being julio heyward
(part nine)
well, this is disappointing and really kind of fascinating all at the same time. the thumb's been hurt since may. bobby cox keeps running him out there because "i love seeing him play". his numbers are dreadful in the month of june because, as heyward has said himself, he can't keep his thumb on his bat. through it all, though, he made such a mammoth impact on the world of major league baseball in april and may that he's going to be voted into the all-star starting line-up by the fans...
...and he's not going to play. why? because cox and the braves have mishandled another injury just like they mishandled jordan's last year. and now, his stint on the DL is going to rub right up against the all-star break. and yet, he is so freaking mature, even though he would be eligible to play, he's putting his team first and saying he isn't going to "rehab" in an all-star game at-bat or two.
bobby cox, i wish i had the words..., and i do, but i've gotta go work. i dislike you so much.
but i love jason heyward.
Wednesday, June 30, 2010
Tuesday, June 22, 2010
world cup 2010
(part six)
((the new biggest game ever))
forget the england match. a week and half removed from that result makes it feel anticlimactic. forget the blown call. fifa made the right decision and banned the dude from showing his face in south africa again. in the subjective world of futbol, that's about as close to satisfaction or retribution as you're gonna get. the governing body of soccer, at the very least, agreed with joe us fan and admitted the ref in the slovenia match was terrible. surprisingly, they released no statement making the same claim against the united states defense. slovenia, too, is in the rearview mirror and at the same time currently setting the pace in the group. that that team plays for a country that holds the same amount of people as houston matters not. all that matters is algeria.
where the frack is algeria?
glad you asked. it's here.
fifteen times the size, in millions of persons, than slovenia, the transitive theory applied to their population would imply that the us is in deep doo-doo come tomorrow morning. if they couldn't put away a country that wikipedia has barely heard of, how in the world are we going to compete with a country of legitimate size and economy? thankfully, the transitive theory applied to anything in sports never matters.
moving on.
i couldn't name one guy on algeria's roster. not one. i don't think alexi lalas can either, and he is one of espn's "experts". he also seems to hate this us team and their lack of moxy, which makes for fairly entertaining television as he rips his countrymen every time chris fowler or mike tirico asks him a question about them. nevermind that alexi lalas is best known for his hair, goatee and being a really solid mls defender. what i mean by crapping on his resume is that i think he kind of sucks too.
back to tomorrow's "most important game ever".
say the us loses tomorrow to "lowly" algeria. what then, other than i care considerably less about the world cup for a few days?
the world cup will move on, but that will be it for this collection of players. not advancing out of this group would mark the last four years worth of qualifying and tournament play a disaster. landon donovan would come back to the mls to die a slow, painful death. you would never hear of herculez gomez, edson buddle and robbie findley again. jozy becomes the face of the team moving forward with stuart holden, michael bradley and several other unremarkable players moving into leadership roles that would soon be vacated by dempsey, onyewu and bocanegra, all much more highly thought of in the states versus the rest of the world. us soccer will be set back. again. another eight years at the least. if this team advances and possibly wins a round of 16 game, the core will be present during the next qualifying run and will be given one more chance to prove their worth in 2014. if they lose or find another way not to advance tomorrow morning, "project 2010" will evolve into project 2018 and younger players will begin early grooming at making an impact somewhere down the road.
there is this great shot that espn keeps replaying of two american guys, probably mid-twenties, celebrating after bradley's game-tying goal. the guy on the right of the shot is completely breaking down, bawling like a baby. normally, i would make fun at such a silly display of emotion. but, dammit, in that moment, i was totally with the guy. just a half-hour earlier, i had written to sarah that the world cup was over. 30 minutes later, life had been breathed back into the us chances, and i was right there cursing at the disallowed goal with the rest of the concerned.
what makes the world cup so intense is the long and grueling process. 31 national teams will spend 6-8 months picking up their collective hearts off the ground (1 will be celebrating for the same length of time), and then they will be forced to look ahead and map out their vision for the next world cup cycle. qualifying runs for 16-18 months. guys come in and out of the player pool, some bringing more hope with them than others. there is a good result that makes a fan believe a semifinal world cup result is possible. then the team will lose to haiti by five goals and it makes you wonder why you ever watched soccer in the first place.
