Figueroa came in for a trial early in the 04 seaosn. Dallas put in a discovery for him. Gustavo's current team asked for a signing fee outside what MLS would pay and the Discovery was denied. Unless he is now out of contract and back in the picutre, which I doubt, then your rumor is a year old. but I will ask about him again.
OK say that we CC does decide that Casey is the guy that he wants what is the chance that we actually get him out of Germany? If we want him how much cash is MLS going to have to shell out to get him? And granted I didnt get to see a great deal of games this year, it seems to me that Dallas needs a larger midfield presence than a running mate for EJ.
I have cut out some of the most noxious nonsense in this simplistic post by Theo. It was difficult, for Theo posts nothing but noxious nonsense. "Chamo, you, (we), are wasting your time. HSG and their minions do not want want non-Euro in their line-up." HSG, and all fans wo are not thick headed bigots want the best player availible. To repeat, the best player availible. In case you are having trouble reading this, Theo, HSG AND ALL TRUE FANS WANT THE BEST PLAYER AVAILIBLE! Where this player comes from, and whatever his ethnicity may or may not be, is a matter of little import. "You will need to be a little more clever to force them to face the facts. Instead, suggest a Latino who currently plays in Europe. Now, that is a real conundrum for these Euro-wannabe's." Wrong again, Theo. You must certainly be getting used to it. Nobody would have any problem with this if this player is, again, the best player availible. It is not at all a conundrum for any of us. "You see Casey, although being labeled a bad egg by Bruce is employed in Euro. In their eyes he still must be great." Which is clearly why there has been some rather savage posts about him in this very thread. "So, we will find out their true colors by the following name: Paulo Cesar Wanchope He is black, he plays in Euro, but he is an HISPANIC. Style, flair, and speaks Espanol." Yes, speaking the Espanol is quite handy in London. From personal expereince, however, I can tell you that Spaniards and Mexicans have a great deal of trouble communicating. Perhaps that is not true of Costa Ricans. "If the Euro league has endorsed him, yet he is Hispanic something doesn't compute for these guys." Of course it does for us. He was good enough, and ambitious enough, to go for the big money in Europe. In order to do that, he must be a very nice player. There are, however, many players in South and Central America, how do not have that ambition, or do not want to leave thier families so far behind. I would suspect it some of these players CC is targeting. "I'm sure we will get comments about diving or some other such stupid and superflous excuse." Since diving is getting carded, it is neither stupid nor superflous. In the Mexico US match in the Cotton Bowl, we saw very little of it, so the Mexicans clearly have gotten the message. "I will wait, but I think this will be too confusing for them to form nor post an opinion." Not at all. I admit I have some small difficulties with your earlier posts. You see, Theo, as much as life has taught me otherwise, I like to think the best of everyone, and that everyone is has a good mind. My previous problem with understanding your posts is that they are such nonsense. As your bigoted and seditious posts became increasingly similar, though, I no longer had to read them to know what your point was, or that you would be using the same arguments that had been refuted again and again. The difference between myself and many other posters is that they have tired of dealing with you. You have been called on your fallicious arguments, and either posted the same thing again, or slunk away. I, however, will continue to post the truth, though it will never get through your protective veil of prejudice. "(Of course he is out of HSG's budget). Interesting to see if these jokers have the guts to show their true colors." So it makes a great deal to post about him. On the other hand, bringing in a former Man City player would make Mud a happy man, and it is not as if either West Ham or Man City fought hard to keep him. I would say that the G Man and CC would have thier differences, as the G Man did not really practice that hard. CC, however, would certainly play him, and the G Man would score. It was Jeffreis, you might recall, who traded the G Man for a worthless player, who just happened to be hispanic. Though that will not compute with you. I would think Theo went through quite a few tissues on this post. Cheers! Sir Drinxalot, upset because I am at work and not in the mood for nonsense.
Ignoring the diversity and flexibility within yourself is not the best way to recognize the value of the diverse Dallas market. While the value of HSG's plan of investing in the Frisco community on a base level represents vital vision; the fact that many youths, including players that are experiencing the beauty and diversity that this world game represents (youth from all diverse backgrounds) - are going to come to Frisco to grow with this effort. Do not be surprised, if effectively represented, that 'all walks' come to Frisco for a truly magnificent experience... ... IF effectively represented - and this representation starts with YOU recognizing the diversity within YOU.
What's wrong with Toni Nhleko? Yes, he's been injured, but I think he could be big in MLS. In about half EJ's minutes he scored half of what EJ did healthy. Plus he's young and will only get better.
