The Metrologist

Come on Metro!

2008-11-23T03:03:00.006-05:00

This blog is as good as done (I hope you're not just figuring that out) but special occasions demand special returns.

The Metrologist supports Metros in this afternoon's MLS Cup.

Classic Metros like these guys.

Will we watch it? That remains to be seen. The early double bill of Jets-Titans and Ravens-Eagles will put some strain on the remote finger, but even if that's the real sports story in these parts tomorrow, we might get around to watching the first half. That should be enough for a team that's played some pretty attractive soccer (by MLS standards) against a team that plays anti-soccer, against a team that is in every sense of the term, anti-soccer.

Make us proud, Eddie.

This Week in MLS-related Avian News

2007-09-19T15:19:00.001-04:00

In order to deal with the ~~flock of seagulls~~ seagull infestations at BMO Field, Toronto FC has unveiled a new weapon (I use that word loosely, as you would about a team that hasn't scored since...I can't even remember. It's Bitchy The Hawk.

Not missing a beat, RBNY has responded with an ornithological mascot of its own.

No word yet on whether they will be bringing in outside birds, or just using the ones that are always circling over the organization.

Press-ganged - 8/15/07

2007-08-15T17:42:00.000-04:00

In which we parse some Metro media...

Pitchinvasion recognizes the fillip of media attention being lavished on MLS supporters over the last day or so. Not the first time the unique atmosphere of MLS support has been plumbed, nor the last if Steven Wells has anything to do with it. For Metro supporters in particular, I would refer you to the pieces done by actual, long-suffering Metro fan (aren't those adjectives all redundant?) Bob Ferguson in the late, lamented NY Sports Express for their You-Are-There quality, if only I could.

This New York Observer piece on elements of the diehard Metro support is already the subject of some discussion in Metroland. I say "elements" advisedly. Though the conceit is that it depicts the Empire Supporters Club and Section 101, which last time I checked were somewhat synonymous (most people in 101 are ESC, but not all of the ESC hangs out in Section 101), there's a bit of randomness and catch-as-catch-can about it. There's a lot that anyone who's spent time around Metro support - or any MLS team's organized support, I bet - would recognize. But there's also much generalizing and generalized, much evidence that the author is unaware of the real nature of his subject, and a little bit of smug mean-spiritedness. Then again, it is the NY Observer we're talking about. When Saturday Comes it ain't, much less the International Journal of Cultural Studies.

Is it an accurate picture? Is it condescending?

The article is what it is, which is a little of both.

I can only speak as someone who was in the ESC for a good long time, but hasn't been for a couple years, due both to distance and a overwhelming disaffection for the current identity, which I just can't get over to the point that I'd give money to that miserable company and show up in the stands.

Nevertheless, I believe there is precisely one thing that has been, by and large, great about the Metro soccer experience over the past 12 years, and that is the caliber of support brought by the ESC. It is the sole reason why many in the NY and NJ area have stuck with this team (or close, for that matter) through thin and thin. It's particularly interesting to get an outsider's view of it.

So let's get the sticky stuff outta the way first. There is some pretentiousness - occasionally cringe-worthy amounts of it. Yes, there's the occasional casting of sham-accents - when it's blatantly played-at is when it's most grating and out of place. For every fantastic adaptation of a foreign chant (something done by supporters around the world, ) there's one that isn't particularly well understood, sung awfully, or way out of context. There is a fair amount of trying too hard, and a poster on Metrofanatic - English, by the way - nails the problem with that succinctly.

But you know, that's in line with a phase that most of us have gone through at some point or another - the slightly strained attempts to show off, among other things, one's international savoir faire. It's devilishly hard to resist, like being that guy who meets the cute foreign chick and throws what little you learned during your study-abroad semester at her, because you can. Maybe it's having something to prove, maybe it's just to be a little different. Perhaps there's too much of that high-concept hyper-cosmopolitanism in a group like this - you may have a soccer reservoir a mile wide and an inch deep. There's no harm in that, you tend to grow out of the excesses of it, eventually. In the meantime, trying too hard is far preferable to not trying at all.

As for "patently nerdy enthusiasms" and all that connotes, that's primarily a matter of how the dedicated, hardcore American soccer fan - the sort of guy or gal that goes out to see an early round Open Cup match, then comes home and writes about it on Bigsoccer, or on a blog - is framed. Now, honestly, there have been times when you could look around the 101 crowd and swear you'd been dropped into a Fellini film (the unkind image not mine, but I'll take it). But would you like to meet the fellas who go out to watch Rotherham vs. Walsall reserves on a rainy night in February? I'll wager that those people are no less nerdish about their soccer (or anything else), but they're the heart and soul of the sport in its traditional environs, and I'd sure as hell rather stand in their section, as opposed to sitting alongside Johnny Loudmouth Frontrunner, in his fresh new Chelsea or Barca top. The diehards here - call them the geekcore if you must - is where virtually all the interesting stuff comes from.

Above all, I suppose I have an issue with this running dialectic of "authentic" versus "simulated" or "play" supporters. Who decides that? That difference, that aspect of inauthenticity and pretend is implicit in phrases like "slipping in and out of English accents" and "many of them present themselves as passionate, rowdy and, like their foreign counterparts, a little dangerous." That may in fact be a legitimate point, but let's warily attempt to talk a little performance theory here: it's not just MLS fans playing the part of traditional fans; all supporters - American, European, whoever - play-act some variation of the Traditional Supporter part, when you get right down to it.

And with that broached, I'm not going to wade any further into the deep waters of theory tonight. But I will leave a question out there, if you're not ready to accept what I just said, then we have to figure out, just what do role-playing American supporter have to do to become "real"? Or is there, in fact, no way possible? Some question.

And on a sidenote, who the fuck cares what Joe Benigno knows or doesn't know about anything? That's just bizarre. Did the author take the "Famous ESC" song that literally? God help he hears the one that half the English-speaking fans in the world sing, about being the finest football team the world has ever seen.

It is a little gratifying to read that "the vast majority of E.S.C. chants and banners have not adopted the new name." That makes up (a little) for the retch-worthy sight of those all-red jerseys in 101.

Meanwhile, local North Jersey weekly - coincidentally enough, The Observer - also pitches in with this story on the stadium woes, which doesn't say much different from the Star-Ledger story I mentioned a few days ago (and absentmindedly, forgot to link). Bottom line: the cleanup is going slower than expected, the opening of the stadium has officially been shoved back at least till 2009, but otherwise, things are just peachy!

Nothing much different from stuff we've already heard, except for this; there are so many little insinuations, so many little messages left between the lines, that one can't help but wonder what the underlying message is. Does it not feel like the stadium still hangs on a knife edge?

The more you look at this article, the harder it is to tell. It could, after all, just be bad writing:

"The multi-million dollar soccer stadium that is under preliminary construction in Harrison has hit a major snag, causing postponement of the development of the stadium for a full year until the start of the 2009 season."

Take that last sentence. "Postponement of the development of the stadium" is so unclear, you could take it to mean that construction won't begin till '09. That's ridiculous....isn't it?

What stands out are the repeated

"What makes the project sticky is the amount of public money tied into it."

references

"Harrison had expected to repay its debt on the stadium by collecting property taxes on the rest of the project. But you can’t collect property taxes on projected sales, just legitimate sales"

to the precarious, politically-significant nature

"The county of Hudson has also a vested interest in the project, having floated nearly $40 million in bonds to build a parking garage near the stadium. The county figured that the parking deck would pay for itself in the coming years, but not if there aren’t any cars parking there."

of the stadium's funding

..."the plans for the permanent home of the team remains in a state of limbo — once again."

which is being messed with by this extended cleanup (or AEG-RB wrangling, depending on who you believe.)

"We’re sticking to the goal of having a professional soccer stadium.”

Boy Bruce, you sure know how drive home the idea this is all just minor hassles.

When I read all that, I see those phrases sinking down the page like little depth charges, not detonating....yet. Or maybe they're hinting at nothing. Are you ever reassured by seeing the words plans, permanent home, and limbo in the same sentence?

"But the project that was delayed and then delayed some more has been given yet another delay of game. You have to begin to wonder whether this might be some sort of negative sign — or whether Harrison, Hudson County and Red Bull can somehow make this thing finally work."

All baseless speculation on the part of a journalist, or veiled hints at which way the wind is blowing on Harrison? I honestly couldn't tell you now.

Buy It Now! Or wait a few hours to see if Larentowicz snaps his tibia.

2007-08-12T15:31:00.000-04:00

I'm not going to spend too much time analyzing it now, but over the past few days I've been peeking over at the Ebay and Stubhub markets for the 8/18 game against the LA Beckhams. Perhaps someone more savvy about reselling on the interwebs can illuminate us better, but considering it's a "major event" I'm pretty underwhelmed when I see auctions for 2 two tickets in the lower level coming down to the last hour with only a bid or three, much less the majority of the tickets on offer going for face value, or perhaps even less.
Stubhub says it has 855 tickets on sale (including several blocks of 20 or more), and that number has hardly moved over the last couple days.
It just doesn't strike me as a live market. That could mean any number of things, I suppose.

So you tell me how hot this thing is in NYC. I can't say I have a bead on it through this, but I think it has something to tell us. No, watching the Ebays ain't necessarily scientific, but it's a damn sight safer than actually taking team management, hyperbolic color commentators, and fans on their wishful words alone.

Could be interesting to watch for a spike either way - people dumping or some of those tickets disappearing - depending on whether or not Becks gets blasted by some Rev bruiser. If he actually plays tonight, of course.

Petter Villegas is alive and well and living in midfield in Puerto Rico

2007-08-11T13:05:00.001-04:00

The things you learn watching FSC on Friday nights!

Sadly (and surprisingly), no video of Petter's (the extra "t" is for "too much dribbling") stupendous golden goal against Tampa Bay in 2000 was found. To this day, that 30 yard bullet to the top corner to win the game is one of the great phantom punches I've seen in my sports-watching life (Villegas scored a few goals, as that clip shows, but they were not of the Riise ilk). What compares? I remember Islanders goon Mick Vukota scoring a hat trick once in an NHL game. The man could barely skate, yet he somehow found himself on the doorstep for tap-ins three times. As catching lightning in a bottle goes, it's on that level.

In between the FSC EPL games, let's take a look at two Metro-related stadium stories coming out, both of which rhyme with the word "dusterbuck."

Would you like to start off with the news that as of this weekend, Giants Stadium is getting more difficult, more time-consuming, and more expensive to reach? This is like saying that the ball is developing even more roundness, that Rob Stone is becoming even more puerile, that hard-working scientists have figured out a way to make a kick to the nuts even more painful.

Key quote:

"Welcome to the brave new world of parking, Meadowlands-style, where the rules of the game at Giants Stadium have just changed after 31 years.

The reason is construction of a $1.5 billion stadium in the parking lots just north and east of Giants Stadium, with the loss of 5,000 spaces creating a parking crunch that will last until the new corporately named stadium opens in 2010."

No one really seems to know what this means for soccer. But let's just jump the gun anyway; oh my God, can we wait for the stories to come out of this after the Beckham game next weekend! No, we can not. It has all the makings of a logistical disaster, on par with the legendary Metros-Ecuador (I believe) doubleheader years ago, which saw scads of fans arriving via PA bus halfway through the second game. This game will actually draw a sizeable crowd, testing the organization's ability to direct and guide tens of thousands of people - many of whom probably have never been to lovely East Rutherford and environs - out to Lyndhurst, over on shuttle buses, and back. Oh, and by the way that'll be double the normal parking fee, please.
Of course I have utter faith in RB.

I'm not sure this is going to be such a hassle for the regular RB crowd, since the 6-8000 coming out week after week probably won't fill up the available lots and arena garage anyway. I could end up wrong on that. Regardless, it really is a gut-punch to anyone thinking the team is going to sop up lots of casual Beckham consumers, barring an absolutely scintillating game (and really, it's the Galaxy and an ill-conceived Metro side - you banking on that?) Look, it's your first time out for the MLS experience, or your first time back in years for that matter; you drive out to Jersey, get shunted around the mulberry bush AND you drop at least twenty bucks on parking? And don't you dare think about taking that grill out when you do find a spot. It doesn't matter if MLS and the team aren't really at fault here - how many of those first-timers and flinty Europhiles are coming away pie-eyed with the romance and spectacle of soccer in the Swamp?

But, you say, at least they'll have a stadium of their own in ~~2008~~ 2009ish. Being of such a sunny disposition, you'd rather go right to Matthew Futterman's Star-Ledger story on the interminable efforts to unearth what appears to be an buried, toxin-ridden Parthenon or something.

Key quotes:
"the stadium has become the project public officials no longer want to brag about."

and

Kevin Tartaglione, Advance's chief operating officer, said his workers are encountering the same obstacles workers on the stadium site have found.

Advance plans to build apartments, dozens of stores and restaurants, a hotel and small office complex at the site.

Tartaglione said, unlike the soccer franchise, he anticipated the environmental and excavation issues....

"We were actually thinking it would be later than that based on the scope of the work that needs to be completed," Tartaglione said. "I haven't confirmed that with Red Bull or AEG. I know they are discussing it, but we are following our own course of action."

Read carefully. RB seems to be leave that Spring 2009 opening date out there without really committing to it, and there's a decent hint as to why.

So, believe who you want to believe about the stadium opening in ~~2008~~ early 09; the construction guys who seem to know what they're talking about and have planned for it, or the soda pimps who, well, don't bother to tell anyone about what's going on if they can avoid it.

EPL Eve

2007-08-10T11:51:00.000-04:00

It's busy times here at Metrologist World Headquarters. Doing some housekeeping, tweaking the look ever so slightly, arranging my sure-to-be-sensational fantasy EPL side on the cusp of a new season(arise and conquer, Planet Of The Tevezs), refinancing the house for Beckham tickets, and dealing with real world obligations, all while stoically surviving the nasty middle American heat.

Knowing a thing or two about blogging dry spells myself (a subject for later posts), I've gone about culling some links to blogs that have fallen by the wayside, have gone dark for a year, or just don't seem to fit in with what I want this blog to be about anymore.

Lucky for you, I've been hooked on a few new ones, which you ought to check out.

Pitch Invasion is one of my favorite daily reads nowadays. "Football supporter culture, passion and politics." Just my kind of stuff, and the more blogs I see like this (see also: Culture of Soccer and Two Hundred Percent. Give me others!) the better. Let me be totally honest. There's a number of bloggers out there that have the gift of recapping/commenting/waxing insightful/newsgathering down, but so much of what's out there - and I'm not calling out, or even thinking of anywhere in particular - seems a combination of dizzy news feedback-looping, attempted clairvoyance, and somewhat meandering snark.
Perhaps it's just me: I'm just not much good at breaking down games and players in such quasi-analytical ways, nor am I all that interested in reading, much less writing such stuff, at least on the novice level. I enjoy the game immensely, but it is mostly the culture, the economics, the politics and everything that surrounds the game that I really want to deal with here. As fans and people, we are all in touch with, and can say something worthwhile about, that.

Secondly, I cannot fail to mention the mindbender that is Football Is Fixed. I quite seriously don't know if its treatise-spinning anonymous author is a holy prophet, a paranoid conspiratorial nut, or if it is all actually a magnificent wind-up. It is a great, if get-a-cup-of-coffee-and-settle-in-for-a-while kind of read. Should I be concerned that I find it, in fact, all too believable?

Altidore: "If I wait until I'm 21 there might be a big drop off"

2007-08-09T11:09:00.000-04:00

"The quicker you can get there the better."

More on Ives's story at Ives' blog.

I would, too.

Talk about ginormous cojones!

2007-08-09T01:25:00.000-04:00

That's what you need to tag a $2800 markup on tickets to the Goldenballs show in the swamp. Of course, you splash out like that, you also get VIP before- AND after-game access to the "exclusive" Red Bulls "pub." Well, now you're talking!
Let's watch this one...

Merch Watch: The "Skyline" T-shirt

2007-04-06T15:21:00.000-04:00

Behold, the RB Skyline T-shirt.

What skyline is that, exactly? Beats me. Tacoma? Memphis? Winnipeg? There certainly isn't anything identifiably "New York" about it. Not that NYC's skyline is particularly distinctive or iconic or anything.

A Mathis Fan's Notes

2007-03-30T23:24:00.000-04:00

In 1968, Harper & Row published A Fan's Notes, the first book by writer Frederick Exley. A "fictional memoir" that plays it fast and loose with the distinctions between fiction and biography (a line I believe is better off blurred anyway) it is one of the best works of late 20th century American literature. If you haven't read it yet, you should.

It's a funny, sprawling, angry, lusty, and disturbing story. Exley writes from the perspective of a character named Frederick Exley, native of a small town in upstate New York whose youth is lived in the shadow of his charismatic, domineering, local legend of an alcoholic father. He grows up, leaves home, staggers from this career to that, gets drunk a lot and institutionalized twice. His marriage fails and his friendships falter; he sinks into several morasses of pure piteousness. Whatever his faults, this Exley is also intelligent, impassioned and literary-minded; perhaps that is why he fits so awkwardly into American life ca. 1950s-60s (and beyond?)

Throughout the book, his drive to find his way and meaning in life is matched by his fierce hunger for recognition - the recognition that comes from writing Great Literature. Only he hasn't written Great Literature, or much of any literature yet - he's only thought about it, wanted it, felt born to it. A typical conceit of fairly bookish, ambitious, slightly pretentious middle-class boys, I would be lying if I said that it had never resonated somewhere inside me. Another binding theme of the story is that of sports - especially Exley's fanaticism for the New York Football Giants, but even more particularly, the figure of Frank Gifford (yes, Kathie Lee's septuagenarian squeeze).

From his days spent studying at USC (where Gifford happened to be the Golden Boy star athlete at the same time) to his years spent in NYC, where he faithfully goes out to the Polo Grounds to watch the Giants play (the descriptions of Exley spending fall weekends in the stands with a motley crew of vulgar, beery brothers-in-arms brings to mind the best parts of being a diehard sports fan) Frank Gifford functions as a sort of parallel figure, only on a higher plane. He is what Exley imagines he should be, if only he could be as effortlessly talented, handsome, charming and famous. And then all his failings - the alcoholism, the dissatisfaction in love and in art - would be negated. Life would be good. Exley transfers a lot onto Gifford, and one might imagine there would be a counter-feeling of hate for him, an anxious, jealous anticipation of seeing him reveal his feet of clay. If only Exley could meet Gifford once, the reader thinks, he'd discover what a arrogant prick he really is and the whole facade would shatter. But no - we discover that they did meet by chance once, at a campus diner, and it was Exley who was the prick, Gifford the relaxed, unassuming one.

"When he looked at me, I smiled - a hard, mocking, so-you're-the-big-shit? smile. What I expected him to do, I can't imagine - say, "what's your trouble, buddy?" or what - but what he did do was the least of my expectations. He only looked quizzically at me for a moment, as though he were having difficulty placing me; then he smiled a most ingratiating smile, gave me a most amiable hello, and walked out the door, followed by his buddies who were saying in unison, "Hey, Frank, what'll we do now?"

