Toronto FC fans too harsh in judgment of De Rosario

Toronto FC fans need to lose the emotional baggage; it’s time to forgive and forget when it comes to Dwayne De Rosario.

Canada’s largest city is also home to the strangest sporting culture in either this country or the United States. Toronto sports fans have a habit of transforming journeymen into stars, while blasting the city’s star players.

Toronto basketball fans loved the transit-riding wannabe-Canadian Matt Bonner and the ever-hustling Jerome “Junkyard Dog” Williams. Blue Jays fans wax poetic about utility man John McDonald. Sure, enough, each hockey season finds another fourth-liner to be mythologized by Leafs fans.

And, with Toronto FC, Dan Gargan becomes a fan favourite, a guy celebrated on the fans’ message boards, who has had animated videos created in his honour by a dedicated member of the Red Patch Boys.

That’s because Toronto loves the guy who shouldn’t have made the team, but did. They love the player who is playing above his head just to keep his job. This isn’t a rub on Gargan or McDonald; there’s something to be said about working your tail off to get a job. But, as Toronto celebrates the journeymen, it is quick to judge its star players.

Toronto FC fans, who are willing to spend thousands of dollars to pad the coffers of Maple Leaf Sports and Entertainment, will not forgive Dwayne De Rosario for a gesture made after he scored a goal in a September loss to San Jose. His move is now infamous; he pantomimed the signing of a cheque. Somehow, fans are OK with giving money to the corporate parent that had put a loser on the field for four years, but aren’t OK when a player suggests he get a tiny share of the spoils.

This isn’t to say what DeRo did that day was right; but we’ve all done ill-advised things in moments of frustration. And, in most cases, we were forgiven for those things by our friends, colleagues and/or loved ones.

But DeRo, well, TFC fans remain focused on it as a sign of the ultimate treachery.

From a guy who WANTED to be traded from Houston to Toronto.

From a player who has played hurt on numerous occasions.

For a player who dreamed of seeing his home town become a hotbed of soccer.

Dwayne De Rosario is not humble. I understood that from the first time I interviewed him. It was at a sun-drenched Spartan Stadium in San Jose, back in 2004; as journalists often do, I combined my vacation in the Bay Area with an assignment. I convinced the editor at the Edmonton Sports Scene that the San Jose Earthquakes were a worthy topic for a long feature. After all, the team’s success in MLS was dependent on two Canadians, De Rosario and keeper Pat Onstad. Actually, Onstad was of more interest because he had a strong connection to Edmonton, as he played for the Drillers of the North American Professional Soccer League.

De Rosario’s confidence shone through.

“I think we are going for sure,” De Rosario said about qualifying for the 2006 World Cup.
He ended up being proven wrong.

In 2010, he spoke of keeping himself in shape to help Canada push for the 2014 World Cup. That same confidence shone through — and he talked about keeping himself in great shape well into his late 30s, so he could keep playing.

So, was it really out of character for him and his agent, David Baldwin, to ask Toronto FC for a trial with Celtic, that he could get the chance to enjoy a short-term loan spell? After all, when Landon Donovan and David Beckham were allowed to go on loan, MLS opened a Pandora’s box. Surely, more players would follow.

Omar Cummings is training with Aston Villa as I write this.

What was made clear over the last few days, is that the DeRosario move to Celtic was made only to explore a short-term loan deal. It had nothing to do with leaving Toronto FC, or leveraging a new contract. Sure, there is no doubt that De Rosario feels that his time with Toronto FC has been littered with broken promises made by management, and new technical director Aron Winter is left in a very bad spot. He made the call to recall DeRo rather than allow him to be loaned out. Winter is blameless.

But, at no time, had De Rosario dogged it as a TFC player.

De Rosario scored 13 of TFC’s 30 MLS goals last season, and directly set up three more. That means he accounted for more than half of the team’s goals last season. Somehow, in the wake of the cheque-signing gesture and the Celtic deal, this has made him a selfish player.

What?

Really?

I see, I see. Thierry Henry was never that good as a Premiership striker. He was selfish. Bayern Munich fans still go on about how selfish Gerd Muller was when he set the Bundesliga record with 40 goals in a season.

DeRosario is not simply the best player to ever play for Toronto FC; he’s one of the five best players to ever to play in MLS. His name deserves to be mentioned along with the likes of Jason Kreis, Jaime Moreno, Eddie Pope, Cobi Jones and Taylor Twellman, all legends from the fledgling years of MLS.

Four MLS Cups.

When he was with the San Jose-Houston franchise, it survived the loss of Landon Donovan. It kept winning. Two more MLS Cups followed. But when that franchise lost De Rosario, it went from perennial contender to serious rebuild project. Read again: the Earthquakes-Dynamo survived the loss of the poster boy of U.S. soccer, but couldn’t live without De Rosario.

DeRo made $443,000 last season. For one year, for most of us, that’s a lot of money. But, think now about all the early years of MLS, when he was making get-by money in trying to build this league. And, unlike most non-athletes, who have careers well into our 50s and 60s if we want, when an athlete is done, he is done. So, they need to maximize the profitability of their playing years.

When the All-Star Game was held in Toronto in 2008, De Rosario and his Houston teammates had played the night before in D.C., in a game delayed until the wee hours of the morning by a thunderstorm.

DeRo got into Toronto just hours before kick-off. But, he came in as a second half sub, and scored the winning goal from the penalty spot. When the penalty was awarded, DeRo guarded the ball jealously. No one, not even David Beckham, was going to take that kick.

That showed the mix of confidence, ego and fitness that De Rosario has.

“My mind was willing but my body ain’t,” he said after the game. “But the atmosphere changed that… rejuvenated me.”

He played because it meant so much to him to play in Toronto.

So, the case for DeRo; he constitutes more than half of TFC’s offence, has been a solid ambassador for MLS, has won four MLS Cups, has been a leader on the national team.

The case against: A cheque-signing gesture and the fact that he wanted to do what other elite MLS players had done before; get the chance to go on loan with a European club before the season.

It’s time for Toronto FC fans to forgive De Rosario.