Less then three weeks after he became only the fifth player named “Ehrenspielführer”—honorary captain of the German national team—and only four days after joining President Barack Obama in Berlin at a state dinner hosted by Chancellor Angela Merkel, Jurgen Klinsmann was fired as U.S. coach and technical director.
Klinsmann’s legacy in his native country is secure. His legacy in his adopted country is going to be a whole lot harder to define.
From the moment he met the massed media at his introductory news conference in 2011, Klinsmann was the smiling, ever-present face of U.S. Soccer. The buzz that day—and his almost constant presence in the headlines since—was a testament to his charisma, celebrity and the degree to which fans hoped he would fulfill his promise.