Now, as much as I love sports - all sports - I have a hard time picking favorites. I don't fan for many teams, never having picked a favorite team in basketball, football or baseball. I just never felt it for any one team - Metro is definitely an anomaly. And there's no individual in any sport who I've taken on as my hero, my idol, who meant more to me than a team, much less a sport. Maybe when I was young there was a little bit of that, as kids do. But as an adult, I think it's a little weird to relate to a potential peer that way, much less someone ten years younger than you. That said, I have felt a deep and somewhat personal affinity for Clint Mathis.

You see, over the past five or six years, Mathis has been as close as I've ever gotten to a Giff.

There are a handful of personal similarities on or near the surface. No, no mohawk, no southern accent, and only one of my ACLs has been reconstructed. But yours truly and Clint are less than two months apart in age, about the same height, more or less the same build, and if you saw pictures of me with the hair closely-cropped and the beard growing in, there's a faint likeness there. It's no separated at birth thing, but a little more pronounced than my resemblance to, say, Brian Ching.

Moreover, Clint plays, when he deigns to, more or less in the same style I do (I still do play quite a bit, and pretty decently.) That, and the fact that I'm about ten times the player I was when I was twenty, are rueful reminders that I was just a couple years too old to have MLS to look up to, that I focused on being a serious player too late - but there is room for that kind of player in the game, and I ought to have been it, if only... I have speed but not too much, some skill but not tons. I do have to say I'm a tad more slim and trim than the Clint we've seen over the past few years, and probably more ready to run box-to-box for 90 minutes. Invariably I'm that withdrawn forward, that exchanger-of-flicks, slider-of-clever-through-balls and walloper-of-twenty-three-yarders, playing within myself in the same way that Clint does nowadays. Perhaps too much - no more daring, lightning-fast 50 yard sprints with the ball. It was very shortly after he made his return from his 2001 ACL injury that I remarked to friends how much Clint seemed to be playing like another great in MLS - Hristo Stoichkov. The problem was that Stoichkov was then 38 years old.

When the story of modern American soccer is written, Clint's going to go down as a talent squandered. Given the flashes of genius he displayed over a very brief period, they'll probably call him the greatest talent to be most rudely squandered.

Is that word, "squandered," harsh?
After all, Mathis was key to the US qualification for WC 2002, and he brilliantly saved our ass against Korea. As this terrific post argues, he was one unfortunate twist away from really, truly putting MLS, Metro and himself on the map in NYC in a major way. It was so close to happening in 2000. And all that aside, he's made a lot of money. He's made the cover of SI. He punked out a Bundesliga coach - how many guys can say that?

Yeah, "squandered" fits.

But we've all squandered things.
Mathis's first run and career peak with Metro neatly coincides with my time living on the edge of New York City. I was fairly fresh out of college, out on my own and thinking of certain big things ahead. Among them, some Exley-ish visions. Big things didn't happen for me there. At least, not the big things I imagined would just fall into place, and not right away. It took about eight steps backwards to move ten steps ahead, and in a totally different direction altogether. If you asked me in 2000 if I could imagine myself here, doing this, I would have laughed. Or been dumbstruck. And I've got a hunch that the same might go for Clint Mathis.

It isn't necessarily a tragic thing, the way things turn out.

I bristle at any mention of "Clint Mathis, the American Gazza." It's lazy and inaccurate; say what you will, but Clint's head has always been screwed on a lot tighter than Gascoigne's. The shock return of Fowler to Liverpool is a better, if not perfect, comparison here today. Not knowing the guy outside of press reports and hearsay, not having spoken to him beyond a few moments at a team event that lasted as long as Exley and Gifford in that diner, I've never thought of Clint Mathis as some uncontrollable addict with problems requiring intensive treatment. A little different, sure. Undisciplined, yes. But another way of saying that is, Mathis appears to enjoy life (and cigarettes, Bud Light, and Doritos are all enjoyable parts of life, believe you me) as much as he did score goals. You may not want that on your team. But I'll be the last one to run people down for not absolutely maximizing their abilities, least of all someone whose peaks and valleys kind of track mine, as long as I'm putting myself in that same box.

The saving grace is that my chosen fields don't wash "talents" up on the rocks by the age of 30. By most soccer standards, the re-acquisition of Mathis is a nonsense move. He's looked like a spent force for years now, since for those of us who remember so fondly what that "force" was like. Founding a lot of hope on a nice playoff performance is a lot like thinking an unproven coach has what it takes based on three or four decent performances as late season fill-in, and casting your lot with him (and no, I'm not talking about Bob Bradley here, but rather, Mo Johnston.) If the best argument you can make is that he comes cheap and its worth a shot, well hell, I come even cheaper. More realistically, there's got to be better value for money, even if the money being talked about isn't much.

Ives blogged that Claudio drove the move, being friends with Clint. That's a nice story, I guess. John Ellinger was the "only coach he'd come back from Germany to play for," too.
Bruce may think he can unlock Mathis's mind and resurrect his career, but I can only imagine that's Bruce way overestimating his own abilities. Otherwise, opinions on the trade run hot and cold.

Yet I really don't care if it's a sensible move. This is the first thing this organization had done since March, 2006 which makes me even the least little bit happy. Nostalgia's a funny old thing, innit?

I say that, and still I can't help but hope for the best and expect the worst. We all remember the way Giff finished up.

How not to honor your club's iconic hero

2007-03-20T19:37:00.000-04:00

Step One: Give the job of immortalizing a man who served the club in virtually every capacity over 60+ years to a professional sculptor who's a passionate fan, yes, but also has never worked on any sculpture on this scale or in this material.

Two: Rush it. Crank it out in less than two years, when comparable works have taken four - and that was with a live subject. (Though I'm seeing that better statues in the "football legends" genre have been done quicker and cheaper, too.)

Three: Hope for the best.

I give you the just-unveiled, already-reviled, and soon-to-be-toppled statue of Southampton legend Ted Bates at St. Mary's.

Good Lord - more photos here.

Man, I feel terrible for everyone here. The fans are understandably up in arms about it; their season has sucked, and now their fundraising efforts - the statue cost over $200k - gave birth to that thing. Bates' family can't be pleased that he comes out looking like Tattoo (as opposed to Tatu - I can't wait till they put up the statue of Tatu down in Dallas, if only to see how they'll replicate the shirt flying off into the crowd in bronze.) The foundry is like "hey, don't look at us." And sculptor Ian Brennan really does sounds like someone who put a lot of honest sweat and toil into the work - it just didn't come off. Ok, understatement there. Did it ever "not come off."

I do love this quote, from an interview with sculptor Brennan.

"I've never seen a smile on a statue before but after a lot of research we decided to go with a pose of him waving and with a smile on his face.

"Generally that's a no-no because most people remember your face as it is most of the time. A smile only lasts a few seconds but Ted was always smiling and if his statue had a straight face and he was still waving, there was a risk of him looking like Stalin or the Saddam Hussein statue that was pulled down."

Don't miss the comments here - particularly those from the sympathetic souls down the South Coast at Portsmouth - which are absolutely worth the price of admission.

And I thought the bronze Batistuta in Florence looked a little weird.

Other times, the post is the goalkeeper's best friend

2007-03-20T01:14:00.000-04:00

You know those magic rec specs Davids wears have that Terminatoresque digital display going on inside, right?

And from another angle, to give you more idea of the damage.

Two more of those, and he's Brett Lindros.

Back and forth/forth and back

2007-03-19T21:15:00.000-04:00

I had begun a post full of sweet venom, razor-sharp enmity, and uncouth but hilarious-cause-they're-true stereotypes before the little voice inside insisted "life's too short to hate." So let me just say: Good evening to all my new friends from the readership of DCenters!

Springboarding off something I wrote over the weekend, it seems they were a little - shall we say smugly? we shall say smugly - pleased with the discovery that "the hatred for DC in New York is much more about New York than it is about DC."

By gum, I think you've cracked it, Inspector Smarmsworth! Metro fan hates DC, but hates Red Bull even more. Lots of self-loathing there. Alert the press.

Without getting into a lengthy thesis here, we can all imagine there is some perfect ratio of positive/negative involved with being a fan. Ideally, I think that means a high amount of positive - Go us! - spiced up with a certain, smaller complementary amount of the nasty negative - Boo (or Fuck) you! If that ratio has always been a little volatile in Metroland, for this Metro fan, at least, it is now completely shot. Speaking for myself, there is virtually no positive side, hardly any "yay our side" left to go on. I like most of the players individually, and can't wait to see a few develop into stars. I like the game of soccer, especially when it's played by teams from places in my country. Other than that, it's currently all about seeing those you don't like go down. That's you, DC - but that's just the way it's supposed to be, isn't it? If it's any consolation to your poor feelings, at least I've got a little grudging respect (which is what that post was mainly about.) Respect for Red Bull, much less pride in what they're doing? None.

Now that is a sad situation, and not a lot of fun to be perfectly honest, but spare your pity for better things. Following MLS isn't a lot of fun, the way it was - that's why as much as I admire your Free Beer Movement (hey, I'll even plug it), you won't find me rushing to take anyone out to a game anytime soon. I figure MLS soccer is worth watching, but minus a team worth being passionate about, I can't be bothered to put myself or anyone else out for it right now. Good luck with that.

Other news n' notes:

Marc de Grandpre, just back from a spa in the Seychelles or something, Fires Back! just a week after Ives's story about the Red Bull New York's 14 million dollar loss last season. Determined to nip these stories in the bud and bringing the full force of his personality to bear on the Metro beat writers, he wrote an email with a lot of fluffy PR language, and cc:'ed it to Dyer and Michael Lewis. Stand-up guy, that Marc de Grandpre.

Funny from this: our spin, spin sugardaddy's man claims RB "deliberately shed off all our sponsors at the end of the year." Well, I thought it was a contest between stupidly arrogant and inept to explain why they lost those major sponsors; I hope you had your chips on "stupidly arrogant," at least if we're believing this line from MdG,
Funnier from this: the usual BS suspects taking it all at face value. Hold tight, Marc and Dieter have a vision! They said it themselves!
Absolute funniest from this: That Ives can not only respond on his blog, but feel free to come into open conflict with the team over this. What's at stake for Ives if he hammers them some more on it? Anything? Some access, perhaps - but RB is Kremlin-like in that regard anyway, so what's his big loss there? They're not going to tell Bruce and the boys not to talk to him, are they? That would be utterly dumb, and it wouldn't work anyway.
But here's the beautifully ironic twist; as much as we like to think journalists can say whatever they want without concern for the sales department, if Ives kept it up, then one imaginable (I'm not saying actual) pressure that could fall on him might be through the team's major sponsors. It's just slightly possible that say, St. Barnabas Health Care wouldn't like reading continual slams on RBNY, justified or not, if it was a major team sponsor AND a North Jersey News advertiser (again, hypothetical). Does it work that way? Who knows. I can imagine it working like that somewhere, sometime. Call it goodwill in the community, or lack of.
Would that RB had any big local sponsors left to aggravate. And it's not like RB is ever going to be buying ads in something so un-edgy and conventional as the local newspaper.
Well, late night thoughts.

And lastly, the jury remains completely out on Bruce Arena (only fair), which is to say that a lot of people are naturally expecting him to be Mr. F'ing Wizard, just 'cause. I'm skeptical, and I was going to get around to my reasons why sometime. Someone who knows a lot more about soccer and MLS beat me to it. Take those reasons, add in the fact that Arena won his MLS championships when three-quarters of the league couldn't play their way out of a wet paper bag and...we shall see, won't we?

Bordello of Bull Blood

2007-03-17T12:57:00.000-04:00

Someone pissed off the Crypt Keeper lately, and by the looks of it, that someone was Bruce Arena. Because our dusty old skeletal friend is neither happy nor charitable with his analysis of how Metro is coming together on the field under The Best Coach America Has Ever Produced (tm).

Michael Lewis reports on Paul Gardner's slams on Arena.

What a truly weird thing to publish - and I'm talking about what Michael Lewis did here. Don't get me wrong. I like Lewis. I'm just not quite sure what the point of excerpting and highlighting an opinion piece in another publication could be - especially one that's sorta there, sorta on-the-periphery like SA is these days. And when it's Paul "Rotmasters was mine!" Gardner doing the opining. Sure, you will find some who like him, some who respect him as part of an earlier era of soccer journalism but think him pretty irrelevant now, and many who throw him straight in the "Cranks" basket, beside Trecker the Younger. Whatever - it's not like we look to Paul Gardner to get the inside scoop on Metro.
It makes me wonder just what the real purpose is on Lewis's part.

Is Gardner saying things that Lewis would like to say himself, but can't get away with, being on the beat and all?
Is it just the product of a slow news week, team-wise?
Something else?

The thing that's missing in the BAS piece, unfortunately, is any kind of response from Lewis - in agreement, in rebuttal, or to moderate. That's a real shame.

But if the Crypt Keeper is more right than wrong here...hoo boy.

Kriss Kross would be proud

2007-03-16T18:12:00.000-04:00

To take it to the weekend, one-time Metro "knowledge-sharing partner" (anyone ever hear ANYTHING more about that?) Eintracht Frankfurt has fans who know how to make the stadium rock. Seriously. Courtesy The Offside.

Just noted - that's an AWAY crowd doing that. Nice.
Proof positive that fans can go out en masse and act passionately for a shitty team...provided it means something to them. Working on that. Or not here, not at all.

Some people are high-minded

2007-03-15T22:42:00.000-04:00

Ives was watching the CCC last night*, and he's got some magnanimous things to say as far as his hopes for DC and Houston in their away legs.

*What was he doing watching that instead of the basketball tonight?
Wait, what was I doing?

That's good. Those are the sane, rational words of someone who cares not just about the team he covers, but about the growth and development of MLS as a whole. You kind of expect and understand it from a journalist. There's even a lot of MLS fans like that.

Luckily, I have no such noble compunctions. While I can tolerate - barely - DC nicking one to send their oh-so-insipid fans home not feeling totally forlorn, I simply cannot wait until Chivas takes DC back to Mexico and makes them look silly, as they inevitably will. Embarrass them. Hang a five on them. Go Goats.

Because you know what I always say - the diving, whining, too-cowardly-to-take-a-flight-to-NYC jerkstore-acting enemy of my enemy is kind of my friend. At least till this tie is over.

That said, it's all too clear from nights like tonight just how incredibly far behind DC our Metro stands, from an all-around point of view.

Without too much exaggeration, I figure that it's 8-10 years before Metro - or whatever name they're called at that point - gets anywhere close to where the filth down I-95 is right now. On the field, they're simply deeper, more skilled, and will benefit from being battle-tested (not that they're doing all that spectacularly) against the best teams on the continent. We're having a hard time getting by college teams and counting on a 17 year old and (maybe) an A-Leaguer to bring the goals. In the stands and in the city, there's simply no comparison. A big chunk of that 26k number came to support the Goats, as anyone with ears (I guess we'll leave out Christian Miles on the telecast last night, then) could tell. But still - 26k for an international match 3 weeks out from the opener. This is a sign, among other things, that DC's FO knows what it's doing, and that the club has some actual connection, not just with the hardcore, but with the people of the area in which it plays. In short, everything that our organization is not.

This second point fiercely sucks, since those who have been around a while may easily remember that (early titles or not) Metro and DC were more or less equal in crowd numbers through the first half of MLS's existence, and the Metro diehard core was always a little more...how do we say this nicely...."credible" than the weird assortment of fake Mods, knife-toting Salvadorans, and margarita-mix buying, tailgate-ticketing elements that constitutes your average DC crowd. That is, until the bulk of the Metro faithful was beat into a fine powder by shit results, shit management, and a shitty gameday experience, and drifted away on the winds.

8-10 years of consistent positive development, on and off the field; that's my conservative (and maybe even optimistic guess) of what it'll take to see scenes like last night's up in NJ. Harrison alone won't make it happen. Nor would winning a title alone. Coming off a week and half of good press to the left of them, good press to the right of them, and a sharp reminder of just how MLS's ultra-egalitarian rules make RB's money a non-factor, even when they care to spend it - can you see RB still being here in 2017?
Prop bets are often sucker bets, but if you know a bookie who'll offer good odds against that....

Marking one year of being a joke

2007-03-09T10:15:00.000-05:00

I am not a great reader of the game or outstanding appraiser of players. I don't have any clout or inside connections ready to leak juicy rumors to me. At best, I've got some words I can turn handily, a decent memory for where we've been in the past, and a passion - dinged up as it is now, insane as it's always been - for American soccer, and American club soccer in particular. Beginning with the Metros.

So when I began this blog a little more than a year ago with this humble post, I didn't have much in the way of a great vision for it, except for this - to chronicle, describe, criticize and have a little fun with the Metrostars' endless journey towards becoming a quality team, a championship team, a team we long suffering fans can be legitimately proud of, come what may - so that in our travels here and abroad we could eventually tell people "yeah, my team is the Metro and I've been there since the beginning. Soy de Metro, de Metro soy yo..." and get a little respect, if nothing else. It could mean something, if we all stuck together; I had some faith in that.

You laugh, and point to ten years of Metro fiascos, like it was something to be proud of at all. Keep dreaming, you naive Metrologist.

Then I'll argue that ten years is in fact nothing much in the big picture of sports, and even 96-05 came with a lot of good times. Knowing full well that all of us are cheering for someone else's business at heart, as a diehard soccer fan who wants something just a little more authentic and rooted, the timeframe I'm operating on is that of decades, not seasons. For every Chelsea that shoots to global prominence and profitability when a speculator drops in and starts buying it trophies, there is a Middlesborough going almost 130 years before winning its first major trophy, or a Yeovil Town FC that goes over 110 years before even making it into the Football League(!) to cite but two examples. This is soccer reality to me, as much as any glitzy cup final. And somewhat perversely, I like it like that.

The point isn't to glorify mediocrity and stumbling around the nether reaches of the leagues for decades. No one wants that. It's to glorify the resilience and endurance of soccer fans through all the shit, a resilience that gets built into symbols like names and badges, and how they mean something to a place, a group of fans, no matter what the results might be. That's enabled people in many places to follow the same team their ancestors, actual or just locally-speaking, did. That enables the 90% of supporters around the world who aren't following G-14 teams to feel like they're not totally wasting their time. And that stability and continuity is worth something you just can't count.

Winning, in fact, isn't everything and isn't worth getting into bed with anyone for - the thought that some fans think an MLS championship - MLS, for chrissakes! - is so important that it justifies hocking the whole shebang of your team's identity is just amazing to me. Winning is the goal, for sure. It catalyzes us as fans. But simply being there, in the same recognizable form and in the same place is every bit as important. It's where real tradition is forged over time, and THAT, not ticket giveaways or aged, expensive world superstars from the right immigrant demo, is what gets people coming back time after time, year after year.

But Metrologist, you say, such nice examples are useless here. Soccer just means something different in the rest of the world, and especially in places like England. It's engrained in their culture and their traditions.

Well, exactly. And you want club soccer to be somewhat "cultural" here too, dontcha?
I do. I'm a big fan of the sports that are part of our culture already. But soccer...that is just something different, and I'd like us to have a piece of that here, too. If it takes till I'm old and gray.

