The Kickers

Great run for Richmond this year in both USL and USOC. Followed you guys throughout the tournament. Well done. The online stream for the Fire USOC game was either complete failure or complete awesome. I'll go with awesome. The local Chicago folks were great.

Nice work Richmond. Potential MLS expansion team in 2014 or argument for promotion/relegation. Doesn't matter. Great year.

Oh. Why isn't Matthew Delicâte in MLS??

A FK Goal in Seattle

I was checking up on Josh Gardner's excellent free kick goal tonight and something struck me. And it wasn't the extraordinary, world class, kick. It was how the whole Columbus Crew team reacted to that kick. Check out the goal again. Maybe again after that one time.

Now again.

What I noticed was the post goal reaction. Not just that of Josh Gardner. But of the whole team. I can't tell you how many sports games I've watched where the team getting destroyed gets a goal/point/touchdown and then proceed to celebrate like they just won the Champions League. Sadly, it happens often.

But curiously. Not after Josh Gardner's particularly fantastic goal last weekend. Not the Crew. Not this team.Gardner. The strike taker. Goal Scorer of something worthy of "top 10". Simply turns around. Head down. And slaps hands with a couple other players and lines back up.

Burns. Burns enters the picture after the goal goes in. He simply trots back to mid-field to restart the game.

Renteria. He reached out to Josh after the amazing kick only to retract after he realizes Josh wants nothing of it. Emilio understands and resumes spartan stance.

Tommy. Oh Tommy. After the strike he sprints into the goal mouth like a bat out of hell to retrieve the ball for restart. For a brief second you can see his arm and fist pump in celebration but it happens as he is running full tilt to grab the ball even though the team is still down by three goals. Amazing heart. Amazing belief. Retain this kid.

Finally. Our Captain. Mr. Marshall. Hands firmly on hips through out the whole event. No sliding on the turf. No giant bear hug. Just a simple "we have been beat. i know you have this in you already. seen it in practice. we are better then this. let's get this over with."Maybe I'm digging into a short moment a little too much. Perhaps Crew players would tell me that Gardner's goal is something to be expected. I like to think that. Ultimately. All I know is that I've watched many a blow out game where my favorite team shows their ass celebrating a meaningless moment late in the game.

Refreshingly, the Crew players didn't here. The game was lost. It was a magnificent worthless moment not to be celebrated.

It's a rare event, this.

6-2 Disappointment.

I watched the game at Jimmy V's with a friend visiting from out of town. He isn't a big soccer fan (but he is just in after a trip to Spain. He also spent a couple years in Bolivia and traveled through Central America quite a bit. Hm. He might not know soccer. But he probably knows soccer) so towards the end of the game I had to ask him what he thought.

"It looks like Seattle is toying with them."

Earlier in the week I was able to catch Seattle's historic win against Monterrey. 5 games in 15 days for Seattle. 4 wins out of it and no signs of slowing down. Seattle started this game with a remarkable amount of confidence and fire. A team "in form" as they say. They also know they are playing well, which is scary. Ever had to go to fisticuffs with a guy smiling directly at you before the first punch is thown? Never a good result.

Coach Schmid, conjuring up his German side, saw the Crew as zero threat. Sigi full of confidence against inferior talent, tactics and most importantly; motivation.

AS FOR THE CREW:
8 of the 11 Crew players were ready for a "#weekoff!!" before this game started. Franchise embarrassed. Fans embarrassed. And I am worried considering the Crew's recent late season history. No excuses this year. They need to win some of these games.

In a way, this game was fitting in that Cunningham finally got his record and in how the team finally got to see a wonderful goal off a free kick (Gardner) during such a game. True to Crew form. Two events I had wished happened in the first few games just to get them out of the way happened in a circus like blowout.

As a result. This result was not bittersweet. Or a *ASSIVE Cunningham achievement. Nor was it a simple "drop(ped) result."

It was a horror show.

And, as Burgin puts it, Will might not of made it out.

(still attempting to confirm, un-conformed outsider sources 3rd and 6th hand reports on the water bottle)

She Would Have Killed Them. Crew Sounder. Game Preview.

The Rise and Fall of Ziggy Stardust and the Spiders from Mars.

Ctrl + click this:::David Bowie.

Pushing thru the market square
so many mothers crying
News had just come over
we had five years left to sigh in
News guy wept and told us
earth, was really dying
Cried so much his face was wet
then I knew he was not lying
I heard telephones, opera house, favourite melodies
I saw boys, toys, electric irons and T.V.'s
My brain hurt like a warehouse,
it had no room to spare
I had to cram so many things to get everything in there
so many people
all the short fat people
and all the nobody people
and all the some-bo-dy people
I never thought I'd need so many people

A girl my age went off her head,
hit some tiny children.
If the black hadn't a-pulled her off,
I think she would have killed them.
A soldier with a broken arm,
fixed his stare to the wheels of a Cadillac.
A cop knelt and kissed the feet of a priest,
and a queer threw up at the sight of that

I think I saw you in an ice-cream parlour,
drinking milk shakes cold and long
Smiling and waving and looking so fine,
don't think you knew you were in this song
And it was cold and it rained so I felt like an actor
And I thought of Ma and I wanted to get back there
Your face, your race, the way that you walk
I kiss you, you're beautiful, I want you to walk

We've got five years, stuck on my eyes
Five years, what a surprise
We've got five years, my brain hurts a lot
Five years, that's all we've got
We've got five years, stuck on my eyes

... brain hurts a lot.
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Happy Friday, Saturday ink.

