Not saying I called it, but . . .

Kasey Keller is right on schedule:

The frustration continues! Once again we can’t seem to find the back of the net. With two big chances at the end to win the game and blow the roof off the stadium, we just couldn’t make it happen. Things could have been worse, we could have been down by three in the first half. On the positive, we kept a clean sheet and got a point out of a game where we could have been dead and buried in the first half hour.

For the record, I saw this coming two days ago:

prediction - we'll have an entry by the end of Monday bitching about the strikers again

Oh vampire goal keeper, why must you be so predictable? How lucky you are the Open Cup final is being played at night at RFK and not during the day in Seattle. Seriously, you better bring along your undead powers - all of a sudden I've got a season riding on this game. Plus in one swift blow I can end Tom Soehn. This is it, Keller. You and me. Let's see what you're made of. Sport is extreme, know what I mean? It's not a game.

DC fans, your tears will taste so, so sweet

Very funny. Prepare for utter annihilation.

Creepy Jose has problems & so do I

"Technical problems" keep CJ from doing his job:

Posted by
Due to technical problems beyond his control, Jose wasn't able to do a running game blog today. Hopefully the techies will get the blogging tool fixed soon. Meantime, you can read the running game story he just sent in:

It's all gone pear shaped for poor CJ, hasn't it? It's like watching today's Arsenal game over and over again in slow motion.

Speaking of pear shaped, was that a great game or what? No? Ok, you're right, it was terrible. Check out the quotes here. When even I'm saying we should have been down 2 or three at the half, you know it was bad.

I thought they dominated the first half. We were lucky to get in at halftime 0-0. We were fortunate we were not down by two or three. I felt the second half was better. We had two changes to steal the game at the end... which would have been nice... Obviously, I'm not pleased and we could have played better. Some guys had to roll up their sleeves and battle a little more than we expected. We got banged up a little bit. It's not going to make our Top 10 in performances

Meanwhile, Keller just won't get the message, will he? Here's a clue, older-than-several-coaches-man - SHUT YOUR PIE HOLE:

I heard part of the press conference when Sigi said it's something we need to truly find what's going to work and if it is going to hurt some people's feelings, it's tough. Everybody is thinking at this time of the year that you got to get your form right to go into playoffs. Right now, we are not even a playoff team. We don't have that form to even make the playoffs. It's something we need to change quickly.

I know you think it's awful helpful to point out how bad things are and where things are going wrong, but in case you didn't notice, that's my fucking job. Not yours. While it's true that we've had a terrible run as of late, it's only going to get harder. And in times like this, the last thing I need is a "respected" (we'll see how long that lasts) veteran on my team proactively saying the ship is going down. Ring the alarm all you want, but what I need right now is someone who's going to rally the troops, not say, gee, boss, we sure are outnumbered.

And oh yeah, Mr. Undead Vampire - being that you're immortal and all, and you've been playing for what seems like forever, you should know better. Or did all those years at Millwall and Tottenham warp your feeble brain?

So keep your negative comments out of the media and off your damn blog (prediction - we'll have an entry by the end of Monday bitching about the strikers again) and do your job. Nice clean sheet. Now shut up. And if you do have something to say, keep it along the lines of "Coach wants me to run a thousand laps in practice for thinking I can say whatever I want to hacks like you, so, I'm sorry, but I really can't talk through this oxygen mask right now." Ok? Thanks.

Fake Sigi out.

Warzycha is flipping out after that Cruz Azul loss

And Sean Michelle had to deal with it:

“Did we go to win? Yes. But if you give up two goals in the first nine minutes, it’s not going to happen. If you get a red card in the first half, that doesn’t help. It was a learning experience.

“I’m not saying that I take the loss easy. It’s 5-0. They just kicked our ass. No one is going to remember that we gave up two own goals and they scored on a penalty that was not a penalty. Nobody is going to remember that we played a man down for 60 minutes. Everybody that is reading the newspaper is going to remember that it’s 5-0. That’s what it is. What I hate after the game is that people are looking at me with that little bit of smile because I know what they’re thinking. That’s what is pissing me off.”

