BLCKDGRD

Did You Know Washington DC Has a Professional Soccer Team?

Goff has the protected and the unprotected:

Marc Burch, Luciano Emilio, Fred, Ivan Guerrero, Greg Janicki, Thabiso Khumalo, Devon McTavish, Jaime Moreno, Bryan Namoff, Santino Quaranta, Clyde Simms

Which leaves the following players available for selection by Seattle in Wednesday's expansion draft: Crayton, Martinez, Peralta, Vide, Gallardo, Doe, J. Carroll, P. Carroll, Cordeiro, Dyachenko, Kirk, Koroma, Mediate, Miller, Olsen, Thompson, Thorpe, Wells, Zaher.

Niell, Carvallo, Martinez, Peralta, Gallardo or Greg Janicki and Boyzz Khumalo?

Not gonna rehash it again, just saying: Next season is on Kevin Payne and Dave Kasper. I give them credit for decency by not scapegoating Soehn, and if the three want to flourish or perish together, Lord Etcheverry bless, but Greg Janicki and Boyzz Khulamo, Greg Janicki and Boyzz Khumalo.

Goff adds

D.C. United did not pick up the contract options on Quavas Kirk, Gonzalo Martinez, Gonzalo Peralta and Rod Dyachenko. The club seems likely to renegotiate with Peralta and perhaps Kirk at a lower salary, but I would be shocked if Martinez or Dyachenko returns.

I should add, while I can't argue with any of the decisions of who to or not protect, it's damning that there's no controversy like last year's Clyde Simms v (MLS Cup winning) Brian Carroll. That was a significant and difficult decision (and I thought, think, they made the right choice), and you knew whichever wasn't protected was going to be picked. Vide v Janicki doesn't weigh by comparison, and since Seattle only gets ten picks, I'm betting none picked are United.

Here's Goff (praise Goff) with list of notable names unprotected plus a link to ALL unprotected.

Ante Razov, Claudio Suarez, Carey Talley, C.J. Brown, Andy Herron, Brandon Prideaux, Jose Burciaga, Terry Cooke, Facundo Erpen, Mike Petke, Brad Evans, Eddie Gaven, Pat Noonan, Duilio Davino, Wade Barrett, Nate Jaqua, Richard Mulrooney, Pat Onstad, Craig Waibel, Kevin Hartman, Peter Vagenas, Khano Smith, Wells Thompson, John Wolyniec, Dema Kovalenko, Clint Mathis, Nathan Sturgis, Andy Williams, Ned Grabavoy, Carlos Ruiz and Greg Sutton.

New players for 2009?

Dema Kovalenko?

Wade Barrett?

Oy. After the 2007 season I was jonesing for 2008 by Thanksgiving. Right now for next year? Oy.

UPDATE!

Seattle agrees: United players suck!

Mmwahgolomaniacal!

To be honest, I thought Obama had finally screwed-up: he grossly underestimated the magnitude of awesome suckitude of Palin/McCain.

A half-hour infomercial when ten points ahead (full disclosure - I didn't see it; I was here) seemed overkill/shark-jumping, even when I remember that Obamacamp bought the TV time when they were anticipating the race, a week before the election, to be in or near margins-of-error.

Obamacamp miscalculated just how shitty a candidate McPalincane is and spent seven million dollars on a half hour of Obama as Billy Mays selling Obama, opening, I feared, Obama to attacks of hubristic arrogance and self-coronation by a media desperate for a horse race. It made Tom Shales hot, so ick, but so far no such backlash. We'll see.

Thank Lord Etcheverry I didn't see it. I don't want any fucking ginzu knives with the power of orange cleaning enzymes no how.

*

• Texas can secede anyfuckingtime it wants.
• Tom Delay's from Texas.
• David Broder teethes his McCain melba toast.
• Duh: The Sequel.
• John McCain is a pussy.
  
• John McCain is a pussy.
• Batshittistic!
• Kaganistic batshittery, an analysis.
• Kittens: The Anti-American Species!
• The Obama-McCain dance-off gets cruncky.

*

Quiet needed:

United 2, Marathon 4

What? Game analysis?

Obit over the weekend, but 17-24-6. That's 57 points out of a possible 141. That's 1.2 points per game.

Good news? In a meaningless game Rod Dyachenko rode the bench. Unfair I know, but the gaping hole at the ten's last name might be Gallardo, but someone decided Dyachenko could fill it when necessary. All the talk about the defensive liabilities is valid, but midfield - remember when midfield was United's overwhelming strength - midfield, wings and ten, are Reason One for United's mighty suck.