for four years, you wait, you watch, you read and you agonize over what will eventually boil down to three group games that determine your fate as success or failure in the eyes of your adoring public. FOUR YEARS WORTH OF PROCESS, BOILED DOWN TO THREE EFFING GAMES. swallow that for just a second. and you wonder why these grown men ooze emotion out of their eye sockets every time the world feed slo-mo focuses in on them. the pressure is absolutely insane.
it magnifies mistakes to the point where colombian captains are killed for just one. it champions goals and victories in ways that super bowl or nba finals or world series victors will never be able to appreciate, because their accomplishments, while great, pale in comparison.
four years worth of process, boiled down to three effing games. four years and two games worth of process and tomorrow is all that matters. the result of the england and slovenia matches are now nothing more than a means to tomorrow's end. amazing. the anxiety for me, as a fan, is crippling. as a player, i could not fathom it.
my prediction? landon goes crazy and plays a role in scoring or assisting in two american goals. the us wins 3-1, possibly winning the group. landon will be the best player on the field. he must impose his will on the game early and often.
i will be a wreck between 9 and 11 in the morning.
game on.
(part six)
((the new biggest game ever))
forget the england match. a week and half removed from that result makes it feel anticlimactic. forget the blown call. fifa made the right decision and banned the dude from showing his face in south africa again. in the subjective world of futbol, that's about as close to satisfaction or retribution as you're gonna get. the governing body of soccer, at the very least, agreed with joe us fan and admitted the ref in the slovenia match was terrible. surprisingly, they released no statement making the same claim against the united states defense. slovenia, too, is in the rearview mirror and at the same time currently setting the pace in the group. that that team plays for a country that holds the same amount of people as houston matters not. all that matters is algeria.
where the frack is algeria?
glad you asked. it's here.
fifteen times the size, in millions of persons, than slovenia, the transitive theory applied to their population would imply that the us is in deep doo-doo come tomorrow morning. if they couldn't put away a country that wikipedia has barely heard of, how in the world are we going to compete with a country of legitimate size and economy? thankfully, the transitive theory applied to anything in sports never matters.
moving on.
i couldn't name one guy on algeria's roster. not one. i don't think alexi lalas can either, and he is one of espn's "experts". he also seems to hate this us team and their lack of moxy, which makes for fairly entertaining television as he rips his countrymen every time chris fowler or mike tirico asks him a question about them. nevermind that alexi lalas is best known for his hair, goatee and being a really solid mls defender. what i mean by crapping on his resume is that i think he kind of sucks too.
back to tomorrow's "most important game ever".
say the us loses tomorrow to "lowly" algeria. what then, other than i care considerably less about the world cup for a few days?
the world cup will move on, but that will be it for this collection of players. not advancing out of this group would mark the last four years worth of qualifying and tournament play a disaster. landon donovan would come back to the mls to die a slow, painful death. you would never hear of herculez gomez, edson buddle and robbie findley again. jozy becomes the face of the team moving forward with stuart holden, michael bradley and several other unremarkable players moving into leadership roles that would soon be vacated by dempsey, onyewu and bocanegra, all much more highly thought of in the states versus the rest of the world. us soccer will be set back. again. another eight years at the least. if this team advances and possibly wins a round of 16 game, the core will be present during the next qualifying run and will be given one more chance to prove their worth in 2014. if they lose or find another way not to advance tomorrow morning, "project 2010" will evolve into project 2018 and younger players will begin early grooming at making an impact somewhere down the road.
there is this great shot that espn keeps replaying of two american guys, probably mid-twenties, celebrating after bradley's game-tying goal. the guy on the right of the shot is completely breaking down, bawling like a baby. normally, i would make fun at such a silly display of emotion. but, dammit, in that moment, i was totally with the guy. just a half-hour earlier, i had written to sarah that the world cup was over. 30 minutes later, life had been breathed back into the us chances, and i was right there cursing at the disallowed goal with the rest of the concerned.
what makes the world cup so intense is the long and grueling process. 31 national teams will spend 6-8 months picking up their collective hearts off the ground (1 will be celebrating for the same length of time), and then they will be forced to look ahead and map out their vision for the next world cup cycle. qualifying runs for 16-18 months. guys come in and out of the player pool, some bringing more hope with them than others. there is a good result that makes a fan believe a semifinal world cup result is possible. then the team will lose to haiti by five goals and it makes you wonder why you ever watched soccer in the first place.
