hearty (and slurred) cries of “Come on, Toom!”

He very nearly pulled it off.

Standing in the 18^th fairway and holding a one-stroke lead, Watson waffled between the 8 and 9 irons before finally going with the stronger club. The decision cost him, as his ball flew onto the green but kept rolling and rolling, until it finally exited into the rough surrounding the greenside area. His first putt was good, settling eight feet from the hole, but his second never had a chance, and with that – his first three-putt of the week – it was time for a playoff.

Enter Stewart Cink.

Cink, who quietly lurked after rounds of 66, 72, and 71, fired a final-round 69 courtesy of an ice-water-in-the-veins birdie on the 72^nd hole of the tournament to finish at two under par for the Championship. Playing 30 minutes ahead of Watson, he could only wait to see if his score held up.

It did.

For a fleeting second, he must have wished it hadn’t.

Turnberry holds roughly 30,000 spectators. All but three – his wife and two kids – were rooting for Watson (“Come on, Toom!”), and it wouldn’t be far-fetched to suggest such a ratio applied to those watching at home.

With the whole world cheering for the Impossible Dream, Cink stepped up to the tee unfazed. He grabbed a one-shot advantage on the first playoff hole and never looked back, overwhelming Watson by six strokes in the four-hole playoff.

The Claret Jug was his, but instead of being treated like the champion he is, he was embraced by many golf fans as a man who had just cancelled Christmas. Which is to say, not at all.

It’s hard to feel bad for Tom Watson. He has, over the course of a brilliant career, collected five of these very titles, and eight majors overall. Sunday at Turnberry was the icing on the cake, a legendary performance that will seal his reputation as the greatest links golf player to ever swing a club.

No, he didn’t win. But he came damn close. His performance will forever be the story of the 2009 Open Championship.

It’s all very unfortunate for Stewart Cink, who called facing Watson in the playoff and his eventual triumph “a dream come true.”

Here’s hoping history doesn’t treat it as a nightmare.