Author: Beau Dure

The guy who wrote a bunch of soccer books and now runs a Gen X-themed podcast while substitute teaching and continuing to write freelance stuff.
olympic sports, track and field

Woly Award: LaShawn Merritt, track and field

Posted on by Beau Dure

LaShawn Merritt won the 2008 gold medal in the highly competitive 400 meters. He followed it up with a world title in 2009.

Then the troubles began. He tested positive for a substance that he attributed to the drug ExtenZe. He returned with a second-place finish to Grenadan sensation Kirani James in 2011, then injured his hamstring in 2012 and didn’t make it to the Olympic final.

So he’s done, right?

Wrong. Merritt blew away the field at the World Championships in Moscow with a world-leading and personal best 43.74 seconds. Then he anchored the dominant U.S. men to victory in the 4×400 relay.

And he’ll take this week’s Woly Award for the top U.S. performance in Olympic sports.

Also in the playlist this week: David Oliver and Brianna Rollins win the world titles in the hurdles; winter sports season starts with slopestyle, halfpipe and cross-country; U.S. volleyballers and wrestlers win; and the USL’s Richmond Kickers try to play racquetball with no hands.

[iframe src=”//www.youtube.com/embed/videoseries?list=PLWAQzaiNbislzoUM-egKxRmf2cKZCrGAN”  width=”560″ height=”315″]

0
soccer

The NASL and the periodic restatement of facts on promotion/relegation

Posted on by Beau Dure

prorelHow did a three-part Empire of Soccer interview with NASL Commissioner Bill Peterson start an epic Twitter beatdown?

Well, it helped that in the first part, he talked about promotion/relegation, the concept that governs most soccer leagues (and other leagues) worldwide, including a lot of U.S. amateur leagues. (I still don’t know whether my indoor team was relegated last season.)

Dan Loney responded with the blog post “Not a Sane League.” That brought out the usual mix of people with an interest in promotion/relegation — some well-intended dreamers who are curious to see if it could work here, plus the people who think promotion/relegation has been kept down by an evil mix of MLS executives, journalists paid off with access or possibly money, and possibly the NSA. I don’t know — I’ve lost track.

That led to the epic Twitter match between Loney and the leader of the accusatory gang. It was mostly off-track, centering on the assertion that the U.S. soccer community has covered up a colorful history in which the old ASL was bigger than American football. Loney showed evidence to show otherwise and demanded that his combatant defend his point, which he completely failed to do.

All of this demonstrates two seemingly contradictory things:

1. There are a handful of somewhat reasonable and capitalized people who think promotion/relegation may be possible in our lifetimes.

2. The people who make the most noise about promotion/relegation online make it really difficult to have a reasonable discussion about it.

For those who are new to the discussion, welcome. Please allow me to bring you up to speed. Read this post for some prior talks, and then please consider the following:

1. Bids for Division I sanctioning were taken in 1993. I have done a fair amount of research on this period for my book and out of curiosity. I know of no effort to have promotion/relegation at that time.

I do, however, know of a bid that had multiple-point scoring like indoor soccer on steroids, and it would have limited players to specific zones and then shuffle them around between periods. This is where soccer stood in the USA in 1993.

2. MLS owners have sunk billions of dollars into this league as it stands now. Municipalities have helped MLS teams build stadiums. The team values and revenue projections that convinced them all to invest in this are predicated on the notion of being in the first division. Many of these investments have been made in the past 10 years — in 2002, the league was down to three owners and had few facilities. People tend to get angry, maybe even litigious, when you get them to pony up tons of capital and then change the rules.

So if you plan to take over USSF and force leagues to have promotion/relegation, bring the lawyers.

3. I have spoken with many team owners and officials in lower divisions. Many of them have relegated themselves. Many owners prefer to play in the fourth-tier PDL than the third-tier USL PRO or second-tier NASL. Why? It costs a whole lot less.

A couple of organizations — Seattle, Portland, Vancouver, Montreal, perhaps Orlando down the road — have made the leap from lower divisions to MLS. They did so over the course of a few years. They brought in owners with deep pockets. They worked out stadium deals. They built up a front office staff. These are not things you do in three months.

4. Promotion/relegation developed in other countries when they had too many teams for one division. In England, the Football League went through its early years occasionally kicking out and adding a new team or two, but a second division wasn’t added until it merged with the Football Alliance. In England and many other countries, leagues developed after clubs had already built their names through Cup competitions.

5. Soccer history in this country has not been ignored as part of a conspiracy to … um … I don’t know exactly how this conspiracy is supposed to work. Seems to have something to do with trying to make people think nothing existed before MLS. Strange argument to make when a bunch of MLS teams are named after their NASL predecessors, or when U.S. Soccer is devoting a lot of resources toward celebrating its centennial this year. (Bill Clinton wrote the preface to the book, so if you like broadening your conspiracy theories, you can now include Whitewater.) Personally, the only reason I don’t often wear my Fall River Marksmen shirt (from Bumpy Pitch) more often is that I’m fat and I don’t fit into it that well.

Several people have made extraordinary efforts to keep U.S. soccer history alive through many dark decades. It’s not as if the NASL of the 70s paid tribute to the ASL of the 20s and 30s. We needed the efforts of Colin Jose, Roger Allaway, Sam Foulds, Jack Huckel, David Litterer and David Wangerin to bring it all to life, even as the National Soccer Hall of Fame ran out of money. (This was all summed up in a terrific story this week.)