for four years, you wait, you watch, you read and you agonize over what will eventually boil down to three group games that determine your fate as success or failure in the eyes of your adoring public. FOUR YEARS WORTH OF PROCESS, BOILED DOWN TO THREE EFFING GAMES. swallow that for just a second. and you wonder why these grown men ooze emotion out of their eye sockets every time the world feed slo-mo focuses in on them. the pressure is absolutely insane.
it magnifies mistakes to the point where colombian captains are killed for just one. it champions goals and victories in ways that super bowl or nba finals or world series victors will never be able to appreciate, because their accomplishments, while great, pale in comparison.
four years worth of process, boiled down to three effing games. four years and two games worth of process and tomorrow is all that matters. the result of the england and slovenia matches are now nothing more than a means to tomorrow's end. amazing. the anxiety for me, as a fan, is crippling. as a player, i could not fathom it.
my prediction? landon goes crazy and plays a role in scoring or assisting in two american goals. the us wins 3-1, possibly winning the group. landon will be the best player on the field. he must impose his will on the game early and often.
i will be a wreck between 9 and 11 in the morning.
game on.
Sunday, June 20, 2010
awesome.
like, four people are going to care about this, but since one of them is me, you are stuck with it. mapped out by an actual cartographer, it's kind of cool to put all of the island's landmarks in perspective to where they were supposed to be.
ahh, so that's why it took ben and richard three episodes to get where they were going.
Saturday, June 12, 2010
world cup 2010
(part five)
((rob green = colt mccoy))
(((thank you, robert green and colt mccoy)))
driving home from nasty's mancave, listening to the instant analysis of the soccer "match to end all matches" (until the us's match on friday, which is now hugely big), i was entirely content with the result. recaps and commentary be damned, the us played the far more talented and far more highly paid english to a well-deserved draw. yes, i said well-deserved. i'll get back to that. the us gained an unexpected and important first point in their pool by playing the world giants toe-to-toe for sixty minutes of the 90-plus minute match. the us started slow and sloppy and gave up an early goal (that one was on you, ricardo clark). for the last twenty minutes, the us hung on and cleared the ball like a twelve year-old "Y" team every time the ball found us feet in their penalty area. i kept yelling "clear it" at the television with absolutely no want or regard for "the beautiful game" or "poetry in motion". i was happy with the idea of taking a point away and i wanted the ball as far away from tim howard's goal as possible. for the middle two-thirds of the match, though, the us was the better team. not only did they create three legitimate chances (the botched header from jozy on the wonderful cross from landon, the dempsey goal, the jozy shot off the post), but they scored on one thanks to the goat of all england, one mr. robert green.
driving home, i thought of how many england fans would echo sentiments similar to those of texas fans or non-alabama fans after colt mccoy couldn't shake off the vicious hit of marcel dareus to return to the national championship game. in that game, surely things "would have been different" if mccoy had played the entire game. in today's match, surely things "would have been different" if robert green would have positioned his hands slightly more parallel to the goal face or laid his body in front of the ball and smothered it or done anything else to prevent the ball from squirting away from him and into his goal. sure, things may have been different, but guess what. they weren't.
leading up to the bcs title game and every other game that any american football players play, players, quarterbacks included, practice and relentlessly workout and masochistically train their bodies and minds for every possible scenario that could happen during the run of a football game. sometimes, their training benefits their efforts. sometimes, the result betrays the hard work the body and the mind have put in. either way, "what happened, happened". in the lead-up to the bcs national championship game, colt mccoy, i am sure, practiced and prepared and worked out and ran as hard as he's ever done any of those things. and yet, he couldn't get up and move on from one tough hit. his team lost the game. regrets and excuses abounded aplenty.
leading up to the england/us match today and every other game that any world footballer plays, players, goalies included, practice and relentlessly workout and masochistically train their bodies and minds for every possible scenario that could happen during the run of a football match. sometimes, their training benefits their efforts. sometimes, the result betrays the hard work the body and the mind have put in. either way, "what happened, happened". in today's match, robert green had the play and clint dempsey completely in front of him. dempsey shot from 25 yards away, the knock a pond-hopper that was struck with pace but not enough that it should have proved difficult to defend, especially for a goalie that is allowed to use his hands. in that moment, though, robert greenchoked blinked. his attention deviated from the task at hand, if only for the most severely split of split-seconds. his hands' position betrayed his mind's idea on how best to stop the shot. the ball squirted away and into the goal. 1-1.
what happened, happened.
