soapbox

This evening we had a prime example of why soccer in the US is struggling to gain/keep/improve its standing in the American sports scene. The MLS “game of the week” was hosted by ESPN2, not a top-end network but pretty much ubiquitous in cable/satellite packages. The game was even moved from 8pm PST to 7:30, perhaps in an attempt to be more family friendly (90 minutes of game time with ~20-30 for halftime) to the national TV audience… but it’s not a national audience if it’s starting at 10:30pm Eastern, so oh well.

But, through bad luck and perhaps poor contingency planning on the ESPN programming department, the previous time slot on ESPN2 was devoted to the Arkansas-Virginia College World Series (baseball) game. Neither one a powerhouse, but when a horrible call from behind the plate (Orel Hershieser was beside himself) in the bottom of the 9th inning sent the game into extras, the network was stuck. So, nobody except for the 73 people who paid for the MLS satellite special package got to see a very entertaining first half between DC United and the Seattle Sounders, a team that sold out for the entire season in something like the first month that tickets were available.

So in a sport mocked for boring, low-scoring games, a 2-1 halftime score was promising, except that nobody got to watch it on TV. Finally, the stupid baseball* game was done and ESPN2 switched over to the feed from Seattle just in time to see a brilliant third goal for the home team. Good stuff, right? just what the network and the home crowd wanted. Then, even better for the producers, DC United scored against the run of play to narrow the gap and set up and exciting finish.

And it WAS a good finish, if you are a fan of open-play soccer with aggression overcoming smart play: Seattle continued to attack even though it was a up a goal, frequently getting caught with too many man up the field, and narrowly dodging an equalizing goal even as it was clearly the better side. Then with 5 minutes to go, the visiting side finally scored the seemingly/cynically inevitable tying goal, setting up a very frantic last 10 (5 minutes of stoppage time) minutes of soccer.

But here’s the other reason why soccer gets slammed – no overtime. A great game, 6 goals, plenty of end-to-end action, but then after a seemingly arbitrary number (90 + x) of minutes the ref blows the whistle and that’s it, game over. 1 point for each in the standings, no overtime, no shootout, no winner. Seattle played entertaining but stupid soccer and wasted two points, DC got lucky and had enough skill to earn a valuable away point, good for them… but many fans, at home and on TV, were probably left with a sour taste in their mouths. All in all, a very ironical and perfectly-titled “MLS Game of the Week.”

* don’t get me wrong, I love baseball. And I love the drama of the double-elimination tourney, I liked watching the “upset” championships of Fresno State and Oregon State in the past couple years, but the sub-pro level of play and the ugly “clank” of metal bats just doesn’t do it for me. I’m sure I’ll get sucked in again this year, but for #&$%’s sake, ESPN was busy reshowing a taped NFL Live on the mothership channel… are we not saturated with Brett Fahv-ruh stories? Do we need to know exactly when/where T.O. picked his new apartment in Buffalo? don’t you think they could have done some switching around? Seriously, bleh.

So, it’s about time that I start posting again, I might as well mention what I’ve been up to…

Being sick.

Whee!

It’s been a long drawn-out process involving huge amounts of coughing, two rounds of increasing nastiness antibiotics for a prolonged sinus infection, Kirsten taking two rounds of antibiotics for some sort of strep throatish infection, and now Sarah working on her second round of antibiotics for her first ear infection. Frankly, it’s just all uncool since I’m pretty sure that I spread the nastiness to my the rest of the family.

It’s raised a big question though since antibiotics are normal enough drugs these days that the insurance companies will only pay for you to get generics. ALL of the drugs that we’ve been taking lately have been made in India. All of them. It makes me wonder how much manufacturing capacity for drugs we actually have in the US anymore. What happens if some natural disaster or unnatural disaster cuts off trade for a couple of weeks? Ear infections don’t get cured for a while because everything is based on just-in-time supply chains?

It actually makes me think that the wacko survivalists might not be too far off track. I’m really thinking about talking to my doctor (well, Sarah’s doctor, I’m not so worried for myself) about getting a little supply of common stuff just in case.

I’d get a gun too, but Kirsten wouldn’t go for that.

*holding arms way way far apart* This much.

So, as we suffer through the Rays-Sox game tonight, K reminded me again why I love her so much.

“He’s the worst of all of them. He says nothing, and he takes a long time saying it, and he’s not coherent… and that’s from someone who knows nothing about baseball.”

Of course, just one inning after this fantastic assessment, he re-verified his should-be-fired-ness by stating “I don’t really like this (the Rays) rotation. Sure they have Garza and Kazmir, and some good young guys in the minors, but after that I’m not impressed.”

What a freaking moron. I leave it to Jeremy to tell us exactly where the Rays’ staff ranks in MLB, but I’d put it in the top 5 especially looking ahead a few years.

I really want to learn how to hack a DVR and install a voice-recognition-and-mute algorithm.

[P.S. K also said "call the post 'How Much Joe Morgan Sucks.' " Have to give credit where credit is due.]

A recent Pew study reports that “churchgoers are significantly more likely to support torture”, but apparently they only asked “white evangelicals, white non-Hispanic Catholics, white mainline Protestants and the religiously unaffiliated” so insert your own GOP-bashing comment here.

More than half of people who attend services at least once a week — 54 percent — said the use of torture against suspected terrorists is “often” or “sometimes” justified. Only 42 percent of people who “seldom or never” go to services agreed. White evangelical Protestants were the religious group most likely to say torture is often or sometimes justified — more than six in 10 supported it.

I just wish the article had a little comment somewhere saying “not all people of faith are vindictive and intolerant” with a link to the peace churches. Don’t even have to mention Quakers by name, I’m not greedy.

First, a triple-shot of holy-crap-has-mlb-gone-in-the-crapper. Selig denies he should share in the blame, the Players Union is clueless, etc.

All of this, however, pales in comparison to the story out of Luzerne County, PA, where a judge and a colleague plead guilty to fraud and for taking more than $2.6 million in kickbacks to send ~ 750 teenagers to two privately run youth detention centers. That’s some seriously sick shit. And the sad part is, I’m not surprised. Our ‘criminal injustice’ system is so far out of whack, so far into the “for-profit” business, it’s not funny.

This year’s snow sculpture is just a pile of snow…called Mt. Moosilauke.

Not having enough of the limelight, the prosecutor behind the effort to impeach President Clinton has recently filed a lawsuit that would FORCIBLY DIVORCE all same-sex couples who married in the year before Prop H8.

Politically this is very clever; I’m guessing that he’s hoping to drag Obama into this just when our President needs to devote all his political capital to overcoming the obstructionist RepubliCants in rebuilding our country/economy.

However, I don’t think I need to tell you how morally repugnant it is. Think about it – the government steps in and tells you that your marriage, your sacred and loving commitment to your partner, is suddenly and arbitrarily broken.

“Fidelity”: Don’t Divorce… from Courage Campaign on Vimeo.