The main lesson that can be drawn from those histories: Soccer has had a couple of opportunities to gain a firm foothold in the USA, and it fell apart through in-fighting over petty crap. Kind of like we could end up doing now if we try to upend 20 years of progress in pro soccer.

6. This might be the most important point: There is no evidence whatsoever that a lack of promotion/relegation is what’s holding back pro soccer in the United States.

The point gets muddied here because promotion/relegation is sometimes considered part of an “open system” in which clubs are free to spend what they want. That’s what we see in Europe, though “Financial Fair Play” rules may introduce some limits, and Germany’s Bundesliga is having tremendous success while refusing to break the bank.

But most soccer owners in the USA in recent years have set out to minimize risk. The NWSL, USL, NPSL, WPSL and APS are designed to keep costs down, and they’re not running the risk of losing revenue by being kicked down the pyramid against their will. That’s why MLS had such rigid cost-containment rules for its first decade and change. Only now, in the post-Beckham era, is that starting to change.

If you’re looking for the NASL to change all that, you may be disappointed. For all the bluster of the New York Cosmos and the lack of an official salary cap at the moment, they aren’t spending crazy money. I’ve been told by an insider (anonymous source alert, though maybe he’ll step forward) that the NASL is operating with “less risk, lower operating costs.”

Meanwhile, MLS is spending with confidence — on stadiums, on youth academies, on players like Clint Dempsey. And the league has managed to do so even as the explosion of cable and new media has made it possible for U.S. fans to see every English/Welsh Premier League game (I plan to make “Ew-pull” stick) and every trick Lionel Messi has at his feet.

Would an “open system” help U.S. (and Canadian) teams develop into superclubs that can hold their own with the Man Uniteds and the Barcelonas of the world? Maybe when MLS and NASL owners have seen enough returns on their investments that they’re willing to risk spending more and seeing their teams relegated. The best-case scenario for the NASL, which is probably not the most probable scenario, is that the league thrives to the point at which it, too, meets the criteria for a Division 1 league. And then — maybe — we could talk about merging MLS and the NASL as the Football League and Football Alliance did in England.

Is that likely? Probably not.

But it’s more likely than creating a thriving U.S. league system by taking over U.S. Soccer and starting an “open system” from scratch or trying to force existing leagues to abide by drastically different rules.

And by pointing this out, I’m part of the conspiracy. And I’ll surely attract obnoxious comments. I’d encourage people to ignore those comments and relish the fact that, this weekend, you can see European games on several networks and then check out your local MLS, NWSL, NASL or USL team. If you’re over age 25, you remember when soccer was something that barely existed above the college level, and you have to marvel at the progress.

Simply put: There’s never been a better time to be a soccer fan in North America. And it’s all been done without telling people who step up to risk their money that they need to take risks that are even less likely to pay off than the ones they’re already taking.

38
mma

UFC: Your unofficial guide to survival as a reporter

Posted on by Beau Dure

Dana White can make things very difficult for those who cross him in any way. Rival promotions are left in the dust. Fighters are cut. And reporters, even entire news organizations, can be tossed into the cold.

The funny thing is that I still like him on a personal level, and I respect what he and the Fertitta brothers did to build MMA from a sideshow to a main event. Had the UFC folded circa 2004 when the brothers were losing a ton of money, I doubt MMA would ever have risen to anything resembling the prominence it has today. The Friends episode in which Monica’s boyfriend is beaten up might have been the peak of the sport.

I don’t blame him for playing hardball with other promotions. Most of the cuts from the UFC’s oversized roster are justifiable, and they let a fighter go off and headline a smaller show instead of taking more lumps in the Octagon.

The attitude toward reporters, though, is an issue. I’ve told Dana before that I don’t think it’s fair to keep out Loretta Hunt, Josh Gross and others who have fallen afoul of the UFC’s good graces.

So today, Deadspin got a tip — a note from Bleacher Report/Houston Chronicle MMA writer Jeremy Botter to other writers, explaining What Not To Do To Piss Off Dana.

(Disclaimer time: I’ve written for Bleacher Report. Most of you know that already. Yes, I was paid. Moving on.)

The fact that it was at Deadspin should set off some alarm bells. Writer Tim Marchman seems to be casting himself as the MMA-community equivalent of the guy who says, “Fine, I don’t want to go to your stupid party, anyway.” He notes with pride that Deadspin itself is blacklisted from the UFC. But … it’s Deadspin. Deadspin has always taken the stance that it doesn’t WANT credentials because its brilliant bloggers might meet actual athletes and come to consider them as human beings rather than fodder for their snark cannons.

But the funny thing is that Botter’s note — not really a memo — is mostly spot-on.

The exception is the mention of Loretta Hunt. She wasn’t actually banned for her reporting on UFC backstage access. At the time of the backstage access story, she was working for Sherdog, which was already banned. And her previous employer fell out with the UFC, too. The details in each case are rather arcane.

(Yes, I know the “official version” UFC drones post to impress basement-dwellers on the UG is vastly different, but that just shows how effective the unofficial UFC spin machine can be. One of the UFC drones on the UG is female, and I think a lot of people in that community are just excited to be speaking to a girl.)

In any case, Sam Caplan backed up Hunt’s story. And to this day, I think it’s a story that would’ve been forgotten if Dana hadn’t responded on video in a way that forced him to reconsider his language. The fact that Dana responded so harshly makes me think Hunt was on to something. Why else would he care?

In any case, it’s worth remembering here that Botter never intended for this to be public. If he was writing this for publication, he’d be a little more careful with the research.