Goff player ratings:

Wells 4; Martinez 4, Janicki 5, McTavish 4, Burch 5; Quaranta 4, Simms 5, Fred 3, Guerrero 5; Khumalo 5, Doe 6. Subs: Vide 4, Emilio 4.

Guerrero, maybe Burch as a back-up and McTavish as a back-up and Doe as a back-up, and Simms can stay, the rest can go, and all are interchangeable MLS mediocrities. There is no one special. And people, please stop talking about Janicki as the next Nelsen - two Marathon goals were directly on him. He's the white Ezra Hendrickson.

OH! United didn't give me anything when I walked through the gate. Twenty-seven home games, I was at every single one (including Houston twice), I've already made the deposits on next season's tickets, and fracking United couldn't give season-ticket holders a $10 coupon for showing up for an utterly meaningless game to spend on shitty United gear?

OH! Had a terrific time!

• Meanwhile, here's Lifton's obit.
• Meanwhile, Boehm contemplates the long winter.
• Meanwhile, Shatz's obit.
• Meanwhile, Fullback on player acquisitions.
• Meanwhile, Goff decides who lives and dies.

More on last night and season autopsies as I see them. Or not.

Columbus 1, United O

The five loud off-season acquisitions were Jose Carvallo and Franco Niell, Gonzalos Martinez and Peralta, and Marcelo Gallardo. The first two were cut. Any of the other three on the field at the start of United's life or death game?

And where was today's urgency, say, at Dallas? As much as United deserved to win today they deserved to lose today for games they would have won had they played as hard in those games as they did today.

That's, um, front office and coaching.

Wednesday's last home game v Marathon has the chance to be weird. Hey, United PR department, give me something  when I walk through the gate.

More Monday. Or not.

My Complicity

While I enjoy being scolded by really sharp scolding, I confess I like me some empire, yo.

I realize the error of my reasoning: empires, like the possum* currently dying in my backyard

(or a certain soccer team) are compelled to survive by any and all shitty means, and still I insist that as long as empires are inevitable - and I'm too stoopid to see alternatives - less shitty empires, as they affect me and mine personally, are better than shittier empires.

Jeebus I'm tired of this argument, but as long as I'm motivated by my self-interests and you're motivated by your self-interests, and every dying possum is motivated by its self-interest, we either need all abdicate our self-interest simultaneously and live in cooperative bliss (which has happened in history exactly never) or work to entangle our self-interests so that you fuck me you fuck you worse.

Give me incentives to deepen my complicity. Bribing me works better than beating me. We choose between those who beat us because they have to and those who beat us because they want to.

*So I go outside to pick the possum up with a shovel (lordy, you should have heard Earthgirl scream when she went outside to feed the feral cats living under our shed (another story for another day) and almost steps on the possum - teehee!) and get close to the possum and the damn thing was breathing. I call Moco animal control and within an hour (!!!) the motherfucking imperialists send out a van and pick the possum up. The woman said they'll evaluate the possum and if it's not near death, they'll release it in the woods.

Draw your own parable.

*

• Maybe a redux, but worth a read if you haven't.
• Most dishonest asshole in America.
• At least this asshole is honest in his assholery.
• Assholes: the civil war.
• When assholes feel constrained at yelling NIGGER!
• I am not wearing the clothes that I'm wearing.
• On teh pig spaz.
• HEY! New Gerald Stern poem.
• Yeah, but when's Power's next novel?

Updates later. Or not.

*

Youtube and typepad still not talking. Typepad help says they don't see a problem (though this has been an issue in the past). They suggest I just link to the music. Um, fuck that.

Meanwhile, imagine Martha and the Muffins' "Echo Beach" while looking at this clumsily related Moco landmark!

 

Click to enlarge (possum, too)>

Cruz Azul 2, United 0

What's with the fucking car-horns? How much better is United's away kit with black shorts? Where does Roberto Moreno* go to collect his paycheck from CONCACAF officials? ANSWER ME!

Goff beat me to it, but I bet a pint that Ben Olsen is the head coach for the start of next season. Preki's success at Chivas, Jason Kreis' relative success at RSL, the precedent has been set. Tom Soehn is plank-walking unless United (a) makes the playoffs and (b) goes deep in the playoffs - someone's gonna pay for this season. If United can't get Mourinho, why the hell not Benny, especially if his ankles are too permanently ruined to play?

