By Jason Davis – WASHINGTON, DC (Jul 6, 2016) US Soccer Players - New York City FC midfielder Jack Harrison is 19 years old. The full extent of his professional soccer career consists of five appearances, just two of them starts. Whatever promise he holds as a player in MLS or beyond is an unknown, no matter what his exploits in two recent NYCFC wins. The clever creative flashes he has shown as part of an improving team under Patrick Vieira are from numerous or consistent enough for us to be sure Harrison will turn his talent into something that bears not only watching, but expectation. Two goals and two assists before anyone quite knows how to play against him does not a phenomenon make.

Harrison surely knows this, even as he deftly fields questions about an international soccer future not guaranteed to happen. Viera, Harrison's coach, surely knows this even as he covers Harrison in praise and shows immense faith in the English youngster by putting him in the lineup at a crucial point in NYCFC's season.

The fans, both of the NYCFC stripe and of other loyalties, don't seem to know this. Rather, a certain group of fans is ready to anoint Harrison as more than just a talented teenager in a league that wants for those too often. Those fans are the ones asking about, and demanding Harrison address, his international intentions because they can’t help their runaway enthusiasm.

Harrison is not American, so any noise about a spot in the USMNT in Russia 2018 or beyond is exceedingly premature. In fact, any thought of Harrison in the USMNT that doesn't take a long-range view is nothing but fancy until otherwise proven. The process that would make him eligible for the team involves several steps. At the very least, Harrison is five years away from possible inclusion. American citizenship, unlike sports hype, does not come easy.

By the absolute earliest that Harrison could complete the process he'd be almost 25 and presumably well into his career. Maybe he'd still be uncapped and willing by that point (a la Darlington Nagbe) to still play for the United States, but there are no guarantees that A) he’d be good enough or B) England hadn’t wooed him into playing for them in the interim.

More interesting that Harrison's chances of becoming a US international at some undetermined date in the future is the phenomenon that has created hype around the idea at all. Harrison is talented sure, otherwise NYCFC wouldn't have made him their first-ever number one draft choice. The wouldn't have waited for him to recover from the hip injury that slowed his introduction into the team. NYCFC identified Harrison under a different head coach, bringing him into the system as he returned to full fitness. Harrison took full advantage. No one needs reminding that he has the tools.

Talent alone doesn't explain why anyone would suggest him for the USMNT, however. What does is a combination of talent and Harrison's origins in England. American soccer fans, always on the hunt for a savior figure to materialize out of the murky mists of our inefficient development system. There’s something about the outsider when it comes to American soccer, even when they receive plenty of hype along the way. It goes back to Freddy Adu, maybe beyond, and continues to the present day.

Here’s another story. Once upon a time, the gaze of American soccer fans fell on Danny Mwanga, the overall number one draft pick of a different expansion team. Fans were anxious for the Congolese forward to get his citizenship so that he might help the USMNT. Six years later, Mwanga, still just 24, is a reserve player with the Tampa Bay Rowdies of the NASL, a teammate of Adu’s.

There's also something evocative about the idea that the USMNT could get a player who might otherwise play for a storied soccer nation like England. If Harrison is one day good enough to play for the Three Lions but instead suits up in red, white, and blue, it will further legitimize the steps American soccer has taken since the 1994 World Cup and the launch of Major League Soccer.

It's unfair to Harrison to label him a symbol of American soccer's collective psychology, because he is good and has made a difference for his team in recent weeks. The truth is that as he ages, unable to play for the USMNT well into his 20s, the fascination with him one day playing for the American side will wane. By that point, his promise becomes his status. When he's done developing, and his career is simply his career, only superstardom will keep his name on the lips of USMNT fans still waiting, waiting, waiting for a hero to emerge from the mist.

Jason Davis is the founder of MatchFitUSA.com and the host of The United States of Soccer on SiriusXM. Contact him: matchfitusa@gmail.com. Follow him on Twitter:http://twitter.com/davisjsn.

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