FINALLY !!! Someone else sees Tonis abilities (when healthy). Give Toni & EJ the start from the get go and (barring injuries) watch them light up MLS. Of course, you are going to have someone in the middle of the park feeding them. Nunez I think is the person right now. Oscar stays on as coach and tutors Ramon. We have the good target forward in Toni right now. We just have to keep him healthy and comfortable here in the ol US of A. Well, that is just my 2cents worth !!
Totally agree.....particularly now that we have an extra SI slot to use. Might as well start the season with Toni. Seemed like the Toni/EJ combo was the most effective throughout the season. Unless they can use the allocation on a can't miss forward, I saw we start off with Toni.
And what happens if Toni gets injured again? Will he take too much valuable time at the forward position getting back in shape and being productive? Wasn't this a dilemna recognized before he came to MLS?
Agreed on the point. And I would add that wasn't his shape an issue? Any chance his shape might have affected his ability to stay healthy? Hmmmm....? I guess it does depend on what CC can find for the allocation and discovery spots - but I sure hope he can find people to make Toni expendible as a starting forward. And if he is taking up assets worthy of a starter in this league (SI spot, cap space), then I say he ain't worth keeping. (OTOH, if we don't find someone, obviously we don't cut off our nose to spite our face - but SURELY there is one good player we can bring in.) Were Toni and EJ effective early on? Yes. But Toni still wasn't playing 90 minutes. (Didn't make the 80th minute in any of the first four games - and when Bobby Rhine went down injured, that pretty much shot the "between Toni and Bobby, we have 90 minutes" theory.) I guess I'm just saying that if we want to be competitive in '05, Toni is not going to cut it. Period.
I am the first to say that while I was quite sceptical of Toni, I have come around in my thinking. I like the kind of player he is. Even so, he has just not produced enough to justify his position as an SI, not with two allocations due. If ROB were to get his Green Card, and FCD could fit the two allocations under the cap along with Toni, then keep him, certainly. If this cannot be done, Toni must be moving on. Steve, you can have your diversity. I will take results any day. That being said, GE really wants a top player from South or Central America. With an MPA, that should be accomplished. It is, however, not a guarantee. The route to getting some top players is byzantine indeed. If the players the team needs are not availible in the New World, it is merely prudent to have a look at the Old. Cheers! Sir Drinxalot
oh please, not even the HSG machine is dumb enough to attempt to say one of those losers is a major player allocation. The other guy, well he wasn't good enough to be signed last year. I doubt he's good enough this year.
I, like many of the Inferno, amp GE et. al. on numerous issues. I was shocked when I found out GE and CC weren't learning Spanish in this market. I even went as far as amping Reyes as an a-mid, when in reality, I've always wanted him at left-mid. Now, after many people have made their voices heard, we may not only be keeping Milton; but we may be picking up quality representation from the other Americas. We had this diverse representation in the past, and we can have it again. But we have twice as much work to do as before HSG took over. And while Andy is working on re-opening the doors with Univision and Telemundo; his and our challenges in building toward Copa viability are now in focus. Let's get this done.
Well then, you will be shockingly pleased to find out that they are indeed learning to habla espanol. In fact, GE announced that at least 15 staff members are being enrolled in spanish classes to learn the language de juego bonito.
