Bob Bradley (like everyone) is smarter than Jamie Trecker

Several news outlets including the Joe Morgan to my Vinnie, Jamie Trecker at Fox Sports, apparently have some beef with Team USA's priorities.

With new USA coach Bob Bradley 2-0 and still with his interim tag attached, questions are abounding about this relatively unique upcoming summer in US Soccer. The Gold Cup, the regional championship of North America ends just a few days before Copa America, the regional championship tournament of South America, where the Yanks are invited guests along with Mexico.

There is a belief out there that the United States Soccer Federation is misguided in fielding two teams for the two tournaments (because clubs will be reluctant to release their players for so long), and that the US is wasting a chance to earn some serious respect in the international soccer community by sending its B team to Venezuela this summer to take on first round opponents Argentina, Paraguay, and Columbia, while its A team stays home to try and hoist the oversized Gold Cup at Soldier Field on June 23 (DAMN MY COUSIN FOR SCHEDULING HER WEDDING THAT SAME WEEKEND!!!!) The Americans are the favorites to win the 2007 Gold Cup and are also defending champions.

Isn't the point of being in Copa America to try and earn some respect by playing in front of an international crowd and get some experience in front of hostile crowds? Why not send the best team you can to Venezuela and try to win the tournament? Claim a scalp against Argentina, or maybe a second-round draw with Brazil? That would go a long way towards regaining the reputation the Stars and Stripes lost at the last World Cup.

True, but frankly, only to me and other people who visit soccer message boards. You can have all the respect in the world (cough, Spain, cough) and it still won't get you results at the World Cup.

Bob Bradley isn't stupid. He knows soccer is still a niche sport in the United States and that by and large, the success of the sport is hinged to the success of the National team, and the casual sports fan only tunes in once every four years in June for the World Cup Finals.

Bob Bradley's plan here is almost absurdly brilliant. Bring your A-team to the Gold Cup , win the North American championship, and earn yourself a place in the Confederations Cup, a tournament held the year before the World Cup in the same country, featuring the 6 continental confederation winners, the World Cup Champion, and the host nation. Send your B-team, full of young, untested prospects to Copa America and see if you can't claim a scalp or two while you're down there.

The team in their prime runs through a weak Gold Cup field (Guadeloupe? Cuba? Honduras? Canada?) and gets USA to the 2009 Confederations Cup, potentially getting matches with World Cup sides Italy, France, possibly Brazil again , and a hungry South Africa team in the same stadiums as will play host to the World Cup the next summer. By that time, the 2007 Gold Cup Champions will be too old to warrant serious consideration for the World Cup squad, but the 2007 Copa America team will be coming into their prime, having already experienced hostile crowds and high-pressure situations in Venezuela two years earlier. Even if let's say on the far outside fringe shot that the United States knocks off Brazil and Argentina to win Copa America, that still won't get them to the Confederations Cup in 2009 because as a North American team they can't represent South America in that tournament.

When the team arrives in South Africa the next summer, most of them will have already been there the year before, and that added familiarity can't possibly hurt on the world's biggest stage, the only international stage that Americans really pay attention to, and in a non-European World Cup, where history has shown that European teams traditionally underperform in, opening the door for US overachievement like in South Korea in 2002.

Bob Bradley's not stupid. He knows his job security depends on World Cup success, and he's aiming for it by serving youth in South America this July.