With that out of the way, let’s look at just how accurate this note really is:

1. Nothing pisses Dana off more than people talking about Zuffa’s financials and getting everything wrong.

True of nearly everyone in the news. The UFC (Zuffa) is stingy with details, sure. But reporters can’t try to fill in gaps in their knowledge with flimsy information.

2. Don’t “report” things unless you have two very credible sources.

Basic journalism there.

3. Don’t be a mouthpiece for a manager who may be feeding you false information.

Hunt was used as the example here, and that’s inaccurate. But the point is correct.

4. Don’t be a mouthpiece for a fighter who may be feeding you false information.

Frankly, if Bleacher Report lives up to this, they’ll be ethically ahead of a lot of major news orgs.

5. Don’t talk about Dana’s history with his mom.

I didn’t know about this, but it never occurred to me to ask. Not sure how it’s anyone’s business unless his mom starts a rival fight promotion.

6. Don’t mix rumors with opinion.

Funny — people loved it when William Safire did it. But again, it’s good basic journalism here. You’re entitled to your opinion. Dana may tease you about it, but I don’t think he has banned anyone simply for an opinion. He doesn’t like inaccurate reporting about it. (The problem comes when the reporting is accurate, and he insists it’s not.)

7. Don’t be negative just to be edgy.

Well, no wonder Deadspin thought this was amusing. That’s their entire business model.

7a. Wait until the media scrum after an official press conference to bring up controversial topics.

People in the news often have their idiosyncrasies, and this is one. I don’t think a reporter is bending to Dana’s will by waiting for the media scrum to ask about fighter pay or something like that. If you know you’re going to get a better answer then, why not wait to ask it until then? Reporters want answers, not pointless confrontations.

8. You’re being watched. They pay attention to all media reports.

They most certainly do. Some in the sports world say they don’t read the papers or pay attention to the news. Dana doesn’t say that. He knows people would just laugh. The UFC is image-conscious to a fault.

So there’s really nothing controversial (other than the Hunt comment) in this note. I could write something similar about nearly everyone I’ve covered.

The larger issue is the UFC’s insistence on vindictive bans against Hunt, Gross, Sherdog (off and on), etc. It actually puts those of us who are “in” the UFC media circle in a tough spot. We seem compromised. I see people accuse credentialed reporters of being UFC mouthpieces all the time, and it’s usually unfair.

In that context, it probably doesn’t help that Botter’s note went public. People with an unflattering view of the UFC’s media relations may see it as a guide to genuflection toward Dana White and company. But it’s nothing more than a reasonable piece of advice for dealing with an oft-unreasonable community.

0
olympic sports

Woly Award: Miles Chamley-Watson, fencing

Posted on by Beau Dure

World Championship season is tough for those of us who try to pick an award winner. What do you do when you have someone who has won three straight world titles (plus the Olympics, plus two world indoor titles) in the women’s long jump, like Brittney Reese? Or an Olympic decathlon champion who repeated the feat at Worlds, like Ashton Eaton?

You give it to the fencer, of course.

Miles Chamley-Watson was just outside the top 16 seeds coming into the men’s foil competition at the World Championships, so he had to work his way through pool play before reaching the knockout rounds. Then he won his first bout 15-12. Then he came from 10-6 down to win 15-14 in the round of 32. Down 11-6 in the round of 16? Came back to win 15-14. Down 12-5 in the quarters? Oh, that has to be it — oops, he came back and won 15-14 again.

The semifinals and the final were comparatively easy. Watch his final performance in the playlist below.

He also picked up another medal today, earning silver in the team competition. That’ll be in next week’s playlist.

So Chamley-Watson is this week’s Woly Award winner, given to the best U.S. performance in Olympic sports this week.

The full list of highlights in the playlist here:

  • Fencing: Chamley-Watson, world men’s foil champion
  • Track and field: Reese, world women’s long jump champion
  • Track and field: Eaton, world decathlon champion
  • Beach volleyball: Jennifer Fopma and Brooke Sweat win first FIVB medal
  • Volleyball: Young U.S. team wins epic match with Serbia
  • Track and field: Usain Bolt isn’t American, but he’s in the highlight reel anyway — besides, Justin Gatlin was the only person anywhere near him
  • Fencing: Team bronze for the U.S. women in sabre
  • Fencing: One for the blooper reel
  • Track and field: Mo Farah at least trains in the USA, and he’s too good to ignore
  • Swimming: Thomas Shields wins 100-meter butterfly in World Cup
  • Swimming: Tyler Clary wins 400-meter butterfly, same meet
  • Badminton: Surreal end to a classic World Championship final between men’s singles legends Lin Dan and Lee Chong Wei

Video ahoy:

[iframe src=”//www.youtube.com/embed/videoseries?list=PLWAQzaiNbisnUbuvswLTLQIMI7Uoiacn7″ width=”560″ height=”315″]

0
college sports, olympic sports

College sports: End “shamateurism” but don’t pay players

Posted on by Beau Dure

Jay Bilas, with whom I’m proud to share an alma mater, stirred things up recently when he exposed the NCAA for selling shirts with athletes’ names on them. Bilas is a thoughtful guy, not a rash flamethrower, so his interview with Richard Deitsch is worth a read. He distinguishes between bad policy and bad people.

Key quote:

This is about NCAA policy, and a small part of the larger, overall point that the NCAA’s policy on amateurism is unjustifiable in this multi-billion dollar commercial enterprise of college sports.

He’s right, but that shouldn’t lead us into “pay the players” territory. Here’s why:

1. College athletes already get something substantial out of their playing careers. Here’s another Dukie, Seth Davis:

Davis took some criticism on Twitter, but he also heard from someone who pointed out that college loans are crippling a lot of people these days. Athletes have a little less to worry about on that front.