It may not be in the cards, sociologically speaking. I've done quite a lot of studying and thinking about it (if it's not apparent by now that the Metrologist is hopelessly shuttered up somewhere in the world of higher education, it should be) and I've gradually concluded it's possible the United States simply isn't set up for it at this point in time. There may not be the room or the inclination in the US soccer world for an idealized club soccer culture to grow. It could be that US soccer will grow nicely, as long as we acquiesce to naming some clubs after the highest bidding multinational lifestyle-oriented conglomerate, and branding others after the Great and Good Clubs of Real World Soccer - Arsenal Colorado, Real Salt Lake, DC Chelsea United, Columbuselona. PMLS = Post Modern League Soccer. The signs point in that direction. It could be our destiny.

So be it. The "product" (and I loathe, loathe, loathe that term) on the field will probably improve. But if that's the case, I can't see much reason for us hardy few to go on acting like fervent, loyal, do-anything-for-our-club-because-it's-repping-us supporters. Why do anything much more than buy my ticket now and then (if I don't feel like watching the Mets/Yankees/Devils/Nets/Knicks, etc., since I "support" them equally), sit in my seat and take in the show? Anything more would be foolish - you can't express your team spirit when there's no spirit inside to be found. Who can scream out Red Bull songs with a straight face? Unintentional self-parody at its worst.

Today, March 9 2007, marks the one year anniversary of the conversion of Metro into the Red Bulls, and this string of discussions is its legacy - the magic candles flickering on the taurine-soaked birthday cake. They always re-ignite. They still vastly overshadow the actual job of supporting this team. They always will, until the last of the dyed-in-the-wool Metro traditionalists give up and find something else to do. Make a wish!

Personally, I don't like spending too much of my precious time in negative ways, and the older I get, the even less so. It's the flipside of my tendency to criticize and play devils advocate; too much of that, and it sucks the life out of you. Who wants to waste time beating this further into the ground? So there's been less and less posted here (you might have noticed.) The US soccer blog landscape has really grown since I started here, in line with big things going on in the sport here, but I've had less and less time for it. I've taken less and less interest in the things like playoff matchups and draft coverage, and planned on spending less and less money. My link to this team, if not severed, is stuck in a state of limbo. As someone who was, and should still be, pretty evangelical about MLS, I now have to force myself to care as often as not. That's not good.

What today also marks is the the ticking-over of the worst year of being a Metro fan ever. While the organization itself has been jarred, and I don't think anyone can say for the better overall (more on that in a coming post), I think what remains of the already-tortured diehard Metro crowd has only been further alienated, divided, and turned against one another. I've been a part of that, on a personal level, more than I'd like to admit. What used to be a pretty cooperative community, especially online at least on the surface, now has serious lines drawn through it.

Hypercaffeinated bickering among the desperate remnants like this isn't pretty and certainly not productive. Yet again, another reason for those like me to drift off instead, or for prospective fans to wonder "why would I want to bother?" It's somewhat reminiscent of a scene I saw once at a Fiorentina match I attended in the late 90's; Napoli arrived for a spring match already sure to be relegated, its ragtag, dejected-looking traveling fans barely filling up a third of the fenced-in visitors section at the Artemio Franchi. The Napoli fans quickly got down to the business of beating the shit out of each other, and by the time Fiorentina was coasting with a 2 or 3 goal lead, the Napoli fans were stretched out over the stands, taking in the glorious afternoon sun rather than bothering with the shambles on the field. A similar sort of Lord Of The Flies scenario doesn't bode well for any resurgence of real Metro - or RB, for that matter - support. The question is, do those running the show even want it?

Over the next few days I'll look at some of the substantial problems RBNY has ahead of it. What isn't working now and why I don't think it can ever work - not as anything other than an ersatz soccer product with their name all over it (maybe that can justify their investment, but who wants to watch that? Not me.) It won't be a cheery or particularly enjoyable analysis. But it's not particularly enjoyable to go through this as a fan. Who knows why we do it? We slog on - for the time being - in the hopes that this joke finally stops being told, or else it's so damn successful that someone decides to take a chance on another NY-area team that isn't such a sham.

Happy Birthday, Red Bull New York. May there be very, very few more for you.

Citibank offering $49m over 5 years for LA Galaxy shirt sponsorship

2007-02-21T12:44:00.000-05:00

Or, when your potential shirt sponsors compete, you win.

Ironic that this sort of thing is completely out of the question when your owner is also your shirt sponsor, isn't it?

I see your permatanned lips movin', but I don't hear nothin' being said

2007-02-20T18:26:00.000-05:00

or, "In Soccer It Can't Happen Overnight," a poem by Dieter Mateschnitz in the Neo-Vague Sakiewiczist style, via the admirably terrieresque Michael Lewis.

In soccer, it can’t happen overnight
It will take a number of years to build a top team.

Winning the championship and reaching the final
cannot be our goal just yet
On the other hand
just
doing well cannot be enough either.
If everyone puts in their utmost effort
and we reach the semifinals, we would consider that a success.

Both the Anschutz Group and Red Bull believe that
famous and international soccer players
joining the MLS will strengthen the league and increase the interest and
fascination of soccer in the U.S.
Corresponding steps are likely to be taken by us, although
this is not a priority
and will happen only
when we move into Red Bull Park.

We are taking it one step at a time
First, we have to build a basic structure
form a solid team, scout for talent, and work on development, etc.
We have to do our homework properly and
only then we can think
about as many big names as the MLS rules will allow

We are confident that Bruce will
build a team that will compete for and ultimately
win a championship
no matter who those players are

We are trying to build the new home for the team and fans
as fast as possible, but
planning procedures and construction work
on Red Bull Park
has to be done properly
We hope it will be open by 2008

We will make use
of as many synergies as possible including
knowledge transfer, common training camps
player exchanges and friendly matches

to build a soccer club and a team
everybody can and will be proud of
including our players, our media partners and above all our fans and supporters
Not only those from the East Coast
but all sports enthusiasts and soccer fans across the U.S.

First we have to win.
We have to be a part of the playoffs on a regular basis
and finish the season in best position possible.
So we have to find the best trainers and
the best players to play intelligent
fast and stout-hearted soccer.

This can only be changed parallel with
the sportive success of the New York Red Bulls.

So there you have it - at the mundane "informational" level, it's merely a smorgasbord of platitudes, puffery, PR, promises tilted in cavalier fashion at the future and wishful thinking, with just one nugget of useful information - if you were banking heavily on any big ZZ-shaped splash in the next few weeks, think again.

My favorite bit of wordy non-information comes in lines 3-7: we cannot legitimately expect to win anything now so don't get your hopes up, but mere everyday success isn't good enough for us, the Mighty All-Conquering Red Bull.
The banality of actual stated goals? Heavens, no, not for us. A visionary poetry of paradox that covers all the bases? Yes!

It is all so oddly comforting to longtime Metro fans, in the sense of eternal return/plus ca change, etc. Vague promises ("we've almost got a practice facility agreement drawn up"), a whole lot of nice-sounding words that mean nothing, and a smattering of excuses why things are currently running behind schedule - it's all we know. Like a warm, fuzzy blanket.

The Metro ghetto of Bigsoccer, as you can well imagine, is enraptured over these "plans" and "vision" of a "true fan."

I looked up do-do-da-douchebaggiest douchebaggery ever, and here's what I found

2007-01-10T14:50:00.000-05:00

We have no doubt it was difficult, but MLS has finally wrangled new owners up to the standards of repulsiveness set by reclusive right-wing zealots, Wal-Mart heirs, and of course, grotesquely perma-tanned Austrian "energy" swill pushers.

That's right - Dookies United.

Typical brilliance from MLS

2006-11-12T16:56:00.000-05:00

Just a quick note from the MLS Cup halftime interview with Don Garber that just aired a moment ago - specifically, a reaffirmation of news from earlier this week that MLS is doing a "cost-benefit analysis" w.r.t. the possibility of bringing David Beckham into the league.

The news isn't really that they're running the numbers. No, it's that they're being so unbelievably, ridiculously public and specific about their target.

These MLS honchos wouldn't make very good poker players, would they? Sigh.

Unless, of course, their "cost-benefit analysis" is really just an routine exercise which tells them the damned obvious; as a good, but limited and hardly world-top-10 player at this point, Beckham's on-field contributions surely won't be worth however many millions MLS pays for him, and it's highly questionable whether his marketing/PR appeal stateside is what some imagine it is - and so this is really just a tactic to get MLS's name in some headlines, here and abroad.

Please don't tell Red Bull about this

2006-10-12T14:40:00.000-04:00

Ah, but I'm sure they're already on top of it.

HireAFan.com (from Deadspin)

"The site has been born after the World Cup of Soccer 2006. During the world cup, I was lacking loyalty to a specific country so I decided to auction off my loyalty via Ebay. The auction was a success with much media interest, and the business of hireafan was born. After my loyalty was secured for Serbia and Montenegro, I discovered there was a market of people that were willing to cheer for any game for a price."

Ha, no shit.

"The concept behind this site is simple. Hireafan.com is exactly as is seems, you pay for a fan to cheer for your team for a specific game. In return for your fan purchase, you will receive advertising on this site, as well as a photograph of your fan in front of a television set during the game."

Gee, anyone know a team with a lot of money to throw away, to go with a glaring lack of attention to its "product"?

Actually, amidst the Beckham-to-MLS nonsense being thrown around last week, someone made the point that for $100 million, the league would be better advised to offer 20 dollar bills to the next 5 million people to come through the gates. That is a sharp take, but at $5 a head this is even more of a bargain.

And it's already got sponsorship from multilevel marketers and online touts? Google is scraping together another billion dollars as we speak.

Dingin' it like Southwest Airlines

2006-10-12T14:22:00.000-04:00

Nicklas Backstrom - Something like the Swedish Ronaldinho of hockey.

Not as incredible as the original, of course, but this looks like it was done without the aid of special effects.

That's what you get for taking down Etcheverry in 1996

2006-10-09T12:07:00.000-04:00

Poor Rob Johnson. Original Metro, the first and best purveyor of the flip throw-in in MLS (hey, anyone could pull that off on the wide sidelines of Giants Stadium or Foxboro, but in Spartan Stadium??) but forever to be remembered Metro fans as the guy who took down Marco Etcheverry for a penalty in the dying minutes of the 1996 Metro-DC playoffs. If only we could go back in time, back to that fall evening at RFK, and remind him not to go flying recklessly in...so much might be different for us today.

(the very epitome of "scything the attacker down")

Now an assistant coach at Temple University, he's one of many Robert Johnsons on the government no-fly list, according to a story on 60 Minutes last night.

DC scum: Still fucking with Rob Johnson, and all of us, ten years later.

The NHL, and comedic decapitation - brought to you by Dodge

2006-10-05T17:42:00.000-04:00

This may have started as a blog dedicated to the fortunes of Metrostars soccer (it's right there in the name, after all) but given the sour-tasting mix of blandness, agitation and indifference CFKAM has been delivering since March, the ever-increasing joylessness that comes from "following" what isn't a club so much as a pure global marketing exercise, I'm so very glad indeed that NHL hockey is back.

But as for hockey fans being back...not so much. At least not the sort who make totally bizarre street hockey-inspired movies like this. Just enough production values (I mean, there's titles! And not just that, but the tinkly sitcom piano, the chiller-thriller shriek sounds) to let you know that a modicum of thought and effort went into this. It would be so much less disturbing - but certainly less funny - if it was just your typical stupid stoner kids joint.

There are at least 3 adults involved with this "production;" clearly, all should be put on a DCYS hotlist, stat. That said, I sure hope that when the NHL rips off Youtube like they're ripping off Myspace (fallen a little behind, haven't they?) the same ~~production company~~ deranged hockey dad has a sequel ready.

Caption contest!

2006-09-27T15:46:00.000-04:00

Name the new Colorado Stadium!

I'll start.

"The Ayers Rock Ground"

The Most Disingenuous Quote In The History Of Soccer

2006-09-22T20:11:00.000-04:00

I can't resist. Step up, Alan Pardew, and tell us about how the ballyhooed arrival of Tevez and Mascherano at West Ham has thrown a few sour notes into the harmonious choir that was their locker room.

"That happens at every big club and [becoming a big club] is hopefully where we are going. The situation will only get worse in terms of players feeling aggrieved they're not playing. All they can do is work hard on the training ground and convince me with their performances that they should be playing.

Will you pardon me a minute while I have a little chuckle at this?

(burns esophagus, sprains abdomen - literally busts a gut, laughing.)

Fitness and availability aside, there is no conceivable "hard work" on the training ground or anywhere else - short of that involving loaves and fishes - which will allow the two starters now consigned to the bench to dislodge the Argentinians in the near future. What a hilarious, if understandable, example of managerspeak.

Minding the Schopp

2006-09-22T20:00:00.000-04:00

(come on, it's not the worst of the Schopp puns you've heard - or will hear)

When a half-decent offensive foray by Marvell Wynne, and Taylor Graham not ending up with an own-goal are your highlights, you realize that ”highlight” can be such an inappropriate word sometimes. Such was the case with Wednesday night’s match against New England – a too-predictable, somnambulant loss in front of eight or nine hundred predictability and somnambulance enthusiasts. The final nail isn’t in the coffin yet, but rather an extremely fat carpenter exhausted himself nailing in the next-to-last, and has fallen deep asleep on the lid. It’s pretty much the same thing.

Oh, and then there was Markus Schopp, whose at-least-he-looks-like-he’s-professional 45 minute coming-out already has some fans looking forward to his contribution next year. Without any concrete knowledge of Herr Schopp’s mindset, first impressions of MLS or (most of all) contract details – with nothing but a pronounced desire to show how clever we can be - let’s spend a moment speculating on the odds of him even being around this team come the new year. The sense here is that chances are, he’s not. Consider some information that’s been making the rounds, as well as what the man said himself at www.markusschopp.at:

“The main reason for my return was Kurt Jara, Salzburg’s new coach….another reason was probably the length of my contract. Salzburg wanted to obligate me for three years – till the EM 2008. I now have the possibility to establish something with this club over 3 years. Until then I hope that my achievements will keep convincing the coach of the Austrian national team and that I will be drafted in for the EM 2008 in Austria.”

Reportedly, one of the factors delaying Schopp’s arrival (besides the proverbial-with-this-team work permit delays – it’s like Giants Stadium was built over an ancient customs and immigration officers’ burial ground) was the prolonged hashing-out of how much of Schopp’s wage Salzburg would continue paying. In which case, the notion that Salzburg and New York would mutually support each other in dominating their respective leagues – vorsprung durch corporate synergy! – looks a little shaky. But it also implies that, despite running him off the team, Salzburg still holds a claim to him (and will, for between one and two more years). Per the usual with MLS transfer announcements, the terms of his move to NJ were “undisclosed.” A loan? A sale? If you can make sense of this interview (wacky google translation), it’s a short-term loan with a player option in December. And that’s what we’ll go with, till someone credible – are you out there, Ives? – tells us differently.

So what, hypothetically, goes into the "opting" part of this player option?

Well, he has to like the team, the league and the atmosphere. Who wouldn’t, after Wednesday night’s stirring display on the field and in the stands?

But furthermore…

If his stated desire to return to the Osterreich mannschaft for a shot at Euro ‘08 is real and not just wishful thinking, then he knows, or he has to know, that he’ll have to get back to Europe post-haste. Markus, it’s just not going to happen in MLS, and that has as much to do with the visibility of MLS in Europe (almost nil) as it does the perceived quality of the league. That in itself might portend a move.

For one thing, European observers have noted his connection to former coach Kurt Jara. So if Jara turns up coaching somewhere in Europe (hardly unimaginable), then a move might soon be in the offing, as well.

Then there’s this; the major difference between acquiring the Djorkaeff-type, free as a bird and wants to go to America to chill type player, and acquiring the JP Garcia/Paco Palencia/Schopp type, who don’t really fit into their home teams’ plans yet can be cajoled/coaxed/paid to do a stint at the branch office (which is what the NJ team is).

In this case, if Schopp sucks, then it’s no help to Metro anyway – just another in a long line of foreign flops. But if he performs well with Metro, he’s a likely bet to be summoned back to Salzburg (who are paying the lions’ share of his salary anyway) or else sold on somewhere else in Europe. This is only the right thing to do, by the way – it would be totally crass of MLS to hold on to him if he can make more money, and increase his chances of making the national team back home.

Of course, it wouldn’t be unheard of, either.

In other words, while grasping at straws is a ritual aspect of Metro fans’ lives, please don’t go getting attached yet.

Wouldn't want to break up that Buddle-Woly tandem anyway

2006-09-21T22:39:00.000-04:00

Need another reason why, fanciful rumors aside, you won't see Ronaldo actually suiting up in MLS next year?

"I'll believe it when I see the..."

2006-09-20T14:20:00.000-04:00

"shovels in the ground." - scores of Metro supporters, on the latest stadium promise (1996-2006)

If you are a Metro fan and live/have lived in the NYC area, you have probably looked out at least once from 280, from the PATH, from an Amtrak train, perhaps even from an plane coming down into Newark, and dreamt of a Metro stadium taking shape behind those great old brick walls around the titanic old Guyon factory in Harrison. I myself built Metro Park a hundred times from a PATH train window back in 2001 (God, it really has been a long time waiting), from the black and red-bedecked Harrison-Metro Park station, to the string of bars overflowing with soccer fans up the Boulevard, to the halo of light hanging over the place on the night of a big game. Someday....someday.

We Metrofans waited a very long time for yesterday's events. Giants Stadium represented virtually everything that held us back, as a team, a soccer league, and as fans. The day marking our escape from it should really be among the greatest, if not the greatest day in this team's history up till now. The fatted calf is still being saved for opening day in the new place, but the second-chubbiest should have felt very, very worried yesterday morning.

It's a shame, then, that I feel so cold about it all right now. My own feelings about "our" team aside (and I use that possessive pronoun cautiously) for the moment, it's hard (especially from a distance) to get a sense of exactly how worked up the remaining Metro fanbase really is. Perhaps that's not entirely fair; I wasn't there and so don't have any firsthand dirt on the days happenings (and given the area's industrial heritage, let's hope no sentimental fans dug up a scoop of earth as a memento, lest their children end up with three eyes, or they themselves develop an aggravating tumor by the weekend.) No doubt those fans who took the day to go down to Harrison were suitably excited. Yet from reading the boards, there's something curiously muted about the whole thing.

Perhaps it the result of senses struck dumb by the whole surreality of shovels really hitting the ground. Perhaps it was weariness brought on by nearly two hours of political pronouncements and mutual backslapping. Perhaps it's the fact that a substantial part of the long-time Metro core, guys and girls who kept the Metros experience passionate and fun and interesting and sharp for years, are gone now. Those who pledged years ago (seriously or not) to order season tickets at twice the GS prices the day the stadium was begun...many have vanished. They've grown older, moved out, had families, or simply lost interest in this. One gets the feeling that everyone, from Garber to RB to the diehard fans remaining, believes this will draw many of them back, along with the much vaunted six million other "soccer-affiliated people" in the region, according to some study Sakiewicz conjured up; one wonders how much they're all depending on that.

I think they're bound to be disappointed.