Crew v. Seattle Sounders, Seattle. 4:00 PM

... and if Irene cooperates, McCracken will be in Columbus this weekend.

That Familiar Place in Columbus (Crew)

Evening dreaming about having enough time to rip into Crew key performance indicators like I mean it.

For the time being and for the lack of time. I decided to look into the Crew's points per game on a ten week rolling average. Meaning; each data point is the previous averaged 10 weeks Win (3) / Draw (1) / Loss (0).

I actually started in 2007 for the data but since I'm using 10 weeks I used that year as a starting point for 2008. I got a lot out of this exercise. 1st. Holy jackhole. I can see why the team was cleaned out after last year. I know part of it had to do with contracts, age, and purging the team after Sigi Schmid left. But, really. Look at the drop in ppg at the end of the year!

Back to the chart. 3 pts is max in the chart above. That happens to be the max points you can get each game in the MLS.

I put the logo at the spot the Crew are in now. Looks like it is very, very familiar spot for the franchise. Last 2 years have gone the wrong direction afterwards. This year? Eh?? oh? duhdun duhhh. hh.

If I were on the board (does the Crew have a board?) I'd be watching very closely. I see a pattern of sucking late in the season over the last two cliff diving years. And in the last two years we've had the same coach and staff. Young team, but late year collapses shouldn't become a pattern.

Good progress after all the personnel changes this year for the Crew. This is Warzycha's 1st real team. He keeps droning on and on about getting better and better and the team isn't there yet. Well, he is in the same place the team has been in the last two years (even with out locally worshiped GSB, hoooooollllllly GSB) so now is his chance to show that growth. Or, really, just the lack of drop off. I think he will strike right through 2008 (in the chart).

So speakeath a tired manufacturing manager.

Mothered Philly Frustrated

Bad weather the night before the game grounded Philadelphia's flight. The day of the game Major League Soccer stepped in and charted a flight for them that only got into town a handful of hours before kick off. That sort of disruption could bother even the best pro.

I also believe that another frustration for the Union is the addition of Freddie Adu. By all accounts Adu seems like a good guy, but the decisions to bring players in isn't so much the franchises or coaches. These decisions are arbitrated by MLS offices. Bringing in a player of Adu's stature is a distraction that will take a few weeks to get over.

The Philadelphia Union are a tight group. Before Adu showed up they had only fielded 19 different players. It's a great testement to the franchises consistency and conditioning. MLS average is 26. All the top teams have fielded less then that. The worst: Vancouver (30), NY (30), and Toronto (37).

The Union played a good game last night. Good control, possession, chances. But they just seemed frustrated. Maybe agitated. Peter Nowak's post game comments suggested that.

THE CREW
A 2nd good week for Kevin Burns. Last week against one of the worst teams and this week against one of the best. He is Manos Hands of Fate this game.

The Renteria / Mendoza connection will need time. Mendoza was not involved in the game most of the time. But, to be fair though, most of the game was running through Meram on the right because he Union is very strong opposite side. That strength was multiplied last night because Le Toux was dropping back so far. Did Renteria and Mendoza cause that drop? Or was it just Robbie Rogers.

Could have been Rogers. One of his first attacking touches lead to the opening goal. Rogers had another excellent game. The guy is on a roll.

This was an intense game. And physical. Not sure if Meram was up for it but he did seem to be in the right places at the right times. I think he is a work in progress as a MF player. His natural position is up top. Benardo Anor seems more comfortable filling in for Eddie.

Hard fought win for the Crew.

Crew IQ

Yesterday, Craig Merz wrote the following over at Crew.com: "When healthy, his bullish runs have effectively put him in a position to score. He had half of the Crew’s first eight goals of the campaign, and has the best goals per 90 minutes average in MLS (0.73) for players with more than five appearances."

Renteria has been playing well, but the goal stat mentioned above is misleading.

1st Problem: Measurement system. "per 90 minutes" used as well as the "appearances." Emilio has 10 appearances and 616 minutes. That equates to 6.8, 90 minute games. Hitching appearances to p/90 statistics will take you down the wrong roads. Roger Torres has been in 16 games for Philly but only has 489 minutes. When pulling goal scoring efficiency, or any other efficiency, "appearances" should not be used as a qualifier.

2nd Problem: Not enough data points. 10 appearances or 6.8 games for Renteria does not give you enough data points to draw any real conclusions other then he had a good start. It's actually dangerous to look at soccer efficiency this way. Millions have been paid to poor players because of a few good games.

3rd Problem: Merz includes goals off penalty kick. Renteria has 5 goals but 2 off PK.

Oh PK. Saving and extending careers since 1996.

Renteria's real goal p/90 is actually good (0.44). It's a rate I see often when I look at good forwards. But is it the best?