2. Most college sports programs aren’t profitable.

Granted, colleges sell a lot of merchandise on the backs of their sports teams. Merchandise isn’t always easy in accounting terms. When I buy a Georgia sweatshirt, the football team plays a big role in my purchase, but so does the fact that my father was on the faculty there for 40 years. When I buy an MIT shirt for my kids, a smaller percentage of that purchase reflects my admiration that so many smart kids at the school participate in sports. (It was 20 percent until a few cuts were made a few years ago. Cal Tech, by the way, is on probation. Seriously. And yes, it doesn’t make the NCAA look good.)

3. Nonrevenue sports shouldn’t just be collateral damage as colleges ramp up spending wars in football.

I have another idea, and it’s related to what I’ve discussed in the past on getting the NCAA to drop the ridiculous regulations and focus on actual cheating.

Let players make and keep outside money.

EA Sports wants to use current player likenesses in their games? Fine. Pay them. (Obviously, they should also pay former players like Ed O’Bannon, whose lawsuit should have settled long ago.)

Someone wants to pay Johnny Manziel $1,000 to sign autographs? Fine. Let him keep it.

Katie Ledecky breaks a world record and is eligible for bonus money? Are you kidding me? What organization in its right mind would say she’s not eligible for it? (As Philip Hersh points out, swimmers who have turned down the money and gone to college have had better careers, which just adds fuel to the question of why people have to choose.)

The NCAA, for its part, says the following:

The NCAA membership has adopted amateurism rules to ensure the students’ priority remains on obtaining a quality educational experience and that all of student-athletes are competing equitably.

But how does “amateurism,” defined by NCAA practice as not making a dime off one’s rare talents, achieve either of the underlined goals?

If Katie Ledecky takes her world record bonus, does that mean she won’t study hard? Will swimmers who otherwise would have been able to keep up with a world record-holder somehow be disadvantaged if the record-holder collected her money?

The point we can’t stress enough: That money isn’t coming from a college that’s trying to recruit Ledecky. No college is gaining an unfair advantage.

And if she’s a student in good standing, who is the NCAA to say she’s not receiving a “quality educational experience”? My “priority” my senior year wasn’t the handful of classes I needed to graduate — it was the newspaper. I saw Seth Davis in the office a good bit as well. That’s how we got employed after graduation.

I’ll repeat from posts past: The NCAA’s enforcers should be concerned with two things:

1. Making sure schools aren’t paying players.

2. Making sure players are students in good standing.

And that’s it.

3
soccer

Washington Spirit vs. Seattle: The final whistle

Posted on by Beau Dure

Wednesday’s game against Chicago was, by all practical measures, the Spirit’s first win since May 16. The league rules are clear. Washington was the better side in the 77 minutes played before the first lightning delay. As cruel as it was for the Red Stars to have their playoff hopes officially extinguished without even being on the field, the Spirit won fair and square.

But it was incomplete. Wednesday night/Thursday morning, Mark Parsons talked about not being able to hear the final whistle in front of the dozens of fans who had stuck it out through nearly three hours of stopping and starting.

Perhaps that made the Spirit hungrier. Parsons and Diana Matheson both talked afterwards about wanting to hear that final whistle. And this time, they did — in front of more than 4,000 fans. (Only a handful of the 4,549 got out to beat traffic.)

Several of us have said over the course of the season that the Spirit, beset by bad karma all season, just needed a little luck to get a good result or two. You could say they got it Wednesday, though it’s worth reiterating that the Spirit played well enough to win.

Saturday night, no luck was needed. It wasn’t a dominant performance, of course, but the Spirit created the better chances. Seattle coach Laura Harvey cited the long road trip for her team’s disappointing performance, but she wasn’t making excuses or disputing that Washington deserved the result.

The Spirit did with a lot of heart, certainly, but also with some tactical and technical shrewdness. Parsons’ formation was described several ways — 4-2-1-2-1, 4-2-3-1, 4-3-3. The bottom line was that the Spirit used two holding mids, Lori Lindsey and Julia Roberts, instead of one. Between their efforts and a solid back line, with Marisa Abegg more than justifying her late-season addition, the Spirit held Seattle to very little. Some of the Reign’s shots were from distances that would challenge field-goal kickers. In a bright start to the second half, Jessica Fishlock had a low bending shot graze the post, but Ashlyn Harris otherwise had little trouble.

The formation tweak, Parsons said, helped to free Diana Matheson and Lupita Worbis in the attack. Worbis spent much of the game being roughed up by Fishlock (fans noticed), who came into the game one yellow card shy of a suspension and will play the season finale only through the bottomless benevolence of referee Kari Seitz. But Matheson had a superb game. The Canadian midfielder was a revelation in the early going this season, slowed a bit after the international break, then reasserted her all-league claim in the last couple of games.

Stephanie Ochs and Conny Pohlers weren’t always on the same page, and Pohlers waved her arms so hard to plead for the ball that I thought her arms might pop out. But they combined well in the 32nd minute. A sweet ball from Lori Lindsey hit Pohlers, who played it wide to Ochs. The tall youngster cut toward the center and played the ball back to Pohlers, who had one of the neatest finishes past Hope Solo you’ll ever see. The only problem: She was offside.

“Before I knew it, Lloyd (Yaxley) was jumping all over me,” Parsons said. “I looked for the linesman’s flag. I always do that — everything’s gone against us. Before we scored, I saw the flag going up. Lloyd’s going mental, and I said, ‘Lloyd, no chance. We’ll get it in the second half.’”