Emphasis is mine, I think. How much you want to bet that asshole Michelle was baiting Robert with tabloidesque questions like "Are you worried about your job," or "How do you think Clark Hunt will react to this embarrassment for the club?" He was always doing bullshit like that to me, it made me want to slap him.

Anyway Robert, I would never look at you in that way. Our relationship is too special for something like that. But I know you will murder Cruz Azul when they return to Crew stadium. It is your way.

Creepy Jose forgets to do his job

Creepy Jose, on finally realizing we were giving Terry Cooke a tryout:

Some of you alerted me to this the last couple of days, and to be honest I just dropped the ball and never even noticed Cooke was out there until today.

Honestly, it's a lot worse than that. Cooke's been an open secret in Soundersville for at least two weeks. In fact, I'm pretty sure I told Creepy Jose about him last Wednesday. We were standing around and he was like, hey, any new trialists? And I'm like, yeah, Terry Cooke is coming into practice, but keep it under your hat, nudge nudge, wink wink, say no more.

And then I guess he must've forgot. I mean, sure, there was that one day his notebook totally flew open, and he's chasing papers across the field, and running through our drills screaming "Carmen! Carmen! I'll get you for this, you silly bitch!" And while he's chasing after these papers and bumping into our players, and Brad Evans and the rest of the guys are doubled over in laughter, Sanna Nyassi's Lebanese dog starts running through as well, biting at the bits of notebook paper flying through the air, and he catches a couple and then Jose starts chasing the dog, and by this point none of us are upright, everyone's literally on the ground laughing. Finally Jose is fighting with the dog for some scraps, but I'm not sure he got all of it.

And I don't know, for the rest of the week, he'd be gone for large parts of practice. We're out there and I'd say real loud, "All right, we're going to do such and such drill for Terry's benefit." And Jose'd be sitting on the bench eating a hogy roll not noticing, and then Drew Carey would come up to him with a weird look on his face, and the two of them would go off somewhere and come back an hour later looking high as kites and giggling uncontrollably. I think they were looking at some of Carey's pictures, but I really don't want to know. And then CJ would just stare at what was left of his notebook until we'd be finished up with practice and one of the training interns would have to tell him he couldn't stay there anymore.

So, yeah, random internet dudes who do Jose's job better than him - don't feel bad that he didn't respond to your e-mails. He's been like that for a while.

Yeah, its hell here

Much love to Kickette for documenting what we have to put up with around here. It really does suck.



Afterward Ljungberg came into my office and we laughed and laughed. And then Fredy Montero knocked on the door and we clammed up real quick and smiled slyly like we were talking about him. He got weird look on his face and walked out after asking about what the trainers were doing with his shin guards. As soon as he was gone we busted up again and saw him stop and pause, which just made us laugh harder.

Oh, and by the way - Carey's got a truckload of those decals.

Feminism, the American Pro Leagues, and Latinos

It's nice to see the discussion in the comments of Dan's article eventually expanded to include issues of homophobia and gender. My regular reader knows I've been posting on that stuff quite a bit this summer and it's nice to see the topic break into the mainstream fan culture, if only for a minute. Lord knows it was better than any of the games last night, that is, unless you liked watching brutal beat downs. Makes my stomach turn, personally.

Anyway, Jennifer Doyle "The Professor" as she's now been dubbed (how great is it that we now have an Arsene Wenger reference in the American blogosphere), posted a followup piece on her blog today, directly or indirectly addressing a lot of what came up in the comments thread during and after her posts, and expounding upon her general soccer world-view . I'll echo that Timon guy when I say, THIS:

You just can't underestimate the positive impact of the sport on girls and women. For all sorts of reason. And I don't see why that shouldn't be enough - why any WPS team should turn itself inside out wondering how to make men who don't care about the game come to watch a match. Women make up half the population (slightly more, in fact). They earn money, they spend money. They spend their families money. Why on earth should the business model for the "success" of the women's game should be almost fear of alienating men?

