How Good Is Lionel Messi? (Lol) And How Far is the USMNT from Argentina? (Also: Lol)

If you watched Fox last night from about 6 pm EST to 11:30 pm, then may God have mercy on your soul. Go for a walk across an entire tectonic plate, throw your phone into the nearest sewer, enroll in St. John’s College and read the Great Books. Go camping, go glamping, learn how to break-dance, do something!

Anyway: earlier this week, I wrote about how, uh, long it might take the USMNT to catch Argentina:

There's some research that, when taken together, suggests developing stars is different from developing pros. One study found that more than 30% of the pros in Europe were born in the first three months of the year, while fewer than 20% were born in October or later. This is because the older kids are bigger at a younger age, so they perform at a higher level early on, get rewarded with better training and placement on better teams and have a massive leg up from the jump. However, another study found that the players who win awards at the highest level -- the stars -- are more likely to be born at the tail end of their age group than at the beginning.

It seems unlikely the USMNT can engineer superstar production without totally revamping this country's sports culture and centering it on soccer. There's a reason why the best teams tend to be the same teams. Every country goes through cycles, but the history of international soccer is basically the history of Argentina, Brazil, Germany, Italy, Spain, France and England -- the two richest countries in South America and the five richest countries currently recognized by UEFA. Other countries have been able to break into that tier for a cycle or two, but no one else has retained international relevance at the highest level for as long as those seven nations. They're the only countries to win the World Cup since 1950.

Then, I wrote about a question we’ve never had to ask before: How good is Lionel Messi these days?

Interestingly, Messi's club and country performances have gone in opposite directions: both in terms of results and individual play. Once Messi had to do everything for Barcelona, they stopped winning as often. And once Messi stopped having to do everything for Argentina, they haven't been able to stop winning.

There have been three international tournaments where Messi averaged fewer than 70 touches per 90 minutes for Argentina: the 2014 World Cup, the 2021 Copa América and the 2022 World Cup. What do those three tournaments have in common? Argentina made the final in all of them and won the past two.

Your boy (me) was also on ESPN2 last night, to talk to Football Americas about the current state of the greatest soccer player of all time:

Enjoy your weekends, everyone.