Other Team Discussion Thread Vol. 12: Spoilers Within

Alright then. You and I play, you let your touch get away from you in the box and I'll take you out. Let's see who's happier with the non-penalty decision after that .

As for the corner kick example, fine, edit it to the split second after the ball has been served. It's a penalty 100% of the time.

 

I've pondered this too. The problem now is that there is too much discretionary power in the hands of the referee and too much, WAY too much, incentive for abuse. Also, there's too little downside in trying to cheat. The absolute worst thing that can happen to a cheater is a Yellow and that's rare. In a sport where games are usually decided by one goal, the upside to cheating far outweighs the downside.

I think your idea is good. Another thought which I haven't been able to completely dismiss, is that we could offer referees a choice. If a clear goal-scoring opportunity is negated via foul, the referee could point to the spot for a simple PK. But if a player is fouled in the box but not with a clear goal scoring opportunity then the referee could call an old-school MLS shootout. Sure, people will still dive but at least it isn't an automatic goal. (I know that the odds of this idea ever happening are infinitesimally small, but there, I said it and I don't care. ) I do believe that something has to change.

 

I would like to see referees make more use of the "persistent infringement" card to penalize a player for a pattern of thuggish behavior for which each individual challenge might not always warrant a free kick but which, in the aggregate, call for action. I hate diving and believe that it is responsible for the undeserved perception in this country that soccer is a sport played by sissies who can't or won't fight through a challenge. If persistent infringement was called more often it's possible that players would have less incentive to dive (and possibly earn a card for embellishment), figuring that the opponent who is shoving and holding will eventually be called to task by the referee.

 

I think that a clear dive should result in a minimum of a 5-match ban, without pay. I'm talking the Charlie Davies, I didn't get touched but am going down. #6 on the list presented earlier. Video replay would have to be used after games but that's done for violent conduct that's missed, and this can have a bigger impact on the result of the game.

As for embellishment, well that's a lot tougher. I'm of the opinion that there should be a minimum amount of time before a player can return to the field after being taken off on a stretcher for medical treatment but you also need to be wary of incentivizing fouls that may result in injury. That said, everyone here who has played the game knows that a stud on the top of your toe or the bone of your ankle can hurt like absolute hell for 30 seconds and then go away as the adrenaline kicks in. Or the cold spray, that stuff really is magic.

 

I like the idea behind this, because I too hate diving. But you want to know that a dive really is a dive with 100% certainty if you're going to assess a penalty as strong as you suggest; and determining to a 100% certainty that a dive really is a dive is pretty hard. You almost never know for certain that you're not missing the one camera angle that shows the foul. More importantly, sometimes players go down without contact, but it's not a dive -- they trip themselves or lose their balance or whatever. Hell, sometimes I trip myself just walking around my living room. I've seen players get yellow-carded for going down without contact where I was pretty sure that they weren't diving -- they just stumbled. Add on a five match ban without pay, and I'd wanna go to court.

 

A perfect example of a questionable dive call would be Freddy Adu's 2nd yellow card.

For him to get a 5 game ban for that, would be extremely harsh.

 

Is there obstruction in the laws? Because I get annoyed when players get accused of diving because they are trying to get around/not be killed by a tackle that is nowhere near the ball and they end up on the turf because, to avoid the contact, they've contorted themselves into some ungainly position where they're trying to pirouette on one toe while leaping 100 degrees from where their momentum is carrying them.

 

Corner kick is taken and a offensive player not anywhere near the ball is hacked from behind in the knees and goes down in obvious pain - PK

Corner kic is taken and a defensive player tries to maintain position on and falls into from behind a forward who is not anywhere near where the ball was placed - Not a PK

Calls made in a US Open Cup game vs Chicago in RFK a few years ago - Correct calls both times

 

So have a system where they get a warning or two and then it escalates. If you trip once then it's no issue. If you're legitimately tripping that many times that it would constitute a ban then you're probably not balanced enough to be playing professional soccer. And if you dove before and you used that as your warning and then honestly tripped and got banned, well, sucks for you for diving the first time.