Pohlers also was denied by a world-class save from Solo at the left post. Matheson set up that one and another chance late in the half, where Lindsey passed up a shooting opportunity and played ahead in the box to Pohlers, who was wide open but couldn’t control the pass.

Matheson kept making good plays in the second half as the rest of the attacking cast changed. Pohlers departed to a warm ovation, drawing an overhead clap from the German forward in response. Tiffany McCarty played a couple of nice crosses from the right wing. A Robyn Gayle shot was blocked by a probable handball; Seitz kept the whistle quiet there and on a similar scene in the Spirit box.

Maybe Matheson was a little lucky to get the ball for the goal. A loose ball bounced around — as Matheson put it, it took “a few bounces” and went “off a few shins.” But the finish was simply top-quality. From an acute angle, she had only a tiny bit of net at the far post she could hit if she wanted to get the ball past Solo. And that’s what she did.

Solo seemed quite bitter afterwards, but she did talk about a touching moment before the game, when she and Ali Krieger met a young cancer patient whose name, coincidentally, is Hope. Solo said she does a lot of meetings like this, “but this one’s special. Maybe she touched me in a certain way, maybe (because) her name was Hope, maybe it was just a sweet family with three sweet kids. It was very touching.”

It’s not physically possible for Solo and Rapinoe to sign autographs for every single person who asked. But on the whole, I think all the fans went away happy. The low score didn’t do justice to the amount of action in the game. The weather was perfect, which everyone especially appreciated after Wednesday’s annoyances.

And it’s the first crowd this season to see the Spirit celebrate at the final whistle.

2
soccer

Washington Spirit vs. Chicago: Clock strikes 12

Posted on by Beau Dure

For 77 minutes, the Washington Spirit and Chicago Red Stars played an entertaining soccer game. Both teams were seriously short-handed, as they had been too often through this season. But they stuck it out and put together some decent chances.

Then the evening took a supernatural turn, like the end of L.A. Story, when the weather suddenly changes so Victoria Tennant can’t fly away from Steve Martin. (You’d never guess from that clip, but it’s actually a funny film.)

It had been a typical first half from the Spirit on the team’s good days. Maybe a little better. Washington outshot Chicago in the first half and had the best couple of chances, including one that was cleared off the line after Diana Matheson, Erin McLeod and a defender awkwardly converged in the box. (I’m told by people who had a better view than the pressbox/broadcast camera that Matheson was not fouled.)

Spirit coach Mark Parsons: “The first half, I feel they got a couple of clear-cut opportunities but we created a lot more. That might be the first half that we got more shots than the opposition for a long time.”

At halftime, the fans were treated to an impromptu juggling and passing exhibition by four tired Spirit national team players who didn’t start — Conny Pohlers, Ashlyn Harris, Lori Lindsey and Ali Krieger.

But Krieger would play a vital role in the second half. The Spirit started on the back foot, with backup keeper Chantel Jones racing out to collect at the feet of Adriana Leon. Krieger came in at midfield and picked up the team’s confidence.

Parsons: “The scariest moment was coming out for the second half for the first 5-10 minutes. I looked at Lloyd (Yaxley, the goalkeeping coach) and thought, ‘There’s only one thing that will help swing momentum, and it’s not a tactical or technical thing. It’s just a psychological thing.’ And that’s when we brought Krieger on. Everyone (on the Spirit) was kind of panicking and shaking a little bit, they see her come on, and everyone settled.”

Then came the first supernatural event. The Spirit scored. From the run of play.

And it was Lupita Worbis, the allocated Mexican player who arrived a few weeks into the season and has bounced in and out of the lineup, who created and finished the play. She won the ball in midfield, spun 360 degrees, knocked the ball left to Diana Matheson and ran on to Matheson’s textbook one-touch return pass. Then she put it through McLeod’s legs and in. All in front of her parents, who are visiting from Mexico.

As if commenting on the improbability of what had just happened, the skies opened up 10 minutes later, with heavy rain sending shrieks through the crowd. That’s Supernatural Event #2. For five minutes and change, the game was played in a downpour. Somewhere in the rain, Chicago substitute Maribel Dominguez somehow found the speed in her 34-year-old legs to race past Kika Toulouse and Tori Huster, but Jones easily collected her cross.

The rain stopped abruptly. But a couple minutes later, the Maryland SoccerPlex’s WeatherBug Lightning Detection System sprang into action. Clear the field. As if to verify the automated sensors, some dazzling lightning lit up the sky while we sat in the pressbox. Supernatural Event #3.

The next 105 minutes have been temporarily erased from my memory. I’ll somehow piece it back together when the time comes to write the book. I know at some point fans were heading back into the SoccerPlex, only for the alarm to go off again.

Then we heard this:

  • When there has been no lightning strike within ten (10) miles for a continuous 15 minute period, the horns will blast three (3) times, each blast is five (5) seconds

But apparently not this:

  • You may return to the field after the three (3) shorter blasts have sounded

Apparently, it had something to do with the likelihood of more lightning in the next couple of minutes. It’s safe to say people were a little confused. A few minutes later, with little fanfare, teams just returned to the field and started warming up.

Sometime during the break, the Spirit apparently had a dance-off, with Toni Pressley taking a narrow victory over Lori Lindsey. The Red Stars, surely aware by then that other results across the NWSL meant they needed a win to maintain their slim playoff hopes, may have been a bit more nervous. Also, the Spirit encouraged me, Kevin Parker and Jennifer Gordon — most of the local media press corps in the absence of a local newspaper recently sold to Jeff Bezos — to get up to the roof and do a media roundtable with Spirit announcer Michael Minnich.

