Previously: Attackers.

NUMBER TEN: HOPE YOU LIKE KIDS WAIT THAT CAME OUT WRONG

Defining different central midfield slots is slightly silly since most players suited for the center of the field are at least somewhat flexible, but in an effort to organize our thoughts we'll do it anyway. So: the USA hasn't had a Central Attacking Midfielder or Number Ten or Trequartista or Guy Who Tries To Be Messi of much note pretty much ever. (Clint Dempsey was always a striker.) There were some promising folks over the last two cycles but for whatever reason Benny Feilhaber and Sacha Kljestan existed on the fringes of the national team.

American 10s in MLS include those rapidly aging guys, a couple more even fringier members of the pool, and File Not Found. Inserting Pulisic here is an obvious option and may be the way it ends up, or the US could just roll out a couple box to box types like they did when Michael Bradley and Jermaine Jones were freed to run by the insertion of Kyle Beckerman behind them. I bet one dollar that's this cycle's solution, with a really fast right back who overlaps and frees Pulisic to tuck inside.

But a speculative name or five here anyway, all of whom are absurdly young. Maybe one of these guys will get good enough fast enough to be relevant. All ages are as of 2022, so... yeah.

Andrew Carleton (22), Atlanta United. Carleton has been a next big thing for a couple years now but he's stuck behind a boatload of expensive South Americans in Atlanta and only gets scattered matches for them. Intra-MLS loans aren't really a thing so Carleton's in a bit of a tough spot.

Richie Ledezma (21), RSL. Ledezma is trialing with Dutch powerhouse PSV and turns 18 in September so wouldn't have a full limbo year if he does go. Ledezma is getting semi-regular minutes in the USL already.

Josh Pynadath (20), Ajax. Pynadath had a couple of years with Real Madrid's academy and is now at Ajax—his mom's job got moved to Holland. He plays on both wings for Ajax but a dual-footed guy with the kind of ball skills Pynadath has is a natural candidate to move inside. He could realistically play anywhere across the attacking midfield level of a 4-2-3-1, but he's 16 so he could also be a potato you never hear about again.

Giovanni Reyna (19), NYCFC. Yes, that Reyna. He'll hook up with a European club as soon as his EU passport goes through and from there will hope to bust into a starting lineup. Realistic best case scenario is another Pulisic type rise where he plays a bunch for a big team and gets integrated the year before the WC.

Gianluca Busio (19), Sporting KC. Youngest MLS signing since Freddy Adu, and it's appropriate to mention Adu in a section in which the oldest guy is 18. Can get an Italian passport so could be another quick move across the Atlantic.

By 2021 everyone except Carleton should be pushing to break through at a high(ish) profile Euro club. There's no better example of the academy effect than the next gen of potential 10s; previously American 10s have been limited in numbers and opportunity since MLS tends to target foreign players at that spot. USL opportunities for teenagers have the potential to break out a number of skilled attackers both here and abroad.

This has been the most crootin' section of this post.

[After the JUMP: still fairly crootin sections.]

NUMBER EIGHT: LET'S TRY THIS AGAIN OKAY

Another reason that this cycle probably isn't going to have a pure 10 is that there could be a (relative) embarrassment of riches in the box-to-box category.

Weston McKennie (23), Schalke. 24 appearances at age 19 for the second-best team in the Bundesliga instantly shoots McKennie to the top of the depth chart at some spot or another. There's ongoing debate about whether he should be a pure holding midfield or become a bit more adventurous; that'll depend more on the people around him than McKennie himself, probably. Since the US produces bulldog defensive midfielders with some regularity and McKennie can do stuff like this...

...I assume he'll be the next gen box-to-box guy.

Darlington Nagbe (31), Atlanta United. The great divide in US soccer fandom, post-Landon, is about Nagbe. On the one side are people like me, who appreciate Nagbe's ability to break pressure and superb ability to maintain possession. On the other side... I can't even, man. I mean, if you want to complain that he has no idea what to do once he breaks pressure and gets to the final third, I hear that. But he's superlative at a really important skill and if deployed correctly he spends his time in the green bit of the the devastatingly accurate Nagbe Heat Map:

found this Nagbe heat map I made that has been collecting dust in my docs pic.twitter.com/qcbdbpPK3U — Chris Edele (@ronalgringo) January 30, 2017

Atlanta has focused on the green bit. Nagbe has been unleashed as a full-time box-to-box midfielder in Atlanta and is one of just three US starters for the best team in MLS. Atlanta's point production has fallen off considerably after he was sidelined with an injury. He'll be pushing it age-wise by the time the next World Cup rolls around. He would need to have four guys ahead of him on the field—ie, there would have to be a #10 or two strikers—to be maximally effective, and that seems unlikely given the player pool. But until there's someone else in the pool with anything approximating his skills, he stays on the list.

