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Not to rain on anyones' MLS Preseason Parade, but unless I've been too buried in hate-drenched, spittle-flecked anger from north of the Ice Curtain to have heard the news, MLS is still operating sans a labor agreement.
(Of course it does appear that said curtain has moved several hundred miles south this week and now runs through Albemarle County North Carolina)
In any case, herewith - and I apologize for repeating a gimmick - my contribution to jump starting a sense of urgency:
You know what's even more cool than winning a Super Bowl?
Levees.
Tell you what, instead of giving Haiti money, let's give them an NFL team. Since apparently that makes everything all better.
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Hey, speaking of sports being incredibly important. I see that the United States Soccer Federation, otherwise known as NORTH KOREA, "unanimously" re-elected Sunil Gulati to as Grand Poobah. How could this possibly have happened, after reading months and months of messages about how Gulati has a conflict of interest with Kraft Soccer, how he bungled horribly the Bob Bradley hiring, and how he stupidly failed to certify either USL-1 or the NASL? I haven't been this mad since someone told me sarcasm doesn't work on blog posts.
Unanimous, huh? Tell me something, how man of you voted? Who out here actually had a voice? Did you even know there was an election? Who...well, you know, I'm actually skirting on a valid point here, so maybe I should drop the snotsnark.
A couple of years ago, when the disgusting greedbags who run CONCACAF decided there was money to be made in the creation of a CONCACAF Champions League, modeled after similar competitions around the world (but, of course, most notably in Europe), they found there was one slight problem:
Despite the fact that almost every flea-bitten third world sinkhole of a country with more than a couple dozen residents and/or cattle has a domestic professional league and could thus send a "Champion" thereof to serve as fodder for the Mexican sides, our neighbor to the North had, as has been noted in this space once or twice in the past, no national league.
And unlike in the case of most of the other countries who find themselves similarly leagueless - eg. Guyana, Montserrat and the Cayman Islands - Canada actually...click here to read more...
Remember when I ranted about a fake Fred joining DC United? Well, for several weeks now, the Galaxy have done them one better. Alex, Juninho and Leonardo are going to bring a little samba flavor to look, I'm sorry, can we or they seriously take a minute or two to come up with new names?
Okay, no one's going to think that the AC Milan coach is back in the United States to hunt down and finish off Tab Ramos. But there's also a Leonardo at NAC Breda, one at Shakhtar, one at AEK, and God knows how many more.
It's actually almost plausible that the Galaxy got the Juninho from Boro, or the one from Lyon, but this is another one.
I already had trouble keeping the Alexes straight. Hey, the Galaxy did have a partnership with Chelsea, it COULD have been one of the famous ones.
I don't care how cultural it is. I don't care who it's a tribute to. I don't care how few last names there are in Portuguese. The Screen Actors Guild makes people come up with unique names - that's why...click here to read more...
Dumpster diving in Google trying to corroborate my memories of the 1998 World Cup, I came across this post from this very site:
Quote:
In fact, I kinda have the suspicion that w/in 5 years time, "Amy Wynalda" will be cited as the most important factor in the US' failure that WC as opposed to the true problem: 3-6-1.
uclacarlos, visionary. Although he was a couple of years off - it only took a little over two years.
Mark Ziegler with a great article here. Makes up for saying a lockout by MLS owners was likely.
[quote]“Not playing the position (outside right defender) I wanted him to play, or (him) going out the night before the Belgium game was one thing,” Sampson said of two prior issues with Harkes. “I could have overcome that and I was prepared to find a way to work it out. After I was informed of...click here to read more...
The nominations for Strangest Soccer Story of the Year 2010 may not be closed quite yet but we've got one today that's going to be tough to beat.
One of the most commented-on stories in US Soccer history, after possibly Belo Horizonte and The Shot Heard Round the World has been Steve Sampson sending John Harkes home from France '98 after ceremoniously naming him "Captain for Life".
At the time it was said that, to make a long story short, Harkes was acting like it was his team or, put another way, was getting a bit too big for his britches.
It now appears that if Harkes was having problems in his britches that Eric Wynalda's wife was the one responsible, according to comments Wynalda himself made on Fox Football Fone-in on Monday night.
Please, enough with the FC's. This goes for you too, ACSTL. It's already tired and played. We have official nicknames in this country. If you want to be traditional, call yourselves the Tigers or the Crimson or whatever. Leave the FC for the UK.
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The Galaxy should wear white shirts with blue shorts at home. Not just because it looks good, but because it makes all the road teams look ridiculous. Maybe Manchester United can rock the dark shirt and white shorts look, but precious few others can.
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Wow. MLS without Steve Ralston.
So that leaves...
*goes to MLSnet...players page...sort by years of experience....*
That leaves Corben Bone, Krzysztof Krol, Andrew Dykstra, Sean Johnson....
*hits the sort button again*
That leaves Jesse Marsch as the last original original. (Jaime Moreno didn't show up until midseason in 1996.) I guess Ante Razov missed a whole year in Spain or wherever - I couldn't...click here to read more...
In the absence of photos of MLS players huddled around 55 gallon fire drums in front of Rio Tinto and RFK this morning, American soccer fans are forced to look for actual soccer news for our Monday morning amusement.
(Although one positive to the former scenario might be that a few stray sparks, possibly from burning the extensive porn collection they found in Josh Wicks' locker, might waft stadium-ward and burn the old barn to the ground, but then I've never liked Baltimore that much.)
High on a lot of people's lists today is the clip of Freddy-Adu-to-Eddie-Johnson:
A nice enough piece of execution, to be sure, but I have a hard time not focusing on the venue: Scoda Xanthi Arena, built in 2004, has a capacity of 7,422.
Like a Greek version of Stade Saputo, we're assured that they can add a fourth set of bleachers and thus raise the seating to a whopping 9,000 or so, but...click here to read more...
"While we still have areas of disagreement, the talks have been constructive and both parties believe it makes sense to continue to work hard to reach agreement," said MLS Commissioner Don Garber. "This extension provides both MLS and the players the opportunity to continue our discussions while clubs are in training camps preparing for the 2010 MLS season."
"Both the Players Union and MLS have concluded that a new agreement will not be reached by February 1, but we have agreed to continue to talk and we will be meeting over the next two weeks to determine if a new agreement can be reached," said Players Union Executive Director Bob Foose. "In the meantime, MLS Players are reporting to training camp, and preparations for the 2010 season will continue."...click here to read more...
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