Metrofanatic's report is, as usual, the most articulate and comprehensive in terms of contextualizing the saga.

Then there's a report from The Kin Of Fish. And photos.

Photos from ESC head honcho jamison.

Press reports from Ives Galarcep, Frank Giase, Jack Bell, and the malodorous end of I95.

A couple things worth pointing out:

I have to question the conclusion made by a number of message boarders, and even tacitly by MF, that we might still be waiting for things to get done in Harrison - or worse - if Red Bull hadn't stepped into the frame. None other than Nick Sak admitted yesterday:

""This deal really got done last August," Sakiewicz said. "When Codey became governor, he sat down and said, 'What will it take to get it done and done the right way?' He set a positive environment.""

Would it have happened with AEG (or someone else) after all? Would we still be holding our breath? All we can say is....it is impossible to say. Still I'm hesitant to bow and scrape too much before Red Bull right now. But then you knew that by now.

Our Favorite Metro Beat Reporter, Galarcep often seems to have two modes - one critical to the point of being strident, the other rather more willing to repeat whatever rationale is coming down the line; never was this more in evidence than in the weeks after the RB takeover, when he swung from positively sycophantic to harshly questioning in the course of about a week. We'll allow him some leeway in playing both sides of the fence; it's gratifying that he, unlike so many others, brought the former attitude along and aired it out a little yesterday -

"Now, about all those fans who have given up. The ones who took one too many trips to an empty Giants Stadium only to deal with overbearing security and buy overpriced concessions and watch an uninspired and oftentimes disappointing team let them down.

Will they come back?

Will Red Bull even make an effort to bring them back, or will Red Bull help realize the worst fears of some die-hard fans who think Red Bulls matches will turn into energy-drink promoting sideshows.

Sounds a little far-fetched? Well, aside from the home-opening festivities in April that included a Shakira concert, what has the new ownership done to attract fans?

In case you haven't noticed, attendances have been steadily declining. No, not the numbers that are announced (which count all tickets distributed), but actually bodies in the seats. Yes, you can argue that the team on the field hasn't exactly done much to make fans want to turn out, but we are still waiting for all these snazzy marketing campaigns from a company considered one of the best in the business at creating buzz, and not just the energy-drink-generated kind."

Youtube finally comes through

2006-08-29T13:57:00.000-04:00

Oh baby, I've been waiting for someone to get this up on Youtube for a while now. Thank you, thank you.

Tell me, why DO you love the Metrostars?

He's like a mobile! brick! wall!

What six goals'll get ya

2006-08-28T14:30:00.000-04:00

In this case, David Hirshey's putative Premiership recap at Deadspin is more a celebration of our Edson (and Ante, whose second goal was disgustingly good*) than anything else. Hmm.

*You know what? Chivas USA is your MLS Cup finalist out of the west this season. Watch and see.

Seven-oh-three

2006-08-23T18:14:00.000-04:00

It took me a moment to figure out why this video turned up after a "Metrostars" search on Youtube. "Metrostars Productions," behind an act called "Most Hated," AND they're out of Virginia? God, you immanent cosmic joker, you.

Not for young or easily offended ears.

The blah is back....and here to stay?

2006-08-23T11:13:00.000-04:00

So if I haven't mentioned it before, I'll do so now; I think that Bigsoccer, which has served as the nerve center/incubator of American soccer fans and culture for the better part of a decade now, ain't the place it used to be. Shall I be polite and say that it's at a low ebb just now? Or offer that the bigger it's gotten, the more it's sprouted separate a myriad of subforums, ranging from South Asian Cuisine and Michigan Municipal Politics to The Slightly Creepy Free For All Community, the more it has lost its way?

That may be part of the reason - and one given by a lot of old-school, been-there-from-the-start Metrofan.com types as they abandoned it en masse for the more cozy, dedicated confines of MF a few years ago. But it's not reason enough for me, given that when I do go on BS, I spend far more time in the off-topics than anywhere else. Much more. Fact of the matter is that nowadays, the soccer-related fora - specifically the MLS News and Analysis and Metro boards - which I frequented most, uh, frequently are a fucking chore to read, and that's being polite. Not to evoke a golden age of yore that never really was (and I go back to the good old days, when Soccer American Graffiti really was the online US soccer community, along with rec.sport.soccer) but the BS boards - Metro, in particular - used to be home to a compact but hardy collection of sharp, critical, well-spoken ~~drunkards~~ supporters. Guys (and a few gals) I liked online, and often enough when I ran into them offline, too.

Now? Too high a count of lotus-eaters and taurine-guzzling shills for my taste. The ratio of exclamatory pap and unfounded assumptions to worthwhile talk must be absolutely incredible, were there anyone masochistic enough to try and calculate it. Whether that's the fault of BS, or a sign that MLS and Metro have managed to slough off that type of core supporter forever - the kind I tend to identify with - I really don't know. Maybe a little of both.

That said, there are still quite a few Bigsoccer posters who I make a point to read because they're damn good, and a few of them seem to be involved with the "Bigsoccer Blog". One of them, Matrim55, weighed in after the Metro-DC match last week with an assertion that "The hate is back." He makes good points, writing entertainingly as always about how hatred of DC took a back seat for a time to hatred of Lalas, what he represented, and what he made of this team. But those days are over now. At least for him. It's time to eat bread again....and hate the DC.

I'm happy he's feeling that way, but as for me...pfft. Pretty much the whole 2006 season has been a pfft for me, for reasons I've touched upon here before (not least in this post last week), but it really hit home last Wednesday night, when I felt...not a damn thing.

How strange. Like any self-respecting Metro supporter, games against DC always meant something special; to try and travel if at all possible, but at the very least to buy my ticket for the emotional roller-coaster as it careened up and down, this team being only one of two that could actually (and I should be ashamed to admit this - or should I?) make me emit tears of rage - or sadness.

We're now six months into Mateschnitz's Brave New World; you've got to figure if it's going to happen, if the "oh, it's only a name, it's still the same team, our team" type of mentality is going to take hold, it's going to do so soon. With momentum on our side, important points to gain, and the much-adored architect of their dynasty on our bench, this was really one to stir the emotions up.

Yet, it didn't. I felt nothing, really. No excitement. No gusto. No ardor. No hatred. Had DC won (an outcome I'm forced into half-hoping for) I couldn't have cared less. Had the Red Donks won, an ever-so-slightly lower level of indifference would have been the result. Not the triumphal glee of old, but the emotional fillip experienced when something bad but insignificant happens to a bad person, i.e. a child molesting embezzler's summer cottage burns down thanks to a wiring fault. Yeah, that's the most effusive I can feel now about this team beating DC. Thanks, RB. And MLS.

Another one tonight. Get your hate on if you like, shrug dismissively if you're like me. You can get your preview from the DC boys if you like; The Kin of Fish appears to be occupied with far more important duties (congrats to him!), and I'm not really the preview-making kind of guy. I feel a little sad for the guys heading down to RFK tonight; it has the whiff of the very ill-fated about it. With a tired, half-strength team and Arena being quoted as, and I paraphrase, not needing nor giving a rat's ass about this competition right now*, I predict a shellacking. But who knows. I'll be doing something else this evening, something other than giving my money to MLSnet and hoping against hope that the stream works correctly.

*I have my own deep skepticism about the conventional view that Arena=our savior, but I'll save that for a little later, so as not to sound any more incessantly churlish than I already do.

Stadium news

2006-08-12T13:21:00.000-04:00

And the crowd! goes! wild! in Soccerboardland, as MLS lets fly with....a drawing. And also (as you've probably heard by now) the announcement that groundbreaking at Harrison is slated for September 19th. Finally.

"OMFG"

"STADIUM AND ARENA,
WE'VE GOT A STADIUM AND ARENA
STADIUM AND ARENA,
WE'VE GOT A STADIUM AND ARENA!!!!!!!!!!!!
Live it, learn it, sing it."

Such first reactions are somewhat understandable. Metro fans have been wandering the desert, so to speak, for almost ten years now. They've sighted oases that turned out to be mirages, and been aggravated. They've endured mustachioed Italian-American Moses promising them he'd dig a well just beyond the next dune, and grown more desperate. They've been made part of the single longest, most played-out joke in American professional soccer, and just about given up hope. So when a date, a real, honest-to-god, break-out-the-ceremonial-silver-shovels groundbreaking date is put out there, you can't be surprised when a bunch of fans run to snatch the silver and blue can, guzzle it, and smack their lips in ecstasy. It could be champagne they're drinking, or it could be warm horse piss and battery acid - it doesn't really matter when you're that thirsty.

They're all gonna call it champagne anyway.

On the good side, it's a nice enough looking place. Better than the current crop of MLS concert-specific facilities? Perhaps, but that's not for me to say - out of the four, I've only been to Columbus, which is what it is. LA looks like a fine place, I guess - from the vantage point of my couch, it's the best venue we've got going in this country. I admit, I like Dallas's eternally-unfinished-construction-site look, what with the bare concrete walls along the playing field, the smell of fresh sawdust and epoxy everywhere you turn (but enough about the Pizza Hut stands). It's certainly unique, sort of a exurban Texas take on Wrigley's ivied bricks, and I hope they keep it that way. As for Chicago, well, if nothing else you can see how cagey AEG was in hiring John Guppy; obeying a corporate mandate to keep the Firehouse in mint condition as long as possible, he's deploying a set of battle-tested strategies (ask a Metro fan) to keep the seats unused, the concourses unscuffed, the whole place immaculate and virginal forever.

That IS what's going on in Chicago, correct?

Anyway, here's to those putting their blind faith in artists' conceptions, carefully selected images and such; best be careful around real estate prospectuses and Match.com, I say. For me, the best thing to remember here is that the long Meadowlands nightmare is nearing its end, and that there'll be a stadium for our team - or some team - in Harrison where it belongs. And that it'll be there long after the soda hucksters have gone away.

Meanwhile, let's just hope that season ticket holders get priority seating for the real main event at Harrison in '08 (or '09, or '10 - soon enough, at any rate): NY/NJ/X Games. AEG+RB+ESPN+the NYC metro area = you're crazy if you think this isn't happening sometime in the next few years.

That was the HDC last weekend. Can't wait to see how it plays next game.

Oh, and as for tonight's match. Do you really think Barcelona is going to be content to leave without beating the holy hell out of someone? Me neither. Prediction: Dunno bout you, but I'd take Barca -2 goals. Have the feeling it's going to be one of those nights.

The Very Opposite of Bling

2006-08-10T13:50:00.000-04:00

Poor Mateschnitzoids.

It's halfway through August, only 5 months since the Great Taurinated Leap Forward Into Glory, yet - shocker of shockers - it's still impossible to procure an authentic replica RBNY jersey (though I do know a fella in Union City who can do the job for you - how many do you need?)

What's a corporate sycophant to do - well, besides dribble excitedly about the foreign stepbrother team who (rightfully) couldn't care less about you?

You could drop eighty bucks on this fine accessory. I only wish I was kidding.

Anyone sensing the profound irony of producing rings for a team that hasn't ever won jack? Sure, you might be able to shift a few, but as merchandising priorities go, tacky-ass rings should really be down somewhere between logo-emblazoned miniature treasure chests for fish tanks, and logo-emblazoned aluminum siding. Who, who would wear this thing?

Funny thing is, I had "ice" just like this when I was a kid. I won it from the chicken machine at the local Grand Union, it was only $79.75 cheaper, and doubtlessly a lot more fun to get.

The halfway mark: Some analyze the league, Metrologist analyzes itself

2006-08-08T21:29:00.000-04:00

I admit I was a little surprised, but not totally flabbergasted recently when Dan R, major domo of the utterly essential, newsbreaking and wiki-worthy Metrofanatic.com, let slip that he nearly shut down the site a few weeks back.

"What I didn't write in this article is that I almost closed the site a couple of weeks ago. The website was supposed to support the team, but at this juncture, one of my biggest reasons to support this team is this very site. So please, let me call this team what I want. Lots of people like the nickname."

Had he done so, that would have left Metro diehards with just one place to congregate - a place that has certainly seen better days, at least as far as Metro commentary goes (but hey, its just peaking now if you're into immense off topic random thought threads, cut-and-pastings of tiresome, aggrieved emails to Jamie Trecker or Paul Gardner, and a smattering of freaky Michelle Lissel and Max Bretos fanboys); I would wager that most of the colorful, worthwhile Metro posters that migrated exclusively to MF a few years ago wouldn't slosh back as a result, but simply find something else to do with their lives, and that would be a loss. Had he done so, he would have put me out of a home page and one of the ten or so sites I check religiously throughout the day, everyday. And had he done so, I would have totally understood why, and not blamed him a bit for it. I've come so close to doing the same thing here, and I've got a whole hell of a lot less history, faithful readers, and personal investment in this humble endeavor than he does with MF.

Why throw in the towel now? you might ask. After all, Metrofanatic.com negotiated the tumult of the past six months, and especially the first few weeks, as deftly as possible. Somehow, it - he - found a way to define MF being broadly against the whole sale/name-change debacle while keeping the allegiance of those who remain for it - a delicate balancing act that some (yours truly, for example) couldn't do. The first couple months were awfully tough for anyone who put time and energy into red and black, so Metro diehards got a free pass to vanish then. If it's six months on and you're still here, the sting ought to be fading away a little, no?

Well, I can't speak for Dan R at MF, but I don't think it's fading. In fact, the above paragraphs are less about Metrofanatic, more a prologue to my own thoughts on this site, infinitesmally less significant, but an effort all the same. You may have noticed - or maybe you didn't, so take a moment to scroll down the page, or else just trust me on this - that I've been posting here less and less frequently as the season goes on. There are some good reasons for that: a hefty workload which only recently abated, the World Cup, and an extended trip abroad are but a few. Suspend your disbelief for a moment as I outlandishly claim that the first half of the MLS regular season isn't a nailbiting dramafest, demanding blow-by-blow deconstruction.

But sprawling once-a-month-posts do not a very interesting or topical blog make; (realizing that, I'm tempted to quote Ferris Bueller after the credits: what are you doing here, anyway?) I've fallen off the pace because it just isn't a lot of fun following this team. Not because they've been mostly bad and mostly rudderless most of the season; Metro has been very bad and very rudderless for practically all of its existence. We're used to that. We revel in that, almost as much as we burned to get out of that rut. You could write a lot of funny, sad, angry stuff about a bad, bad team. No team in MLS has has more funny, sad, angry stuff written about it than the Metros over the first 11 years.

No, for me it hasn't been much fun and I've written next to nothing for one reason; despite all the language and symbol gestures we prickly supporters might make amongst ourselves, we're still referring to a team named after, emblazoned with, controlled by a fizzy drink maker now. It's just not the same. That's still hard to block out, to make obscure, and we can only succeed to a point. Beyond that, I steadfastly believe that whatever success the Red Bull experiment might have in the short-term (a cup win here or there, perhaps) the end result will be failure. Failure that dents their bottom line a little and really does a job on us. It won't be good for American soccer, depending on how and when it shakes out, but more importantly, it won't be good for us as diehard fans, supporters of a certain vision. It's hard to look out for the success of a team, or the growth of its support, when you're thinking like that.
A few years ago, some of us would throw the term aguante around the Metro boards and stands. What's aguante? Let's ask Youtube.

You can substitute whatever corollary of "passion," from whichever country you desire. Whatever. There's simply something perverse and futile in an American soccer fan, much less a Metro fan accustomed to denatured sub-5000 crowds, seeing that and thinking "that's what we're going for." Perverse and futile, because by the time an MLS crowd has a fraction of a fraction of that size and passion, I'll be long dead and gone. Yet that's been the dream and the objective all the same. To get to something like that, even if it was only a couple hundred of us.

The simple fact (and the thing that makes "Embrace The Colors" ever more irritating, stupid and phony a slogan each time I see it) is that no decent amount of people are ever, ever going to feel that passionate about "Red Bull." That's what I think. I daresay that if I'm wrong about that and some hundreds of people went nuts with Red Bull aguante, I'd be repulsed enough to consider rescinding my membership with the human race. I wouldn't want to know any of those people, that's for damn sure.
But I don't think it's really possible. I don't think there are enough people willing to make themselves, quite literally, "passionate" tools. If you feel that way, there's only one real sensible stance to take, as far as I can see - you want to see Red Bull fail, and the quicker the better.

In the past few months, I've discovered that's hardly an enjoyable way to exist as a fan, and even less a motivation to blog.

All this - what ARE you doing still reading? - might seem like its leading to the winding-up of this blog. Unexpectedly (as in, when I started a little while ago, I wasn't sure what I'd be writing at this point) it isn't. Ah shit you say, what a waste of my time when I could have been reading Deadspinor something. Well, maybe. But it's a good time to be reading - and writing, as it were - about soccer in the US; there's a blog community worth being a part of. So I think I'll stick around a little bit longer. Happy halfway point.

The essence of Metro, last night in Colorado. Poor Colorado.

2006-07-21T13:38:00.000-04:00

What a strange, strange little game they had last night there in Colorado. If you missed it - and how could you not prioritize a Thursday night Chivas-Rapids battle? - then you missed much of the last six years of Metro history encapsulated in one match.
Or rather, encapsulated in just thirty-some minutes. I tuned in around the 60th minute myself, just in time to see:

The Incredible Ballooning Clint Mathis winding up with all the agility of a creaky gate, nudging a volley into a empty net. Because it's a volley and the powers that be tend to wet themselves over such things, it'll certainly contend for MLSNET goal of the week honors. And that will be ludicrous. I see, or score, a goal like this around once a week in the park. 2 goals on the season for Clint, which puts him ahead of last year's pace, I guess.

Mike Petke barging an opposing midfielder over for a soft second yellow and early shower. A little clumsy by Mike, but that dimwitted call put Colorado under the gun for the last 25 minutes, and they didn't prove up to the task. Brings a tear to the eye of the nostalgic Metro fan.

Jonathan Bornstein scoring an extra-time goal straight out of Clint Mathis '00. Now that's what we used to get.....for about 8 weeks before he tore up that knee.

And finally, a Bob Bradley team giving up the lead, a minute after grabbing it in extra time, and settling for a draw.

It couldn't get much more like Metro.

This and that - July 13 edition

2006-07-13T18:02:00.000-04:00

Forgive me for being away for a while, but I didn't know the Galaxy has signed former almost-Metro Ante Jazic.

I did know, however, that Bob Bradley-coached teams have had a bad habit of stepping on landmines in recent US Open Cups.

Coming soon: A frisson of excitement?

2006-07-13T16:51:00.000-04:00

Multiple whispers have Bruce Arena as the next coach/GM of the Reds. We should have definitive word by the weekend, shortly after Friday's sparsely-attended, uncompelling matinee defeat.

You didn't have to be a clairvoyant to see Arena ending up in the Meadowlands sooner or later. Several years ago I figured that we'd end up with Arena running the Metros post-WC'06, after doing a little dosie-do with Bob Bradley. Of course, Bob didn't hang around long enough for that (nor did the "Metros", but that's a different story).