And again, I'm talking about the blatant, no contact dives. Many examples in here:

 

No, you are mistaken, I'm afraid. It's only a free kick (or penalty, when a defensive player commits the foul in the box), when play is underway. Before the kick's taken, the ref can punish misbehavior, but the restart of play is still a corner kick.

 

It seems that the USOC pairings are officially out as of today. If Dulles Aegean Hawks win defeat the Richmond Kickers, the game is at the Soccerplex in Boyds. If Richmond beats Dulles, the game is in Richmond. Thus, go Dulles!

The DC game would be May 29.

 

Which makes sense, I guess. Keep the travel minimal; and don't force Aegean Hawks to pay a huge flat fee.

 

To be certain about dives, turn to the NHL and post game video review. You could not only access penalties to the diver, but also use it if refs are constantly falling for it without handing out any yellows. It cuts against the tradition of the game, but it would help. BTW, hope this hasn't already been suggested....

 

So the Pink Cows have traded Agudelo to Chivas for Heath Pearce and $$$$ (guess that means Nesta is coming to town)

Why do they so actively court disaster? I mean, we mean well and fail...it's like the they go out of their way to say "how can we f$%k this up?"

 

The gift that keeps on giving! If it ain't fixed, break it! Or something like that!

 

I dunno. Seems like a good trade to me. They need defense and Agudelo only plays when someone else is hurt or injured. They'll take that money and use it to buy down an expensive forward's salary.

It's the kind of deal DCu used to make.

 

Agreed. They got rid of a player that wasn't making it off their bench, and got one of the best left backs in the league (which the mini-Goats were playing out of position). They don't have to pay Pearce's full salary. And, they got allocation money, which they need since they're going after a big target. I think it's clearly a win for them.

 

It does seem they won that trade, but the more telling thing was all the non-NJ players jumping on twitter to say how happy they were Agudelo escaped that shit-hole of a team.

In related news, they fined Conde for being arrested the other night.

 

Well I see a team that is finally clicking, and leading the league, because they've been freed of the burden of a star-centered approach and their response is to get rid of a hungry young talent, bring in an older player who, IMHO, has a reputation that exceeds his contributions but not his opinion of his own abilities, and looks to be putting themselves in position to double down on the star factor up top.

I guess we will see which one of us is right, but my view is that;

Cooper cannot keep up his form for the whole season
Henry will come back and demand to be the focal point of play but not accept all his responsibilities with the team
Henry freelancing will lead to Cooper freelancing (primarily by drifting out wide)
Nesta will come on and not play at first and probably not take MLS seriously
Henry and Nesta will end up starting together after Cooper cools, Nesta will expect to get work from others so he can poach, Henry will be running around but instead of serving up Nesta will take all the shots himself
Pearce will come in and either 1) take a spot from a player who has contributed to a good run or 2) bring a crappy attitude when he is not a starter in short order, and
Rafa will go off and do something stupid again and again and again

 

Well, I can't know what they were thinking; but I suspect the biggest thing they were all happy about (#FreshStart and all that) is that he's now likely to actually play. Which is also a good thing for the US, as well. I don't know whether he'll ever grow into being a really good forward for the US; but he wasn't going to at Jersey, because they weren't playing him.

 

Huh?

 

Nesta is a CB, you may be thinking he is a forward.

This seems like a bad trade for NY, to me. Haven't they been shutting everyone out since DC destroyed them? Heath Pearce is nothing special.
The reason it's a bad trade is that Agudelo will fetch a 'transfer fee' or whatever MLS is calling it because of his youth and international experience. If they use the money on a new DP and that person is terrific, then I stand corrected.

 

Yeah, that's why I posted "huh"?

Even competent left backs are a rarity in this league. He's definitely not worth his full salary; but the mini-Goats agreed to pay a big chunk of it. And Roy Miller, their nominal starting LB, is injury-ridden.

And apparently, part of the terms of the deal is that Jersey gets a chunk of that too. So I don't think that makes it a bad deal for them.

I'm presuming that Pearce's full salary will be on Jersey's books next year, at which point the quality of the deal drops significantly to me. I suspect that this is a "this year" move -- they're making moves to try to be a big winner right now.