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October 31, 2006
Chavez, Reed to answer questions in online forum
Thanks to an alert SSV member, we have been informed that San Jose mayoral candidates Cindy Chavez and Chuck Reed will be answering questions posed in an online forum at the Mercury News web site. While SSV is not endorsing a candidate in this race, we figure it doesn't hurt to ask them if they're enthusiastic about bringing the team back. If you'd like to ask a question, too, please do so. Here's the page for Chavez and the page for Reed.
And, heck, as long as we're writing—how about that stoppage-time goal from Brian Ching to knock Under-a-Chivas USA out of the playoffs? We hate not having a team but somebody's gotta win MLS Cup this year, so it may as well be DeRo, Chinger, and co. (It'd be OK with us if Joe Cannon wins it, too.)
Posted by Jay at 11:00 AM | Comments (0)
October 25, 2006
Lagos, Foudy selected for USL Hall of Fame
Two players who have made a huge impact on Bay Area soccer have been elected to the United Soccer Leagues (USL) Hall of Fame.
Manny Lagos, who played such a big role in the Quakes' 2001 and 2003 championships, will be joined in the 2006 Hall of Fame class by Julie Foudy, former US women's national team star, Stanford grad, and Bay Area Women's Sports Initiative co-founder, as well as long-time U.S. defender Marcelo Balboa.
Here at the blog we recall a number of great Manny Lagos moments. He scored some key goals against Columbus in the 2001 playoffs, for example. Our favorite Lagos goal was against Tampa Bay that same year, when Landon Donovan played a blind scoop pass to an onrushing Lagos, who headed it past a very frustrated Adin Brown. If we close our eyes, we can still see Manny running the left flank with his awkward, stork-like sprint. We'll take him on our team any time.
As for Foudy, her list of accomplishments is somewhat longer: Olympic gold medalist, World Cup champion, champion of women's sports, Title IX crusader... it goes on and on.
Congratulations to all!
Posted by Jay at 06:59 PM | Comments (0)
October 24, 2006
Mulrooney recognized as Comeback Player of the Year
It's likely enough that most of the people reading this blog were at Spartan Stadium last May for one of the strangest games in Earthquakes history. During the course of the first half, a total of three players left the game with serious knee injuries: Troy Dayak and Brian Ching of the Quakes and former Quake Richard Mulrooney, playing his first game in San Jose since being traded to FC Dallas.
Mulrooney's road to recovery was long and he missed the rest of the 2005 season but his return to form in the Dallas midfield was rewarded today with the MLS Comeback Player of the Year award. He played in 25 games, starting 23. He only scored one goal but his nine assists this year tie his career highs set with the Quakes in 2000 and 2001.
Our congratulations to Richard.
Posted by Jay at 04:37 PM | Comments (0)
October 16, 2006
SF Business Times checks in with article on Quakes
Many readers of this fine blog were disppointed to see that the Mercury News coverage of Lew Wolff's presentation to the San Jose Silicon Valley Chamber of Commerce in August, which focused almost exclusively on his blunt appraisal of the prospect of moving the A's to San Jose. (None, basically.) Instead of presenting the opportunity that San Jose now faces—working with Wolff to build a new, privately-financed $100 million soccer stadium—they used lots of ink to report what most of us knew was already a foregone conclusion.
Fortunately, there are some publications in the area that get it, and we count the San Francisco Business Times in that category. The current edition of that fine publication features a front page story on the Earthquakes, and details the Quakes' work to date.
The story reiterates much of what Wolff and SSV have said already: they're interested in sites near downtown San Jose, the Santa Clara County Fairgrounds, and the overflow parking lot at Great America in Santa Clara, although their rights include the entire Bay Area and Sacramento. The article also mentions that this effort is separate from the A's work towards a new stadium in Fremont and that "a stadium that could host both soccer and baseball is not an option Wolff is considering."
The article does manage to sketch out a little bit more specifically what the A's have in mind:
A new stadium likely would cost about $100 million, a tab Wolff and company said they will cover. The A's look to the Chicago Fire's new stadium as a prototype facility. The 20,000-seat stadium, opened this season, has 48 suites available for between $25,000 to $60,000 per season. The $70 million facility also has a stage to host concerts and other non-Major League Soccer events.
