Monday, June 16, 2014

10 Things I Didn’t Know About Soccer in America

I like to think that I have a good grasp of how the intermingling of entertainment, music and sports combines to make American pop culture.  I have more useless trivia floating around in my head than anyone I know about all things pop culture. This weekend that idea of  “pop culture knower” was exposed as a myth as I started seriously getting engaged with the amazing spectacle called the FIFA World Cup.

As I began gathering information on the teams, their histories and their players, I discovered that the American team is not just a novelty any more. The United States Men’s National Soccer Team (USMNT) is an actual thing that has been getting more respect every year in the international community. Granted, they have a way to go before they’re mentioned in the same breath as England or Brazil or Argentina, or even Mexico, but still, they’re getting a lot of press. Landon Donavan not making the team actually hit the front page of the sports section in Middle America and a lead story on ESPN.

So, guess what a lot of press and TV coverage gets you in America? It gets you a place at the American Pop Culture table. People start talking about the players, the uniforms, the mascots and the girlfriends. And when people stop talking about scores and start talking about girlfriends, you know you’ve hit the big time. Professional soccer is now inching closer to the edge of the big time.

OK, here are some things I learned about American Major League Soccer (MLS):
  • Most players for the USMNT play in the MLS
  • MLS has 19 clubs
  • 10 teams in the Eastern Conference, 9 teams in the Western Conference
  • They all have killer logos
  • People actually attend games. The average attendance for the Seattle Sounders was 44,000 per game in 2013. Twice the Mariners average
  • In 1994, the last time the World Cup was played in the Americas, the US did not have a professional league
  • Jurgen Klinsmann, one of the world’s biggest stars in 1994, is now the coach of the US team
  • Recent ESPN poll found that among Americans 12-17, soccer is now as popular as baseball and way ahead of hockey.
  • Washington Times survey found that 30% of Americans planned to watch some World Cup play
  • The US will have more fans in attendance at the World Cup in Brazil than any other country.
  • The US will have the second largest overseas TV audience after Germany 

Every four years I read the stories about how soccer is finally breaking through the American sports barrier, but this year it feels a little different. There are a lot of forces at work in the making of sports pop culture sausage. Judging by attendance numbers, it appears that MLB baseball, NFL football and NBA basketball have probably reached their peak in popularity. Which leaves us with Soccer. If you want to see what’s going to be the biggest growth sport in America over the next 25 years, read the latest census report. Today’s kids are tomorrow’s ticket buyers and it doesn’t look like they’re gonna want very many tickets for the Super Bowl.

2014 USA Team Signed Capitano USA Soccer Ball

This Adidas Capitano USA Soccer Ball has been personally hand signed by the 2014 United States Men's National Soccer Team including Brad Guzan, Chris Wondolowski, Clint Dempsey, DaMarcus Beasley, DeAndre Yedlin, Geoff Cameron, Graham Zusi, Jermaine Jones, Jozy Altidore, Head Coach Juergen Klinsmann, Kyle Beckerman, Matt Besler, Michael Bradley, Mikkel Diskerud (Mix Diskerud), Nick Rimando, Omar Gonzalez and Tim Howard. 



Friday, June 13, 2014

Is Jack White A Rock Star?


Happy Friday the 13th. I read an interesting article this morning by Andrew Romano over at the Daily Beast and he asks the question, Is Jack White the Last True Rock Star? His answer? Maybe. Mr. Romano gets right to it with his spot on analysis of Jack White, his music and his well-crafted persona.

Full disclosure, I’m a Jack White fan. Not so much a White Stripes fan, but a big Jack White fan. He plays rock and roll. Throwback rock and roll. Garage band rock and roll. I think he’s a rock star. And he’s kind of an asshole about it. And that’s partly why he’s a rock star. Show me a rock star who’s not a little assholey and I’ll show you a pretender.

He’s also a rock star because he’s a guitar god and he has a cool story. Apparently, as a teenager in Detroit (gotta be Detroit, right?) he worked in an upholstery shop with a guy named Brian Muldoon. Along with showing young Jack how to stretch fabric over an old couch, Brian also turned him on to punk music. They then started a band called The Upholsterers and eventually cut a record. The rest is whacky musical history.

White’s musical progression has been steady as he moved from his early days in the Detroit punk scene to his recent collaborations with legends like Jeff Beck, Alicia Keys, Bob Dylan and Mick Jagger. It was his earliest collaboration, however, that got the ball rolling. Jack White married musician Meg White in 1997 and eventually formed the garage rock band The White Stripes (Meg was a rocker). The White Stripes, as we all know, became impossibly popular and continued to perform all the way until 2011, even though they got divorced and had crazy rock star lives.

