5/29/03: Hawaii Five-O

WUSA's Charge keeps fighting to develop fan base, acceptance (NJ.com)

From that:

How about my next birthday party?

 

from the Powell, Rapids Reach Deal Article

ummm....that's what i would look for in a player.... a vocal personality.... is there a rating for that on fifa 2003?

 

Other than that, it's a great bid.

 

Oakland Trib article on a George Best NASL Quakes goal

http://www.oaklandtribune.com/Stories/0,1413,82~10835~1422134,00.html

also an accompanying short interview with current Quakes GM Johnnie Moore about that goal and George Best.

The Trib has a slow website with lots of pop-ups.

Thanks to j and everyone for this great service, you guys are the best.

So, the economic development director had his staff take some pictures of some undeveloped land near a freeway and wrote a letter about it, maybe even made a powerpoint presentation about the benefits of the village of North Aurora and sent it to the Fire in care of Peter Wilt. I guess when you are economic development director for a village, you work with what you have.

Tony

 

Does that Best goal exist in video form anywhere?

 

Yes....I saw it on a George Best biography tape not too long ago. No idea what the name was or where you'd get a copy, but the goal was magic.

 

But the ticker on Sky Sports News said he wasn't coming to the U.S. ... noooooo ... the British media are never wrong!

 

From http://daily.stanford.edu/tempo?page=content&id=11462&repository=0001_article
"Mainstream soccer acceptance necessary":

"A decent storyline, although the most interesting note might be the absence of the seemingly unstoppable Real Madrid, far and away the most talented team in Europe. Milan knocked them out with a 1-0 semifinal victory."

Ouch.... I must have missed that Madrid-Milan matchup. Sadly, it sort of underscores his point: even the guy trying to convince us world soccer is important doesn't care enough to get basic facts right.

 

Women's soccer won't be taking over this time around
-Knoxville New Sentinal (writer is from Birmingham Post-Herald in Alabama)

 

This has got to be going straight to the soccer basher thread.

 

This is why he's in Birmingham, Alabama.

 

I guess being ranked in the Top 10 in the world and a Quarterfinals finish in the World Cup is not very good - equal to a team that wins 26% of its games. What a pile of crap.

Having an opinion is one thing - ignoring the facts is another.

I'm sorry, I know many of you would prefer that we not react to this guy. But I'm gonna have to. I just wish I was sitting next to him at a bar.

Here is his e-mail address:

sports@postherald.com
and phone # 205-325-2421

as posted on-line by his paper.

 

Actually, I wish I was standing on his throat.

Semantics, really.

 

Well, we know what he uses his for.

 

Mr. Simms: Do you have any experience?

Robbie: No, sir, I have no experience, but I'm a big fan of money. I like it. I use it. I have a little. I keep it in a jar on top of my refrigerator. I'd like to put more in that jar. That's where you come in.

 

That's funny - where'd that come from?

I know that bashing soccer bashers is frowned upon, but I wrote an e-mail to that guy and his editor so I am going to put it here cause I think it turned out pretty well.

Soccer-bashing writers are a dime a dozen. The old stand-by British hooligan jokes and ”the basic problem with soccer in a nutshell: You don't use your hands” jokes are great. You went a little light on the xenophobia, but you more than made up for it with your chauvinistic comments. It’s very funny, really. But it’s all been done before. As a journalist working for a chronicler of current events, I would think at least you would keep up enough so that when you decide to write about something – it is based in facts and not what you remember from 20 years ago. Reading your commentary “World Coup? Women's soccer won't be taking over.” It is obvious you have not been paying attention to the sport you took great lengths to denigrate.

I’ll try and be brief:

Let’s start with the women’s game. I am no huge fan of women’s soccer – but I’m not going to make fun of them either. Why shouldn’t they play – they make up half the US population for crying out loud? There have been 3 Women’s World Cups since 1991 and the US has won 2 – it would have taken less than 2 minutes to find that out – but then you would have lost a chance at a very good joke. But the important thing to remember is that the US volunteered out of the goodness of its heart to host this even on such short order. No other country in the world has the money, facilities or organization needed to hold the Cup in such a short time. The WWC 1999 made money – this will be a money loser and the US is doing it as a favor. That’s all.

As for the men’s soccer, you clearly have not been paying attention. Calling US Soccer the "that sport we're just not very good at” is a basic error in fact. Last summer, the US Men made it to the Quarterfinals of the World Cup and for the last 10 months have been consistently ranked in the Top 10 in the world by FIFA, ahead of even such countries as Italy and England. Comparing The US Men’s National Team to a baseball team that has won 26% of its games this year goes beyond exaggeration. US player Brad Friedel was voted the best Goalkeeper in the English Premier League (EPL) this season and arguably the worlds most popular club, Manchester United, has reportedly made 3 bids in increasing amounts to purchase the contract of another American goalkeeper, Tim Howard, who plays for the MLS Metrostars.

I could site many more examples, such as American Claudio Reyna who was the captain of his EPL club Sunderland before tearing his ACL or Brian McBride who turned down a contract from another EPL club, Everton, so that he could come back and play for Columbus in MLS. Or the 61,000 fans who attended MLS Cup 2002 last November or the 69,000 fans who attended this month’s US v Mexico game in Houston. Or the 27,000 seat, soccer-only complex opening in Los Angeles on June 7th. But those would be recent facts and they are evidently not at issue here.

I have no problem with someone not liking soccer. In fact, I’m glad its not as mainstream as football or basketball. I don’t even mind people making fun of it except when it is clear that person has not made an honest attempt to find out the first thing about which he is talking.

I realize your column falls under the “Commentary” and as such won’t fall under the same kind of factual scrutiny that your NY Times colleague Jayson Blair fell under. But that doesn’t excuse you ignorance of the current factual state of the game – even in the name of humor. But then again, no one has ever mentioned Alabama as being open-minded or forward-thinking in these sorts of things.

But hey – enjoy your philandering, over-priced, over-paid, criminal-filled sports and I don’t just mean at the University of Alabama. I’ll keep enjoying my soccer.

Chris Murphy

 

Rack'em.

 

I think you probably lost them at "xenophobia", which they probably think is a fear of Lucy Lawless, but well done anyway.

 

Hi,

Thanks to Jim and others who have emailed me.

Apologies for the error in my article -- I somehow mixed up the group play result when Milan beat Real for the semifinal. I've corrected it in the online version, and I sent in a correction which assumedly will appear in tomorrow's print edition. Please do not take my mistake as disrespect for soccer or capriciousness...I do not know as much about soccer as I do about other sports, but I do enjoy it and wish I knew more about it. I went online to check facts and get information to try to get the correct information but unfortunately got mixed up.

Thanks for the emails and apologies again. You have a nice site here.

Mark Thoma
Stanford Daily