After years of team-hopping, Steve Trittschuh is a constant in a revamped defense Steve Trittschuh is shivering by his locker in the Colorado Rapids locker room. ááááWhat’s this? Post-traumatic stress disorder? Or just a bad day at the office? After all the Rapids have just been royally stuffed, 4-2 by the Dallas Burn. “No, man,” he laughs, pointing to the iced cooler in which his feet are immersed. “I’m cold! Freezing!” The 90 minutes preceding the chilly foot-bath saw Colorado blow a 2-0 lead against a Burn team that was playing for the second time in 48 hours. The match also provided some defending of epically comic proportions. In three games, the Rapids have conceded no fewer than 14 goals, forcing the team to drop below .500 and taking the shine off Colorado’s bid to become the most-improved team of MLS: Year Two. “Overall, Tritt’s done well,” says Rapids coach Glenn Myernick, for whom praising a defender at a time like this is no mean feat. “He didn’t have a good game tonight. He lost [Burn striker] Dante Washington at three critical times in the game. He’s our captain. He’s a very quiet leader. He’s not a rah-rah kind of guy. He’s a great pro and on a night like this you expect more from his experience. “But overall I’m just very, very happy with him.” Trittschuh is the Colorado Rapids’ quiet captain. The 32-year-old central defender is one of a handful of players to not only survive but thrive on the revamped Rapids’ roster. Last year, he toughed things out in midfield, a largely bypassed area on the field of play, with a broken toe for the team’s final 13 games. Hence the freezing water.

Teamed up with Balboa

This time around, he’s anchoring the Rapids’ defense with Marcelo Balboa. “I had played in midfield in the past,” says Trittschuh. “But last year, toward the end of the season, [then-coach] Bob Houghton wanted us to get in the box as much as possible, to get on the end of something, “[This year] I like playing with Marcelo. And the more this team plays together, the more games it gets under its belt, the better it will be because basically this is a brand new team. All the other teams have had a year’s [start on us].” The return for Colorado last year was five goals and two assists from the 6-1 defender. But it wasn’t enough to keep the Rapids out of the Western Division cellar, nor was it enough to keep Houghton in a job. “I can’t say Bobby did anything wrong,” says Trittschuh. “If you look at his record in the past, he’s had success with every team he coached. Maybe the guys just didn’t understand the style of play he wanted because it was basically English style ù play the ball in their end, get balls in the box, get them to make mistakes. Maybe certain players didn’t understand it, maybe they didn’t want to play that way. But I respect the guy. I still keep in touch with him. “Mooch has come in and done well here. He’s got one vision of what he wants to do and he’s done such a good job. He’s still learning, but I see him as one of the top coaches of the federation. “Mooch knows the system, knows what the American player is like and how to deal with them.” So what is the American player like? “That’s a good question,” laughs Trittschuh. “I guess when you grew up in the European system, you’re used to one thing. There’s not as much pressure here as in Europe just yet.” Trittschuh knows what he’s talking about. After Italia ’90, in which he started in the team’s opener, man-marking Tomas Skuhravy in a 5-1 loss, he headed to Sparta Prague, playing the 1990-91 season in Czechoslovakia. After a season’s hiatus, he returned to Europe to join the Netherlands’ SVV Dordrecht ’90 for a year. Never likely to avoid the drop, Dordrecht was relegated and Trittschuh headed home to the Tampa Bay Rowdies of the APSL, which served as his summer club on stints abroad, and later the Fort Lauderdale Strikers and the Montreal Impact, leading the latter to the 1995 APSL crown. Then MLS stepped in. The Rapids acquired Trittschuh as a third-round pick in the 1996 draft. So how does MLS compare with the level of play he experienced in Europe? “It’s getting there,” he says. “The quality of play here is good. Maybe we’re not at the level of the top teams in Holland or Czechoslovakia, but against the lower teams of both leagues ù yeah, we could play with them.” And then there was the national team. Trittschuh’s main stint came between 1987 and 1991, when he earned all but one of his 46 caps. He scored the go-ahead goal in the 1-1 tie against Trinidad & Tobago in 1989 and played in the team’s World Cup berth-clinching match in Port of Spain.

National team memories

After a four-year break, he earned an international recall and started in the U.S’s 4-3 win over Saudi Arabia during the honeymoon period of Steve Sampson’s tenure. But aside from a recall in a strike-bound friendly against Peru, in which he didn’t play, he hasn’t heard anything from U.S. Soccer. Still, given the return to favor of Marcelo Balboa in the U.S. defense and a recall for Colorado teammate Peter Vermes, does he entertain any hope of another return? “Ah well, I think my time is past,” laughs Trittschuh. “But what can you do? I think [Sampson] is happy with the defenders he has on the team at the moment. “But I was with [the national team] almost six years and I have some great memories. The World Cup, and I always look at that final game in Trinidad [in 1989] when we had to win and we did [1-0], being a part of that was unbelievable. That was the first time we had qualified in 40 years. That’s a great memory. “And you never know what would have happened if we hadn’t qualified for that. Maybe this league wouldn’t be here. Maybe [FIFA] would have taken the [1994] World Cup out of our hands. That was a big step in getting this league going.” As for the immediate future, Trittschuh has but one aim with the Rapids this season. “Our first goal this season was to make the playoffs, and I think at the moment that is a very attainable goal for us,” he says. “Once you get to the playoffs, who knows what can happen? It’s a totally different game. “This year, it’s a good team, we’ve just got to put it together, that’s all.” by Soccer America Senior Editor Duncan Irving