Well, that is nice, but I'd hope they would also have people fluent in the language and the culture on the staff as well. Do they? If not, do they plan on doing that? A year's worth of basic Spanish ain't gonna' cut it - not if that is all they have. (Disclaimer - I don't know if they have Spanish speakers on the staff or not - if they do, and they have that need met, then please ignore this post. If you haven't already. )
Theres probably no way FCD can afford these players ,but I haven't heard much about them in a while so I thought they might be available. Dwight Pezzarossi (Gua/ no team?) I don't know if he is on a team. http://www.playerhistory.com/soccerplayer_statistics.asp?PLAYID=11052 Ronald Gomez (Costa Rican/ Saprissa) I think he is recovering from a season ending injury though. http://www.playerhistory.com/soccerplayer_statistics.asp?PLAYID=11829
Dwight Pezzarossi (Gua/ no team?) I don't know if he is on a team. http://www.playerhistory.com/soccerplayer_statistics.asp?PLAYID=11052 Right age, right position, but seems to be on a different team every year. Also, it looks like he has only had one really good year. Of course, it could be that he needs a long stretch in a warm location and a spot with FCD could provide this. Ronald Gomez (Costa Rican/ Saprissa) I think he is recovering from a season ending injury though. http://www.playerhistory.com/soccerplayer_statistics.asp?PLAYID=11829[/QUOTE] A few years older but more acomplished. I would like to know more about the injury, as if it were not for that, I would be very interested if I were in the FO. But would El Senor let him go anywhere in the MLS except Chivas? Intriguing possibilities. While CC has his targets, I dobut they are set in stone, and who knows which player might catch his eye? As long as he can perform in the MLS, I do not care who CC selects. Cheers! Sir Drinxalot
Stern John and found this here: http://soccernet.espn.go.com/feature?id=317653&cc=5901 Having seen him play, I would say not a bad pick up. While we are having our players we are looking at, here are some of mine: http://www.arsenal.com/player.asp?P...rofile+-+Quincy+Owusu Abeyie&nav=Player+Files http://www.arsenal.com/player.asp?P...yer+profile+-+Anthony+Stokes&nav=Player+Files http://www.arsenal.com/player.asp?P...ofile+-+Olafur-Ingi+Skulason&nav=Player+Files http://www.arsenal.com/player.asp?P...=Player+profile+-+Ryan+Smith&nav=Player+Files http://www.arsenal.com/player.asp?P...ofile+-+Jeremie Aliadiere&navlid=player+files http://www.arsenal.com/player.asp?P...ayer+profile+-+Johan+Djourou&nav=Player+Files http://www.canaries.premiumtv.co.uk/page/Squad/0,,10355~23362,00.html Good news about all these players is they are younger than me which puts them in the Dev. region. Plus some them have gained first team action, but again since they are young, might be avaible on loan with an option to buy. Not sure if HSG or MLS would pay for the transfer, but it would be worth looking into.
Look at the history of HSG in Dallas. While they may be actually trying to round the corner on their way of thinking, (or giving it lip service), they admit their short commings in this area. Why do you not take their word for it? The last couple of years have been the great Latino purge. Do the math. When you have facts to support your fiction, send us a copy. Come on Scipio, even if you are on I mind altering acoholic bender, you cannot mean what you write. You are not implying that HSG have given us "the best player available"? Who? Garlick? Quill? Simo? Talley? Do you proof your thoughts prior to clicking the post button? Well, good to see you on the right side of at least one issue. Your indignant response forgets that I may have been responding to someone else's opinion that you do not share. There are others besides you on this board. Now who is spouting noxious nonsense. You clearly understood what I wrote. As for Wanchope, we can all forget about him. Malaga loves him. He is currently drawing $85K a month. Let's get to the meat of the discussion and put the petty tit for tat aside. Do you really believe that CC wants a player who's style of play, methods of training, methods of injury rehabilitation, culture, ect ect will put them on a collision path? We can "target" all kinds of players. I don't give a rip about "targeting" them. What I would like to see is for the FC HSG to actually "sign" one. Remember last year's thread about whether or not CC's trip to SA was simply a ruse. Sure enough, as predicted...nada. One trip to Euro, and voila, Simo the hack. First of all, diving and fouling are the same. Both are against the rules and have consequence. I am not condoning either practice, however intelligent teams and players often do both. I am sure that you cheer Simo when he chops his cleats into an opponent. How hypocritical of you to sneer at diving. Secondly, Mexicans getting the message? WTH? That is so offensive on so many levels. Let me stick to the soccer part of it. Hopefully, you are not implying that MLS referees are "cleaning up the game" for the rest of the world? We have some of the most piss poor officiating at all levels, especially at the professional ranks in this country. Mexico, on the other hand, is extremely world class in this regard. Watch the TV show on FOXEsp in which they rate and analyze the week's officiating in MFL. Next, go watch an MLS officiated game with the same critical eye. Keep a barf bag handy. You will need it. So you are now Mr Sunshine. A year ago you boasted about your negativity. In fact you would issue some negative diatribe and call it "vox fatum" or some other "genuine nonsense". What is the cause of your sudden conversion? Does CC or some HSG dude let you fetch them their beer or carry their golf clubs? For a guy who used to say was "as hard on the team as anyone", you have made an inexplicable transformation. Do you even know what you stand for? It sure doesn't seem like it. As for me being a "bigot" because I correctly analyze the actions of HSG. My measuring stick is simply the actions of HSG. I don't want to hear about trips to SA, watching a game at the barrio field to look for talent, taking a look at hundreds of resumes, going to take a Spanish class, ect ect..... I am judging on the basis of actions--not b.s. If their is action to support a different conclusion, then I will be the first to say so. Nor did Wanchope fight hard to stay there. He, guess what, disliked the style of play. He said that he felt that the overemphasis of the aerial game, (at which he excells), was limiting his other attributes. Now, trading G of RC when RC had not recovered from a major injury was stupid. And yes, no one tried to pin that on HSG. The speculation being that G would rot for CC. (irreconcilabe stylistic differences) Hmm, I wonder if these two paragraphs are in any way related? Is that so? Then why are you spouting so much "noxious nonsense"?