Lest you think I'm a separatist, I ask: Why don't we have more faith in the men in our lives? (We seem to trust them enough to coach the cast majority of the teams.) I see lots of guys at matches, of all sorts of ages. They are often more romantic about the women's game than women are! (e.g. "This is how the men used to play - as a team - before it became all about money and militaristic defense.") I don't think they care either way about the sexuality of the players - and we don't need to keep them in the closet to hold their attention.

There's a lot more I think is interesting and/or agree with, but I'm not going to quote the whole first part.

As for the part about Latinos:

Here's my cross - the link between gay fans of women's soccer & Latino/a fans of the men's game: I think fútbol fans feel this way because they have been kept in the closet.

Yeah, the point's more nuanced than that, but again, fair use is fair use. For my part, I think MLS has bent over backwards to reach and engage the Hispanic community. From Spanish language broadcasts to youth leagues to signing players from Latin America in droves. Has the league always been effective? Hell no. And the Professor is right about there being a disconnect between the anglo soccer culture that sprung up in the 60's and has continued to this day in various forms, and Hispanic soccer culture. To be fair, it's a divide that cuts across our whole society, with a few notable exceptions.

I do think things are changing. In a lot of ways, it's not 2004 anymore. Do you know where this picture was taken?



Columbus Crew Stadium. The place where the Germanically named Nordecke is home to frat boys, Anglo/Euro footie fans, and Hispanic fans on Crew game day. Things haven't always run smoothly in the stands along those cultural lines, but there's been a lot of good to come out of the fusion of the groups in the corner.

Now that picture didn't appear in the English language newspaper of the same company this week, which really underlines the current situation. But the Hispanic situation is one where MLS is truly adapting. There's too much money at stake not to.

From another perspective, it's not like the communities the Professor is talking about are going to have a whole lot of trust by default in MLS. And much like the girlfriend or boyfriend who had to work out their issues before you could get with them, the Hispanic immigrant community has a lot to come to terms with in regards to its own identity before you'll find its members lining MLS and WPS stadia en masse on Saturday nights. It's a relationship that will take a lot of work on the part of *both* parties, and not even that will guarantee a healthy symbiosis.

Fake Sigi out.

More Real

From Chicago Fire Confidential:

Well after months of rumors and a few days of unofficial reports, the transfer of the now former Fire Defender Bakary Soumare to Boulogne of the French First Division has finally gone through.

Of course, this news is merely a formality at this point -- I think we all knew Baky was going to go to the newly promoted club -- but all the same, the official aspect of it makes it a little more real.

Yeah, that whole "transfer happening in reality" thing does tend to make it more real. Just not Real.

On throwing out the first pitch

Creepy Jose decided to break the story about me throwing out the first pitch for a Seattle Seahawks game. To be perfectly honest with you, I hated it. All those yard lines, the wicket stand, the center back wearing a bunch of stuff, the helmets on the gridirons. All in all, it was pretty dumb.

Worst part was, Drew Carey came up from LA with me to do it. So I had a whole plane ride with him talking about how much bull shit health care reform is, and how he doesn't give a fuck because he has more money than John Lennon, etc. etc. And all I want is to sit and listen to the Wagner that's being softly played over the plane's sound system. A little bit of Tristan, hmm? No? You're going to talk to me the whole flight? You're going to stand with me in the elevators down to the field, too? And you're going to take pictures of me for your creepy collection as I throw out the first pitch? Fuck you Drew. You wouldn't know a Liebestod if it bit you in the ass.

Well, duh

Dan Loney weighs in with what I figured out long ago. I can boil his post down to a single sentence.

MLS has found a way to make money from people who hate MLS.

And that's pretty much the point of Soccer United Marketing's existence. Quite honestly, it's the answer to keeping MLS afloat and prosperous in the long term. When MLS lucked into the World Cup rights back in 2002 (although it wasn't viewed as a windfall at the time) the owners quickly realized two important facts. First, there was a huge market in the USA for non-MLS soccer. Second, the league could in fact make money on that market, while at the same time using that market to promote MLS.

