Mike Ryan

Welcome back to Morally Abhorrent.

And when we created this, this is a little sideshow attraction for the Levitard Show alongside Chris Whittingham.

It was to discuss a World Cup that everybody had mixed feelings about in Qatar.

and never in my wildest dreams did I think that the title would still play four years later when the United States, Mexico, and Canada would jointly host the next World Cup.

This is a World Cup that has left me feeling super conflicted and many in our audience super conflicted because we all thought that this would be going better.

And I'm not just talking about the nation at large.

I'm talking about the soccer and our global positioning inside of FIFA.

And we're going to explore that a little bit here.

And in this first episode, as we reintroduce this concept to you and the greater DLS universe, we're going to have a central focus.

I'm going to have a lot of friends, a lot of familiar faces come through the show.

Chris Whittingham will indeed be back.

In fact, he will be in our next episode.

But I wanted to start with the USA.

We are hosting, after all, this is a pivotal moment in U.S.

soccer history, not just for the nation as it develops into a soccer nation, but also as a program.

2026 was supposed to represent huge progress and a legit opportunity to do something outstanding on the men's side.

And right now, there is very little reason for hope.

So we're going to bring in Tom Bogert of The Athletic.

golazo and soccer wise the premier soccer insider to help give us a lay of the land and catch you up on some history tom thank you for doing this thanks for having me i know we talk ad nauseum in private about all the drama surrounding the u.s soccer team you're probably a little bit bored by it so i just want to give people kind of like

The top news items here.