Christian Pulisic doesn't care about your feelings. He doesn't care about the United States. "Captain America" is anti-American, a Croatian born in Philadelphia who spent his best footballing years in Germany. He hates the badge, the shirt he has worn 78 times, and everything it stands for.
Pulisic doesn't get it. He doesn't understand American exceptionalism, the will to win. He won't pull himself up by his bootstraps. When the going gets tough, Pulisic accepts it. He is comfortable in defeat, and can live with the fact that he might not win every single game of football ever. Pulisic is a quitter who is willfully giving up on his country.
Or so we have been told.
Last week, the USMNT star revealed that he would not be playing in the Gold Cup. The attacking midfielder, arguably the best player in the U.S.'s history, has elected to take the summer off. There has been subsequent talk about recurring injuries. Pulisic supposedly has a hip flexor problem. He still hasn't recovered from a few knocks sustained over the course of the season.
And, predictably, the former USMNT star-turned-pundit contingent exploded. Pulisic is in the wrong, the talking heads insisted. Bad look for Pulisic. He is the leader of the U.S. squad, and should behave as such. Former USMNT star Alexi Lalas opined, "People are actually looking at this team and saying 'Why should I care if what you are doing leads me to believe that you don't care?' How the hell did we get here?!!”
But the truth is, Pulisic is absolutely doing the right thing - both for himself and for the USMNT at large.
The Gold Cup's value is decreasing year-on-year. At this point, it's more or less meaningless. And for a footballer who can't stay fit at the best of times, a summer off is not only preferable, but also entirely necessary - especially if he is to perform to expectations at a home World Cup just more than a year away.