So MLS created SUM and used it as a vehicle to get their hands into the Mexican league and Copa Libertadores qualifying, née Interliga. SUM also promotes a lot of the Tri matches in the USA (which seems like the only place Mexico plays friendlies these days). Then to expose Mexican fans to MLS, Superliga was created. I'll never understand why the competition is so maligned, but to MLS's credit, they've now got a format which allows it to stay around and get MLS clubs in front of the eyeballs of hispanic fans.

Now SUM is promoting matches with big European clubs against MLS sides. While Loney is going on about how the MLS teams in the massive SUM matchups this summer don't cost much, the real reason they are involved is to expose fans of the big European clubs to MLS. Yeah, the money's nice, and that's why SUM is running things, but the presence of MLS clubs are just as important.

Loney then talks about how MLS is the domain of the "die hard" MLS fan. Wrong. MLS is what the white kids are watching, aka, youth. The "die hard" MLS fan, if it exists, is much too small a market to matter.

And in fact, in an interview last year, Garber talked about how MLS's top demographic targets were hispanics, core (European and South American) soccer fans, and youth.

Major League Soccer’s marketing strategy for the League is to focus on three primary groups:

1. Youth … mainly the 14 million soccer players in the US under the age of eighteen. This group consists of individuals who are developing preferences for a lifetime and often times have disposable income and leisure time. We believe this group is the brand influencer of an entire generation.
2. Hispanic – there are nearly 43 million Hispanics in the United States and 85 percent of this group comes from soccer-loving countries. They are passionate about soccer, but that does not necessarily make them an MLS fan. We have to change the perception among many Latin Americans that the quality of play in MLS is low. We believe that meaningful competition between MLS clubs and Mexican First Division clubs will help us convince more Hispanic soccer fans, especially the 27 million Mexican-Americans, that MLS is an exciting, high-quality league.
3. Core Soccer Fan – Research states that there are 65 million people in the United States connected to the sport of soccer and six million list soccer as their favorite sport. The core soccer fan group is loyal and knowledgeable, but often is a fan of European or South American soccer and not a fan of MLS. Improving our talent pool, and perhaps just as importantly, the presentation of our games, is essential to capturing this audience.

So the point is that until MLS is the main draw for these groups of soccer fans (if ever) there's a huge market out there that MLS makes a lot of money on and simultaneously uses to promote the core asset of MLS to potential fans. Over time the plan is to turn those fans to MLS, but in the meantime, a lot of money flows into MLS cofers, money that the owners aren't sharing with the players. And we haven't even mentioned the Gold Cup, CONCACAF Champions League (a rather new co-opting), WPS, and a whole host of other competitions.

Incidentally, Brad Rothenberg, son of Alan, had this to say about the Hispanic audience:

If you can gain the trust of a Hispanic consumer through soccer, you can translate that brand trust to anything.

Which is precisely why MLS wants to be at the front of the line. Which they certainly appear to be:

For instance, on a recent Wednesday night, MLS mounted an exhibition game of Rumbo al Mundial's Mexico versus China at Quest Field in Seattle, which by most standards would be considered, at best, somewhat of an emerging Hispanic market with a significant Latino presence.

"We had 56,000 people in the [sold-out] stadium, all wearing green [the Mexico National team's color] and none of them were rooting were China," said Kathy Carter, evp of MLS' marketing arm, Soccer United Marketing, New York.

Loney concludes his post by being a bit worried:

Now, MLS is in a new world. Winning is nearly irrelevant, the big money comes from games where the result doesn't matter, from fans who despise the teams. I'm not prepared for that world. Are you? Is anybody?

Hell yes. Because MLS is getting it's crumbgrabbers into those people and over a period of years plans to turn them into fans of their league. Think of SUM having a halo effect on MLS, much like the ipod did for Apple's Mac business.

Dan also says:

"If you want a picture of the future, imagine a boot kicking a ball in a meaningless friendly - forever."

