Arena isn’t enough — What (or who) it would it really take for Gulati (and the system) to change?

Bruce Arena resigned last week. The consensus, I think, is that it’s not nearly enough.

Listen, I’m not someone who thinks that changing one guy at the top — Sunil Gulati in this case — is going to make things all better. Maybe most of the board of directors of the US Soccer Federation who has supported him should also go? I don’t know enough about the inner-workings of an extremely political organization like that to even consider specifics right now.

But after Gulati affirmed that he’s not resigning last week, I started to take the liberty of looking through what’s online about the Board of Directors and the bylaws of the USSF. I need to educate myself (at least a little) if I’m going to have an opinion about this.

Here is a link to the list of who is on the Board of Directors. 

And here’s a place you can click for yourself and read through the bylaws. Because educating yourself as a soccer fan can’t hurt either, right?

I’m no lawyer, but it seems that something like a motion to remove Gulati from the top would require a 60 day waiting period unless it’s considered an “urgent case.” In that case, a 2/3 majority vote would be required.  Right now, there is a three-term limit on the presidency that Gulati has in place. I suppose that could be amended, but that seems like a slam-dunk to the people who are talking about whether he’ll run for another term, which is confusing to me. Maybe someone who has the opportunity to talk with people in the chain of the USSF can explore that.

His Wikipedia page says that Gulati, an economics lecturer at Columbia University. Full time. Also he runs United States Soccer. Because that’s just a little part time thing. 

Looks like someone on Reddit had the same general idea I tried to address here. 

OK, let’s talk about the people who could be in charge of changing US Soccer, aside from Gulati:

Executive Vice President – Carlos Cordeiro

What you need to probably know is that Cordeiro is a former executive at Goldman Sachs and was described when elected as a confidante to Gulati. So, I guess you won’t find much change just by Gulati resigning, because Cordeiro would serve out his term. I think. 

Player representatives

The player reps get twenty percent of the vote, no matter how big the Board is. There are three players reps on the board: Chris Ahrens, Carlos Bocanegra, and Angela Hucles.

Ahrens is a Paralympics player and adaptive PE teacher in San Diego. 

Bocanegra is a 38 year old who went to UCLA and spent time in English soccer before returning to MLS and playing on the national team. He is, by far, the most recognizable name on this list aside Gulati. His resume seems like it would have some context, but it’s hard basically all you’ve known of US Soccer has been run by one guy. 

Hucles is a former player on the women’s team and is the president of the Women’s Sports Foundation.

Pro Council Representatives

Don Garber in the MLS Commissioner and always has MLS owners’ best interests in mind. His stance will, by definition, to make the professional game less open. Promotion and relegation is the last thing he, and MLS string-pullers like Bob Kraft want. 

Steve Malik is the the owner of the Carolina RailHawks of the NASL. This is interesting, since the NASL filed a lawsuit against the US Soccer Federation for not having fair and open practices with regard to putting leagues into Divisions and not having an open promotion/relegation system. Malik would almost certainly be in favor of Pro/Rel, which, it could be argued, is at the heart of most of the issues American’s have pointed to as shortcomings of our soccer program over the past few days. 

Adult Council Representatives

Richard Moeller is a member of the Board of Directors of the United States Adult Soccer Association. According to the USAAA website, he is the vice president of the USAAA board. It looks like he’s the president of the Florida State Adult Soccer Association. No telling where a person like this is at with regard to a desire to see change.

John Motta is the president of the United States Adult Soccer Association and an executive at Dunkin Donuts in Massachusetts. Based solely on where he’s from and what his day job is, my guess would be he’s a person who would be close to people like Kraft and Gulati. That said, he did post this on Thursday, and his tone sounds anti Sunil, which is an easy position to take publicly in these times.

Clarification on running for President of US Soccer. Here are the requirements as of 9/1. The Board passed this nominating procedure. pic.twitter.com/cTdpUjpQtv

— John Paul Motta (@JohnPMotta) October 12, 2017

How far with reform the USSF will go probably depends a lot on people like Motta. Motta’s twitter account certainly confirms my suspicions about how much of a damn political dumpster fire the whole thing is… .

Youth Council Representatives

Jesse Harrell is the Chair of the US Youth Soccer Board of Directors. He’s in the insurance business in Houston and that’s just about all I could find on him in the few minutes I spent. I do this site for fun, remember?

Tim Turney is the Vice Chair of US Youth Soccer. If you google “Tim Turney youth soccer,” the second and fourth hits are articles about how officials were directed not to speak about concussions for youth players. So, that’s fun. It seems that Turney is from Kentucky and 

At Large Representative

John Collins was the attorney for the USSF nearly 20 years ago, according to his LinkedIn profile. He has been a US District Attorney and now is in private practice (again, all according to LinkedIn). Here’s an interesting article about an antitrust suit brought against USSF and Collins and about his fighting it off. Probably pertinent to what’s happening both with the NASL lawsuit and the American undercurrent to cut the power out from those who have it at the USSF. Just judging from his history with the organization and the fact that he’s a lawyer who’s been in the middle of these things before, I’d say that whatever happens, Collins is probably someone who is in the middle of things.

