If Bruce Arena Returns, MLS Must Make Him Explain Revs Incident

Bruce Arena New England Revolution sits on the sideline while coaching the New England Revolution ... [+] during a game at D.C. United's Audi Field on September 27, 2020.

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A juicy — if probably unlikely — possibility emerged on Friday afternoon in the form of reporting from The Athletic and ESPN, saying that recently resigned New England Revolution manager Bruce Arena is candidate for the vacant D.C. United job.

The link is intriguing for a lot of reasons.

Arena’s career as arguably the greatest American manager began at the pro level with D.C. when he guided the Black-and-Red to the first two MLS Cup titles ever contested in 1996 and 1997. Presently, both the club and the coach find themselves at low points. D.C. doesn’t appear to have much of a short- or long-term vision after parting with most-recent manager Wayne Rooney. Meanwhile, Arena resigned from the New England job after an investigation into alleged inappropriate remarks, apologizing for his behavior in an official statement but never revealing what the behavior was.

The immediate potential for a redemption arc is obvious. But as part of Arena’s departure, MLS indicated in a statement he would have to petition commissioner Don Garber for reinstatement to the league if he wanted to take another coaching role.

Perhaps that statement was made assuming Arena would retire. But now that it appears he’s open to coaching in the league again, MLS must only permit such a return on the condition Arena give far more public detail about the events leading to his resignation.

Whether Arena understands this or not, his episode exists not in a vacuum, but in a league where there have been three incidents in the last three years involving MLS players accused of uttering racial slurs toward an opponent. Of those three accused, only New York Red Bulls striker Dante Vanzeir admitted to a misdeed, while league investigations into Minnesota’s Franco Fragapane and D.C.’s Taxi Fountas were officially inconclusive. And Fountas was later accused of uttering a slur at a teammate in a separate incident this season that led to him parting with the club in August.

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There’s also the saga involving MLS broadcast host Kaylyn Kyle, who said during an interview on Sirius XM’s “The Football Show” that Arena was being investigated for using a racial slur toward someone in the organization. Kyle later apologized and said she misspoke, and it’s possible she just filled in blanks that weren’t there. She also incurred a month-long suspension as a result. But while those kinds of errors happen, they only add to the context in which Arena’s lack of revelation about what happened must be viewed.

As for the micro analysis of Arena’s exit, there are a couple possible interpretations.

One is that assistant Richie Williams — whom Arena reportedly told to prepare to leave the team after the season — reported Arena for some sort of minor infraction with an aim toward saving his own job and possibly taking over as full-time manager. In The Athletic’s reporting on the investigation, it indicated Williams may have been a source of the allegations against Arena. And in the aftermath of Arena’s resignation, the Revs also removed Williams from the interim role and inserted Clint Peay, amid rumors of distrust between Williams and his staff and players.

But another interpretation of events suggest that, whatever Williams’ motivations, Arena’s actions were serious enough and real enough to merit lengthy deliberations. More than a month passed between when Arena was first placed on administrative leave on Aug. 1 and when he officially resigned as manager on Sept. 9. There were almost no media leaks about the investigation for the first month of that. Perhaps that was the consequence of an extensive fact-finding operation. Or perhaps the fact finding was relatively straightforward, and the rest of the time was spent wrangling over the legal terms of Arena’s conciliatory but unrevealing exit.

A D.C. United spokesperson declined to comment for this post. And the club has maintained that it will be hiring a new sporting director first who will then be in charge of the managerial hiring. Of course that doesn’t completely disqualify Arena, since he assumed both roles in New England. But reading between the lines of the initial reports, it sounds more like Arena’s camp sending feelers out there than D.C.’s.

Arena has long been unafraid to use his position to voice his opinion honestly, while also refusing to discuss factual issues he doesn’t see in his best interest. It’s partly that approach that has endeared him to so many of his former players.

It may also be a reason for the Revs’ routine habit of giving as little information as possible on league-mandated availability reports, one that has been met with little resistance and may have provided Arena with a sense of security. Several times in the last few seasons, New England has not indicated availability issues with key players in the leadup to the match, and if any discipline has been meted out by the league for those omissions, it hasn’t been made public.

Perhaps that leniency is why Arena and his camp feel comfortable expressing interest in another MLS job so soon. But in a world where the league has already stated it found previous allegations against Arena credible, it must demand far more disclosure out of the coach now, even if he is the all-time MLS wins leader. If he can’t admit exactly what he did and is allowed to coach again anyway, fans will be right to assume the worst, and the league’s anti-discrimination efforts will have no credibility.

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