It works nicely on multiple levels. There's the sort-of homecoming for Brooklyn-born Bruce. Moreover, there's the appeal (taste the irony) of taking over MLS's "marquee" club - that marquee being the one on the wretched old movie palace downtown that's been shuttered for 3o years. It's been 8 years since Arena guided DC, but it's still hard not to see black-and-red there, so that's a storyline to be thumped again and again. It's a little weak by this point, however - time, the cumulative suckage of this club, and the fact that Metro has had everyone from Jaime Dog Moreno to Richie Williams to Kevin Payne associated with the team makes it hard to get all agitated about another DC guy. For that matter, I reckon most DC fans would rather see Bruce go overseas or upstairs at Soccer House than come to Jersey - either he succeeds, at their expense, or follows in the proud tradition of accomplished coaches who come to Metro to destroy/kneecap their own legacies. Of which DC is a fundamental part, in Arena's case.

Solid as the story sounds, we'll see how it all plays out. Reports also have RB making eyes at Jurgen Klinsmann for some sort of unspecified front office role, which makes you wonder just a little if the team is just playing PR games by getting their names associated with all the big names in American soccer coaching circles - that is, both of them.

Is he the man to start draining the taurine-tinted morass in East Rutherford? Eh, I won't be banking on it. But, at least he gives good quote. The gang over at MLS HQ must already be dancing a jig over the return of Mr. Diplomatic.

The Capello rumor

2006-05-24T09:10:00.000-04:00

Yesterday afternoon came the almost-unbelievable-yet-somehow-feasible story that Mateschnitz is ready to offer Juve boss Fabio Capello $5 million, and some Lotharesque perks (any places in Trump Tower open?) to escape the mushrooming Italian soccer scandal and coach in NJ. For one year, anyway.

Since rumors generated by the Italian press have earned a reputation for being more or less watertight, we're going to go right ahead and take this as a done deal. Farewell Mo! Welcome Fabio!

No, really, this would be us throwing a finely-appointed lifeline to a guy who, world-class manager and all, has no knowledge of or experience with the weird world of MLS nor the American player, but could probably use a year or so away from the glare of the Italian courts and media. That's one reason, I guess, why we should even be bothered to give this rumor the time of day; I can think of exactly five million others.
So, make a "splash" by throwing some soda money at a guy who'll likely do a Queiroz after eight months or so, leaving us back at square one?
Yep, that's just exactly what this team needs to do right now.

The sun is out for the first time in months

2006-05-20T16:19:00.000-04:00

So no time for anything but today's picks just now.

Houston 2 Chicago 0
Colorado 2 DC 1
Metro Reds 0 Chivas 1
FCD 2 New England 2
RSL 2 KC 0
Galaxy 0 Colorado 0

Piling on

2006-05-15T16:49:00.000-04:00

It's not going to make us feel any better, but, I can't help myself here after checking out some just-released WC rosters (still waiting on you, Togo!). Like, Trinidad & Tobago's.

Look at the one and only alternate. A name from the past - Evans Wise. Evans Wise!

That's right, people. We're one strained Trini hamstring or tainted goat curry away from having the Tampa Bay Mutiny put more players in the World Cup than the Metros.

Abbe Ibrahim - remember him?

2006-05-15T13:29:00.000-04:00

It's WC roster deadline day, and just like you I'm frenetically clicking refresh on the Togo page at Fifaworldcup.com and waiting to see if Abbe's been named to the African debutantes. As for this slimmest of chances that someone (sort of) from Metro will be reprasentin' in Deutschland....it's not looking good for him, since he isn't listed in the squad for the Togo team that lost 1-0 to the Saudis yesterday in Holland.

As MF.com has explained, that may in fact be a little beneficial for us, at least if you want to see him back as a Metro Red anytime soon. After telling him, his physical attributes and raw style to get lost over the winter, Mo evidently woke up one morning and realized his striking options were, well, shit, and meager shit at that. Cue an interminable period of visa problems (we don't know where the culpability lies, but MF insinuates that the team was partly to blame for these) Togo national team training camps, and so on. We're still waiting. The official Togo Football Federation site - surely the only offish national team webpage with naked Kelis photos posted front and center* - is shockingly devoid of reports on the situation.

But if it is true that the team is only offering Abbe a $10,000 developmental contract, can you blame him for looking elsewhere? I'd go fishing for a while, too.

On the other hand, with Peguero scoring this weekend, and the news that Jozy Altidore is back, and scoring with the reserves, one wonders if there's that much interest from the Metro end anymore, anyway.

*Ha! Made you look. Can't wait to see how my keyword stats are skewed by people searching for "naked Kelis photos".

Red Bull: tasting an awful lot like Hateorade

2006-05-13T10:47:00.000-04:00

If I listened long enough to you
I'd find a way to believe that it's all true
Knowing that you lied straight faced while I cried
Still I look to find a reason to believe

Someone like you makes it hard to live
Without somebody else
Someone like you makes it easy to give
Never thinking of myself

If I gave you time to change my mind
I'd find a way to leave the past behind
Knowing that you lied straight faced while I cried
Still I look to find a reason to believe

So the two or three fortnights of our discontent have brought us to where schmaltzy covers of tragic folkies mean something deep...deep, man. Metro Reds fans - the very few that are left, going by the dismal non-Shakira-doubleheader home crowd and tumbleweedy message boards - are looking hard for something, anything to latch on to with this team. Can you name much of anything that qualifies, offhand? The fact that Meola is still ambulant at his advanced age and capable of keeping us (somewhat) close? The fact that Jeff Parke has rediscovered his almost-being-thought-of-as-a-possibility-for-the-fringe-of-the-US-B-team form? The fact that Marvell Wynne hasn't been eaten by a marauding wolf, or had his legs broken by a marauding Franchino? Beyond that, what? Michael Lewis reels off facts and stats that draw a picture of one of the worst starts in team and league history.

It just isn't much fun being a Metro Reds supporter right now. You can hold your cheap catcalls about "was it ever?" Yes, there have been plenty of times in the 1o years prior when a little frisson of fun did bubble up through the mediocrity. And at least things could be interesting. Right now, they're not even interesting. This is a badly built (or badly deconstructed, then hastily abandoned) team we're stuck with right now, reliable producers of the most mind-numbing matches of the week in MLS (the Chivas 0-0 draw, I thought, was a not-scintillating, not-totally-abysmal exception) and its hard not to tip over into sheer negativity when you realize this. If you're going to devote any attention to them at all.

Negativity swiftly stops being fun, too, unless it becomes your stock in trade - the bitter, poisonous fuel of those grubby crabs who follow consistent, hopeless cellar dwellers and revel in their destiny as losers. They need to lose to be who they are, gleefully wallowing in and tasting their own poison, because they'll be forced to swallow it anyway. Metro supporters may have a little of that knowing masochism and will to suffer in their makeup, but I'll be damned if I go through much more of it for the sake of a marketing project like RBNY.

Still I look to find a reason to believe.

As someone stung on multiple levels by the March changeover, I know I've been exceedingly critical and down on the whole RB thing. Negative all along. We're now 2 months into the new era, and, unfortunately, I've been more right than wrong about where and how this is going. Right that it would upend the team on and off the field in bad ways, right that Red Bull wasn't going to recast us as "more traditionally European" (people who think a sponsor on the front of the shirt = European ought to ask around for some help), right that nothing of substance was changing in the short-term (this season), right that the only thing in it for us now is the surrender of the club's identity, name and colors - the things that real supporters care about most, because these things are what we started with and are our continuity. Not because they weren't contrived or conflicted at some point, either. But we all bought into it and made it ours.

There are a whole set of assumptions some hopeful folks continue counting on - Red Bull has tons of money they're dying to spend, Red Bull won't stand for losing. I'll work on picking those apart in the next few days, because I don't think they're necessarily founded in reality. There's another assumption that I find especially troubling; the one which holds that we might just throw this transition year away, and come back strong next year when RB has all its people and players - Ronaldos and Figos, of course - in place. Then you'll see what New York soccer is all about!

What a disastrous line of thinking that is. RB already used up its honeymoon/fresh start card with the New York area public, and has been following it up with duds ever since. This organization only needs 2006 to approach the '99 level of futility, and they'll be solidly and permanently irrelevant here. Does that sound too dark? Permanently irrelevant?

Yes, permanently. I think this organization, and MLS, are uncomfortably close to losing any shot at the NYC soccer market.

Still I look to find a reason to believe.

We've been talking about must-win games for so long now that it sounds farcical to talk about today being a need-to-have. But if we can't win at home tonight, against a Chicago team that's been making abundant use of that Motel 6 league sponsor deal, then when can we? Moreover, does Mo survive if we don't? After him, the shakeout of shakeouts.

BigAppleSoccer says we'll be doing without Buddle, Graham and Magee today. So unless it's a negative number, I'd take the under. And even then, it might be worth a shot.

Ives says Steve Jolley makes his season debut in the 3-5-2, and Marvell Wynne sits. That's not going to help his march to the Rookie of the Year award.

Speaking of the BR - "Red Bulls need a shakeup"; "Red Bulls need wings" - just when will the Bergen Record headline writer exhaust his supply of broad, cutesy drink-related references?

Predictions:
Last week was a strong one for everyone from the Reds (hey, they didn't drop any points) to me, as I tipped back over .500: current record (as of the morning of 5/13) - 17-16 (3 correct scores).

Dallas 3 Houston 1
New England 2 Chivas 1
Metro Reds 1 Chicago 1
Columbus 2 Colorado 0
DC 2 KC 2
Galaxy 1 RSL 0

My Bye Week

2006-05-06T15:52:00.000-04:00

Just predictions for the moment:
Last week saw my record dip below .500 for the first time in 2006. Trying to pick it up with...

New England 2 Galaxy 0
KC 1 Chicago 1
Houston 3 Dallas 1
RSL 2 Columbus 1
Colorado 1 DC 0

Eric Wynalda's World Cup predictions

2006-05-01T14:40:00.000-04:00

Czech Republic 1, Ditk....ah....Taylor Twellman 13
Taylor Twellman 9, Italy 2
Taylor Twellman 40, Ghana 0

I'm only joking a little.

"First stage prediction: The U.S. beats the Czechs 1-0 (on a set piece), ties Italy 1-1 and destroys Ghana 3-0 to earn a birth into the next round."

Uh huh.

Commercializing soccer: the good side

2006-05-01T09:04:00.000-04:00

Maradona for Brazil was worth a laugh, and the new Gatorade US Soccer spot is a nice recap of where we've been in the last year and a half, but this Carlsberg ad from the UK takes the prize for the winningest soccer ad I've seen in a long time. If you've ever dragged your ass out of bed on a Saturday or Sunday morning to have a game, you'll see everything about it is just perfect. Except you didn't play for what's probably the best pub team in the world. Thanks to the Matchnight blog for the link.

Direct Kickin' Again - the 47th round edition

2006-04-30T16:19:00.000-04:00

"Here's Justin Mapp, opening up his legs again."

Thank you, New England PbP Guy, for inspiring me to shut off the TV and do something with my Sunday.

More Direct Kickin' - the 10:56er

2006-04-29T22:58:00.000-04:00

From the "huh - who woulda thought" files:

"Niemi twice denied Trevor Sinclair and also Claudio Reyna, although David James was hardly idle in the City goal. The impressive Simon Elliott brought an excellent fingertip save from the England keeper, although Cottagers skipper Luis Boa Morte should have done far better than glance a close-range header wide seven minutes before the break." (http://soccernet.espn.go.com/report?id=186091&cc=5901)

"9 - Clint Mathis" (http://www.mlsnet.com/MLS/scoreboard/game.jsp?match=04292006_HOUCOL)
Note the conspicuous absence of a little red arrow and "70" afterwards. Wow.

So, who was in charge of Taylor Graham's uniform tonight? 5 demerits for forgetting about the "Red Bulls" on the back (alternatively, well done on that one, now try to "forget" about the other 10 next time), and 3 off for affixing the Adidas logo somewhere around "epaulet on an army tunic" level.

Speaking of, I want to like Graham. Really, I do. A lot of Metrofanatics were skeptical of an A-League defender with his pedigree amounting to much, but I saw the possibility of another Mendes, or even Zavagnin story. So far, the skeptics have been right and I've been wrong. He's scaring the bejesus out of me back there. Come on Taylor, find your feet already.

So, if you'd written a script for "Metro: The Movie", you couldn't NOT write this part of the script; it's been a shitty start to the season, but finally the team looks half focused, like maybe they'll find a way to scratch out a desperately needed away result. It's neck and neck, and the first goal could make all the difference in the world; that's when the key to the offense pulls up lame 60 yards from where he SHOULD be. And where is our second best option on offense on this most crucial of nights? In a pink cumberbund, doing the Electric Slide at the Villa Maria Banquet & Catering Hall in Hasbrouck Heights.

Direct Kickin' - 8:24 edition

2006-04-29T20:26:00.000-04:00

Notes and gripes:

Could John Harkes possibly employ more words to less effect than he does now on the DC telecast? After Greg Vanney cleaned Freddy Adu out a little roughly from behind, Harksie indulged us in a typical 10 second stream-of-consciousness tangent that somewhere, somehow, may pass for "commentary" - but to the rest of us just sounds stupid and pointless. It went a little something like this; "well, that's Vanney, with all his experience, playing in Europe, in France for a few years, and he was with the LA Galaxy before that, and then he came back here to MLS to play for Dallas." Well thank you, John, for the nonlinear career capsule, but w.t.f.? Combine him with the guy who yelps "It's in the net! It's in the net!" - still the clear winner for most shockingly awful trademark goal call around - and you have a broadcast team that gives me a migraine. These guys could make Brazil '70 vs. Team Cloned-Ronaldinho an unwatchable drag.

Don't look now, but Ben Olsen has struck again in his insidious one-man plot to sabotage the 2006 US World Cup effort by making the team. Yep - following that weak dribbler against Jamaica that my seven year old cousin would have palmed away imperiously, the former American Taliban-alike cued another one off the end of the bat and through the infield for a seeing-eye base-goal tonight. Nedved and Essien are now furiously saying novenas for him to complete the hat trick in the second half and nip that last spot in the US midfield.

That Freddy Adu - besides being kinda fast, and having a nice stepover or two, is having a blinder tonight. As in, I think he's crossing with his eyes closed or something. Nightmare.

Nice strike by Ronnie O'Brien to tie things up, certainly aided by Troy Perkins going after it with all the alacrity of a slapstick fat man chasing a bunch of papers around in a stiff wind.

Predictions

2006-04-29T16:34:00.000-04:00

Quick predictions, more later.

RSL 2 Galaxy 4
DC 2 FC Dallas 0
Columbus 1 KC 0
Colorado 2 Houston 3
Chivas 2 Metro 1
New England 3 Chicago 0

Season record: 11-11 (2)

Caution: rehabilitation of Diego entering "cute phase"

2006-04-26T01:48:00.001-04:00

If Maradona suffers nightmares of playing for Brazil after a little too much Guarana Antarctica, what the hell kind of bad soccer dreams was he having back when he was neck-deep in the charlie?

"Something involving Exit 16W, synthetic turf, and a smiling, moustachioed Italian-American man," he answered, all too cynically.

One glorious afternoon in the Swamp

2006-04-23T11:29:00.000-04:00

If you were at the Meadowlands on Saturday afternoon, you couldn't help but feel astonished at what you saw. You hoped - no, you expected it might be something like that. But that good? Really? Never mind the previous forms of the two teams - a story of two sides going in opposite directions quickly. This is an ongoing blood feud, and those rarely yield laughers.

So it seemed this one would be a nailbiter, too. What started off as a close contest changed dramatically about halfway in. All too inevitably, the more organized, more discipline, more spirited, all around better side seized the game by the scruff of the neck and took it away. It was decided early in the second stanza by a irresistible flurry of goals, but the piece de resistance, for me anyway, came in the latter stages of the tilt; a broken play, a swift turnover, and then in one delectable move, our forward controlled, stepped, and casually back-heeled over to a wide-open teammate for an easy goal. Stylish. Astonishing.

Yes, for a Devils fan like me, beating the living hell out of the Rangers was like a two and a half hour orgasm.

And oh, the Reds played at the same time across the parking lot? So they did. "Played," if you're being charitable. I'm only being charitable out of pity, pity for the players and coaching staff, who have been thrust into an untenable situation and are doing what they can. I don't believe that the talent gap between this team and the rest of MLS is that wide - there are good players on this Metro side. Nor is Mo Johnston necessarily a coaching charlatan. But given all that's gone on - not just in the past week, but since the takeover itself, Saturday's result shouldn't have surprised anyone. I didn't make it through the entire match - too busy watching the Devils-Rangers game in the company of an agonizing Blueshirt buddy to bother with it, to be honest - but I saw enough. Right now, this team's got nothin'. But we knew that, didn't we? The parts aren't there, and what parts are there, aren't working right. What was most startling Saturday was the sense that those rumors we've been hearing about Youri - those saying that he detests the whole Red Bull takeover, that he came over to have some fun playing and win a championship here, and is inclined to eye the exit now - is being reflected a little in his play, a little more in rumors that he and Amado are on the outs (if they were ever on the ins).

The only semi-interesting thing about this game would be the admittedly "dumb" post-goal celebration by Helmet Boy. Was it classless? Funny? Clever? Disrespectful? Worthy of a card? Or should everyone just shut up about it already? Over on the winning side of things, DCenters tries to equate it with Clint Dempsey's rococo celebrations, like his home run swing at the home of the Washington Nationals last season.
Well, that's not quite right, D. As much as both kinds of celebration are premeditated (like a lot of goal celebrations, of course), there is a significant degree of difference - a more caustic brand of salt for the wound - when you start adding props into the mix. Nor was this prop the self-glorifying, look-at-me kind, like Joe Horn and his hidden cellphone. The spirit of this was pure show-them-up, in-their-face, and in their house.

Thing is, why should we care? On one level, I don't. Make fun of Red Bull, for all I care. It's a stupid product, with a stupid name, and a stupid image which I've got no affinity for. The problem is, its stupid identity is now firmly tied to the identity of this team, leaving it wide open to dopey, contrived shit like Special Alecko's stunt. Funny funny, ha ha.
However, if you're a team in crisis (and this team clearly is), on the edge of coming apart at the seams (as I believe this team is), you have to do something there to show you still have a pulse. That you're not just going to be trod over and made to look like a gutless laughingstock in front of the few fans left caring.

There were 18 minutes between Eskandarian's second goal - the de facto end of the contest, given the toothlessness of the Metro Red attack - and his substitution out of the game; that was ample time for someone in Red to attempt to seat Alecko in the stands for 6-to-52 weeks. And it's an indictment (as well as a damn shame) that not one player on this shambling, disconnected bunch of individual runners wearing a meaningless shirt had the ability, the will, or the nuts to try it. Medieval, brutal and rashly unsportsmanlike? Yes, of course; it's also quite likely what would happen if this was a team in anything other than name, something more than a simulacrum of a soccer club. Ask Mo or Youri about the probable results, if someone pulled that playground crap in a league they played in. It wouldn't likely be pretty, and the odds on that team ending up with a Fair Play award would lengthen considerably, but so be it. Is it too much to ask, for someone to Roy-Keane-on-Alf-Inge-Haaland him? Go finish the job Matt Reis started, for God's sake. Try and do something in response.
Look, it was damned apparent to anyone with a pair of eyes that this team was not getting back into the game, so "score a bunch of goals" isn't really the answer. Yet you have to do something, anything. Eric Wynalda actually observed something valuable (yeah, shocked me too) when he noted how the team's reaction to Youri's goal, well, sucked. This team is anything but right now, and with more change imminent, it's going to get a lot worse before it gets better.

