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lovely

so if you havent heard, houston plays in cancun in the first week of march. ie spring break. ie prob one of the sickest mls roadtrips ever. if you are a fan or just have the $$$ this is a trip you gotta make. soooooo sick.

out of the loop

ive been out of the loop for a couple months, viruses plus school have minimized my blogging.

bbv

brag: us is in final round of world cup qualifying
beat: i'm still poor, and adsense hates my blog
varience: school is almost over for the quarter.
oops that last one is a brag :)

beatdown

In case you missed it



my main thoughts from the game:
DE MARK US BEEEEEEESS LEYY: oh my. two goals in the first half, looked extremely dangerous at all times, and even after a couple guys got stuck in bad against him, he still fought it out. well done lad, please let this be the beginning of you being back.
the future is bright: oh my. breakout much? a couple of the youngins showed up big.
-jozy looked super dangerous. his beastlyness is undoubted at this point, and his goal was one of those that you see forwards that are bosses score.
-jose francisco torres looked sharp in the midfield, passed well and uncorked a shot from like 30 out that was a scorcher. kid is 20. and lethal. and left footed. oy vey.
-freddy "what it adu?" did work. he took a guy one on one and then snapped in a beaut that gooch smashed home. i got love for freddy. in fact, i even snatched the us away with his name on it. do work fredu do work.
-sasha got robbed. by chingaling. another super game from sasha, he looks great at dcentermid with baby bradley. he would have scored if chingy hadn't poached it off the line. well done anyway.

so when i said the future was bright, well, let's just say we could be talking "cop car weird attachment lights that they shine on your car at night when you get pulled over" bright.

big ups to gooch too, classy header to get the last goal and get some love from his friends and fam, who were 100+ strong. gotta love a big goal for a big crowd. also much love to dc, the place was rockin, you could tell from tv when 20ish mins in the screaming eagles section was literally bouncing. magnificent.

a picture is worth a thousand words

but these two are worth a lot more then that.


chingy is gettin his inner thief on lately. he is poaching goals left and right, and suddenly you can't count him out of anything. get it boy. the goal he stole from sasha kljestan on saturday was dirtay. however, as well as he has been playing, you cant argue with his production and level of play. well done chingaling.

BEST.JERSEY.EVER.
hands down.

fresh blood

finally. this is very very good news. good old Bob Bradley has decided to bring in some of the young guns. its about time. here is the roster

GOALKEEPERS (3): Brad Guzan (Aston Villa: 2/2 SO), Tim Howard (Everton FC: 6/5 SO), Troy Perkins (Valerenga IF: 0/0)

DEFENDERS (8): Carlos Bocanegra (Rennes: 16/2), Danny Califf (FC Midtjylland: 2/0), Steve Cherundolo (Hannover 96: 17/0), Jay DeMerit (Watford FC: 1/0), Frankie Hejduk (Columbus Crew: 13/1), Oguchi Onyewu (Standard de Liege: 11/0), Michael Orozco (San Luis: 0/0), Heath Pearce (Hansa Rostock: 5/0

MIDFIELDERS (7): Freddy Adu (AS Monaco: 1/0), DaMarcus Beasley (Glasgow Rangers: 19/4), Michael Bradley (Borussia Moenchengladbach: 5/2), Maurice Edu (Glasgow Rangers: 3/0), Sacha Kljestan (Chivas USA: 3/0), Danny Szetela (Brescia Calcio: 0/0), José Francisco Torres (Pachuca: 0/0)

FORWARDS (5): Jozy Altidore (Villarreal C.F.: 0/0), Brian Ching (Houston Dynamo: 9/4), Charlie Davies (Hammarby IF: 0/0) Clint Dempsey (Fulham FC: 11/4), Landon Donovan (Los Angeles Galaxy: 24/8)

why hello jozy freddy charlie jose danny michael and jay. good to see you all again. lets see you smash some fools in the qualifiers and lock up some long term spots as the future team. except the future starts now.

missing: marvell wynne, kenny cooper and chad marshall. I'm optimistic we will see you lads soon too.

