Just a little more than 2 days before Season 11 gets under way in DC. Of course, that means the official site is comin' at ya with a big platter full of warmed-over pap and not-really-news. As in, Pele's supposed to be in da hizzouse for the home opener. I say "supposed," considering how he was similarly booked for the Cosmos Throwback Day in 2001, only to Lothar it at the last minute. (lexical note: the verb "to Lothar" may be used to describe any kind of unexcused continent-hopping, contract-breaking, or cradle-robbing, but is especially apropo when it involves all three.) Don't worry, even if he does, there will still be a bunch of guys older than my dad with lots of adjacent consonants in their names whom I never saw play, but were apparently pretty good.

Seriously, I won't knock them or that. Attempts like this, to build bridges between the memories of the Cosmos and the Metros should have been going on for at least the past 10 years. There ought to have been more attempts to acknowledge pro soccer's modern history, so good on RB for doing it now. Whether it's going to be sustained is another story.

That said - as they line up before the match, don't you think Mark Semioli, Esq., and Brian Kelly (now raking in the bucks on Wall Street, at least according to thirdhand scuttlebutt) might be glancing over at old teammate Gio Savarese, and thinking "you poor sap...you keep trying to get out, and they keep pullin' ya back in"?

Here's something funny. Ian Plenderleith - DC-based, but I'll try not to hold it against him - wrote a nice bit on the Red Bull takeover here. The less-than-enthused tone of that column came to the attention of corporate, who dispatched one of their crack bullshit sprayers to ply him with yet more trite jibber-jabber about how unique and innovative Red Bull really is. Blah blah blah. It's all to the same tune we've read in umpteen other statements since the takeover; "Red Bull is about spirit, creativity and helping athletes to acheive their potential." That's all just so much unctuous crap, it's hard for anyone with functioning brain cells to process. A little bit like Nike, Red Bull may pretend to be something more than a major global for-profit corporation - something more profound, more enlightened, or more avant-garde. But it isn't. Therefore, Red Bull is simply about making piles and piles of money; if they just admitted that, it would be harder to disbelieve every single superficially noble thing they say or do. Shortly after, Plenderleith wrote a follow-up based on and including that RB response, calling it what it is - rote, empty marketingspeak. Are we too cynical? Only time will tell.

From Formerly-Metro to Former Metro: Oh look, Clint Mathis insinuates that "friend" and former coach John Ellinger betrayed him by trading him over the winter. I say, Clint's got all the right in the world here. After all he did for you, John Ellinger! Giving up his burgeoning European career! And the consistent scoring! The tireless running up and down the field! The veteran leadership he brought game in and game out! The return on (a maximum salary-plus) investment!
I've got a soft spot for Clint Mathis that will never go away, but that sort of inability to look back and say "you know, my season really sucked" is Exhibit A in the case of Why I Don't Want To See Him Back In Metro, and cringed really hard when I read rumors to that effect.