tim howard was tested more often than robert green and rose to the occasion all but once. the top three men of the match all were american (howard, onyewu, cherundolo). landon outplayed the more expensive lampard. dempsey outperformed the more highly thought of aaron lennon. jozy absolutely owned jamie carragher on his run and near miss.
soccer, when the result on the scoreboard is a draw, is the only sport that can be then judged by vested observers by the merit count of "who deserved to win". over the run of play and staring through very american tinted glasses, i felt like the americans every bit deserved the draw and may have even "deserved" to win. my subjective opinion will never change the actual result, and i don't care that it doesn't.
colt mccoy trained and was paid to bounce back up after the dareus hit. he didn't.
rob green trained and was paid to make that stop on the dempsey shot today. he didn't.
"what happened, happened."
now that is the exegesis of a platitude, dammit. (winking smiley)
(part five)
((rob green = colt mccoy))
(((thank you, robert green and colt mccoy)))
driving home from nasty's mancave, listening to the instant analysis of the soccer "match to end all matches" (until the us's match on friday, which is now hugely big), i was entirely content with the result. recaps and commentary be damned, the us played the far more talented and far more highly paid english to a well-deserved draw. yes, i said well-deserved. i'll get back to that. the us gained an unexpected and important first point in their pool by playing the world giants toe-to-toe for sixty minutes of the 90-plus minute match. the us started slow and sloppy and gave up an early goal (that one was on you, ricardo clark). for the last twenty minutes, the us hung on and cleared the ball like a twelve year-old "Y" team every time the ball found us feet in their penalty area. i kept yelling "clear it" at the television with absolutely no want or regard for "the beautiful game" or "poetry in motion". i was happy with the idea of taking a point away and i wanted the ball as far away from tim howard's goal as possible. for the middle two-thirds of the match, though, the us was the better team. not only did they create three legitimate chances (the botched header from jozy on the wonderful cross from landon, the dempsey goal, the jozy shot off the post), but they scored on one thanks to the goat of all england, one mr. robert green.
driving home, i thought of how many england fans would echo sentiments similar to those of texas fans or non-alabama fans after colt mccoy couldn't shake off the vicious hit of marcel dareus to return to the national championship game. in that game, surely things "would have been different" if mccoy had played the entire game. in today's match, surely things "would have been different" if robert green would have positioned his hands slightly more parallel to the goal face or laid his body in front of the ball and smothered it or done anything else to prevent the ball from squirting away from him and into his goal. sure, things may have been different, but guess what. they weren't.
leading up to the bcs title game and every other game that any american football players play, players, quarterbacks included, practice and relentlessly workout and masochistically train their bodies and minds for every possible scenario that could happen during the run of a football game. sometimes, their training benefits their efforts. sometimes, the result betrays the hard work the body and the mind have put in. either way, "what happened, happened". in the lead-up to the bcs national championship game, colt mccoy, i am sure, practiced and prepared and worked out and ran as hard as he's ever done any of those things. and yet, he couldn't get up and move on from one tough hit. his team lost the game. regrets and excuses abounded aplenty.
leading up to the england/us match today and every other game that any world footballer plays, players, goalies included, practice and relentlessly workout and masochistically train their bodies and minds for every possible scenario that could happen during the run of a football match. sometimes, their training benefits their efforts. sometimes, the result betrays the hard work the body and the mind have put in. either way, "what happened, happened". in today's match, robert green had the play and clint dempsey completely in front of him. dempsey shot from 25 yards away, the knock a pond-hopper that was struck with pace but not enough that it should have proved difficult to defend, especially for a goalie that is allowed to use his hands. in that moment, though, robert green
what happened, happened.
tim howard was tested more often than robert green and rose to the occasion all but once. the top three men of the match all were american (howard, onyewu, cherundolo). landon outplayed the more expensive lampard. dempsey outperformed the more highly thought of aaron lennon. jozy absolutely owned jamie carragher on his run and near miss.
soccer, when the result on the scoreboard is a draw, is the only sport that can be then judged by vested observers by the merit count of "who deserved to win". over the run of play and staring through very american tinted glasses, i felt like the americans every bit deserved the draw and may have even "deserved" to win. my subjective opinion will never change the actual result, and i don't care that it doesn't.
colt mccoy trained and was paid to bounce back up after the dareus hit. he didn't.
rob green trained and was paid to make that stop on the dempsey shot today. he didn't.