Here is what you get when looking at players around Emilio Renteria's minutes:

Rate: 0.63 / 714 MINS De Rosario (time with DC only)
Rate: 0.57 / 632 MINS Alan Gordon (time with TFC only)
Rate: 0.56 / 809 MINS Conor Casey (Injured)
Rate: 0.45 / 792 MINS Brian Ching
Rate: 0.44 / 616 MINS Emilio Renteria
Rate: 0.40 / 453 MINS Steve Zakuani (Injured)

That puts Renteria in some good company but you can also see that using low appearances (5) as a qualifier yields exceptions (injuries, recently traded players) which is an indicator that says 5 apps is not enough time to pull any real substance out of.

Regardless, even using Merz system his claim on Renteria isn't accurate anyway. According to Stats, Inc. Paulo Jr. has 5 apps and a p/90 rate of 0.89 for RSL.

------------------------
Past performance predicts future results.

In 2010 Renteria scored 5 goals in 857 mins or 9.5 games. His rate was an extremely impressive 0.52. Combine last year with this year and we get 16.4 games played and a goal scoring rate of 0.48.

That's very good. Comparing to guys with similar minutes in 2011? Eric Hassli (0.49) / Landon Donovan (0.48). I'd say that's good company.

Poland. Showdown. Crew. Union. Part One.

What are the chances. Piotr Nowak. Robert Warzycha. Two head coaches taking Major League Soccer teams to battle for 1st place in the Eastern Conference from the same country. Born less then a year apart, 47 years ago. And less then 1.5 hours from each other. The odds of that are nothing to nothing. It doesn't happen. But it has here.

Both the Crew and Union are having similar seasons. They aren't ripping it up offensively but have found themselves atop their conference. Strong defense and scoring when they need to. It's MLS unlocked. Spare me the West v. East stuff. Late game starts stifle the East. It's built in.

While putting the game program for this game together I starting thinking just how great it is for both Piotr and Robert. Both of them Polish national team players in the 1990s battling it out in MLS. How great is that? Where are the stories on this?

Warzycha is from Simkowice and Nowak from Pabianice. Both of them are 47 yrs old as of this writing. Robert turns 48 tomorrow. Believe it. To be a fly on the walk after this weekends game. Time to look up some 1990s Polish national team history to try and make sense of this whole thing.

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The picture right here is a good one. I've been around sports for quite sometime. This year's Crew team is a very likable one. That picture captures the 2011 Crew perfectly. Couldn't find the clean pic so I had to screen shot it from the mls site. Too good not to post for years down the road from now.

Part two of Philly v. Crew is next month. No matter how it ends up both these teams will be making noise in the playoffs for the MLS Cup. The winner is already decided.

1963/64 Poland.

Happy Birthday Robert Warzycha. Let's go Crew.

Vamos Muchachos OR If I Had the Wings of an Eagle...

Big MLS games this week / weekend... in the East anyways. (Not to say seeing Robbie Keane get going would be great). Of course the two teams at the top, ze Crew and ze Union, will be honking each others horns in Columbus. Of course if the home side takes all three points they'll be clearly stating their case for the Cup. I'm thinking Robbie Rogers brace minimum.

Personally I'm ripe for the 2 road games United has (VAMOS!!!). We've been better away (4-3-3) than home (3-6-3). Of course this doesn't always mean anything. Maybe it just means as endearing as RFK is, the mold and decay may be getting to black and red. The home fans are great, but with such a huge place it may sound full but every quick glance shows a lot more orange seats than black shirts.

We're up against a bottom table Chicago team tomorrow night, then on Sunday we're at a strong-at-home Sporting KC (we will be "sporting" our all-red third kit ["how red is it?!]). If we take 4 or 6 points here, we can lock up that 3rd spot in the table. Especially if NE can hold Houston off tonight. On top of that we have a game or 2 in hand so our PPG will stay high.

The defense has been great in the last few games. Jakovic has impressed on his return, MacDonald, Kitchen, Woolard AND White (if we need him) will be holding it down. Hamid will most likely be back in the net, or out of his net most likely...

DeRo and Pontius have put DC on the map the past 3 weeks, but Davies, Najar and Wolff have also been showing well. Davies NEEDS a run-of-play goal, there were opportunities in the Vancouver game for him, but he just didn't receive that final pass from his teammates. He showed a good spirit each time though, as he had his arms out in disbelief he slowly brought them down and assured his teammates he was ok with it. His time is coming. Mark my words.

In other interesting world football news, the EPL starting with a whole bunch of drawrs, though plenty of interesting moments (barton = thug). Bolton trounced QPR, but we get to see what they're worth when the line up against Man.City and Agüero et. al. All that said, I'm still just as excited to see what happens in the MLS. The overlap of the 2 seasons is going to kill my social life.

More good news for MLS, is the success in the CCL (much better than in the past, showing that these teams can compete AND do well in our region. We should be dominating if we're to expect our National Team to also do well. Seattle played a wild game with two really nice goals from Fucito (who?) in spite of going down a man. LA won semi-handily (no that's not a word) but should have taken more goals from their home game in the series (sidenote: boot to the chest red card in this one, though it's no de Jong).