After a warmup period and the return of maybe 250 of the 2,000-plus fans in attendance (sadly, all the food vendors packed up and fled early in the storm), play resumed a little at 10:48 p.m. And Chicago resumed a bit better than Washington. Jen Hoy eluded Toulouse and crossed to Dominguez, who was wide open in the box but put her one-touch attempt well over.

(Have allocated Mexican players ever accounted for all the goals in a multi-goal NWSL game? Maybe before Cuellar was traded from KC?)

Then came Supernatural Event #4. The MSPWBLDS (we’ll call it “mospwuhbleds”) sounded again. 10:52 p.m.

Players, coaches and refs froze. No lightning was visible. The Red Stars seemed displeased, and honestly, the Spirit didn’t seem any happier. Everyone wanted to play.

But you do not argue with the MSPWBLDS. The field was cleared again. And, in fairness, lightning did indeed resume a couple of minutes later.

(At this point, feel free to check out the game highlights, which are excellent:

By this time, the stadium’s midnight curfew was looming. Various deals were struck with the referees and the league to let the teams warm up in the SoccerPlex’s big gym, which was fortunately NOT hosting a basketball or volleyball tournament at the time. They did have a couple of hoops down around 7-8 feet for young summer campers, and I’m told Ella Masar dunked.

I’ll go ahead and give the details (at least as I know them) now rather than waiting for the book.

A few fans were in the SoccerPlex building, and it occurred to the media quadrumvirate that we could go in there as well. Mark Parsons actually asked me the Chelsea-Real Madrid score. He was disappointed in that.

I ventured over to the SoccerPlex’s front desk. A couple of Spirit staffers had gathered there along with SoccerPlex staffers who were monitoring the weather system. That’s when I was able to confirm the info in this tweet, and I ran back to the pressbox to hack it out:

By those terms, one lightning strike after 11:30 would end it. But in reality, it dragged on a bit longer.

At 11:40ish, there was a gathering in the SoccerPlex behind the bleachers, next to the locker rooms. The crowd included a ref (on the phone), at least one policeman, various staff from each team, and stadium staff.

At 11:42, a couple of people in CSC event staff shirts nodded and walked away from the meeting. They called out to other people — “(the game) will not resume.”

And still the refs were talking.

So I can’t give you a final moment at which the game officials declared the game — and the Red Stars’ playoff hopes — done. I can only tell you the teams held out hope as long as humanly possible.

Most Spirit players were in the hallway, not in the locker room. But there was no moment of celebration. One by one, they filed out (as did several Red Stars in one of many classy gestures as all this unfolded) to meet fans and sign autographs. I wished I could have rushed out to see that scene, but I stayed in to get various comments, many of which the Spirit posted to the team’s site.

Parsons was the first to dissect the game. He thought the Spirit had the better of play before the delay, and McLeod said pretty much the same thing. He thought Chicago wouldn’t have come back if the game had continued with no delay. We can’t say that with certainty — the Red Stars certainly have a flair for drama — but it’s safe to say the delay helped the Red Stars regroup and reorient.

The end didn’t completely suit anyone. Parsons said his first emotion upon hearing the game was over was “gutted” — he wanted to finish it out and hear the final whistle, no matter how small the crowd had gotten at that point. But then he went back and got his team to celebrate in the locker room.

“After all the things that have gone against us, maybe it was meant to be.”

Chicago may be the only team in the league unluckier than the Spirit. Their U.S. allocations were injured (or, in a move that looks a bit more curious in hindsight, traded for next year). Then injuries rattled the rest of the team, including one of the league’s best midfield engineers in Lori Chalupny. And then they had to sit and watch their playoff hopes, faint as they were, tick away without even being able to fight on the field.

At that point, though, nothing would have been a satisfactory ending. A 10-minute resumption at 11:50 p.m. would practically been a new game, bordering on farce. Imagine if you were a Sky Blue fan and you saw the Red Stars get two goals against a Spirit team that didn’t come back strong after nearly three hours idling in the SoccerPlex.

When I left, the stadium clock was frozen at 80:04, as if the game had been played at Pompeii. Appropriate for a game that entered into the supernatural.

In the end, I don’t think we saw an unjust ending. The better team on the night won. But if the mythical force of soccer karma has repaid part of its debt to Washington, it now owes Chicago — a class organization — that much more.

3
soccer

On concussions, Krieger, Wambach, etc.

Posted on by Beau Dure

The soccer community, much to its credit, is taking concussions seriously. Even those of us who are at the low rungs of the coaching ladder have been required to watch videos so frightening that the natural response might be to sit a player for life after he or she first heads the ball. We have high-profile ex-players like Taylor Twellman and Alecko Eskandarian whose careers were cruelly cut short but have stepped forward to talk about concussion safety for the betterment of the next generation of players.

So when Abby Wambach tumbled to the ground at the Maryland SoccerPlex early this season and no one took immediate action, astute observers like Stefan Fatsis (who was there and had a better view than I did) took note. Fatsis questioned the lack of response, followed up after a week of conflicting information, then covered U.S. Soccer’s comments concluding Wambach’s injury was mishandled on the field but then correctly handled afterwards.

Now another national team player, Ali Krieger, has taken a hit on the field. The immediate reaction July 14 in Seattle was drastically different — Krieger sat down right away. The next time I saw the Spirit practice, Krieger wasn’t there. Nor did she play in the Spirit’s games July 20 or July 27. She played 21 minutes as a substitute July 31 against Western New York.