I would LOVE to see Stern John play for FC. He's my second favorite foreign player ever in MLS right behind Graziani. If we can't have Graziani up top with EJ I say we do whatever it takes to get Stern John.
theo I think I've figured out my beef with you. I don't mind you over-analyzing the actions of HSG, I mean they are the monkey's who put us in Dragon Stadium (ughhh I drove by it today, barf). My beef is that you think that if a player is not hispanic then they aren't good. You talk about the "hispanic purge" like it was the holocaust. Could it be that all the hispanic players we lost needed to go? Graziani was a pain in the ass, yea he scored like crazy but he was a cancer. Zarco got old. Martinez has his eyes on Mexico, he always has. Vaca had the heart of a lion but his body couldn't make up for it. Sure no one wanted to see Suarez go but he got stuck on the end of a bad bad deal. My point is, while we haven't seen as many hispanic players as we use to, I don't feel its necessary we have hispanic players. Its just too racist to me, had the same feeling at the Town Hall Meeting. All the hispanics feel like we HAVE to have a key hispanic player. All I care about is how they play, they can be white, black, Mexican, Russian, I don't care they have to be worth a damn. We should not be having affirmative action for hispanics just because we have a lot of hispanics in Texas. Now having said that I'm not satisfied with the players we had last season. Quill, Talley, Gbandi, even Garlick, they don't cut it. Does that mean if they were hispanic they'd be amazing? Hell no, we should be finding the best players possible, regardless of their nationality.
Exactly. Having someone of Hispanic nature does not guarentee that they are the best player avaible. If a guy from lets say...Thailand wanted to play for Dallas, he put up G-Man goals, Simo's defensive tackles, ROB's run...would you take? Theo, while you might dislike Simo, he did a better job than Deering did and he did want a defensive midfielder is suppose to do-TACKLE HARD. Granted the MLS refs need to decide they want to call the game both ways and be consistant, but he did better than I thought he would. Point is as Scipio said, you get the best avaible player out there.
The Hispanic purge went deeper than just the players. The front office lost Andy Swift and Cecilia Novoa, both of whom worked hard for not only the Hispanics but also the hard core soccer crowds. The move to Dragon was a move away from a Hispanic area of town. The Burn have had Leonel Alvarez, Hugo Sanchez, Ariel Graziani and Oscar Pareja to name a few who have excelled with the team. Had HSG not done all these moves at the same time, had they replaced some of the latin players with other players of that pedigree and won with them then there would not be as much of a point. Maybe HSG needed to learn what I'm sure Andy told them from the start. First hand lessons are best remembered.
Wanchope is past it. No way his fitness holds up in MLS. Bad value for the MLS (HSG) Dollar. Perfect fit for an AEG team that can afford to take the risk. HSG spend this time around has to be low risk and high impact. But I'm not on the Casey bandwagon either. Casey can finish in the 2.Bundesliga, but the only other place he consistently put balls in the net was for Clive in Portland. -bs
The thing that kills me is that Lamar attended at least a dozen games from '96-'00 when we had the festive side full and rocking. Lamar was extremely active at the Numbers table with Abbott et.al. during that era. He knew what Billy, Andy, et.al., accomplished in this market, and what they had to spend to make it happen. John Wagner's office (HSG mothership) in a dowtown tower on Young Street is less than 5 minutes from where the Burn's office was on McKinney. And yet, it was almost as if they purposely had to kill the team so the "fixes" would be "their idea". Or, maybe they really didn't listen to what Andy told them. And maybe they really didn't pay attention to the Dallas operation at all. We now know HSG was hands off for a long time when we all speculated that they had to be paying close attention. I'll never get it. There is one person who could enlighten us all, but he has said he's not likely to ever write a tell-all, and based on his new job, that probably wouldn't be a good idea. The Sucklack move has only one parrallel in the Dallas Business Scene during the last 10 years, eclipsed only by Belo's "CueCat" disaster that cost them $37MM (see the observer link that Buzz posted). But we will find out shortly what HSG is willing to do to repair the damage. Or not willing to do. -bs