There have been a few things I've been keeping my eye on lately that may be flying under the radar of some so here's a look around the league at the stories that have been peaking my curiosity or, if they're not lucky, my ire. It's a whirlwind tour from the glassy waters of Vancouver to the, well, glassy water of Hampton Roads. Okay, fine, so the adjectives aren't that great this week. Give me a break, when we get to the other side of this thing we should all know a little more about what's going on around the A-League this week.
The business of finding a proper owner in Vancouver should be picking up as Bob Lenarduzzi is now returning from helping CBC in their World Cup coverage. Some say he did a very good job talking shop with the CBC folks and we hear he's now looking forward to getting on with pulling this Vancouver club back up by its bootstraps. I'm sure there will be several fans who will be happy to welcome the former player/coach/general manager back as he hunts down investors.
Speaking of things involving the Whitecaps does anybody else wish that the Colorado Rapids would just make up their minds? This jerking around of Vancouver's Mr. Jordan is getting a bit tiresome. Tim Hankinson is one of the more likable coaches in MLS but this on again, off again treatment of the now a Whitecaps, now a Rapids player is entirely bush league. It shows a complete lack of respect for the rest of the Whitecaps and their fans. Unfortunately for the Canadian teams in the A-League there are no guarantees that they would even be remotely compensated should Jordan (or any Lynx, Impact, or Storm players) finally leave for MLS. That's not even getting into the fact that they probably deserve a little something for their patience so far in this complicated saga.
Hampton Roads has been making waves recently but they've finally been of a much better nature. So far they've signed Gary Glasgow, Darin Lewis, Gabe Eastman, and Douda Kante who all have had some sort of experience with an MLS club. Kante was drafted by D.C. United but spent most of this year with Wilmington in D3. Gary Glasgow, of course, used to play for 2000 MLS champs Kansas City. Darin Lewis never did crack the Metrostars starting line-up but he is still a skilled athlete and should do well in Hampton Roads. Eastman has bounced around a fair amount in the past few years between the A-League and MLS but did hang around for a bit with San Jose and Los Angeles. They will still need some time to come together as a team, though, as most probably saw in their televised match against Atlanta on Thursday.
Incidentally if you'd like to chat with the Mariners new owner make a trip over to USLdiscussions.com's Mariners forum and look around. He might even make you a deal on that rusted out Pinto you've had sitting around your yard for the past 10 years. Mike Field apparently knows what he wants and seems to be going out of his way to get it. So far he's brought in players people might know while supplementing those guys with loan players like Taly Goode from Kansas City and Justin Mapp from D.C. United. Mapp also happens to be a possible prospect for the U.S. Olympic team for 2004 in Athens. Then there are the promotions such as bringing bands in to create an event atmosphere instead of a minor league ballgame atmosphere. Only time will tell if this will pay off but if Field starts giving away cars I may even start buying tickets.
Is anyone else getting more than a little tired with the extreme sides of the coverage soccer has been receiving lately? It seems like those who like to knock soccer bring up attendance figures and their own personal dislike of the sport in order to discount those fans that are just happy to be mentioned in the mainstream press. Then there are a select few who mention things like turning points and the game of the future as they talk about the U.S. finally arriving on the international stage.
The added press is all well and good but there are many of us who are waiting for soccer to arrive on the national stage. Those of us are mostly satisfied with making progress and that's what we've got right now. As John O'Brien said post-Poland: I'll take it. A lot of us are happy that mainstream press folks seem to be able to actually say the word 'soccer' without going into spasmodic fits of laughter and flashbacks to when they used to give soccer players wedgies in high school. Then there's the fact that some players are even getting to meet Kelly Ripa and Ali Landry and being taken seriously during interviews, yet I digress.
The point is that we are getting there. We are not "there" yet and we might not be "there" soon but you know where we can be? We can all try to be at a soccer park somewhere in this country as part of our weekends. Many of us will have done that as part of our 4th of July celebrations and many non-soccer people will be there with us. Will it be due to the success of the U.S. Soccer team? Nah, sometimes people just like to see colorful things go boom.
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