But Jack was not just a one-trick pony and he continued to explore music outside of the Stripes. In 2006 he founded the Raconteurs with Brendon Benson, Jack Lawrence and Patrick Keeler. Based in Nashville they were immediately labeled a Supergroup and the band became an instant legend to music aficionados around the globe. The band released two critically acclaimed albums, BROKEN BOY SOLDIERS in 2006 and CONSOLERS OF THE LONELY in 2008, and toured heavily during those years. Along with their originals, fans loved hearing the wide range of loopy covers the band did including such diverse songs as Sonny and Cher’s 1966 hit Bang Bang (My Baby Shot Me Down).

The Raconteurs, while never achieving huge mainstream popularity, are still considered one of the best-kept secrets in modern rock. If you’re an unapologetic fan of Mr. White and aren’t familiar with this particular episode of his amazing career, get your eyeballs over to the Youtubes and check out the Raconteurs. 

The Raconteurs Hand Signed Autographed Guitar

The Raconteurs Hand Signed Autographed Electric Guitar 


Wednesday, June 11, 2014

Have You Ever Been to San Antonio?

Have you ever been to San Antonio? If so, did you get it? Did you understand what you were experiencing? If you’re not native to the southwest you probably wouldn’t understand San Antonio on your first trip.  To understand San Antonio you have to understand Texas first. Texas is its own planet and its cities are like continents in that they exist unto themselves. Dallas and Houston are always trying to be sophisticated urban centers of commerce and style, Austin is always trying to stay relevant as the cowboy hipster capital, and Amarillo and El Paso are cow towns with the amazing ability to stand still in time. San Antonio is none of these things. San Antonio is simultaneously old and new and completely disconnected from what the outside world thinks. As a southern Arizona guy, I love San Antonio and everything it stands for. And this goes for their only pro sports franchise, the Spurs.

There are a whole group of southern Arizonans who got turned on to the San Antonio Spurs in 1989 when they drafted Tucson’s favorite son and University of Arizona star Sean Elliott in the first round. Sean had torn up the Pac 10 and eventually broke Lew Alcindor's (Kareem Abdul-Jabbar) all time PAC 10 career scoring record. At the time, the Spurs were one of the worst teams in the league. As luck would have it, 1989 was also the year David Robinson and Terry Cummings joined the team. With this new line-up the San Antonio Spurs went from worst to first in one season. It was the fastest turn around in NBA history. The Spurs were on their way.

San Antonio is a place that doesn’t like much change and the Spurs reflect that attitude. Spurs players have a propensity for staying. Great players that stay in one city for a long time tend to build great teams and the Spurs are no different. From 1978 to 2014 the Spurs have won 20 division titles, 6 conference titles and 4 championships. The rise of “Big Three” started ten years ago when Tim Duncan, Tony Parker and Manu Ginobili started to gel as a unit. The addition of great role players during this time served to propel the Spurs into the elite of the pro basketball world.

As NBA old age sets in on the Big Three and coach Gregg Popovich, its only a matter of time before all of their jerseys are hung from the rafters of the AT&T Center (I know, I wish it was still the Alamodome too.). But you know what? The fine folks of San Antonio are OK with that because they know the next crop of great players has already arrived. And they’re not going anywhere soon.

So, the next time you’re in San Antone, find a funky local restaurant, order the daily special, and relax. Then you’ll understand.

San Antonio Spurs Signed Floor Tile
Floor Tile Hand Signed by Gregg Popovich, Tim Duncan, Tony Parker, Manu Ginobili

Tuesday, June 10, 2014

I Know, I Know, First Soccer and Now Hockey

I know, I know, first soccer and now hockey. Yes, they’re both foreign born sports without a huge American viewership but it’s playoff season for crying out loud. 

By the time you read this The Stanley Cup will probably have been won by the Los Angeles Kings and everyone will be talking about what an offensive powerhouse the Kings were and how weak the Rangers were. Fans will also say the outcome was sealed a month ago because the West was so much better than the East and it wouldn’t have mattered if the Blackhawks had played the Bruins for the cup. Looking at the stats it would be hard to argue the point.

I think we can all agree that that the Rangers did their best with what they had and maybe even overachieved a bit. At least they made it to the Cup series. The Rangers have a storied history but they’ve only won the Cup four times since they started as an expansion club in 1926. I think we all forget that it’s been 20 years since they last won the Cup in 1994. 20 years!

The 93/94 Rangers were a great team with a crazy cast of characters and their fans were crazy about them. It was one of the best years to see the Rangers play at the Garden. Some interesting stats; The 93/94 Rangers had the best record in the NHL that year at 52–24–8 and were driven by the amazing Mark Messier and Adam Graves. Adam Graves had a career year and broke the team record for goals with 52. Brian Leetch became the first American-born player to win the Conn Smythe Trophy, and Alexander Karpovtsev, Alexei Kovalev, Sergei Nemchinov, and Sergei Zubov became the first Russians to have their names engraved on the Stanley Cup.