UPDATE: Landru wants credit for this from past May.

I do think there is an interesting alternative to Soehn, but I'm not sure that alternative is ready to be a coach yet--evidence indicates that he still thinks he's a player, and may or may not have some reason to think that.

Oh, the game? Industriousness ain't enough if your midfielders are stiffs. Kirk, McTavish, Carroll, Miller were never going to create a goal with two strikers, one name Cordeiro, so they weren't going to create a goal with just one. I admit my fascination with young African strikers with three syllable names starting with K persists. And Zaher serves a mean corner; not mean enough to make up for other deficiencies, but a mean corner.

*Look, the Great Collina

could have refereed this game and United wasn't going to win, so I'm not blaming the loss on Moreno, but I remember watching games with Moreno in the past and being impressed by his fairness and command, so some anti-United bias was up.

Updates, edits, links, later. Or not.

United 2, Ningland 1

Winning? More fun!

Two extraordinary goals by Doe and excellent play by Khumalo made up for hamstrung performance by Emilio, who could risk no effort less pwang went the hammie, and Clyde Simms' most energetic game in two months and decent (by United standards) organization on defense that required Crayton need only make a half dozen acrobatic saves. Formula for success!

Here's Goff's ratings:

Crayton 7; McTavish 6, Peralta 6, Janicki 6, Burch 5; Khumalo 6, Simms 6, Quaranta 6, Guerrero 6; Doe 8, Emilio 5. Subs: Martinez 5, Moreno 7, Fred 6.

Sure, MLS' post-season silly-ass tournament is stoopid! and I'll take another home game if available (and postpone the obit), but a win v Marathon at home this coming Wednesday - in which we won't see many regulars - to probably finish the home games is all I ask.

OH! Goff says Ningland wasn't offsides on their goal, but MLS referees and line judges suck suck suck, impartially, without agenda, but suck suck suck.

And Jeff Larentowicz is a punkass asswipe.  

Edits, updates, links, later. Or not.

Houston 0, United 0

O-O! Aucking F!

Here, some notes from game:

• Why the hell is Houston wearing all-white at home? It has to be marketing that so many teams go wussy at home - in all sports. If white at home is not traditional, don't.
• Jeebus, did Rongen rally to the Coach's Club creed of honor. "Credit to Tommy for having his team ready to play." Other than the Dallas game, I haven't questioned the effort, I've questioned the talent and the coaching.
• What's worse, that a team gives all and isn't good enough or a team is good enough but doesn't give all, and that's an easy question and begs the bigger question: if it's the former, it's not the coach or players, yes?
• Jeebus, it sounds like Rongen is arguing the justification for Soehn's return next year.
• Khumalo does have a terrific touch, but I've seen the movie of United's experiment with young African strikers whose name has three syllables and starts w/K.
• And speaking of coaching and talent, does Houston's talent outclass United's more than Houston's coaching outclasses United?
• Announcer saying JAN-icki. And credit United if they played him to see what they have. Which doesn't answer the question, why is Janicki the going-into-halftime interview on comcast.
• UPDATE: Janicki in a daring white sash headband!
• Hematoma!
• 64th - If de Rossarios' shot is eight inches right, Crayton is beaten.
• Dominic Kinnear, KGB strong-man in Bond movies.
• MLS referees suck royally, equally. Suck suck suck. And Namoff can't play v Ningland.
• And on cue, refs miss a red card on United. Crayton needs be gone.
• 81 - announcer not Rongen says, "...if Simms can get on his horse..." as if the metaphor is appropriate in soccer, and if successfully argued OK, what horse does Simms have left?
• 83 - but Crayton in air is terrific. He's good at what Wells sucks, Wells is good at what Crayton sucks.
• Sssh... Quaranta isn't very good. He reverts to automaton passing when winded, when tired.
• All praise, Ivan Guerrero.
• Crayton saves at 94, Wells probably too.

And then this morning I read:

D.C. United goalkeeper Louis Crayton was chatting with well-wishers outside the club's locker room following a 0-0 tie with the Dynamo on Sunday night when, he said, a Houston fan directed a racial slur at him.

Crayton, who is black, leapt over a barrier and attempted to confront the man before security and United General Manager Dave Kasper restrained the native of Liberia.

"It is so sad that he would say that to me," Crayton said. "I am saying hi to the fans and he walked up to me and told me, 'Hey, you're a monkey, go back to the jungle.' I told him, 'Hey, you can't say that to me. I am not a monkey, I am a human being like you.' I jumped over to ask him why he insulted me, and he kept going."