That future is now, and has been for a while. What MLS hopes is that one day it's own teams have crowds like that, and that's why it's putting it's teams in front of them. Right now the matches may be meaningless, but the plan is for them to one day matter much more than life and death.

In the midst of bitching about Superliga, Dave of Dave's Football Blog distilled the main point in all of this last year:

And that, folks, is MLS in a nutshell. The league only puts emphasis on the competitions that it can control. It doesn’t want to open itself up to the rest of the region, because that just doesn’t jibe with its business model, and as long as the business model keeps working, there’s no reason to make major changes.

MLS wants to control as much soccer revenue as it can, while at the same time promoting the league. It's probably the best business plan the league could have right now.

Fake Sigi out.

Pitch Invasion does it again

A great article on gender issues in soccer:

Nearly every feature story on Marta makes a big deal out of how she grew up playing with boys as if this were unusual. Of course it’s fun to read about Marta’s childhood years fighting macho attitudes on dusty pitches and in the street — but just once I would like to see it acknowledged that her experience is not extraordinary. It is in fact absolutely typical for female players, especially (but not only) those living in places where women’s sports is not accepted. In the U.S., girls play with boys, by the way, and many also find themselves combating patriarchal attitudes about sports when they lace up their boots. Brazil hardly has a monopoly on machismo.

The Pitch Invasion piece is a rewrite of this earlier blog post. Both are well worth the time to read.

Meanwhile, things are not going well over here

Yeah, that loss to the Revs was bad. Bad in a bad way. First we've got players not taking penalty kicks like they're supposed to, and then the Revs win in that god awful way only they know how to do. I feel like Greg Andrulis. And now Kasey's back to blogging:

Where do I begin, I feel we could have played three games last night and not scored a goal. We had some very good chances throughout the game, but at no real time did we force Matt Reis, the New England goalkeeper, into a difficult save. In fact, I don’t think we had one shot on target. We couldn’t even score from the penalty spot. Not our night. I was happy with the defensive effort. After the bad game in San Jose we have conceded only two goals in three games. Now we just need to put it all together.

Yeah, we know you think the strikers are shit and that you and the defense are all that. Do the words San Jose mean anything to you? No? Didn't think so.

Anyway, I ate those guys out. No need to go into details, but let's just say Sir Alex is calling for tips. And tonight is all bad - Toronto or Chivas could leap frog us, and the latter still has two games in hand on us after tonight. And so does Colorado. Even though that win in LA was great, pretty much nothing is going the way we want at the moment. Of course, I did predict that we might have problems going into this last stretch, but it's worse than even I imagined.

So yeah, about that Open Cup thing. But I can't start trying now - not caring has worked pretty well so far.

I am never, ever coaching in New York

Yeah, another dead homie. Look at that table. Not even Arena could survive. Seriously, that team is the best argument the league has for relegation - 14 seasons of pure suck, a stadium that's drained away more MLS treasure than every other team combined, and the most retarded logo/mascot/sponsor the league has ever seen. Meanwhile, Michael Lewis says the team is for sale again. Honestly, even San Jose has it more together than you people. You mean St. Louis still doesn't have a team, and we're treated to seven years of this?



There is no god.

How's that Szetela acquisition working out?

Mwa ha ha:

Why no Szetela in recent games? "A few personal things came up. ... I'd rather just keep it between the team."

I mean, who could have seen that coming? Meanwhile, DC continues to fall further and further behind the Crew in the standings. 8 games ago, they were looking like they might be real. Now they've only won once since mid June and are in serious trouble. Think Soehn will survive if the team misses the playoffs? Not a chance.

As for that "We win trophies" bullshit? Yeah, we're going to cut your heart out in RFK, bitches. Get ready. By the end of the game Soehn will look like he was on the wrong end of a mortal combat match.

Back to Business

Finally got some time to blog. Yeah, I know it's 45 minutes before game time, and I just barricaded myself in the coaches room for a few minutes, but who cares? It's not like Nicol comes up with any varying tactics. Let's see . . . pack the middle of the field, slow the game down, be physical and score on a counter or two. Yeah, that about covers it. Like the Joker said in the first Tim Burton Batman movie, "I like him already!"

