Returning Beckerman an important piece of RSL's passing puzzle

Kyle Beckerman will undoubtedly be called back into action for Real Salt Lake immediately after returning from Gold Cup duty, with Saturday's match against Colorado Rapids an important one and Yordany Alvarez suspended for the match — and two others after that one.

With a US Open Cup semifinal on Wednesday, metering Beckerman's hours — and avoiding an unfortunate injury — will be at the forefront of Jason Kreis's mind. He was a near-constant in the Gold Cup-winning United States squad, and he most recently featured for 45 minutes in the MLS All-Star Game.

While it may be tempting to think of the defensive midfielder position as one that requires less effort to undertake successfully, Beckerman's workrate is phenomenal and rarely involves him sitting deep for long periods of time.

Beckerman currently completes the second-most passes per minute in MLS, with a pass coming approximately every 1.5 minutes he's in play — about what he was at last year — but his accuracy has actually decreased, going from 87 percent in 2012 to 84 percent this year. Given the entirety of the team has been pushing further forward, with Beckerman an important part of that, there's little surprise there to be had.

Interestingly, only one player surpasses Beckerman in passes made per minute — Yordany Alvarez, who completes one pass every 1.48 minutes.