We wanted him. They wanted him. He was half ours. He was half theirs. Born here, he looked and sounded like he was meant to be there. He fled before manhood and made his mark down there. Then he had to choose. For a while he wouldn’t. Did he not want either? But then he picked us and it all changed.
He’s not wanted. We don’t seem to want him. They wanted him, but now that he wants us, they surely hate him. He defies characterization. Categorization can’t catch him either. We know who he is—he has a name. We know what he looks like—he’s been on television. But still, we don’t know what he is. Sure, he wears our colors, but he lives with them. He has three names—two end in vowels and one flaunts Siamese r’s. It’s as if he’s saying, “I’m one of them, but I’m coming to you, only because I can.”
We see him and we know where he should play. He falls four inches short of a sixth foot. His height is only un-eclipsed by his 135 pounds. But we know this type. England has many of them, these lightweight little men. Gravitationally attracted to the sideline, they are. They run and run and run. Their feet pedal an invisible bicycle up and down. They run into defenders. They run past defenders. They run out of bounds. They always run. An occasionally correct angle will run them into a dangerous area and in the rarest of moments they switch their feet. They stop pedaling and change their gait 90 degrees, moving the ball sideways, shocking everyone and allowing a teammate to score.
But he has the audacity to stand in the center. You can’t run in the center. There are too many men—emphasis on that last word. The middle is for men. This is where they fight, scrap, jump, and kick. They kick each other and occasionally the ball. Yellow and red are universally accepted. In the middle, men do manly things. And he’s clearly not a man. His hair is too long, brushed back without any gel like his mother did it. These men use gel. His face has no hair. It never had any. These men must shave daily. And his team was decided by his mother. These men do nothing but pay for the houses of their mothers. The middle is no place for him.
To win the ball from these men, you must use strength. Jumping high, aiming elbows, sliding cleat-first—these are all ways to defend in the middle. You get the ball back by pushing your opponent off of it, legally, of course. Every attempt at the ball is a risk of being carded. He is in the midst of all this, but wins the ball with minimal contact. He times his jumps and steps into tackles with the right timing, poking the ball free.
Then he gets the ball. We all scream for him to get rid of it immediately. In the middle, you must play fast. He is in danger. The ball is too big for him. These men are coming after him. He needs to get rid of it now.
He swings his left leg back as if to save himself, but then he steps on the ball instead of releasing it. He rolls it backwards, taunting these men. Two more touches slide him sideways—still unharmed. In this chaotic center of manliness, he is calm. A frenzy surrounds him, but doesn’t touch him. So different from the men around him, he’s unaffected.
He takes a bigger swing and the horror creeps back in. Little men can not do that. They can’t kick a ball that far, especially from a stand-still. Their bodies seem incapable of the correct form needed to do so. Clearly, the strength is lacking too. Only, his form is perfect and the ball leaves his foot with a tender power. The ball sails high, over all of these men, diagonally across the field, landing on a teammate’s foot, touching the opposite sideline.
Has he fooled us all? Both sides wanted him, but now it seems like no one does. He proves himself with every touch and every tackle. His play fools us at the same time it proves him. We can’t accept what he does. It doesn’t make sense for him to be doing the things he does and doing those things for us. A boy we so desperately wanted chose us. Now he’s desperately needed.
Ryan O’Hanlon is a recent graduate of the College of the Holy Cross. You can follow him on Twitter.
Read More: José Torres, Mexico, USA
by Ryan O'Hanlon · June 3, 2010
brilliant article, but im lost on who it is.
@Ben The title didn’t help with that?
Unreal. Thanks for preserving the sanctity of prose in the 21st century.
ye dumb from me sorry, thaught it was a pseudonym
I tought you meant the portuguese legend, “the good giant” José Torres. Who seems to be the complete opposite of the player you described.
http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_RRi94RC_M8A/SkiWR4HwhyI/AAAAAAAAAys/1LrP8j9aW-o/s400/Torres.jpg
Beautifully written.
Someday, we will finally realize that size is not that important in football if you have the skills to control and move the ball. Even in the center, it’s not as important as many, especially American pundits, make it out to be.
O’Hanlon is right: Torres brings much needed ball control skill to the American team. And more importantly: as more American fans watch players with actual ball skills, we will start demanding better skilled players. Everyone wins.
So I hope Torres gets some deserved World Cup playing time.
He is the eye of the hurricane.
Ah, Kenny G, at it again. Good stuff, ‘mate.
I like Torres a lot. He’s like a little American Pirlo, who might might be my favorite player ever. Great writing.
Very nice. Who knew soccer was such a mysterious sport.
Well written, but I lost interest in no time. I have honestly never heard of him. Is he a big deal in the States?
this player has game, and so does Ryan O’Hanlon
This could only be written by someone whose mind has been deadened by the English game and its pale imitation in America. Every week I watch a team that fields guys who play like that in the middle of the park. But apparently it’s José Torres who is the object of wonder, not Xavi or Iniesta.
@nick I like this comparison very much.
@Otter This is a post about US soccer culture and how the game is seen around the USMNT. Congratulations for having discovered Xavi.
Otter is the reason that Barney Ronay wrote that column on Barcelona.
@Otter You’re not from around here, are you?
He looks at the comments of these men. He cringes, as they do not realize how thunderously overwrought the article they’re reading is. He scrolls the mouse down, to the end of the thread, in disbelief. Only then does he poise his cursor — blinking — in the box, and complain with tender power.
Ironic because you wrote it in the style of the article!
What is this, horseville? Because I’m surrounded by naysayers! Wordplay!
I, for one, loved it. Well written and spot-on.
@BCR If you want something overwrought, check this out: http://www.runofplay.com/2010/04/07/gods-and-geniuses/. It’s way more over the top than this one.
Very nice… i do hope the boy sees a lot of the pitch in the tournament. As you said, he is the type of player the US has needed for so long. Bless him!
Both Dempsey and Torres has shown the importance of craft in soccer success – neither went the Bradenton/ODP route as youngsters, yet both have reached incredible heights by forging their own path. Great stuff!
@Otter Xavi plays for the USMNT? Wow, I had no idea.
“The Misfit”?
I thought there were going to be Flannery O’Connor references and lots of people getting killed for no reason at all. Alas…
Congrats on graduating Ryan.
OK, I’ll try to be less subtle. The rhapsodizing about Torres as if he’s a unique player misses the point that everybody else knows that type of player is necessary and develops them and plays them, but the US can’t seem to develop players of that type, and the big brains of the MNT don’t seem to trust or know how to use one when he’s dropped in their lap. Am I the only one who has the impression that he was recruited as much to spite Mexico as to have him play for us?
Do “we” all know that slight, skilled players can’t work in the engine room? Only if “we” never watch the rest of the world (and just because I don’t watch Modric and Sneijder and Scholes every week doesn’t mean I’m not aware of them), and only if “we” don’t want to look at the rest of the world for how to improve the MNT. So count me out of your “we.”
@Ryan Good link, but that writer seems more qualified–he has two years of midfield experience (in quite a dangerous place, with “men” that are “coming” for you, might I add) under his belt!
@Elliott Dempsey was Dallas Texans, which I think is ODP
You nailed it. Brilliant. I wonder what Coach Bradley thinks? He also seems to be conflicted about Torres. But, suffice to say, the team is different with him on the field.