Didn't mention how nice it was to paste LA. I love winning down there so much, you have no idea. Those guys have got to be terrified of facing us in the playoffs. I get giddy just thinking about it.

As for tonight? Guess what Bob Bradley - I'm coming for you.



It's go time.

FS out.

Or I could have just linked to this

I swear, I work too hard.

Your blog post is a disgrace

Honestly, I have more important things to worry about than BA Duane right now. If I didn't, I'd be posting more often. But there's just too much fail in his latest stick poking/hit whoring effort to let it go unchallenged. To summarize, Duane thinks Columbus Crew should be moved because they drew just over 6,000 fans to see their team play the Puerto Rico Islanders in a non-league match on a Tuesday night:

. . . there is something seriously wrong in the Columbus market (and Dallas and about three others to various degrees). With an average attendance of 13,360, which ranks ninth (tenth, really. It's hardly fair to compare K.C.'s attendance to the rest of the league since it plays in a stadium that only fits a fraction more than 10,000 people) it's hard to argue otherwise..

In a league that shares revenue you are only as strong as your weakest link. That the Crew are a wonderful team on the pitch matters little when they continue to drag down MLS off of it. Yes, the CCL is a different animal and it was a weeknight and (fill in five more excuses here), but come on!

6,161 is pathetic. 13,360 is pathetic. Especially when you are talking about the best team in the league.

If Columbus doesn't want the team, I'm sure there is another city out there that does.

And later Duane helpfully clarifies the gist of his argument in an ill-advised comment:

Your attendance is a ****ing disgrace. Making excuses for it only makes you feel better about yourself.

At it's core, the post looks like nothing more than sad attendance smack directed at the fans of the team that Toronto has a shocking inability to beat. I could talk about how the Crew traditionally average more than 18,000 fans a game after the Ohio State Fair concludes. I could talk about how Columbus fans (and MLS fans in general) are notoriously apathetic to non-league games (pointed out in some of the comments to Duane's post). How teams like San Jose and New England are ranking just ahead of the Crew by padding their stats with double and triple headers featuring European or national sides. How the Crew haven't had the benefit of a Beckham game like other teams. I could go in depth about how not counting KC means the Crew still rank 9th, not 10th, in attendance. I could get involved in any measure of attendance smacky, butt-counting nerdery.

But let's go in another direction.

Duane is clearly bothered (more than either of the two Bens up there) by how Columbus Crew can win the league and not be one of the largest drawing sides. Sure, back in 1999 when Crew Stadium opened the Crew was either top of the league or close to it in terms of attendance (sound familiar, teams with new stadiums?), but things leveled off and they had a run of bad form, and for a couple years dipped noticeably below 15k a game.

It's a variation on arguments that have swirled since Columbus was the smallest market to be awarded an original MLS franchise. For a long time there've been BigSoccer posters who occasionally bring up how Columbus is too small, or doesn't draw well enough, or the Hunts are cheap asses, and so therefore it should be moved or contracted or sold. Usually these posters are dealt with as the trolls they are, and nowhere that I know has this type of argument been elevated to obvious solution status like it has been in Duane's blog.

I'll admit to being a little confused as to how low non-league attendance, when coupled with historically solid mid-level league attendance and better than average performance on the field, along with a soccer specific stadium, lead to the conclusion that Crew are dragging down the rest of the league off the field. Maybe Duane's going with the image issue all the empty seats create, but it wasn't exactly hay Houston was making tonight in the CCL, either.

The fact is when push came to shove, Lamar put down $27 million big ones to build Crew Stadium (and who knows how much else on other things), which laid the foundation for the strategy that helped the league survive through the 2001 downturn and start to thrive a few years later once SUM got cooking. On the basis of that alone, one could argue that without Crew Stadium and the Crew, the rest of the league (including TFC) wouldn't even be here. It's not an argument without problems, ignoring Anschutz among other things, but it's a salient counterweight to what Duane is trying to say here.

