Without a road game, Ralston's week 'weird'

By RODNEY PAGE

© St. Petersburg Times, published May 24, 2000

It was Saturday night, and Steve Ralston was sitting on his living-room couch. Game time was approaching, and for the past 24 hours, Ralston hadn't felt like himself.

For every road game since July 13, 1997, Ralston had been there with his Mutiny teammates, flying to games, eating pregame meals, trading stories in the locker room. But Saturday, Ralston was unable to play against the MetroStars because of a bruise just above his right ankle.

He had been injured for previous road trips but never severely enough to miss the trip. Now it was just him; his wife, Rachel, and the channel changer.

"It was weird," Ralston said. "It's a lot easier sitting on the couch watching the game. You see the game a lot differently. You can see the forwards attack and the defenders get back and defend. In the first half it looked like we could have beaten Manchester United, but in the second half we let it get away. I wanted to get out there and play.

"I'd look at my watch, and I'd think, "I bet the guys are at the pregame meal.' At any time I knew exactly what was happening. I knew that at 7 a.m. my roommate, Dom (Dominic Kinnear), was getting up early going to read his paper. It was weird."

Ralston is Major League Soccer's leader in minutes played with 11,474 and had played in 42 consecutive games before missing last week. He had missed only seven games since joining the Mutiny as a rookie out of Florida International in 1996.

During that span he had a few nagging injuries. And for almost half the 1998 season, Ralston played on a right ankle that later was determined to have a fracture in a small bone.

Ralston is back at practice this week after missing last week. He'll play against Kansas City on Saturday afternoon.

"I was talking to somebody the other day about the (games played) streak ending, and it was inevitable, really," Ralston said. "In this sport, you're not going to play every game. I've just been lucky."

After Saturday's game, Ralston will miss the Mutiny's next two because of U.S. national team commitments. He was selected by coach Bruce Arena to play for the United States in the Nike Cup, U.S. Soccer's most prestigious annual tournament.

The national team plays South Africa on June 3 in Washington, D.C., Ireland on June 6 in New England and Mexico on June 11 at East Rutherford, N.J. Ralston said Arena told him he would start against Ireland.

Arena called up Ralston twice in 1999, but Ralston missed a game against Jamaica because of back spasms. He was called up four times in 1997 but failed to make coach Steve Sampson's final squad.

"There've been a few times where I've been healthy and I just haven't played well," Ralston said. "But there have been times when I've been injured. It just kind of seems like it works out that way.

"Bruce called me the day before the (MetroStars) game, and I told him I felt great, no problems. Then the next day I was like, "Oh, no, I jinxed myself.' But (Arena) called after the injury and asked me how I was doing. I'll be ready to go."

TWO MISS PRACTICE: Mutiny defender Chad McCarty missed Monday and Tuesday's practices to attend his girlfriend's college graduation in California. He will return for Thursday's practice. Carlos Valderrama missed two days of workouts to film an ESPN commercial for MLS in Bristol, Conn.

METRO MESS: When MLS assigned Mexican forward Luis Hernandez to the Los Angeles Galaxy last week, it might have been the best possible move for the MetroStars.

Because the high-scoring Hernandez was sent to the Galaxy, the MetroStars added two talented players and gave up little.

The league was determined to put Hernandez in a Galaxy uniform to improve attendance from Los Angeles' large Mexican community, and the Galaxy was unable or unwilling to make a trade to acquire a foreign allocation spot.

So MLS had a dispersal draft that allowed the MetroStars to get Galaxy midfielder Clint Mathis with the first selection.

New York/New Jersey then traded disappointing midfielder Brian Kelly for Roy Myers, whom the Galaxy dealt because it had one too many foreign players after the Hernandez deal.

Mutiny coach Tim Hankinson was asked about the moves during a recent league conference call with reporters and reacted angrily. He declined to comment, saying he didn't feel like paying a fine for his opinion.

"I'm going to save that money and send my kid to college to take an ethics class," he said.

The MetroStars, in the nation's largest media market, could help the league gain exposure -- if only they were any good. And a faction always has insisted that the league bends over backward to help the MetroStars; MLS' most notable off-season acquisition was Lothar Matthaeus, and he wound up a MetroStar.

Information from other news organizations was used in this report.

© St. Petersburg Times. All rights reserved.