So far, so good. But when Krieger was a late scratch from the August 3 game at Sky Blue, the questions started.

There’s no harm in asking questions. Fatsis was right to question the way the Wambach concussion was handled. The harm comes in assuming answers when the information is incomplete. If you’re not a doctor, don’t play one on Twitter.

What we DO know is that Krieger was taken out immediately and sat out the next two games. That’s plenty of time to keep running tests and then move her back into gradual activity when her symptoms cleared.

Some people view her substitute appearance with suspicion. They shouldn’t. When an elite soccer player takes several days off from training, you can’t expect her to ramp up to 90 minutes in a few days. Whether it’s a concussion, an ankle injury or a trip to Aruba, time off from training is going to limit someone’s ability to play a full game right away. (Note that a couple of the late signees to the NWSL — Sky Blue’s Ashley Nick and Washington’s Marisa Abegg — have been playing this summer, so they were fit and ready to go. Portland’s Tina Ellertson is a fantastic player, but she hasn’t been playing recently, so the Thorns didn’t sign her and toss her out in the starting lineup right away.)

What happened next is indeed curious. Krieger missed the next game. I can’t really explain why. But neither can you. It takes a strange sort of conspiracy theorist to come up with a reason why the Spirit, already mathematically eliminated, felt it vitally important to play Krieger for 21 minutes in one game if she hadn’t been medically cleared to play.

Let’s ask this question: Can concussion symptoms go away and then come back? Yes. Ask Marc Savard.

Now bear in mind — we don’t know the details of what’s going on with Krieger right now. Maybe she felt slightly off. Maybe she has full-blown post-concussion syndrome. (Don’t panic — from what I’m hearing, this is unlikely. Just stating it as within the realm of possibility.) We don’t know.

Perhaps teams and the NWSL in general should be more forthcoming with injury information. But until that happens, be very careful about filling the gaps with stuff we don’t know.

The evidence doesn’t suggest Krieger was recklessly rushed back onto the field. If anyone has any evidence to the contrary, by all means, share it.

1
olympic sports

Woly Award: Missy Franklin, swimming

Posted on by Beau Dure

It’s easy to lose track of major swim meets (less easy to lose swim of major track meets … OK, that’s awful). So many events, so many Americans winning so many medals.

So let’s recap the World Swimming Championships day-by-day, though the first day was counted under last week’s Woly Award recap. Each link goes to one of Nick Zaccardi’s handy recaps at NBC’s Olympic Talk blog. Events with asterisk will be in the video playlist:

SUNDAY

– Men’s 400 freestyle: Gold to China’s Sun Yang, bronze to USA’s Connor Yaeger.

– Women’s 400 freestyle: Gold and U.S. record to last week’s Woly winner, Katie Ledecky.

– Women’s 4×100 free relay: USA (Missy Franklin, Natalie Coughlin, Shannon Vreeland, Megan Romano) edges Australia on Romano’s fantastic anchor leg.

– Men’s 4×100 free relay: France comes back to beat USA (Nathan Adrian, Ryan Lochte, Anthony Ervin, Jimmy Feigen).

MONDAY

– Men’s 100 breaststroke: Gold to Australia’s Christian Sprenger; no U.S. medal.

– Women’s 100 butterfly: Gold to Sweden’s Sarah Sjostrom; bronze to ailing American Dana Vollmer.

– *Men’s 50 butterfly (non-Olympic event): Brazil’s Cesar Cielo edges U.S. surprise Eugene Godsoe, who takes silver.

– Women’s 200 medley: Gold to Hungary’s Katinka Hosszu; USA’s Caitlin Leverenz 7th.

TUESDAY

– Men’s 200 freestyle: France’s Yannick Agnel dominates; USA’s Connor Dwyer silver, Ryan Lochte 4th.

– Women’s 100 backstroke: Missy Franklin’s second gold (first individual). Elizabeth Pelton 4th.

– *Women’s 1,500 freestyle (non-Oly distance): Katie Ledecky’s second gold and a world record of 15:36.53.

– *Men’s 100 backstroke: 1-2 for the USA: Matt Grevers and David Plummer.

– Women’s 100 breaststroke: Gold for Lithuania’s Ruta Meilutyte, who broke the world record in the semifinals. USA’s Jessica Hardy, the former record-holder, takes bronze.

WEDNESDAY

– Men’s 200 butterfly: Gold to South Africa’s Chad le Clos. USA’s Tom Luchsinger 5th.

– *Women’s 200 freestyle: Missy Franklin’s third gold, dethroning Italy’s Federica Pellegrini.

– Men’s 50 breaststroke (non-Oly distance): South Africa’s Cameron van der Burgh gold; no Americans in final.

– Men’s 800 freestyle final (non-Oly distance): Second gold for China’s Sun Yang; surprise silver for USA’s Michael McBroom, with Connor Yaeger fourth.

THURSDAY

– *Men’s 200 medley: Ryan Lochte takes his third straight world title in the event.

– *Men’s 100 freestyle: Australia’s James Magnussen avenges Olympic loss by holding off the USA’s Jimmy Feigen and Nathan Adrian.

– Women’s 200 butterfly: Gold for China’s Liu Zige.

– Women’s 50 backstroke (non-Oly distance): 1-2 for China’s Zhao Jing and Fu Yuanhui.

– *Women’s 4×200 freestyle relay: Another huge moment for Katie Ledecky (third gold, led after leadoff leg) and Missy Franklin (fourth gold, rallied to win with anchor leg), joining Shannon Vreeland and Karlee Bispo for the world title.