"what happened, happened."
now that is the exegesis of a platitude, dammit. (winking smiley)
Tuesday, June 08, 2010
world cup 2010
(part four)
((my starting XI))
in the spirit of this deadspin post from earlier today, it's time to "shit just got REAL!!!" the HACAM world cup coverage up to full gear.
it's not often that one of your top three favorite teams (alabama football, the braves, us men's national team, in that order) has the biggest game of their existence. saturday, the usmnt have that game. this isn't the confederation's cup. england isn't going to take the us lightly. this isn't portugal of 2002 when the us were coming up and and aging, pre-cristiano ronaldo portugal were overrated and on their way down. this isn't any match ever with mexico. this is effing us v. england on the world cup stage. this is epic. this is what world cup should feel like.
and so, today i'll put my bob bradley hat on and announce the starting XI for saturday's match.
(please note: this will not be the starting eleven for saturday's match, because i am not the coach. if i were the coach, this would be my team. i'll explain in a minute.)
jozy
dempsey landon
holden benny bradley
spector bocanegra onyewu cherundolo
howard
here is what's not going to happen saturday. any formation from bradley that's not a 4-4-2. jozy'll probably be paired up top with buddle (the proverbial "hot hand") with herculez/robbie findley coming in early in the second half if buddle remembers that he plays professionally in mls and acts as such.
the midfield is going to be landon, dempsey, bradley and ricardo clark if clark is healthy.
the backline? who knows. captain bocanegra will be there. so will cherundolo. the other two spots will be up for discussion until gametime. is onyewu healthy enough to go 90 minutes? probably not. can he go 75? maybe. if it's determined that he may be able to go 75, you play him and hope that the us has found its way into a lead. the fourth spot is anyone's guess. our defense has sucked the last several games. i'd rather find a way not to play four of our defensive backs. get holden on the field. or benny. chances are it's not going to happen.
here's where i see my line-up working out. the usmnt is going to be sharing a field with some of the highest paid players in world. what england makes in money, though, is not counted in their athleticism. rooney's a world class athlete. so is aaron lennon. the others will all be world class soccer players, but not necessarily athletes. my starting three up top is quicker and more athletic, to a man, than england's back line. advantage: us. the problem will be getting the ball to them.
where england's depth is likely to own the us is in the midfield. gerrard, lampard and lennon are the truth. there is a great chance that they will control the run of play for 60-65 percent of the game. how would i counter? with benny. benny feilhaber is the most composed on-ball player the us has produced since tab ramos (my favorite all-time us player), and yet he doesn't seem to crack the starting line-up. i have no idea why this is. seeing him play on the field with his great vision and perfectly weighted passes just drives me the more crazy when he's not playing. who could find a way to get the ball to my attackers, dempsey and landon, and they to jozy? benny could. the question becomes, who do you take out? if bradley is bent on starting two forwards, neither of them landon or dempsey, you don't have many spots to fill. michael bradley is a done deal. so is a defensive midfielder in the person of clark/edu/torres. landon and dempsey are starting. it's the formation that handcuffs the us choices. not the personnel. benny will not start. i hold out hope that he gets a chance to make an impact.
i won't spend much time on the defenders. they don't deserve it.
the final piece of the upset. tim fucking howard. he's a world class goalie. great athlete. and he is going to have to play out of his mind saturday for us to have a chance. there will likely be at least two times during the match when it's just him and rooney. he has to win both those chances. he has to organize his sieve of a defense well on set plays. and he has to make two, maybe three saves that end up as "top plays of world cup 2010" highlight reels. the english will play fast. and they will make chances. if howard keeps them to one goal or, strike me dead, none? holy shit. it will be on.
so there we have it. the us starting XI that wasn't.
more coverage to come.
(part four)
((my starting XI))
in the spirit of this deadspin post from earlier today, it's time to "shit just got REAL!!!" the HACAM world cup coverage up to full gear.
it's not often that one of your top three favorite teams (alabama football, the braves, us men's national team, in that order) has the biggest game of their existence. saturday, the usmnt have that game. this isn't the confederation's cup. england isn't going to take the us lightly. this isn't portugal of 2002 when the us were coming up and and aging, pre-cristiano ronaldo portugal were overrated and on their way down. this isn't any match ever with mexico. this is effing us v. england on the world cup stage. this is epic. this is what world cup should feel like.
and so, today i'll put my bob bradley hat on and announce the starting XI for saturday's match.