US plays saturday at RFK. oh how i wish i could be there. could this be the coming out party we have all been waiting for??

biggs

ride or die time

we go play at ucsb today. last year's national champs. nothing like jumping straight into the fire. it's go time.

9 things to love about MLS right now

9 clubs with jersey sponsors. The fact that there is enough interest in teams to sponsor them is a great step in the right direction, the more teams that get sponsored, the higher profile the league becomes in the public eye, teams generate more revenue both with jersey sales and with the sponsorships and the more i have to spend on buying jerseys to keep up with the new sponsors and the new looks for the jerseys. Which keeps me poor but lookin fly.

8 of the teams in the league play in 7 Soccer specific stadiums. For the first time permanently, more then 50% of the league plays in a soccer specific stadium now that Real Salt Lake moved into their new digs. The list includes Chicago, Chivas USA/LA Galaxy who share, Colorado, Columbus, Dallas, Real Salt Lake, and Toronto. The increased presence of soccer stadiums gives the teams better chances of profitability because they get more of the revenue generated by the games and events that go on at the stadium, which will help keep both teams and the league profitable.

6 more weeks until the MLS cup at the Home Depot Center

5 great goals from last week


4 guys to watch as they likely use MLS as a launching point for their careers. Sasha Kljestan (at the one minute mark), Robbie Rogers (4th goal above from goals of the week)
Marvell Wynne
and Kenny Cooper. congrats to each of these guys, they are all having great seasons and have very promising careers ahead, both for club and country, but rumor has it that club will likely not be part of the MLS next year, so enjoy them while you can.

3 teams from each conference get a spot in the playoffs guaranteed, which leaves two wild card spots. I'm not a huge fan of the playoff system, but wild card spots are golden in any sport. The NBA should consider this, considering the western conference is dominant and the stupid warriors always finish 6th in the east, but 9th in the west. This is even better in MLS because it makes the playoff race even more exciting, and before this weekend's games there were no teams mathematically eliminated. This also gives my san jo quake boooiiiiisss a better shot at sneaking in.

2 New Expansions – Not only is the league up to 14 teams currently, with Seattle coming next year and Philly the year after, but the league is looking to hit 18 teams by 2012. That is grand, but the fact that there are quite possibly 6 real contenders (St. Louis, NYC2, Vancouver, Portland, Montreal and Las Vegas). More competition means better ownership, bigger franchise fees, and more commitment to the league and to soccer, which is good all around.

1 Landon Donovan – the dude is scorching it this year. For all you Landon haters out there, the talks about Bayern Munich being interested when the winter transfer window comes around is because of his stellar play this year. Averaging just under a goal a game? Straight up ballin son.

what does this all mean? It might be the best time to be an MLS fan ever. I'm certainly loving it, that is for sure. things may not be all good in the hood yet but they get closer every day. Soccer is here to stay folks, best get used to that idea. oh and let's all hope that vegas gets an mls franchise, that would make for some absolutely glorious soccer trips.

biggy

so good

Thisisamericansoccer has done the best soccer piece i have ever seen. It is on clint dempsey. Peep it here, it is worth the read and gives you the inside scoop on a lot of the mystery that Demps is. plus, he is a baller.

weezy gettin his blog on

lil wayne blogs for ESPN. the biggest surprise? dude's a tennis and hockey fan. weezy is takin thuggin to a new level, on the ice. bummed he has no love for soccer but sh*t happens, you know. plus he got love for nadal. just imagine nadal and weezy in the club. watch out ladies watch out.

roadtripping

I have two major aspirations in terms of going to soccer games right now, the first is to attend the World Cup in 2010 in South Africa with a bunch of my friends. That plan is on track. The second is a more lofty and spread out goal. A quest that I have no knowledge of anyone popularizing or even publicizing. It is to take the MLS stadium tour, to hit each MLS stadium in both the US and Canadia.You always hear about the people who travel from MLB stadium to MLB stadium across the US, and what a grand old time they have doing it. I would prefer to see the magnificence of BMO Field and the Red Patch Boys and kick it in the Nordeke in Columbus

