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December 12, 2007

Good times, bad times

What with it being the week of the big Led Zeppelin reunion, we couldn't resist a reference to the grand old band (did we say old?) in today's headline. Plus, there's good news and bad news, so it seemed to fit.

The good news is that there's been an unscheduled Quakes news explosion, with stories appearing in three different publications as well as some items from other sources:

• Sports Illustrated's Jonah Freedman spoke with Quakes co-owner Lew Wolff, who related the good and bad news about the Quakes' stadium efforts. The good news? Everything is on track, barring an unforeseen disagreement with the City of San Jose. The bad news? It looks like the earliest opening date for the new facility will almost certainly be 2011, which means three seasons at Buck Shaw instead of the two-to-three mentioned in previous public comments. Of course, we will gladly choose three years at Buck Shaw over what we've had the last two years.
• Apparently, Mr. Wolff was on a bit of a press junket, because he spoke with John Ryan of the Mercury News as well. Ryan reports that the Quakes are up to 2,700 season tickets sold (up from 2,000 last week as the ticket reps continue to work through the list of fans who've already put down deposits), the capacity for Buck Shaw will be between 10,000 and 11,000 (smaller than we've heard before), and that "General Manager John Doyle is scouting in England, Coach Frank Yallop in Mexico and assistant Ian Russell in Costa Rica."
• Debbie Arrington of the Sacramento Bee also spoke with Wolff, this time about the region's soccer community:

  "If you look at all the states with the most soccer players, adult and youth combined, Northern California would be first – and we're not even a state," said Earthquakes co-owner Lew Wolff, noting Southern California ranks several slots lower. "Not having a professional team here for even a moment was too long."

  Arrington also spoke with Quakes' executive VP David Alioto about the recently concluded Tryout Tour.

• Speaking of which, now we move on to the "bad times" portion of our program. Incredibly, it appears that paying $150 for the privilege of working out in front of some pro scouts can be seen as an act that requires a high school athlete to give up their eligibility, as reported in this Contra Costa Times story:

  At least five high school boys soccer players have been ruled ineligible by the California Interscholastic Federation because of their participation in a tryout for a San Jose Earthquakes developmental team, and there's a chance many more players could be involved.

  CIF executive director Marie Ishida said Tuesday that the players -- two each from Las Lomas and Concord, one from Acalanes and any others who might come forward -- would likely have their eligibility reinstated because of some ambiguity in the rule.

  But that won't happen until the CIF compiles a more complete list of the players involved, Ishida said. She noted that the Earthquakes were sending a list of participants from the tryouts and that she would work with North Coast Section commissioner Tom Ehrhorn to determine which of those participants are on high school teams.

  Ishida said regardless of whether the players are reinstated, though, any games they played after the tryout would be forfeited. That could ultimately have a major effect on league standings and NCS playoff seedings.

  It's an ugly situation to be sure — we feel confident in saying that the Quakes did not intend to do anything that would compromise a player's amateur eligibility, and it seems like the CIF is ruling on a technicality. We wonder — If the event had been given a different name that didn't use the word "tryout," would any of this be an issue? ("Come see if you have what it takes to be a member of the Earthquakes' Prospect Posse! We're looking for players who may someday have what it takes to be an Earthquake.")

  And, uh, should we even mention that the Galaxy had 800 people at open tryouts in February and nobody raised a fuss about it? They're a California team too, right? No, we probably shouldn't mention that.

• In any case, there's an interesting account of the Quakes' tour from one of the talent evaluators here on BigSoccer.
• Speaking of BigSoccer, there's a rumor there that the Quakes will be one of three MLS teams, along with the Red Bulls and Toronto, participating in the Carolina Challenge Cup from March 15-22. (It's unconfirmed so far, so don't go making those travel reservations just yet.)
• There's an interesting story about how soccer may benefit from California's changing demographics in the Los Angeles Times.

  At Jefferson (High), more than 100 students tried out for boys' soccer, and football Coach Doi Johnson has begun to wonder whether soccer will continue to rise in popularity.

  "I don't think it will ever overtake football, because it's America's game," Johnson said. "It might overtake basketball. If you said that in the '80s, that thought wouldn't be fathomable."

• Finally, reader DW Quakes asked yesterday if San Jose might be interested in obtaining DC United's Christian Gomez, who is apparently on the trading block. We replied that if the sticking point was money, we weren't sure Gomez would be worth it.

  As it turns out, money is not the issue — it's reportedly the number of guaranteed years in the contract (DC wants one, Gomez wants at least two). A quick check of the salary data provided by the MLS Players' Union shows that Gomez had a guaranteed salary of $218,500 last year, which sounds like a pretty good price for a guy who racked up 10 goals and 9 assists in 27 starts last year, even if he did turn 33 last month. So yes, we'd take him — but we'll defer to Doyle and Yallop to determine if he's the right fit for the team.

  Update: The Washington Post's Steven Goff has this to say on the topic: "Gomez to SJ? Not that I've heard. I do know which club that is interested in him, but was told off the record and am obligated to remain silent. Sorry. If anything of substance develops, I am sure other folks will start talking and it will go public."

Man, this was a long entry. We probably could have used "Ramble On" as a headline, too.

Posted by Jay at December 12, 2007 06:32 AM

Comments

Posted by: S at December 12, 2007 02:08 PM