(please note: this will not be the starting eleven for saturday's match, because i am not the coach. if i were the coach, this would be my team. i'll explain in a minute.)
jozy
dempsey landon
holden benny bradley
spector bocanegra onyewu cherundolo
howard
here is what's not going to happen saturday. any formation from bradley that's not a 4-4-2. jozy'll probably be paired up top with buddle (the proverbial "hot hand") with herculez/robbie findley coming in early in the second half if buddle remembers that he plays professionally in mls and acts as such.
the midfield is going to be landon, dempsey, bradley and ricardo clark if clark is healthy.
the backline? who knows. captain bocanegra will be there. so will cherundolo. the other two spots will be up for discussion until gametime. is onyewu healthy enough to go 90 minutes? probably not. can he go 75? maybe. if it's determined that he may be able to go 75, you play him and hope that the us has found its way into a lead. the fourth spot is anyone's guess. our defense has sucked the last several games. i'd rather find a way not to play four of our defensive backs. get holden on the field. or benny. chances are it's not going to happen.
here's where i see my line-up working out. the usmnt is going to be sharing a field with some of the highest paid players in world. what england makes in money, though, is not counted in their athleticism. rooney's a world class athlete. so is aaron lennon. the others will all be world class soccer players, but not necessarily athletes. my starting three up top is quicker and more athletic, to a man, than england's back line. advantage: us. the problem will be getting the ball to them.
where england's depth is likely to own the us is in the midfield. gerrard, lampard and lennon are the truth. there is a great chance that they will control the run of play for 60-65 percent of the game. how would i counter? with benny. benny feilhaber is the most composed on-ball player the us has produced since tab ramos (my favorite all-time us player), and yet he doesn't seem to crack the starting line-up. i have no idea why this is. seeing him play on the field with his great vision and perfectly weighted passes just drives me the more crazy when he's not playing. who could find a way to get the ball to my attackers, dempsey and landon, and they to jozy? benny could. the question becomes, who do you take out? if bradley is bent on starting two forwards, neither of them landon or dempsey, you don't have many spots to fill. michael bradley is a done deal. so is a defensive midfielder in the person of clark/edu/torres. landon and dempsey are starting. it's the formation that handcuffs the us choices. not the personnel. benny will not start. i hold out hope that he gets a chance to make an impact.
i won't spend much time on the defenders. they don't deserve it.
the final piece of the upset. tim fucking howard. he's a world class goalie. great athlete. and he is going to have to play out of his mind saturday for us to have a chance. there will likely be at least two times during the match when it's just him and rooney. he has to win both those chances. he has to organize his sieve of a defense well on set plays. and he has to make two, maybe three saves that end up as "top plays of world cup 2010" highlight reels. the english will play fast. and they will make chances. if howard keeps them to one goal or, strike me dead, none? holy shit. it will be on.
so there we have it. the us starting XI that wasn't.
more coverage to come.
Thursday, June 03, 2010
ho-ly shit.
(world cup 2010)
((part three))
if jozy plays saturday versus australia in nothing more than a scrimmage, bob bradley should be shot.
(world cup 2010)
((part three))
if jozy plays saturday versus australia in nothing more than a scrimmage, bob bradley should be shot.
Tuesday, June 01, 2010
world cup 2010
(part two)
everyone is gearing up to care about soccer just as they do every four years. and by "everyone", i mean people like me. i love soccer. REALLY love soccer. i think it is a wonderful game. but i am not a diehard soccer guy. i don't play it anymore. i also say that because i don't have that one club team that i root for. my one team that i can get emotionally invested in is the national team, but i don't think that gives me credit to the claim of being a diehard. i follow mls and the us national team pool guys closely enough to know who's got a legit chance of playing and making the team, but that's about it. when it comes to professional soccer, i am a sucker for stars, therefore the only matches i watch are the big time english and european league games pitting the the best against the best and the occasional champions league match in the middle of a tuesday when i happen to be off.
every four years, though, the world cup rolls around and soccer is force-fed to the sports public in the hopes that we will watch and care enough for espn to justify the billions of dollars they spent to air every match on their channels. and every four years, i care very much. as a matter of fact, i am so stoked for the us vs. england match next week that the last 7-10 days have and the next 7-10 days will absolutely crawl by. i'll try and write down a few things that interest me here between now and then in the hopes that it will help pass the time.