Independent Directors

Two of the three Independent Directors have collegiate/NCAA ties. At least one of them is talking about change, but who knows how serious anybody is?

Donna E. Shalala is the president of the University of Miami. She tweeted about the need for a revolution last week, as reported by SI. We’ll see how serious or far-reaching her concept of “revolution” will go. 

This morning 2-1 unacceptable For us in USSoccer more than a wake up call. Time for a revolution. Need a long term plan that is smart

— Donna E. Shalala (@DonnaShalala) October 11, 2017

Val Ackerman is the commissioner of the Big East Conference. She has come out strongly against paying student athletes in the past. Here is a 2013 profile of her in USA Today. No mention of soccer anywhere in there. The March 2017 articles you can find that link her and US Soccer also tout term limits of 12 years. Again, I’m confused how Gulati would get re-elected for the next cycle since he’ll be at that limit. 

Lisa Carnoy is a bank president on the East coast, so I would posit a guess that she’s not in the business of upsetting the current regime. She’s not listed currently on the website, but there’s a tweet and some articles that would indicate she’s also an independent director. In the announcement by US Soccer of her joining the board, there isn’t any mention of soccer experience. 

Welcome, Lisa Carnoy!@LCarnoy will serve as an Independent Director on the Board, the governing body of the USSF.https://t.co/7v2MDBBJdK

— U.S. Soccer (@ussoccer) August 26, 2017

Immediate Past President (non-voting)

Dr. S. Robert Contiguglia’s wikipedia page is interestingly small. It says he has “played, coached, and managed soccer at several different levels,” which, based on their biographies I could find, puts him ahead of most other board members in that regard. He doesn’t get to vote. 

CEO/Secretary General (non-voting)

Dan Flynn’s resume says he was a collegiate soccer player over 40 years ago and is an Anheuser-Busch executive. Straight from the USSF’s website: “He was also directly involved in Anheuser-Busch’s sponsorship of the 1986 World Cup in Mexico, which served as the springboard for their future involvement in the sport on a long-term basis.” So, though he’s a non-voting member, his presence is interesting in that Anheuser-Busch is a huge sponsor of US and Mexican soccer. 

Flynn is quoted as a representative of US Soccer in this release from the USSF, though I guess he could technically be a representative of both sides?

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So, there’s the information I could gather in my spare time over the last few days, and maybe it gives you a more rounded-out picture of who’s in charge over at the US Soccer Federation. 

Here are a few things that stick out to me:

Lots of banking people and people tied to MLS

This was probably a natural thing around the turn of the millennium. It’s probably less appropriate and natural now, especially with the budding conflict between a free market system and the current system that ensures an MLS franchise can’t be relegated. 

Not tons of soccer people

Aside from the players, there aren’t very many high level soccer people on the board. I see lots of people who have worked on the business side of things for a long time, but I don’t think I saw any kind of coaching certification or anyone who has that level of context. There are more women there recently than there have been (good) and some players (also good), but by and large, most of these people are business people rather than people who think about soccer full-time. Probably having both a business/political IQ and a soccer IQ would be great for everyone here to have. Doesn’t seem like there are lots of examples, if all you’re doing is reading their biographical information that’s first-page searchable. Maybe I’m wrong and I’ll find out that Richard Moeller is actually a highly trained soccer development tactician. I’m open to that kind of information.

East Coast Bias

Holy moly! Who on here has any west coast representation? For a country so geographically big and regionalized, it seems like having someone from California around would be a priority. Obviously, it isn’t. There is a high concentration of power in the USSF in the New York/New England area. One of the three players (Bocanegra) is originally from the west coast, but as I looked at people’s biographies, the most western state I think I saw is Texas. I wonder how that affects everything from resources to selections at even the earliest of ages. The lack of west coast representation has to have an impact, doesn’t it? Californians sometimes joke about having their own national team. 

Change would mean a MASSIVE shift

Given the ties that many or most of these board members have to both Gulati and each other, and given that people generally think they’re doing the right thing (whether they are or aren’t), it would take an amazing amount of change in the groupthink that goes on within the board or in the people themselves. Given how long he’s been there, it’s likely that Sunil Gulati has been a huge part of getting each one of the board members onto the board. Even if people in the (still sometimes ignorant) US Soccer community want to put the blame on Gulati, it will take much more than ousting Sunil to deal any real change to the USSF. Even if he’s ousted on the next election, the Gulati principles will remain long after he’s gone in the form of the people he helped get there. You see, organizations and boards like this are not easily moved or changed. At least not usually. Especially not when so many dollars in general are up for grabs — specifically if the United States has a shot at a World Cup within the next decade. 

What do you think? What would you like to see change? What is a reasonable timeline for real systemic changes or do you feel that tweaks are better than changes? Comment below or find me @fansmanship on twitter.