Crackerstanis, mofos.

Actually, that doesn't surprise me, but this does:

United Coach Tom Soehn said his team "was passionate about the way we defended and knowing what it takes to get a result here. It was a real positive step for us."

Pretty much says Soehn hasn't been getting the best out of the players, yes?

Here's your god-taunting moral quandary of the day:

Say United wins it's last two and backs into the playoffs as the eighth team and then miraculously runs to MLS Cup: just how at peace will you be, O worshipers of table, with your embarrassment of undeserved riches? That's right, pretty fracking at peace.

Fullback on moral victories and tourniquets.

Updates, edits, links, later. Or not.

UPDATE: D on the Crayton incident.

Saprissa 2, United 2

I should spare myself aargh but I must scratch it: when I'm emperor of the universe, I'm banishing Christian Miles to the pit of a Jiffy Lube and permitting him only say, "Clear," which he'll manage to mispronounce.

It's not Jeff Carroll, moron, it's

Precarious and rinkydink? The best Fox Sports Channel can give us from their Fisher-Price studios is Christian Fucking Miles? At least the schmuck paired with Miles thought Miles as big an idiot as I do.

Who didn't think United would lose, badly but hopefully not too embarrassingly? I've no idea how many first-teamers Saprissa started (and never expected Fox to tell me, of course), but the reserves did surprisingly well considering how outclassed they were by whomever Saprissa fielded. So what?

Here's Goff's player ratings:

Wells 4; Thompson 4, Janicki 4, Gonzalez 4, Zaher 5; Kirk 5, Carroll 4, Vide 5, Miller 4; Dyachenko 5, Doe 6. Subs: McTavish 4, Burch 5, Khumalo 5.

Fwrt, there's goes 20 years worth of diverting $150 a paycheck into Vanguard mutual funds. Who thought this season's misery could be rendered meh by doomier clusterfucks?

Rage? Christian Fracking Miles drives me to rage. United? I'll forgive United enough if at next season's opening game Zach Wells and Rod Dyachenko aren't on the squad.

We Are the Enemy

Remember, these are wondrous end-days for true Crackerstanis and christers, whose lesser of win/win is Palin/McCain winning. Anything necessary to maintain the chosen narratives of defeat, exile, rebellion, ultimate vindication through martyrdom will be done.

The irony of the Palin/McCain incite-the-crackers strategy is that most crackers want Palin/McCain to lose, but only after a to-the-death fight, with victory in sight, with victory stolen from Jeebus by the obamantichrist and his heathen brethren. Even the fuck you of a Palin/McCain victory can't match years of martyrdom and spiritually rewarding exile in the devil's desert.

Ammonium nitrate prices must be spiking in anticipation of gleeful martyrdom. If Obama wins, Crackerstanis' devoutest wish, the next major terrorist attack in America will be by glorious Crackerstani warriors.

*

• If you love freedom, assail a hack.
• Rise of the Moostopo.
• McCain's dickhead.
• Batshit insane.
• No one breaks Richard Cohen's heart and is spared a vicious screed.
• Palin/McCain as Echo and Narcissus.
• Meanwhile.
• Dana Milbank Theater.
• Of Spock and Flanders.
• Republican War on Words by everyone's favorite lit-critic to hate.
• Anonymous blog attacks in Mocoland? I know they're talking about a different type of blog than this one, but if you really want to know my real name you can (a) figure it out easy enough with some basic sleuthing or (b) email me and I'll tell you.
• HEY! New ALBERT GOLDBARTH poem!

Updates later. Or not.

*

Watched five minutes of New Orleans v Minnesota on Monday Night Helmetball before realizing New Orleans, in hideous white shirt/black pants, was the home team. I saw two minutes of Baltimore at home yesterday wearing even more hideous white shirt/black pants and watched a quarter of the Racial Slurs v Eagles game in Philadelphia when the Eagles wore white shirt/green pants.

One small reason that reverberates disproportionately in my chapel of helmetball apostasy is my local helmetball team wearing

at home instead of

Wear the colors at home, asses.

Still, it's impossible to live in Beltwayopolis and not know how the Racial Slurs are doing and be reminded that there will be a new Racial Slurs stadium in DC before a new United stadium, which includes the possibility there will be neither.

No one asks me anymore how I separate my politics and my soccer.