Well, at least we've got the Devils.

More on them, and other stuff, later

.500

2006-04-22T02:07:00.000-04:00

Another dud week for Metrologist predictions saw me go 2-4, bringing me up to 9-9 for the season. On the bright side, I did nail one of the correct scores (my first of the season). Unfortunately for Metro fans like me, the one I got was the gasping, grasping 1-1 road draw to a wilted RSL.

For those of you keeping track (and surely, the only one doing so is me), my 9-9 puts me 2 behind Marc Connelly, 2 ahead of Jeff Bradley, and well ahead of Ives Galarcep, who went 1-5 in his first week of picks.

Week 4

DC 3 Reds 1 (I hate to think this'll be the game in which we break. Prove me wrong, guys. Please.)
Houston 2 RSL 1
LA 2 Columbus 0
FCD 2 KC 2

MLS's Worst Kept Secret No Longer Secret

2006-04-16T20:34:00.000-04:00

Goal.com (and Univision TV in New York, according to online observers) is reporting what we all already knew: Alexi Goes To Hollywood.

Well, at least he was upfront about the situation up to this point.

Let the fireworks begin.

Matchups, predictions, and a thought on capped Reds

2006-04-15T12:52:00.000-04:00

Randomness:

Kin of Fish has your Red-RSL breakdown here. He's calling them "must-have points," which I semi-sorta agree with, but he imagines we'll end up having them in the end. I don't see it. Hate to be the pessimist, but this game absolutely stinks of draw to me. 1-1 is my prediction.

I've been shadowing the Bradley-Connelly Derby going on over at Marc's blog; after a hot 5-1 start, last week wasn't nearly so good to me. 2-4 in week 2 puts me at 7-5 (0 correct scores) which knots up the Battle of Connecticut (Connelly's a fellow CT-er, in case ya didn't know.)
Here's my list for week 3.

Columbus 2 Chicago 1
DC 1 Houston 1
KC 2 New England 0
Colorado 1 Dallas 0
RSL 1 Reds 1
Chivas 2 Galaxy 1

Watching Tony Meola get his 100th cap against Jamaica on Tuesday got me wondering; if that's the last time he gets called up by Bruce (and all things being equal, I'll wager that it is) how long will it be before we see another Red called up for the US? Sometime in 2007? With no one else in the present group of 35, and very few of them even knocking on the door, it's very possible isn't it? Perhaps another question should be, who's going to be the next Metro to get called up to the national team? Buddle? Wynne? Arvizu or Altidore? It could be quite a while before a Red is wearing red white and blue again.

Worth reading

2006-04-15T00:17:00.000-04:00

Here's an provocative piece on Red Bull marketing and obscure extreme sport events like kiteboarding to Cuba, which you might be interested in. It's a bit of an eye-opener for those out there who think Red Bull = standard, intuitive marketing in any way shape or form, and sheds some light on what RB's "marketing genius" is really based upon. Question is, does so-called "murketing" sell soccer in the U.S.? Call me very, very skeptical.

A few choice snippets.

"You don't drink this stuff for the flavor — it's been described, accurately, as tasting like liquid Sweetarts — but for the effect. It’s supposed to give you a boost — it "vitalizes body and mind," as the can puts it. Presumably this explains why Red Bull associates itself with fringe athletics. Marinkovic joined me by my umbrella. I asked him about the drink, and he stared at the Red Bull can in his hand. But he didn’t say anything about the various promises printed on the back ("Increases endurance," "Stimulates the metabolism," and so on). "It makes a good mixer with Vodka," he said. "And it’s kind of a hangover cure."

***

Maybe it was the Red Bull, but the beach scene struck me as odd. It wasn't the apparent incongruity of a drink postures as an aid to sporting achievement but is also widely used as a party potion. Nor was it the maddening uncooperativeness of Red Bull's PR flacks, which I'd experienced from the moment I first contacted the company. (I'd originally been invited to ride in one of the boats escorting the kiteboarders to Cuba. Then I was disinvited. Then the trip was postponed and I was invited again. But it was postponed again; from there I entered an information-free loop of shifting dates and contingencies. I finally compromised and decided I would accompany the crew only as far as Key West.)

No, what seemed weird was that this was a marketing event no one knew about. There was no advance press release. There was no Red Bull tent set up to attract local news crews to cover this zany enterprise, or hand out free samples to curious onlookers. For that matter there were no curious onlookers.

***

"Usually the wizards of branding want to be extremely clear about what their product is for and who's supposed to buy it. Red Bull does just the opposite. Everything about the company and its sole product is intentionally vague, even evasive. While the drink appears to be targeted specifically at someone — extreme athletes, ravers, cosmopolitan students — the brand identity is actually pretty nebulous."

***

Mateschitz avoids such nagging issues by almost never being interviewed, and my requests to speak with him were turned down flat.

"He doesn't like the media," offered Emmy Cortes, Red Bull's U.S. spokeswoman. But she assured me he is "a very charismatic gentleman" in his "midfifties," single, and "kind of a playboy." Here she added an impish laugh, which seemed a little practiced. "Not even that many people in the company have met — or even seen a picture of — Dietrich. He's almost like a myth within the company." Again with the laugh. Cortes also told me I would not be able to speak with Red Bull’s marketing and strategic planning chiefs for North America, where the drink first appeared in 1997. This coyness, she explained, was of a piece with "the mystique of the brand."
(Hmm, that's just what I want in a guy running my team. Didn't we already have one of those guys?)

***

"Red Bull has supposedly crafted a strong identity for a specific target audience; the truth is that its identity is purposefully indistinct. Reticence, you see, is the first rule of murketing: Stay silent about what it is that makes you different, and eventually someone else will supply the answers."
(Again, does this strike you as a winning formula to market soccer?)

***
(Be sure to read through to the end, and note the difference between what happened between Florida and Cuba, and what Red Bull said happened...)
"All of which brings us to the final lesson of murketing, which is: Never let the truth get in the way of your brand’s message."

Makes me feel all warm and fuzzy inside.

A Vote For Giorgio Is A Vote For Fun

2006-04-11T15:58:00.000-04:00

A few days ago on Metrofanatic, I speculated that by the end of the week, both protagonists in the offseason Amado-Alexi sideshow might be out of the organization. Denials are flying out of the O'Brien camp (which doesn't mean a whole lot to me), but things are still heating up on the Lalas-to-LA front. I really don't doubt that Big Red and Red Bull will very soon be parted; it only makes sense that Lalas hung around to see the home opener out, and with that done spent yesterday's day off packing his beach clothes. Board rumors of a FO shakeout make this scenario seem that much more likely. The real heavy lifting, or at least enough of it, is done. If RB plans on bringing in its own crew this season, now's the time to do it.

What next for us, then?
The Metrologist can't even begin to fathom the words "Nick" "Sakiewicz" and "return." Please, make yourself a drink or something while I go rinse my brain.

Do we have other names?
As it turns out, we do. One that's striking the fear of God in the hearts of Metro fans, pro- and anti- Red Bull alike.

Gli mics sono delizioso.

We all need a little perspective.
The worst of all possible choices isn't Chinaglia, you see. Sure, he's an insufferable, deluded blowhard, dismissive of the organization and the league in general, who will kill this Red Bull experiment stone-dead. And with it, NYC-area pro soccer for another generation. But at least it will be a spectacular fiasco, the soccer-world manifestation of an elephant dosed up on a bucket of roofies, forced to pedal a dynamite-laden bicycle across a highwire four stories over a fireworks truck, while Our Sisters of Immaculate Agony perform an interpretive dance upon its back. If you've got to see it all go poof!, don't you want to see it go like that? Finally, finally MLS will have a certifiable-lunatic chairman/president figure of its own, something American soccer (and American sports in general, wretched province of so many "rational"- spit! - men) has long lacked. I'm not just talking eclectic, harmless, mid-table cute crazy, a la Dimitry Piterman. No no, there is a whole 'nother level to aspire to, a tinpot despot plane you only reach by exhibiting that special blend of swagger, malevolence, detachment from reality, spite, volatility, megalomania and just-plain-nutsiness that guys like Eurico Miranda and the late Jesus Gil y Gil had leaching out their pores.
Now, I'm not saying Giorgio Chinaglia is up to that standard just yet, people. But he's young, he's a comer, and he's got it. We need to grab him while we can, and allow him to develop it.

You're damn right he'll make them run on time.

Yes, under the guy who helped coax organizations like the Cosmos, Lazio and Champions World into crippling and/or unrecoverable nosedives, Metro area soccer will be dead within five years, and we'll all be heartbroken, emotionally shattered and pissed-off. But oh, what a ride, right into the mantle of the Earth!

What you really have to fear, what I really do fear, is the appointment of some comparatively colorless Mitteleuropean tactico-crat retread (perhaps one with a nice record to show for himself) who expects to build Metro and run Metro as if this were the Old World, the many idiosyncrasies and challenges of MLS and American soccer be damned.

We've been there.

We've been there again.

And that sucked. We know it just doesn't work. But does RB? Not if rumblings are to be believed. If they really are thinking of either of these options - and there's reason to think they very much are - it's the road to perdition for us anyway. So ask yourself; if you've got to watch the team actually shrivel up and perish, how do you want it to be - like Wile E Coyote, throwing an anvil off a cliff without ever paying attention to the rope looped around his leg, or like a pitiable, pallid, depressive salaryman, choking down a bottle full of Value-Rite sleeping pills and a fifth of Korski in a dank-smelling motel by the freeway?

What, still waiting for the next game update?

2006-04-11T14:34:00.000-04:00

So, that half-baked experiment in live-blogging Saturday's game ended right around the instant Time Warner finally picked up the phone (was it only an hour's worth of the "Seedy Cinemax Soft Porn Sax Grooves" CD I heard?) and activated Direct Kick for me. TV and computer are rooms apart here at Metrologist World Headquarters, and I wasn't up to running back and forth for yous, when I could be sprawled on the couch with something greasy and fattening. Wouldn't have been such a problem if MLS HQ types weren't so predictably asleep at the switch, or should I say, half-soused on gratis RB & vodkas in the swamp Stadium Club, safe in the knowledge that some short-straw-drawing sophomore intern was ready for any contingency. But it's just as well. Some things - and Matchtracker is right at the top of that list, as we were finding out - just don't lend themselves to the cheap snarkiness that is the strength of the mode. While other things - ex-player color commentators on regional sports networks, fat kids in crowd shots, Joey Franchino, Sigi Schmid, and Jack Edwards - positively cry out for it.

I wasn't there for this first home opener under the new regime, so my willingness to deliver uninformed comment aside, I can't say much about how it all came off. A success? A disappointment? Something in between? A little of each, I'm imagining. Talked to two friends and long-time supporters later in the evening, and they said somewhat different things; in two nutshells:
"There were thousands of people there for Shakira/the hoopla, who couldn't have cared less/known less about the team and the game."
Contrast with:
"I came in expecting the worst, but none of the outside spectacle effected my experience at all...I didn't care about it, but it was easy for me to ignore."
So there you have it. More game recap comments on the usual boards, running the gamut.

***

"The idea of the eternal return is a mysterious one, and Nietzsche has often perplexed other philosophers with it: to think that everything recurs as we once experienced it, and that the recurrence itself recurs ad infinitum! What does this mad myth signify?" - Kundera, The Unbearable Lightness of Being

We wonder, Milan. We also wonder: will a 0-0 draw marked only by quasi-medieval brutality in the midfield inspire many of those 35,000 tire-kickers to come back sometime? Well, if nothing else, it probably wasn't the downer a 1-0 loss on a slapstick own-goal would have been. Which is something, I suppose. You know what I was thinking around the 70th minute, because you were thinking it too; it can only be a matter of time now.
It can only be a matter of time.
The expectant first-night crowd inaugurating another bright new age of NYC soccer, the same opponents from up the road....it was all set up to be so grotesquely, yet symmetrically perfect.
This doomed fatalism is the most reliable part of the Metro fan mentality, if not the Metro fan mentality itself. If you weren't making mental bets on which one of our guys was slipping on the Nicola Caricola mask around minute 87, you just aren't a Metro fan. Knowing it would have brightened your evening about as much as the dog vomiting on the sofa, didn't you almost want to see it happen?

Live - Metro Reds vs. New England

2006-04-08T19:33:00.000-04:00

Coming up on the end of the first half; 0 Metro shots on goal (granted, Edson hit the post, sez Matchtracker) to 3 for the Revs. 10 fouls as well. Arisrules at MF says Buddle's been strong, Graham pathetic, Wynne showing fast but raw, and everything else...in a state of relative disarray.

Superclub, huh?

****

Almost a half hour in, and it looks like the live stream is not going to happen. Actually, one senses that what will happen is even worse - the stream will pop up right around the 81st minute, when we're down 3-1. Count on it.

I'm not a specialist in remote viewing by matchtracker, but it looks like we're getting worked. Amado, in particular, seems to be itching for a yellow for persistent infringement. Joe Franchino has more shots on goal than our side. Maybe we don't want to be seeing this one.

****

Fifteen minutes gone. We're all still scoreless and sightless. 5-0 Metro advantage in the fouls department, so at least we're on top in something. Same lineup as that in DC last weekend, in case you were wondering.

Ok, now we're not even getting the blank screen...that's not a good sign at all.

****

We're a minute twenty eight in, and O'Rourke and Guevara have already been whistled for scything down New England midfielders. Awesome.

Whoops - that's three, as notorious hard man Chris Henderson upends Clint Dempsey. Can we go 4 for 4 inside of three minutes? Stay tuned...or....trackered.

****
And....we're live blogging! And writing up assignments for class on Monday! And working off the last bits of the hangover from last night. And....staring at the dreaded black screen of death. Did someone at MLS HQ forget to pay InDemand? Or is the weather playing hav-ock ((c) Ty Keough) with the starting time?

Nope - it's underway. But we're stuck with a Matchtracker for now.

Update: "Mad" Mike Jones (Mike Jones!) not really that mad

2006-04-08T18:22:00.000-04:00

Breaking RBNYNN News Alert: Motocross and flyover cancelled due to inclement weather. Sadly, you'll just have to put up with watching soccer.

Reds v. Revs and more

2006-04-08T12:57:00.000-04:00

Whoever's got the RBNY account at Peter Pan Bus Lines has been cleaning up over the past couple weeks, no? A week after the Metro Army rolled down to RFK on the corporate dime, Big Taurine is subsidizing the visit of a few hundred New England fans for today's tilt. I haven't spent much time this week calculating just how many are going to be in the stadium tonight, amidst a maelstrom of rumors and "I heard from my ticket guy that..." type hearsay. I don't think there's any chance of getting the 60-80k numbers that have been bandied about over the past few weeks, Cosmos tribute/Challenger the Eagle/BMX superstars/Crazy Legs Colon/frenetic papering-of-the-house be damned. But the crowd should be big (live is another story), and if you're a longtime Metro fan, you know what that means. Chances are good we're coming out flatter than flat. Kin Of Fish breaks down the matchups, so I don't have to. Which is good, because I largely suck at such position-by-position analysis, and I'm not a big believer in it meaning anything anyway.

Prognosticating is nothing terribly new, but just let Marc Connelly go heads-up with Jeff Bradley on his Ussoccerplayers.org blog, and suddenly everyone's a Carnac - myself included.
A belated look back at last week's predictions shows that hey, I did pretty damn good. 5-1 isn't a bad way to start the season, but unfortunately there's (almost) nowhere to go but down from here.

Metrologist Picks, week 2:

DC 3 Chivas 1
Metro 3 Revs 2
Houston 1 Kansas City 1
FCD 2 RSL 0
Colorado 1 Columbus 2
LA 1 Chicago 0

Metro Myspace (and Fakespace) Fun

2006-04-06T21:04:00.000-04:00

Myspace stal...er...search is one way to kill a couple hours of a stagnant Thursday night. Question is, how many Metros are on - or are faked on - Myspace?

As it turns out, quite a few. Let's start with the ones worth disclosing.

You might still be ruing that state of disarray we seemed to be in through the preseason. Fangueiro? Swiorczew...the hell with it....who WERE those guys? Was the front office doing any work to improve this team between November and February? Or was it backburnered because Alexi was too busy getting his Myspace Music page up and running? Seriously - started the site on 1/16/06? That's five days before the draft, fer chrissakes.

Former Metro or not, Eddie Gaven always seemed like the quiet type. Or the type to get fakespaced by some adoring kid out in the suburbs, a la Freddy Adu and his small army of Fakespacers. Or the considerable number of Landon fake-artists. I'm betting on the latter.

But they're not all fake, and there's where my niggling sense of ethics and privacy rears its ugly head. I could put names and links here for a laugh - and in fact was about to do so. But then, just about all these guys are around my age, and (as you can imagine) are doing the same stupid, silly or just plain fun things there that the rest of us do there. So let them, I say; they're not getting paid enough to give all that up just yet. It's not like they're inviting fans to friend up with them.*
In Page Six style, I'll just ask... which Metro simply says he's "living and working in NYC....and help as a soccer coach to young kids around the area." Well, that's putting it mildly, isn't it? Nice bit of humility there from one of our starters (for the moment, anyway). Maybe that easygoing nature is why he's got so many more lovely ladies on his than I have on mine. Speaking of lovely ladies, a certain Metro midfielder proudly proclaims that he's "found her!!!" Good for you - now get to producing this season if you want to build that special someone a love nest. Click here, click there...you'll find a couple former Metros with something in common...one who seems to have shambled out of the league, another just working his way up overseas. If you're halfway adept, you'll run upon another overseas-based star - I mean a guy you'll be seeing in Germany this summer. Never saw him as the Quagmire type, really. Root around a little bit more, and you might just discover our very own Metro Red Kyle Orton situation. You'll know when you see home..r. Crotch grabs for Metro!

Proof positive that MLS players are just as attuned to the power of social networking, mediated self-expression and identity construction as the rest of us. Or, they too get off on creeping to 17 year olds posing in their boyshorts on those long pregame nights in suburban KC hotels. Either or.

*This whole "allow them a little private space" thing doesn't apply when we're talking about a guy who scored against us last weekend. "Listening to a lot of James Blunt"??? You freaking wuss. Even a Jersey shirt won't redeem you from that.

Metro 2 DC 2: Instant impressions

2006-04-02T18:59:00.000-04:00

Meola looks lean, mean and controlled his box.
Parke looks like he's back. Strong game. But man, you coulda had the glory there on that volley.
Mendes is an MLS defender, but gives me agida as an outside defender. When are we gonna trade a bag of cap space to Chivas for Orlando Perez, so they can pick up O'Brien?
Graham is big and will play in this league, but appeared nervy.
Wynne looks funny when he runs. A little bit of crazy legs. But his speed had the right side of the DC attack three-quarters locked up already, and once he's gained some real experience and skill on the ball, you might as well just not come down his side of the field.
O'Rourke takes the smart foul. But I miss Michael Bradley.
Amado was maybe half the presence he has been in seasons past. Not "half as good", just "half as prominent in the course of play". That's not entirely bad, nor good. I'd settle at 75%.
Youri's still magnificent.
If Buddle stays hungry and healthy, we'll forever think fondly about Eddie Gaven - but won't miss him. Did you see him run through the entire DC defense? "Scintillating" is the term, I believe.
At times, some very, very good team defending (something this team has never been good at.) At other times...not.