Tyler Adams (23), NYRB. Adams is widely expected to move to RB Leipzig in the near future. Leipzig is also owned by Red Bull and just hired former NYRB coach Jesse Marsch as an assistant with an eye towards possibly making him the head coach in the near future. Adams thus has a clear path to extensive playing time with a Bundesliga club that finished second in the league two years ago and missed qualifying for the Champion's League by two points a year ago.

Adams could be either another wide-ranging midfielder or end up at right back, where he's played on and off for the last couple years. Both of those spots are fairly crowded but the added flexibility Adams provides will help him make rosters.

Keaton Parks (24), Benfica. Parks got a little time late in Portuguese power Benfica's season and before that was playing the second tier—Portugal has B teams playing just one league down—where he scored seven goals in 29 appearances. He was recently extended to 2022 and might could break through into one of Portugal's big three.

Parks has a weird skillset because he went from 5'6" to 6'4" over a brief period of time but probably slots in best as a midfielder who sits fairly deep when the opposition has the ball and breaks pressure with long diagonals and then runs into the box late, but he is reputedly Not Good on defense right now and needs to develop some bite. Nonetheless Benfica is talking to him about all three levels in central midfield but is focusing on him as a 6. I'm still slotting him in further up the field; see above about fine midfield gradations. Meanwhile ask again later about Parks, hopefully after a breakthrough year.

OTHERS: Cristian Roldan (27) had a cup of coffee with the national team and could re-emerge but is suddenly in tough with the teenage breakthrough horde likely to improve faster than him. Ditto Sebastian Lletget (29), who had a couple promising caps last year and then immediately got injured. Emerson Hyndman (26) can't get a game with Bournemouth and just got loaned to Wigan in the English second tier. Gedion Zelalem (25) missed nine months with an ACL tear and has a contract that expires next year, making this put-up-or-shut-up time at Arsenal. Luca de la Torre (24) has been on the first-team bench at Fulham for a year and got into five games last season but has a tougher road to the first team after Fulham got promoted. Loan time?

NUMBER SIX: A MERCIFUL LACK OF COMPLANING ABOUT MICHAEL BRADLEY

McKinnie is an option here. If it's not him things might be a bit prosaic relative to TEEN AT SCHALKE(!) and TEEN AT DORTMUND(!).

Chris Durkin (22), DC United. Durkin broke through to DCU's starting lineup in April and hasn't been able to make them not suck but even in his first start his ability on the ball stood out. Since his coach praises his physicality and says that one thing he has to work on is not getting super-aggressive to stomp out every play, that sounds like a defensive midfielder in the making.

Kellyn Acosta (26), FC Dallas. Acosta is aging out of Next Big Thing status and settling in as a high-end MLS player with a lot of versatility. Like a number of people in this post he's had injury setbacks lately, hernia surgery in his case, and is returning to full health. The hernia issue caused a series of groin strains that apparently took a rumored Euro move off the table; hopefully a fully healthy Acosta gets back to that level. Like Adams, Acosta has some experience at outside back—on the left in his case—and it's nice to have a couple of flexible guys on a tournament roster.

Wil Trapp (29), Columbus Crew. Trapp made the last version of this post but stayed on the fringe through the 2018 cycle as his ability to ping long-range passes didn't overcome his slight frame and relative lack of athleticism. Trapp fits best on a side that has a lot of possession and likes intricate passing; the US was not that. And probably won't be that. His best shot is if the US does hire Berhalter, his current coach in Columbus, and tries to implement a version of his current system.

Perry Kitchen (30), LA Galaxy. Kitchen is the most conventional defensive midfielder in the 2022 pool, a guy who goes and busts up plays and then lays it off so the attacking guys can go to work. A brief sojourn in Europe saw him named captain at Scottish club Hearts but now he's back in MLS, slotting in at a D-mid slot the Galaxy desperately needed to fill. He's not going to be the sexiest pick—he'd be this cycle's Beckerman, albeit with more speed—but sometimes you just need a Beckerman.

OTHERS: Marky Delgado (27) stood out as one of the poorer USA field players during the most recent U20WC but is apparently doing well in Toronto? Russell Canouse (26) is yet another DC United midfielder in the picture but if the best the US can do is a bunch of starters at a not-even-good MLS team, that seems bad. Also Durkin's time has come at the expense of an injured Canouse so it's unlikely they'll coexist. And yes, Michael Bradley (34) will be old and will cause many annoying internet arguments but his legendary fitness and professionalism might allow him to continue on as a relatively static and crafty #6.