today, si.com's georgina turner listed her top five world cup players at each position. not surprisingly, the us doesn't get a guy on any list. i imagine that if she stretched her respective lists out to ten, only tim howard in goal would have a chance of making the cut.
those rankings provide a nice lesson in perspective for anyone (including me!) that likes to think the americans have a true chance of getting past the round of 16. how long has soccer been played? a long time, right? well, the us has never produced a world star of any significance outside of goal. ever. sure, landon is borderline recognizable at this point, but he wouldn't have his own sportscenter commercial if espn didn't own the rights to the world cup and wanted you to know at least one us player to root for. and since "we" don't have stars (really...we only have 2-3 guys with star-level talent), we have to get by on scrappy. we are the mid-majors of the world cup. it would be a really good story if we could get to the final four, but unless something crazy-ass crazy happens, we aren't going to make it.
is it possible? sure. probable? nope. (thank you, therapy, for that mantra.)
and so nasty and j. lynn and others like us will root like mad against all odds for the us to give us something to cheer about. we'll cuss at jozy and dempsey and landon because they can't finish the way rooney so often does and most likely will against the us. we'll be disappointed that the us didn't win the world cup (or, worse, didn't make it out of the group) even though we were never supposed to.
that doesn't change how awesome the month of june will be. especially the first couple of weeks of the tournament when there will be a game per day that i dvr and watch when i get home.
very rarely do i become a usa homer. i don't love the olympics. i hate singing patriotic songs in church. i wish "god bless america" didn't replace "take me out to the ballgame" at random braves games. come next saturday afternoon, though, the berserk dude with stars and stripes on his face walking around without a shirt could be me.
and you best not be rooting for england.
(part two)
everyone is gearing up to care about soccer just as they do every four years. and by "everyone", i mean people like me. i love soccer. REALLY love soccer. i think it is a wonderful game. but i am not a diehard soccer guy. i don't play it anymore. i also say that because i don't have that one club team that i root for. my one team that i can get emotionally invested in is the national team, but i don't think that gives me credit to the claim of being a diehard. i follow mls and the us national team pool guys closely enough to know who's got a legit chance of playing and making the team, but that's about it. when it comes to professional soccer, i am a sucker for stars, therefore the only matches i watch are the big time english and european league games pitting the the best against the best and the occasional champions league match in the middle of a tuesday when i happen to be off.
every four years, though, the world cup rolls around and soccer is force-fed to the sports public in the hopes that we will watch and care enough for espn to justify the billions of dollars they spent to air every match on their channels. and every four years, i care very much. as a matter of fact, i am so stoked for the us vs. england match next week that the last 7-10 days have and the next 7-10 days will absolutely crawl by. i'll try and write down a few things that interest me here between now and then in the hopes that it will help pass the time.
today, si.com's georgina turner listed her top five world cup players at each position. not surprisingly, the us doesn't get a guy on any list. i imagine that if she stretched her respective lists out to ten, only tim howard in goal would have a chance of making the cut.
those rankings provide a nice lesson in perspective for anyone (including me!) that likes to think the americans have a true chance of getting past the round of 16. how long has soccer been played? a long time, right? well, the us has never produced a world star of any significance outside of goal. ever. sure, landon is borderline recognizable at this point, but he wouldn't have his own sportscenter commercial if espn didn't own the rights to the world cup and wanted you to know at least one us player to root for. and since "we" don't have stars (really...we only have 2-3 guys with star-level talent), we have to get by on scrappy. we are the mid-majors of the world cup. it would be a really good story if we could get to the final four, but unless something crazy-ass crazy happens, we aren't going to make it.
is it possible? sure. probable? nope. (thank you, therapy, for that mantra.)
and so nasty and j. lynn and others like us will root like mad against all odds for the us to give us something to cheer about. we'll cuss at jozy and dempsey and landon because they can't finish the way rooney so often does and most likely will against the us. we'll be disappointed that the us didn't win the world cup (or, worse, didn't make it out of the group) even though we were never supposed to.
that doesn't change how awesome the month of june will be. especially the first couple of weeks of the tournament when there will be a game per day that i dvr and watch when i get home.
very rarely do i become a usa homer. i don't love the olympics. i hate singing patriotic songs in church. i wish "god bless america" didn't replace "take me out to the ballgame" at random braves games. come next saturday afternoon, though, the berserk dude with stars and stripes on his face walking around without a shirt could be me.
and you best not be rooting for england.
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