Those RBNY jerseys....very nice. For a rec league team. 14DelTablon tells Metrofanaticos all about the intense creative process that led to those beauties you saw on the field today. Anyone wanna start a pool on how many iron-on letters/numbers get totally yanked off over the course of the season?

DC banner: "Our Love Don't Cost A Thing". Don't you f'ing hate it when the scum are right? It makes my skin crawl to say it, but I do. It sure would've been nice to see so many fans flaunt their Metro passion when it costed a couple shekels.

Metro vs. DC

2006-04-02T15:06:00.000-04:00

I started this blog in the depths of the offseason with a sketchy idea - to write about Metro, from the point of view of a Metro supporter, with one guiding principle: what needs to be done, to make the Metrostars the top team in the US, and a legitimate top team in the region, and eventually in the world of soccer?
(Obviously, I thought it would take a little while)

As I write, there's less than two hours now till the new Metro era gets underway. Strange feeling I get as I say that; I'm feeling a mix of the anticipation that comes at the start of every season, and a real unsettledness that's hard to put a finger on. That's new - I've never felt quite like we were on the cusp of losing this team in the way I feel now. An odd day to say such a thing, I know. Is it true that some good has come of the Red Bull takeover? Undoubtedly. That's been chronicled, and assuming that the 700-strong Metrofan Armada doesn't break apart on the shores of the Delaware this afternoon, there will be a lot more accolades for RB tomorrow. That's fine. But the quease-inducing, ire-raising name change aside, and the Red Bull honeymoon period aside, there is still a shoe that very, very few are watching. At some point - I don't know when or how - it is going to drop.

I had been planning on spending time this afternoon writing a proper season preview, but there are just so many questions around this team, long-term and short-term, that I'd rather let the string play out a little first before commenting. How many certainties does this team have right right now? You got me. As far as starting lineup goes, Ives seems to be throwing names at the wall, even if they're guys that saw limited action in preseason (Canero, Henderson, Wynne). Edson looks ready to go, as well as Youri and Amado - Honduran fender-bender aside.

Final score?

It's a complete shot in the dark, but I'm going to say DC 1, Metro Reds 1. Boswell and Guevara.

Week 1 predictions

2006-04-01T17:12:00.000-05:00

Let's see if I can even come close to .500 this year.

The Metrologist's Stone Cold Lock Predictions, v.1

Chicago 1 Dallas 2 (yeah, I know the game is going on already; you'll just have to trust that I figured these predictions out this morning, and have been out doing things all day.)

KC 2 Columbus 1

Los Angeles 2 New England 2

DC 1 Metro Reds 1

Chivas USA 2 RSL 0

Houston 1 Colorado 0

Good on a hot Texas summer day...

2006-03-31T11:12:00.000-05:00

Welcome to MLS, Houston Creamsicles.

Bulls for Pele

2006-03-30T19:41:00.000-05:00

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.

Forwards are like busses...

2006-03-29T01:52:00.000-05:00

You wait a whole offseason for just one, and then.....

The Eddie-for-Edson deal has mercifully been consummated, after 7 years and 34 days of waiting. Farewell to one enigmatic local product, hello to another. The draft-day sins of Octavio Zambrano have finally been exculpated...sort of.

Is J.P Peguero a Red now? That was the rumor on MF this morning, courtesy of Kristian Dyer, former nynjsoccer.com and current ESPN man. But we're coming up on a day with no confirmation, so maybe this was just a contingency deal, something like the original Buddle-Gaven draft-day swap that never was.

But look, there's another signing. This one, not so earth-shaking. Welcome to the Metro Reds, career Metro reserve teamer Jerrod Laventure! Now that you're off the rolling 3 day contracts ("The O'Neill Peart special"), maybe that credit rating inches up high enough for you to secure a Capital One Tin Card. Maybe. No end to what you can do with a 16 dollar limit.

Note on Zoffinger

2006-03-24T12:20:00.000-05:00

Red Bull New York. New York Red Bulls. New York/New Jersey Red Bulls. New Jersey Red Bulls of New York. "There's no law forcing them to put NJ in the name" "Zoffinger's agitating for state legislation." "Screw you, George Zoffinger"

Plus ca change...

The whole affair, the spectacle of getting-attention-for-all-the-wrong-reasons is just so, so, so, so typical of this franchise.

I have to be honest - the sudden flare-up of enmity at George Zoffinger and the NJSEA resonates very little with me. I couldn't care less. It's not like anyone's suddenly finding out Zoffinger is a nitwit, a double-dealer, or a vampire who lives on the blood of tenants like the Metro. That's always been the case and will be as long as we're under his thumb. While I've got no love for him, if anything, I think Jerseyites fighting to have their state represented is proper and just (the problem, of course, is that this isn't a grassroot Jerseyite movement - this is a guy trying to make political hay). Regardless, message boarders sniping about a "state inferiority complex," and how NJ ought to just shut up and be "NY" are wrong. Every argument I've read about "New Yorkers coming to games and spending money," as if that was good enough, has proven extremely flimsy. This is about more than a few tax dollars. The cause is just, even if the guy pushing it is a leech.

That said, lets say the Jersey contingent wins. What then? New York/New Jersey Red Bulls is a stupid, clunky name. As is every jarring permutation you could come up with.

But then, so is anything with "Red Bulls" in it, anyway.

Into the homestretch of the prologue

2006-03-24T09:11:00.000-05:00

Less than two weeks before the Metro Reds take the field in earnest, and if you can claim you know what this team will look like, you're lying. Hell, take that literally; I'm getting the strong sense that on the evening of April 2, the starting eleven will be warming up in their Underarmour, waiting on a couple gnarled old seamstresses to finish darning up the new jerseys. Anyone want to bet our first glimpse at NY96's new look comes when they trot on the field at RFK?

That's a superficial aspect of things, of course. Yet it's a decent metaphor for the half-baked state the team is in right now. What we can't see, but know, is that there's still a ton of experimentation going on. It's all about Mo throwing formations and player combinations at the wall, to see what sticks. Stammler at forward? Why not? Three-man, four-man backlines? It's supposed to be half-baked.

An old, consoling refrain gets invoked after a couple goalless, (and apparently) threatless stinkers like those we've had in Carolina: "It's only preseason." Well, it is only preseason. And if we know one thing after ten years of MLS, it's that no one wins the league by July. It's not merely impossible, what with the playoffs; it's bad strategy. Coming out of the gate red-hot, like LA '96 or Revs '05, can burn a team out long before the finish. I'm not a big believer in MLS teams going wire-to-wire in any event. It just doesn't happen very much.

If you believe the first five to eight weeks of the season is something like a play touring and working out the kinks before hitting Broadway, you don't get apoplectic after getting blanked by a second division side that's been together for a week. You don't put a huge weight on what happens in the "final dress rehearsal", tomorrow night against Houston.

However, does Mo really have the luxury to play around for the first quarter of the season?

Considering that the massive overhaul hinted at over the winter never really came off - considering that this is largely the same personnel as what we finished off with, t he question(s) today should be; how much worry is warranted over the lack of a physical, go-to striker?Youri's a force, but it's unfair - and stupid - to put the weight of the world on his 38 year old shoulders.

Why is there nothing on the horizon?

Shouldn't this improvement process be a little further along by now?

Metro Reds

2006-03-10T22:14:00.000-05:00

The Metro Reds Initiative

A Statement on a Strange Day

2006-03-08T16:32:00.000-05:00

The Metrostars (nee' New York/New Jersey Metrostars) of Major League Soccer died today, March 8, 2006 at the age of 10, after a short illness caused by investment.

I have not written anything about this incredible saga in the last few days for a variety of reasons: because I am stuck under a mountain of work already and facing deadlines by the score; because I have entirely too much to say about it and would probably spend the whole day going on about it; because I already have spent nearly two days going on and on about it, on message boards, arguing with people who see this as simply wonderful. It's not.
That doesn't mean everything was perfect under the status quo. It wasn't.
Still, I refuse to sing my heart out for "Red Bull".

There are no protest options, no Ryman Leagues available to us.

Yet one idea, after all the shock (well, I can't say utter shock), anger, resentment, distress and so on subside, remains. An idea that came to me in a flash of inspiration, an epiphany, at around 4 this morning, when I was unable to sleep. The Metrostars are gone but "Metro" and it's history will not be. The hard-headed, spirited assortment of people who have banded together over the past 10 years to make the whole thing fun - no matter how much "hardware" wasn't won - won't let it be.

The Metrologist sure as hell isn't getting rebranded; instead, he's going along with the core of committed, anti-shill Metro supporters - perhaps you could call us the Refuseniks '96 - who will find a way to rebrand this rebranding. To make alternate word and visual symbols that link us to the boys on the field, to, if you like big words, create a supporter vernacular. To declare symbolic independence from "RB".
Short n' sweet, we just aren't going to call it what the new guys are branding it. But we thank them for the money they (potentially) will put into this team, and we'll appreciate them keeping Giorgio Chinaglia at least a continent away from us at all times.

An announcement will soon say it is "RBNY". For me, RBNY could only ever mean "Red-Black New York." As for the team's common name, right now, "Metro Reds", perhaps "Reds" for short, leads the discussion here. But that's still to be settled, over time, and by the supporters who'll be using it.

Join us.

Damn you for inventing the internet, Al Gore.

2006-03-02T19:57:00.000-05:00

Stuff like this makes me hate people.

I mean, read the umpteen "comments." Or don't. Puts the lie to the idea that Guardian readers are a headier bunch than the rest.

It's Amado Day!

2006-02-12T11:35:00.000-05:00

But first, a comment (which I hope doesn't blossom into a rant)

I usually wake up a little late on Sunday mornings, missing the first 45-60 minutes of the Serie A match on FSC.
Lately I've noticed that I rarely, if ever, miss anything important.
This morning's Cagliari-Lecce "clash" being a prime example. I came in at 0-0, and endured 45 minutes of godawful, banal, boring, bad soccer that was never going to lead to anything but 0-0 (unless, of course, either one of the sides had made good on their own-goal attempts. They weren't even capable of that, the donkeys.)
Being utterly neutral, why do I subject myself to this? I really should have slept in longer.

Of course, to hear some bar-room/rec-league pundits say it (yes, I'm setting up a straw man here, but only after I've stolen the souls of people I know and wedged em deep inside the straw) even a soporific, stone-dead Serie A draw beats out the best MLS match you could imagine. Or rather, even in a dismal, depressing affair like that played in Sardinia today, you see something different, transcendent. They don't just draw. They draw beautifully, elegantly, skillfully, in a way American players can only dream of. Mind you, it's American "fans," neat new Real/Milan/Arsenal replicas clutching for dear life around their fleshy middles, spouting this so much of the time.

This line of reasoning is crap, just like this morning's match. The play was crap. The ideas were crap. The players were largely crap. But people see what they want to see ("Serie A (cue: lusty panting) is always beautiful, always a step above"), and they also want to be seen as articulate, perceptive, knowledgable, no matter what. They want to make a statement that underlines their cultivated, specialized knowledge. That goes for any fan of any sport, I guess - but twice as much for US Soccer Guy, who works so damn hard to show he belongs with the rest of the world, but knows he'd blow his cred the moment he even suggested that the emperor forgot to put on his clothes this morning. Or that MLS might be worth following, much less that it's the equal of the big three or four in Europe. Which it isn't, just yet.

There's a peril of judging a league from matches in isolation, like I'm striving to avoid doing (God knows, I really enjoy Italian soccer much of the time), but which a lot of folks do with impunity when it comes to MLS. Two perils, in fact; that you'll invariably get it wrong, and that you'll look pretentious in being wrong.

Obviously, there are an awful lot of garbage matches in MLS. As there are in England, Italy, Spain, Germany, Holland, France, and any other nation you care to choose. If the fan you're talking to doesn't acknowledge this essential fact, don't believe that they've watched too much soccer. There's no argument that those great old leagues have something over our little league (and with many times the history, money and attention, why shouldn't they?) Yet the fact remains, even there; sometimes, soccer is simply boring. And bad. Really, really bad. It's the inevitable, sharp contrasts between the really bad, the tepid, and the utterly amazing - be it some superhuman move Ronaldinho pulls off, or John Wolyniec hitting the shot of his lifetime, and one of the really memorable shots I've seen in professional soccer - that makes it all worth waking up for.

So it was a half-baked rant after all. Hm.

***

Today is Amado Arrival Day, according to Ives. It's actually Amado Arrival Night, as he'll be getting in late and missing yet another day of training (or in this case, a match against the U-17s) We have Michael Lewis standing by at the airport for up-to-the minute coverage. Film at 11.

Putting together a picture of how the team is doing from press reports and the occasional bigsoccer post from eyewitnesses is akin to Kremlinology.

Stars ascending:
Adrian Serioux - looks like he's just about signed, sealed and delivered to the Metros. He's already been noted for his good work in the scrimmages, and that's after a three month layoff.
Mike Magee - I figured he'd be on his way out this winter, and I wasn't happy about it. He's only 22, has talent and has worked to get stronger and despite being bounced all over the field hasn't bitched. He's started off well this preseason, and Mo sounds pleased.
Jordan Cila - Hasn't been highlighted like Magee yet, but his name keeps popping up in the scoreline. Assisted on both of Magee's goals, so maybe they've got a chemistry there. Do remember, however, that Brian Kelly won the MLS Pichichi way back when. And look where that led him.
Josimer Altidore - Rates a mention, simply because he skipped school and made his first appearance in black and red, against Columbus. Certainly a historical moment we will look back on years later.

Off the boil:
Carlos Fangueiro - For every mention of his skillful play, there's another of his lack of tenacity and yapping. Do we really need another Amado in the midfield? Barring something special, I bet he's the first one out.

Hard to say:
Piotr S. - A Bigsoccer poster claiming to have been at the Metro-RSL match (and who fakes that sort of thing?) described him as a cut above the rest (also some interesting comments on Wynne, Hendo, and Altidore there). Other reports have him only showing "flashes". If Serioux is all but done at a nice price, how likely is it that Mo will sign another DM, especially at the higher salary a European vet is likely to demand?
Eddie Gaven - It's only match reports from early preseason scrimmages, but he hasn't stood out yet. Is his fire lit?

Looks like Metro v. U-17 (do we share Josimer?) is being streamed on TheCrew.com at 4 PM.

You don't spit into the wind. You don't tug on Superman's cape..

2006-02-07T02:12:00.000-05:00

You don't pull off the mask off the old Lone Ranger and you never, ever, turn your back on, leave your credit cards laying out around, lend lawn equipment to, or otherwise mess around with Bob Gansler.

In the wake of the Johnny X story breaking recently, perhaps the weakest rationale that I've seen on Bigsoccer (motto: "Celebrate Weak Rationale!) for preventing teams like the Metros from signing their academy players without putting them up on the open market (either via draft or Szetela style lottery) is that smaller cities will be at a disadvantage, that inevitably and inexorably the major markets will leverage their enormous (and lets face it, far more attractive, sophisticated and witty) populations in ways that Podun...er...DC just can't do, and so will turn into unstoppable dynasties. Well in response to this, let me say;

a) boo hoo hoo. Hoo hoo. The shackles have been on the big market teams long enough.
b) Remind me again what part of Paterson, Queens or Yonkers that Clint Dempsey, Eddie Johnson, and Clint Mathis (god rest his talent), to name but three, are from? The "smaller cities" - let's call them the Hunt Clubs - aren't exactly playing in soccer wastelands, either. Aren't they notorious youth soccer hotbeds? Doesn't half the Revolution side come from spitting distance of Arrowhead Stadium?
c) Bigger isn't always necessarily better. In fact, smart is usually best. Smart, like handing the reins of your club over to black-souled crypto-deviants like Bob Gansler.

Here's a man who gleefully sack-punched Bob Bradley a couple weeks ago by drafting Yura Movsisyan. Bob covets the kid, trades down on the assumption that he'll be there - not least because he's a poor Armenian immigrant whose biggest dream is to play close to home, becoming so popular among the adoring crowds in the second-largest Armenian city in the world (hell, for all I know, LA is the largest Armenian city in the world) that they actually change the club's name to Pyunik USA. It's a great story in the making, and if Bob B. was leaving obvious signs of using his first pick on the guy, you've gotta figure that the couple coaches ahead of him, all things being equal, would lay off.
Not Gansler. Bobby G. grabbed him - given that Yura's reportedly a project (with huge upside, but a project all the same) it's hard not to think that Gansler did it just because....he could. For shits and giggles. Or because he really is a Bad Man. Hey, there's an Armenian somewhere in KC. Yura can be a great story for that guy.

Now less than a month later, there's Kenny Cooper. Same drill. A Dallas kid who's coming back from Europe for the express purpose of playing at home. He might be halfway decent, but no one's tipping him to walk into the top 5 in scoring next season, so it's not like exhibiting a little gentlemanly reserve would be like saying "no thanks" to Ronaldinho. Cooper's a talented kid who wanted to develop back at home. Does Gansler say "well, thats nice, I wish him luck, but not against us"? Does he fuck. He jumps in there with a discovery claim and figures to score a player, a pick, or something out of the deal. Because in the MLS setup, the position that Dallas is thrust into is one of weakness.

Well, that was the initial storyline that we were getting from the stories coming out earlier. The end result - which is by no means very clear even now, is that Cooper goes to Dallas for nothing (thus, apparently no triple-threat trades between KC, Dallas and Metro today). Muddying the waters more is Dallas GM Michael Hitchcock (courtesy 3rd Degree)

""Discoveries are not tradable," said Hitchcock. "Kansas City simple passed on their discovery claim as Cooper did not fit into their plans."

Pardon me while I call bullshit on that "discoveries aren't tradable" idea - I don't have the gas to go looking now, but I challenge any one of you hundreds and hundreds of readers out there to find an instance of a discovery pick being traded. If it's not exactly legal, then the player is simply "picked" and shifted, all the same. I think the only thing that happened was that Bob Gansler got a call from Uncle Lamar asking him to ease off. Gansler may be a Bad Man - and that's a good thing to be in a world filled with stupid, easily exploitable rules (i.e. the world of MLS) - but I don't think he's a stupid one.

The morals of the story?

- The MLS system for distributing these players is funked up, and as long as it is, I can't get that agitated over machinations like this. I wouldn't be taking the guy out for beers n' laffs after he'd just shaken me down thanks to a stupid league setup, but that's beside the point. Good on Bob Gansler for taking advantage of the system while he can.

- The Metros damn well better not think of putting a guy like Johnny X, or any other academy product, through the Generation Adidas-lottery draft rigamarole. Because there is little, if any honor among MLS coaches.