It shouldn't come as a surprise that they're pointing to Toyota Park as an example of what they want to build—they've hired the same architects for a Bay Area stadium. The good news here is that the same firm designed Home Depot Center and they're not pointing at that as an example of a good soccer stadium.
In any case, nice to see the Business Times give the story the attention it deserves. Let's hope the rest of the region's media follows suit.
Posted by Jay at 12:53 PM | Comments (0)
October 11, 2006
AEG to sell DC United for $33 million
A story in today's Rocky Mountain News states that a $33 million deal for DC United is nearly completed. The buyer is Blue Devil Ventures, an investment group whose managing partner, former Duke basketball star Brian Davis, is also involved in an effort to buy the Memphis Grizzlies of the NBA. (Coincidentally, Davis is profiled in today's USA Today.) If the sale goes through, it would leave AEG with just three MLS teams, half of their former holdings.
We here at the blog are impressed. Setting a new record price for a team without its own stadium says a lot about what investors think of the future of the league. Also instructive is a glance at the most recent investors in MLS: Kroenke Sports, Dave Checketts, the Maple Leafs, Red Bull, Lew Wolff, and now Davis—all groups with professional sports experience. While it seems that the Big Four sports in the U.S. used to snicker at soccer, it looks like they have a new attitude now: If you can't beat 'em, join 'em.
Posted by Jay at 02:06 PM | Comments (0)
October 10, 2006
My Name is AEG
We at SSV enjoy NBC's program, "My Name is Earl" not only for the excellent soundtrack and great comedic acting of Earl's brother, but for its underlying theme of karma. Do unto others what you would have done unto yourself. Or something like that. For those of you who don't watch the show, its about a good guy named Earl who was once bad. After winning $100,000 in a lottery after stealing the ticket, Earl promptly gets hit by a car. So he decides its time to stop his bad ways. He needs to get better karma.
We see AEG kind of like we see Earl: a good guy whose made some poor decisions. So when we saw that AEG's prized L.A. franchise missed the playoffs this year, (see http://soccernet.espn.go.com/report?id=195924&cc=5901 ) we couldn't help but think of Earl. Could it be karma?
Last year the future-secured Galaxy were one of the worst teams in MLS and barely made the playoffs. Yet they had one good game against us future-in-the-balance-need-to-win-MLS CUP-or-its-off-to-Houston Quakes, and were able to ride it all the way to an MLS Cup.(There were rumors that our manager-less Supporters Shield winners were housed not at the usual comfy Marriott, but at a less prestigious and more inconvenient locale the night before the match.) Amid all of these distractions, the best team in MLS lost to the worst team to qualify for the playoffs. The best team didn't win the MLS Cup and then got moved to Houston. And the fans suffered.
The move was made despite recent reports confirming what everyone here already knew, that San Jose had a (relatively) large and loyal fan base. (See http://www.signonsandiego.com/sports/soccer/20060927-9999-lz1s27goal.html . Yeah, LA has more fans, apparently. One would hope so with a new stadium and 10M people from which to draw them.) So while in many ways, AEG's golden franchise is fast becoming San Jose South, what with its former star player Landon Donovan, its former star head coach Frank Yallop, and former star manager, Alexi Lalas - it remains to be seen if they can recapture the magic that was the San Jose Earthquakes circa 2000-2005. We at SSV believe that until the Quakes return to MLS, any LA victories will ring false, because their true rival is gone. Perhaps there was a bit of karma then, to this failure of the mighty LA Galaxy.
Posted by Colin at 12:29 PM | Comments (1)
October 01, 2006
DC United falls short of Quakes' record
DC United was handed their fifth loss of the year last night, and with that loss they now will fall short of tying the Earthquakes' MLS record set last season of just four losses.
DC's setback came at the hands of the Houston Dynamo. Some guy named Brian Ching—that name sounds familiar for some reason—scored a spectacular 86th minute bicycle kick for the 1-0 win. (You can find a video clip on MLSnet.com.)
Posted by Jay at 07:51 AM | Comments (0)