FRIDAY

– *Women’s 100 freestyle: Australia’s Cate Campbell wins, with Missy Franklin just missing the podium.

– *Men’s 200 backstroke: Gold for Ryan Lochte; bronze for Tyler Clary.

– Women’s 200 breaststroke: Gold for Russia’s Yuliya Efimova; bronze for USA’s Micah Lawrence.

– Men’s 200 breaststroke: Gold for Hungary’s Daniel Gyurta; no U.S. swimmers in final.

– *Men’s 4×200 free relay: USA gold, even with Lochte swimming his third event of the night. In order: Connor Dwyer, Lochte, Charlie Houchin and Ricky Berens, who came home with a comfortable margin of victory of more than two seconds. That’s three golds in two days for Lochte.

SATURDAY

– Women’s 50 butterfly (non-Oly distance): Gold to Denmark’s Jeanette Ottesen Gray.

– Men’s 50 freestyle: Brazil’s Cesar Cielo does it again, with Nathan Adrian (4th) and Anthony Ervin (6th) missing out.

– *Women’s 200 backstroke: FIFTH gold for Missy Franklin, by nearly two seconds.

– Men’s 100 butterfly: Another gold for South Africa’s Chad le Clos. Ryan Lochte finished 6th — not his best event by far.

– *Women’s 800 freestyle: FOURTH gold for Katie Ledecky, with a world record of 8:13.86 more than two seconds ahead of the pack.

SUNDAY

– Men’s 50 backstroke (non-Oly distance): Gold for France’s Camille Lacourt; USA’s Matt Grevers ties for silver. Yes, a tie. That’s two medals for Grevers.

– Women’s 50 breaststroke (non-Oly distance): Let’s run through the chronology – coming into the meet, the USA’s Jessica Hardy had the world record. Then Russia’s Yuliya Efimova broke it here, only to see Lithuania’s Ruta Meilutyte break THAT record. But then Efimova came back to win the final in non-record time, beating Meilutyte and Hardy, though the latter took bronze and equaled her American record. Which used to be the world record. Got it?

– Men’s 400 medley: Gold for Japan’s Daiya Seto, silver for USA’s Chase Kalisz, fourth for USA’s Tyler Clary.

– Women’s 50 freestyle: You know it’s the Netherlands’ Ranomi Kromowidjojo for gold here.

– *Men’s 1,500 freestyle: THIRD gold for China’s Sun Yang. USA’s Connor Jaeger 4th.

– Women’s 400 medley: Medley sweep for Hungary’s Katinka Hosszu; bronze for USA’s Elizabeth Beisel, USA’s Maya DiRado 4th.

– Men’s 4×100 medley: USA wi… nope, disqualified. Same as 2012 Olympics. Ryan Lochte once again denied another medal. France upsets Australia for gold.

– Women’s 4×100 medley: Easy win for the USA and SIXTH gold for Missy Franklin, who led off in backstroke. Then Jessica Hardy on breaststroke, Dana Vollmer butterfly and Megan Romano freestyle.

OVERALL

Another dominating performance for the USA, with some familiar multi-event names (Franklin, Lochte) joined by less-heralded Olympic champions (Grevers), others confirming their Olympic breakthroughs (Ledecky) and some medal-stand newcomers (Lawrence, Plummer, McBroom, Kalisz, Godsoe, Feigen, Dwyer).

If you want the full list of U.S. results, the best compendium is at Wikipedia, which also rounds up disappointing performances for the U.S. water polo teams (men 9th, women 5th), last week’s synchronized swimming, open water and diving action, and the 1-2 finish in women’s high diving for Cesilie Carlton and Ginger Huber.

USA Swimming also wrapped up the swimming portions of the meet.

So who wins the Woly Award?

Ledecky was the meet’s outstanding female swimmer (China’s Sun Yang took the men’s award), but that included an accomplishment for which she won the Woly last week. This week alone, Franklin won six world titles. Can’t top that.

So Missy Franklin wins this week’s Woly Award, given to the top U.S. performer in Olympic sports.

Other events of the week:

WRESTLING: Jordan Burroughs is now 60-0 in international wrestling, winning the Stepan Sargsyan International in Vanadzor, Armenia. Brent Metcalf and Clayton Foster also won their weight classes.

EQUESTRIAN: Richard Spooner, Reed Kessler, McLain Ward and Beezie Madden combined for second place in the FEI Nations Cup of Great Britain.

And we had U.S. championships in ski jumping (seriously – in 88-degree weather), bobsled pushing and shotgun shooting. See TeamUSA.org’s roundup.

The video playlist also includes the U.S. women’s volleyball team’s first loss in ages, some water polo highlights, and some events from the World Games. Enjoy.

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0
soccer

Washington Spirit vs. Sky Blue: The brief recap

Posted on by Beau Dure

One badly battered team was slightly better than the other badly battered team. A couple of calls — the lone goal looked offside, one likely handball in the box went uncalled — might have skewed the game the other way, but they didn’t.

There. That’s your recap.

More detail? OK, just a little …

– It’s fair to say the Spirit aren’t playing with a lot of confidence right now. This game was better than the last two, but they still only forced Jill Loyden to make one save.

– The 4-4-2 experiment wasn’t bad, but I think the Spirit have already proved they can cancel out Sky Blue in midfield for much of the game.

– I don’t have the official word on why Ashlyn Harris and Ali Krieger were late scratches.

The Spirit will end the season with three home games. The motivation and confidence should be greater for those games than they were on this road trip. We’ll see if that’s enough to get something out of those games and end on a positive note.

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