Amado is in camp, sez the official roster on Metrostars.com

We sez that someone at Metrostars.com was reading this on the plane down to Florida. That's if "soccerwriter" in the Old Quarter of Bigsoccer has it right...and without giving any secrets away....The Metrologist figures anyone who shares his Christian name ought to get the benefit of the doubt.

Huh?

2006-02-05T16:16:00.000-05:00

Who creates a blog named after, and dedicated to lampooning, the floppiness of a second-year RSL forward?

The guy or gal behind You Dive Like Jamie Watson, that's who.

A simple idea, with the potential to be brilliantly banal, or banally brilliant. The soccer equivalent of carstuck.com.

Still waiting

2006-02-05T13:12:00.000-05:00

That means we'll have one, two, three.....

The Metrologist apologizes for his post-draft hiatus, but he's only just come to after passing out. It's bound to happen when you hold your breath for a week and a half, waiting for the other shoe to finally drop on the Amado, Eddie and Ante trades (while simulataneously racking your brain for more cliches to describe the situation). Just imagine that multi-pronged attack - Eddie and Edson blazing past helpless defenders, Youri and Al Ocation spreading passes left and right from midfield, and Chelsea phenom Joe Keenan holding it down at the back. Did you smell Metro glory? Because I did.

Of course, it never came to pass. Perhaps because the first, floppy-haired domino to fall got picked up at the last minute, and our first rounder sent to California for Marvell Wynne.

That left many Metro fans (The Metrologist included) a little surprised, but heaving a sigh of relief. Well, not so fast. Michael Lewis writes this morning that Amado and Eddie could be packaged up and sent to an unnamed team for a player and allocation. Metrofanatic does a good job of reading my thoughts on such a deal; who on Columbus and KC (the most likely trading partners) is worth swapping Guevara for straight up, never mind along with Gaven? No one, I say.

Sure, there's an allocation in there, too. And just look at some of the recent success stories that have come via the allocation process. DaMarcus Beasley begat Andy Herron, Cory Gibbs begat Pando Ramirez, Carlos Bocanegra brought back Samuel Caballero. And how we could forget that part of the Donovan allocation landed us Daniel Garipe?

Yikes.

In the past few weeks, we've learned a little lesson about dashing for the fire extinguisher at the first wisp of smoke (keep in mind, Matchnight and Big Apple Soccer were reporting the Gaven-Buddle deal as done). But the smell of smoke is still blowing around the Swamp; Amado's coming back from Honduras (sometime) carrying two jerry cans of gasoline, along with a couple pounds of nitroglycerine in his pockets. And he's promising to do jumping jacks. Let's just hope Molexi know what they're doing.

EDIT for a thought: On that note, Marc Connelly over at the second-best Connecticutite-penned soccer blog notes how the longer this goes on, the more Amado's trade value falls. I'm afraid that's awfully optimistic of him. It may already be a lot lower than we think, and it has little to do with time. The moment Amado made noises about jaking his way out of the Metros, every GM in the league had to be thinking "if he would do it to them, he might do it to us, too." So he's contributed to driving his own stock down, and Alexi seems likely to hold the line and not get rooked.
Oh yes, it's a mess.

***

I'm not sure what he'd say now if you could find him, but a few weeks ago Sol Campbell was again quoted as being interested in playing for the "Metro Stars" in a couple years, when (we assume) he is old and unreliable. "Or somewhere like that."

Girliest reason for a suspension in history!

2006-01-19T01:55:00.000-05:00

Non-Metro, but it's 2 am and I'm getting a little punchy from work here.

Deco banned two games for hair-pulling.

Say hi to Abe Lenstra for us

2006-01-18T20:12:00.000-05:00

Life has been busy, and so I haven't yet commented on the major news of the last couple days - stories emerging that not only could Amado Guevara be finding a new home in Dallas (with Eddie Johnson coming back the other way), and Eddie Gaven dosey-doing with NY homeboy Edson Buddle to Columbus, but also that Ante Razov is being linked with a move over to Chivas USA, and a reunion with his favorite coach, for a lil' bit of wampum (and who among us didn't see that coming?)

But just as well, since none of that has come to pass as of yet.

Let's start with the one deal that has gone down: last season's minutes leader and message-boards-whipping-boy, Michael Bradley is off to Heerenveen. Yes, Heerenveen - the "club with tradition", as their website oh-so-distinctively puts it (nb: I love continental clubs that provide English versions of their websites, even if they're pretty bare-bones, and the Dutch are especially good about this.) He'll be part of a club that's just outside the traditional troika of Ajax PSV and Feyenoord, is still competing in the UEFA Cup this season, and has built a reputation for nursing prospects into stars and selling them on. It's going to be a lot of fun to see just how much PT he can pull down, and how quickly. I've never seen Heerenveen play, so your guess is as good as mine there.

(come on, this or Yurcak Field on a Wednesday night in August?)

Not bad for a kid who only ever got to play in NJ because Daddy was the coach. Yep, if it wasn't for Mrs. Bradley acting the part of the youth soccer mom from hell, and waving the rolling pin threateningly at Coach Bob when he walked in the door each evening, Junior Bradley (or Mini Bob, another clever nickname there) wouldn't have been playing a major role for the Metrostars - hell, he would have been hard-pressed to walk-on at Ramapo Community College. At least, that's what some of the finer (and more prolific) minds of the Metro message board worlds would have you believe. There is caustic internet rhetoric, of which we're all guilty at some point (for further examples, refer here,) and then there is outright lazy, unthinking crap, bordering on the slanderous but definitely bathed in stupidity and cynicism. Through the previous season, we saw enough of the latter, surrounding a talented kid trying to do his job and acquitting himself pretty well, to last us another ten. It pissed me off to no end then, and months later I still have a hard time letting it go. If nothing else, it drove my opinion of (some of) my fellow Metro fans miles into the earth's mantle; that's hard to square with a feeling built up through following Metro for 10 years, that we have the most intelligent, critical, savvy, funny, human supporters in the American game. Those feelings may be mostly gone - as have a lot of the folks that inspired them, unfortunately.

But, enough. I couldn't be happier for Michael Bradley. He gets out of a situation that was going to go nowhere for him - and that's not even supposed to sound pessimistic about the '06 Metros already. Where there is smoke wafting up around the wispy form of Eddie Gaven, there is probably fire, and I bet that Mike Magee is not making any dates to go out in Manhattan next weekend, either. The Bob Bradley-driven youth movement appears to be coughing up blood before gasping its last and keeling over - not that that's a terrible omen per se, just that it leaves him out in the cold.

It will be a crime, however, if the Metros don't pull down some sort of allocation in return.

UPDATE:

On second thought, I'm a little concerned with the thought of our Metro progeny playing on that radioactive Dutch grass.

(I know, there are so many directions to go with the phrase "radioactive Dutch grass", it boggles the mind.)

Then again, he's a Jersey kid, right? Radioactive grass? Plus ca change, plus la meme chose.

Taxdodge - A true underdog story.

2006-01-15T18:02:00.000-05:00

Well this is a new one, even for Metro.

Let me tell you how it will be
There's one for you, nineteen for me
'Cause I'm the taxman, yeah, I'm the taxman

Should five per cent appear too small
Be thankful I don't take it all
'Cause I'm the taxman, yeah I'm the taxman

If you drive a car, I'll tax the street,
If you try to sit, I'll tax your seat.
If you get too cold I'll tax the heat,
If you take a walk, I'll tax your feet.

Don't ask me what I want it for
If you don't want to pay some more
'Cause I'm the taxman, yeah, I'm the taxman

Now my advice for those who die
Declare the pennies on your eyes
'Cause I'm the taxman, yeah, I'm the taxman
And you're working for no one but me.

Ladies and gentlemen! Children of all ages!

2006-01-15T12:19:00.000-05:00

Please direct your attention to the center ring in Secaucus, for the next act in the ongoing Amado-Alexi circus. According to the Honduran press (adding the appropriate skepticism, that should actually read "According" "to" "the" "Honduran" "press"), Amado is so fed up with Alexi that he wants a trade out - preferably to Dallas. Otherwise, he states, he'll just dog it.

Assuming the story is for real, it's hard to filter out what part of this is posturing and what part isn't. Amado's no stranger to this sort of rhetoric (though "I'll dog it", if not proven to be an enormous, terrible misquote, might be a step too far to come back from with an apology).

And surely someone, somewhere is going to respond with something like "oh, those Central Americans! Down there, it's a normal thing for star players to bitch, moan, deliver stinging ultimatums to their bosses through the press and question their own desire to play at 100%! It's all part of the dance, the drama! You just have to play along!"

Well, maybe. But the way I read it, Alexi and Mo aren't interested in this dance or playing along. There's an air of ruthlessness about the Aleximo regime right now - Mo's indelicate comment about "not missing" Tim Ward after the trade last week was a sign of that (Mo, can't you just say "he's a fine young player with lots of talent, but we needed to make this trade to better our team now"? Why kill a kid?) The speculative bit I wrote a few days ago about this coming to a head real quickly between now and draft day is looking a little more clairvoyant this morning. Amado's leverage through all these recurring episodes in the past was his undeniable talent, and the fact that he's the linchpin of the team. For him to even suggest he'd jake it negates the talent argument, and from the p.o.v. of Aleximo, doing a deal now gives you a whole season to draft, sign and build around a stable core. I'm not campaigning for it, and if I'm advocating, it's with half of a very heavy heart - trading Amado would be incredibly difficult, both practically and symbolically. If you believe the stories that he's been shopped without success for months now, then perhaps you have to rethink what he's worth on the market, given the baggage that comes with him. Yet I sense the chances for something - a trade, a sale - coming to pass are increasing.

Bob Bradley apparently is this close to getting Jesse Marsch at Chivas. WTF? Bob Bradley was trying to get Jesse Marsch, every day and every night, for the entire time he was with the Metros. I guess the statute of limitations on Chicago's don't-trade-with-Bob law ran out over the winter.

How'd you like to be a Houston Clashquake? First your team is packed up and moved out of town; you've got to sell your digs and find new ones, the front office and administrative staff you've come to know are almost all eliminated. Now you're told by Corporate that since the new Houston unis aren't ready yet (settling on a team name would be a good first step), you're going to have to play the preseason in old SJ gear. Yeah, I'd be disgusted too.

Fifa cancels opening gala

2006-01-13T11:11:00.000-05:00

...and the world heaves a sigh of relief; anything that inflicts less Black Eyed Peas on civilization than is absolutely necessary is to be celebrated. Sepp for the Nobel Peace Prize.

Rumor: Ward to Columbus for Hendo

2006-01-12T11:22:00.000-05:00

So sez someone on Bigsoccer.

Conceivable? Sure. Advisable? Possibly. Desireable? Errr..

Stay tuned.

UPDATE: If Metrofanatic says it, that's good enough for me.

Comment in a bit.

The combine; Amado

2006-01-12T00:56:00.001-05:00

Combine time is here again, and that makes for one of my favorite times of the year, as far as American soccer goes. See, I'm not a college soccer head at all. In most years the only college soccer I see is the final four, and I missed that somehow, so don't expect me to start expounding on why the Metros need to be picking Garey or Sturgis or Peterson or whoever. Any information or opinions formed on a player - right now I'm all about taking Sacha Kljestan - comes thirdhand (which makes it all seem so much more valid and exciting, ironically - all these players are future SUPERSTARS!). God bless those who are clued-up - some of them are providing a valuable service right now, ahead of the draft in Philly. For the rest of us, the combine kicks off a chaotic, mysterious week during which we'll get our hopes up over guys we've hardly seen, if at all, project how the whole thing might shake out successfully for our club (truth is, we won't know what "success" is for 2 years, at the least), and then watch as none of it comes to pass AND a nice "untouchable" chunk of our team gets shipped away.

It seems to happen that way every year, especially if you support the Metros.

Unlike some other leagues (MLB and the NHL come to mind) MLS doesn't typically experience a wild flurry of activity in the days before the in-season trading deadline. It might be the cap, it might be the relatively rigid nature of MLS squads once the season is underway, but the transaction wire rarely even gets up to orange-hot at the deadline. On the other hand, Draft Day is the focal point of a ton of activity just about every year. Teams go through amazing, contorted transformations on Draft Day, and that can be quite a sight to be behold. So far, all signs point to the Metros being in that dance once again.

I'm sitting here hoping Alexi and Mo aren't planning to tear down this team, but I can't say that they won't. Read the interviews that Mo's given since taking over, and you see it over and over again - new faces, new blood, new attitude are what he wants. "Not good enough", Mo says. And he's right, but from the outside, I wouldn't say we were so bad as to have to start rebuilding again. I'll expand on this later, but I quite seriously believe that if they had just managed to kill off Revolution on that night in Foxboro, the Metros would have won the entire thing. So while improvements are in order, giving up players like Michael Bradley, Mike Magee, Jeff Parke, and (if smoke indicates fire) Eddie Gaven would be an awfully bitter pill to swallow, after we've already endured 2-3 years of their growing pains. We could do without another shake-up. Will Bradley - a dirt-cheap, solid starter and future star - be dealt to purge the most prickly reminder of his father's regime? Will Magee - by now a versatile part, if not the Twellman Mk. II I foresaw him becoming - go as well? How about Parke, who can't possibly be as bad as last year made him look? It's one thing if Mo's got a vision, but I'm especially uninterested in plans of this sort if they're done solely to further Lalas's agenda of big name stars.

Which makes what I'm going to talk about next sound a little hypocritical.

If retooling is in the cards in Secaucus, then it may require cutting the deck right at the Metros' best player, and greatest potential albatross.
I'm talking, of course, about what Metrofanatic calls the Guevara conundrum, now quickly gathering steam over the issue of Amado playing in an exhibition game in Honduras a few days ago, sans team permission.

We've heard his opinions on the refs, on his pay (both legitimate gripes).
We know he wasn't happy with not getting to trial at Blackburn (an even more legit beef - it's odious of MLS to hold him back from that chance, regardless of how good he is for the Metros, but that's league m.o.).
Now this.
At what point is enough, enough?
And if it isn't enough now, what if there's a good chance it will be halfway through the season, when there ain't much to be done about it?
If Alexi Lalas, Mo Johnston, and you, Metrofan, want the transcendent Guevara, the MVP-caliber Amado possessing incredible ball skills and the ability to dominate a game, you're simply going to have to put up with the Guevara of stupid cards, whining to the media, and unsanctioned jaunts to play for a team thousands of miles away. Embrace the Guevara that explodes with a hat trick against Colorado, wires the last kick of the game into the top corner against Chicago, or dispatches penalties (usually) in cold blood, and you'll have to suffer the Guevara that bogarts corner kicks (terribly) and free kicks (inconsistently), takes the bait from cagier opponents, slows and diverts Metro attacks with his dilly-dallying nearly as much as he electrifies them, and, as we saw in the homestretch last season, has the ever so slight inclination to canine it if he's not happy.

Some might dispute this, but I don't quite know how; Amado Guevara is the greatest Metrostar ever. This team has never had a player who has performed at such a high level, so consistently, effectively and durably, for so long. Not Donadoni, not Clint, not Gilmar (!) He is, as much as can be said of anyone on a team that now draws 15,000 on an outstanding day and hardly ever troubles the NY area sports radar, the Metros' icon, the Metros' face. In times to come, we will be talking about these years as the Guevara era. But for all the moments of brilliance, there's real reason to doubt if the Metros' Guevara era will ever include a championship.

That's the underlying premise of this blog - discovering and describing what it's going to take for the Metros to win their first MLS Cup (and their next, and the one after that, and so on). That's all I'm really concerned with, nothing else. It should also, of course, be the only thing Alexi, Mo & co. are thinking about. Amado's amazing when he's on....but is he the one to lead this team to a title?

A good question. Remember, that generally speaking, when a team trades one big talent for several smaller talents/prospects/picks, that team almost always comes out on the short end. Even more so in MLS, where a solid vet with a high salary can be had for a late round pick.

As I said...look for this to come to a head rather quickly in the next 10 days, one way or the other. That's if Alexi & Mo are playing things smart. A pacified Amado or a gone Amado. We'll have a hard time getting to the promised land with an unsettled Amado.

Worst. Metro. Memento. Ever.

2006-01-09T17:55:00.000-05:00

On Ebay, as that cuddly anarchist collective from Leeds once sang.

I want this almost as much as descendents of the Austro-Hungarian royal family want the "Scenes of Sarajevo" set of commemorative plates.

My other jersey's collar is popped

2006-01-09T14:26:00.000-05:00

Non-Metro related, but...

Logan's Revenge is passing around a purported shot of the WC '06 Nike unis; not to bite on his traffic but here it is.

All well and good, right? I'm not a total uniform nut, so I'm not going to get into the ins and outs of aesthetics and all that; as long as a shirt is not aggressively obnoxious or putridly ugly (and you can all think of some examples yourselves), I'm good. And the US version actually looks pretty nice, nice enough for me to splash out for sometime this spring. But....what's that on the Dutch kit? Is that...could it be...a collar? Damn you, Nike. You know all you had to do was slap that on the US shirt - all you had to do was stitch that on anything, even the denim thing from '94 - and every soccer nerd in America, myself included, would be camped outside the Nike store to get at it.
C'mon, just do it.

Not even two years on and...

2006-01-07T14:29:00.000-05:00

that splashy televised raffle for Jerseyite and should-be Metro Danny Szetela is looking like a real success, isn't it?

First off, Brit press hyperbole aside, we can't be sure this is anything more than a workout trip; and even if an offer was forthcoming, you can count on MLS acting pissy and holding the boy back. But if the door was to open somehow, all we can say is, "go Danny, go". No one, but no one is going to blame you after the way you got screwed here.

2006-01-06T23:59:00.000-05:00

Your 2006 Metros - A work in progress.

2006-01-05T17:54:00.000-05:00

It's January 5th, 2006; 94 days before the start of the 2006 Metrostars season. Following the signing of Scottish D/M Peter Canero, and the parting of the ways with Colombian bust Sergio Galvan Rey, can't-pass defender Chris Leitch, and only-can-pass mid Mark Lisi, this is your current Metro squad.

16	Michael Bradley	M, F
1	Jon Conway	GK
23	Danilo da Silva	D
10	Youri Djorkaeff	F, M
24	Eddie Gaven	M
26	Taylor Graham	D
20	Amado Guevara	M
21	Jason Hernandez	D
7	Mike Magee	M, F
4	Carlos Mendes	D
1	Tony Meola	GK
5	Jeff Parke	D
99	Ante Razov	F
22	Tim Regan	D, M
6	Seth Stammler	D
2	Tim Ward	D
13	Zach Wells	GK

With two weeks to go before the Superdraft, we're finally due for the first real news about the Metros and MLS since the end of the season - minor trades and waivers aside. A good place to start The Metrologist Report - as of this moment, the only blog I know of devoted to Alexi's Swamp Circus - The Metrostars. They're my team - after 10 years, the pride I utter this with could only be tinged with perversion and masochism - and this is where I'll try and dissect, (semi-regularly, semi-critically, and quasi-intelligently) what the hell's going on there. Stop by here once in a while for any (mostly) Metro-related news, rumors or thoughts that come down the pike.