From my perspective, there is nothing to back up Duane's assertion that Columbus is dragging down MLS, attendance-wise or other. It's the blogging equivalent of the people showing up to health care town halls carrying guns and signs of Obama looking like Hitler, asking questions about death committees. His post is that far out of left field, and it needs to be called out as such.

Again, it's clear that Columbus's success eats at BA like nothing else, and that he wishes with all his heart to exorcize that part of reality from existence. Here he is, in the most cosmopolitan city in North America outside of New York, San Fransisco, LA, Chicago, New Orleans, Boston, Houston, Miami, Montreal, Vancouver, or Washington DC, with "sold out" games, a shiny new stadium, and Toronto can't seem to win much of anything, let alone a single game against those provincial fuckers from Columbus. I suppose in his mind it's like Arsenal losing to Derby County back in the 70's. Yeah, I'd be frustrated, too.

But it's no excuse for just posting bullshit and thinking readers will accept it without offering any sort of critical eye. That truly is a disgrace.

Fake Sigi out.

I really have been busy

In addition to trying to stop the free fall, I've been working on a new site design. These things take time.

Yeah, it's not going well

Another league game, another loss. It's not like we're even in the hard part of the schedule yet, although RSL away is rapidly becoming a not-fun fixture.

So, yeah, getting smoked by San Jose last week was damaging - this makes it worse. If we keep this up, we'll be fighting it out with Toronto for the playoffs. I said a while ago that we're maybe the 8th best team in the league, and hey, it looks like it's playing out. But seriously, 10 points since I wrote that June 8th? Yeah, not ok. Maybe I should try and win that Open Cup thingy.

Also, welcome to those who've stopped by after reading Bill's blog. Apologies for the light week - I've had my hands full with Barcelona and delivering beat downs in practice, not to mention finishing up that damn Narwhal review. In addition, I've been in the Manhattan Beach bunker receiving intravenous bratwurst injections through an IV. I'll be back to it this week. In the meantime, check out the archives.

Oh Snap

I told you we were over-rated. But 4-0 to the Smurfs? Christ.

The first goal (in the second minute!) was an absolute howler - Alonso is so getting the hose again. And then Riley got sent off. And then Cornell Glen scored on us (seriously?). And Keller flopped around like a Ruiz on the third. And Tyrone Marshall got stripped faster than a Cadillac in downtown Detroit on the fourth. It just kept going.

And no, it's not any better in Spanish. This will not be a good week in practice. Evans and Alonso better be rubbing a lot of lotion, know what I mean?

A Terrible Goal Call

Jeff Cunningham went off for 4 goals last night against KC in a historic night for him. And yet, his night provided a great example of bad goal calls by MLS television announcers. Cunningham's third goal:

. . . about the benefits, for more info, visit the Hooper's Kids Club sign up table located at the Hooper's Hang Out, or checkout FC Dallas dot com . . . and FC Dallas goes up 4-0! Jeff Cunningham is having himself a night - won't let me get the promos in.

I'll note that during the time the announcer was talking about the Hooper's Kids Club, Brek Shea sent a phenomenal cross from about 35-40 yards out on the left wing that landed directly on Cunningham's foot just outside the six and was one-timed into the goal past a helpless Kevin Hartman.

On the one hand, I recognize that this isn't totally the announcer's fault on some level - someone's telling him he has to do the promos, and so he does them. But goal calls like this are the aural equivalent of football lines on the field. And if you're going to do promos, it takes an understanding of the game to do them at times when you won't be caught out of sorts.

It really is advertising run amok. And it's worse than hearing Dave Johnson say "It's in the net!" fourteen or so times during the Houston - DC game.

As an aside - was the Bill McDermott/Eric Wynalda combo in the announcer box for the Athletica game last night weird or what? Wyno sounded sort of high, and McDermott's bubbly effervescence rolled along without concern for his partner. At the risk of death by strange, I think we should be treated to more of this combo in nationally televised games. Anything to keep it interesting.