So congratulations to the 2004 Rangers for their great effort and don't forget the team that took you to the promise land in 1994.

New York Rangers 1994 Team Signed 16x20 Photograph
New York Rangers 1994 Team Autographed 16x20 Photograph    

Saturday, June 7, 2014

World Cup Soccer - Can Brazil Go All the Way?

Can Brazil go all the way and win the cup? Las Vegas says its a pretty good bet. The FIFA World Cup tournament is set to start next week in Brazil and teams are finishing up their pre-tournament warm up matches and planning their strategies.

An audience of a billion soccer fanatics is awaiting the biggest sporting event on the planet with a level of excitement that can only be felt every four years. The loyal fans of the Brazil team are waiting with both excitement and dread as they impatiently wait for the first match. The expectations are so huge for this team that nobody in Brazil will sleep until that first match with Croatia has been won. 

The latest odds favor both the Brazilians and Argentineans with both teams going off at 1/4. Fans of the Brazil team believe it is their year to win for a number of reasons: They are playing at home, they have the best World Cup history of all teams, groups D and G are considered weak, the professional bettors and soccer pundits have picked them to go all the way, and last but not least, they have some of the best players in the world.

This last point is probably valid because they do indeed have three of the best players;
Neymar (best winger), Marcelo (best left back), and Thiago Silva (best Centre back). If these three incredibly talented players help win the cup, they’ll have the joy of being included on this list of Brazil Soccer legends; Careca, Carlos Alberto Torres, Clodoaldo, Jairzinho, Kaká, Pelé, Roberto Rivellino, Romário, Ronaldinho, Ronaldo, Toninho Cerezo, Tostão, and Zico.

Brazil Soccer Legends Signed Soccer Ball

Friday, June 6, 2014

9 Out of 10 Americans Love Sports Statistics

9 Out of 10 Americans Love Sports Statistics. I always laugh at that headline but the silliness can’t hide the truth, American sports fans are obsessed with statistics. Big statistics, little statistics, statistics about statistics. Basketball, football and baseball are the biggest offenders with endless data about every possible bit of minutiae.

Baseball probably has the deepest set of stats because people have been tracking them since the 1880’s; games played, home runs, hits, RBI’s, strikeouts, errors, walks, steals, fouls, etc, etc., etc. And those are just the big categories. Baseball has hundreds of stats that span everything from host cities to player’s kids. You can even find stats on mascots.

It sounds crazy until you think about the nature of the game. Baseball is probably the most leisurely of all the major sports. You go to the park, lounge in the sun, watch some of the game, eat a hot dog, drink a beer or a latte, and window shop while wandering to the bathroom. The other thing baseball fans do is fill out the scorecard. Yep, tracking stats in real time. Football and basketball are also stat heavy but you’ll rarely see someone with a score card.   

Baseball actually celebrates stats with a thing called The Midsummer Classic, or more specifically, the Major League Baseball All-Star Game. A fan ballot picks the fielders, managers pick the pitchers, and managers and players pick the reserves. Guess how they pick? Yeah, player stats. But you already knew that.

Autographed 2013 American League All Star Baseball
Autographed 2013 American League All Star Baseball    

Tuesday, May 27, 2014

The 2014 FIFA World Cup Month of Glorious Insanity

Memories of the 2010 World Cup in South Africa are still vivid in the minds of soccer fans around the globe. In no particular order of remembrance, Spain beat the Netherlands 1-0 with an extra time goal, the endless blare of the plastic horns called vuvuzelas drove a billion TV viewers to the brink of suicide, and the official song was Waka Waka which was performed at the closing ceremony by Columbian Superstar Shakira. (Bet you forgot that one.)

This year marks the 20th anniversary of the World Cup with play beginning on June 12th in Brazil. 32 teams will grind their way through the most intense playoff format in professional sports until the final two teams meet on July 13th in the championship game. Spain, Brazil, England, Argentina and perennial powerhouse Germany are the early favorites but, as in all sports, hope springs eternal for fans of every team. However it goes, the world will have soccer on the brain for the next six weeks.

Which brings me to American professional soccer, the MLS. This week one of the most storied players in MLS history, Landon Donovan, was snubbed by the US Men’s National Team. No World Cup for Landon. Predictably, American soccer fans are outraged and not just because he’s the beloved elder statesman of American professional soccer. It is a popularly held belief that Landon Donovan is still one of the better players in the US with a ton of experience on the international stage. The guy has scored more points in international play that any American player. Ever. But this is World Cup soccer and US coach Jurgen Klinsmann has ice water in his veins. He loves and respects Landon but thinks he’s past his prime. Maybe so, we'll just have to wait and see. So now Donavan will be watching from the sidelines with another elder statesman and former LA Galaxy teammate, David Beckham.


David Beckham Landon Donovan Hand Signed Autographed 8x10 Photo
Landon Donovan & David Beckham Autographed 8x10 Photo