Jordan Morris' commitment to Stanford confounds USMNT brass

Jordan Morris clearly has some fans among the United States national team decision makers. Jurgen Klinsmann made the Sounders Academy product the first collegian to receive a senior national team cap since Ante Razov in 1995, the year before MLS started. Morris recently picked up his second cap, as well.

Berti Vogts, who was recently named the USMNT technical advisor, is also impressed. He's not as impressed with Morris' decision to stay school, though.

"He's a good player," Vogts told ESPN. "Wow. I cannot understand why he's playing in college."

It's certainly not for lack of interest.

The Sounders have made no secret about their willingness to sign Morris as soon as he's ready to leave college and there have even been rumors that the 20-year-old could sign in Europe if he was so inclined. But Morris has so far resisted those overtures and will instead by heading back to Stanford for his junior season, hoping to build off a sophomore campaign in which he had four goals and six assists.

It should also be said that Vogts, at least, seems to think Morris playing in MLS wouldn't be quite as bad as Klinsmann sometimes suggests. The 68-year-old veteran of world football suggested that once you get outside of the top teams in the top leagues, the difference between European football and MLS can sometimes be exaggerated.

"When you see matches from Stuttgart, Hamburg," he said, "they play at the same level of speed as MLS."