and scope out Real Salt Lake's new digs instead of spending time in the friendly confines or the BOB, watching a sport that has quickly lost my interest. sorry baseball, but even during the summers, there is plenty of good soccer that is more interesting then you are. So this is the beginning of the trip, the gran voyage across north america to support a league that I have grown up with and hope to grow old with. and maybe if all goes well, I can even do a little compare and contrast with the stadiums that I visit in South Africa and maybe even Europe too. However, this trip is dependent on things outside my control, like who gets the next expansion and when it occurs. and when slackers like San Jose actually nail down their stadium plans. For now, the tally is at one, my trip to the Home Depot Center doesn't count, cuz those have all been for US games. The one is the Oakland Coliseum for quakes galaxy august 08. might not be magnificent, but you gotta start somewhere

a look inside the club season: the first step

my alarm goes off at 6:45am saturday morning. the first thing I do is question my decision. do I really want to play? is getting up at least 3 days a week at times that routinely make me shudder worth it? is the fact that all my friends went to the bars last night and some have stumbled home only hours earlier going to compel me to get up, or ignore my alarm and sleep. too often the battle is that first step out of bed. today is a battle day.

it's day two of tryouts. yesterday was a day full of ups and downs. running my two mile in 12:59 was an up. the running i did the last couple weeks looks to be paying off. the turnout at tryouts was a downer. less guys then the year before, which sucks. as much as i like my spot on the team, and as much as i like the guys from last year, new blood is good. it encourages players to work harder, to play like they have to prove themselves everyday. we need that. our leading scorer, doo doo brown, isn't coming back this year. it's really too bad, as he is a guy who has the talent to play out of college for sure. easily the best player i have ever played with. still, at least 14 of the core guys from last year's roster are back. the chemistry on that team was great. if we can carry that to this year, we can battle santa barbara for a league title and a shot at nationals.

playing club is a strange beast. we have a college team at cal poly. most of us could probably play for that team, possibly as role players and the like. for one reason or another though, each one of us didn't get a shot at that team, didn't make that team, or didn't want to play for that team. everyone has their own reasons, many tried out and the coach just didn't see it. mine is different, i broke my arm senior year of high school and never even got that look i desired so greatly. being a late bloomer has its disadvantages. however club came along last year, and i jumped at the shot to play at a more competitive level again. playing with guys who had played for the poly team allowed me to realize i could hold my own, and at the end of the season the coach had honored 3 of us as "all league players", and my name was on the list. it reawoke that dream, the one that was always there as an overachieving youth, of playing for a bay area mls team and the national team. if only....

i get home saturday, after our second session of the day. two a day tryouts have crushed my body. it hurts all over. again. just like it did this morning, and nowhere near as bad as it will tomorrow morning. still not pleased with my play, but pleased with my effort. this year, its time for me to step up. for this could be my last shot at my first love, the beautiful game.

lp and busta

shinoda is so ill. love the piano. glad the video is as sick as the song by itself is.

compare and contrast

slight difference. one falls out of planes, the other acts like they have been shot down in a plane. floppers in general irritate me, but the azzurri has a special place in my heart for their ridiculousness. ain't got no love for you fellas.

Rep your hood son

fortunately the only thing that fell that day in a us jersey was me out of a plane. and not the team itself. oh and my headband. tragedy that was. fortunately, 2 out of the 3 made it out impressively. the headband, however, has not been seen since about 11,000 feet over Lodi. which is not somewhere i would want to get lost.

quick update

life has been nuts the past week

i made the illustrious cpsc a squad, or cal poly club soccer team. since then, all week we have had practice at least once a day and my body has been dead. practice has gone well, we head to san diego this weekend for a tournament there. i'm stoked to be back with the boys, the team is a bunch of really good guys and i def enjoy myself on and off the field with them. we are in the second bracket, and hopefully we can bring home a championship to get the year kicked off in smashing fashion. i anticipate i will be starting at either right or center back, and am stoked.

fifa09.is.unreal. the likelyhood of me going out and buying a xbox360 has increased dramatically since i played the demo two days ago. you can just tell they are really starting to get the fluid motion of soccer down. which is scary because well, soon i don't think you will be able to tell the difference between video games and real life. like the fact there is going to be an 8 on 8 mode where each guy controls one guy. the lines between real and unreal get more and more blurry every new release.

pics coming in a min.

biggy