Yes, MLS, meaning Major League Soccer. You have to know that the USA has a soccer league. We share it with Canada, much like the Canadians share a hockey league with us? Come on, guys, the MLS has been in North America for 16 years now. You should try it, you’ll like it.

Anyway. Playoffs. Six of the 18 clubs are the playoffs proper; four more have battled successfully for Wild Card Spots and will be playing each other in single elimination games for the chance to play on into November. Let’s take a quick look at the Wild Card clubs.

Quick note: clubs hosting playoff games are listed first, and regular season records follow a wins-losses-ties format.

FC Dallas (15-12-7) vs. New York Red Bulls (10-8-16)
Pizza Hut Park, Frisco, Texas
Wed., Oct. 26, 9 pm ET

Look at this picture and tell me soccer players are hot. LOOK AT IT.

First of all, can I just say that the Red Bulls should be embarrassed to be in the playoffs with that regular season record. Yes, tie games count and help your standing during the regular season (MLS and NHL share a similar points system), but the Red Bulls have only won 10 out of 34 regular season games outright. I thought only teams in the NFL were allowed to get into the playoffs with a record that bad.

The Red Bulls will certainly try to make things interesting for the Toros. French National and team captain Thierry Henry leads New York in scoring with 14 goals in 26 appearances. Unfortunately, Luke Rodgers, the team’s next highest scorer with 9 goals in 23 appearances, will not be playing due to a left knee injury; this means that Joel Lindpere and Dane Richards have to step up and help Henry from the midfield. And with perennial playoff goalie Kevin Hartman guarding the net for FC Dallas, scoring opportunities may be few and far between. Of course,  Dallas have big legs of their own: midfielder Brek Shea has 11 goals in 31 appearances, and 15 other players on the squad have at least one goal during the regular season. With the Red Bulls having given up 44 goals compared to the Toros’ 39, I don’t see how New York pulls this out on the road. Prediction: FC Dallas 2-1 New York Red Bulls.

Colorado Rapids (12-9-13) vs. Columbus Crew (13-13-8)
Dick’s Sporting Goods Park, Commerce City, Colo.
Thurs., Oct. 27, 10 pm ET

Andres Mendoza's scoring feats are all the more impressive once you realize he has to carry other players on his back the entire time he's on the pitch.

This game could prove to be a long and torturous one for The Crew. Let’s look at the facts: The Rapids have only lost twice at home, while Columbus has lost 10 times on the road. The Rapids have forced 44 goals this season, the same number that The Crew have allowed. Andrés Mendoza does lead Columbus with an impressive 13 goals in 34 appearances, but he is the lone bright spot on an otherwise barely mediocre team. Prediction: Colorado Rapids 2-0 Columbus Crew.

Source, source, source, source

I can now name two soccer players.  (One is married to a Spice Girl, and the other should be a Spice Girl.)

When elaborating on the possible reasons that people in opposing stadiums boo him, Cristiano Ronaldo of the (insert team name here if you feel like looking it up) was quoted as saying,

I think that because I am rich, handsome and a great player people are envious of me. I don’t have any other explanation.

Don’t forget pounds of glorious brains. I’m also struggling to come up with a possible explanation for the jeers you inspire when making public appearances. Because you seem to be a man who understands people.  It’s like a puzzle, and I love puzzles. Let’s see if we can crack it.

You might smell like onions. I had this friend Richard who always smelled like onions and I was his only friend. You could smell like onions. I’m not even sure he was aware of it. You might want to ask everyone you know if you smell like onions. You’ll want to ask everyone because you’re so rich and handsome that people might not tell you the truth.

I looked up some other pictures of you. I couldn’t find any of you wearing a shirt. Except for the ones where you were crying. Maybe that’s it.

It could be because you’re European. Oh, wait, it’s the Europeans that hate you? That’s probably not it then.  I thought we were talking about the Americans not liking you, because I’m not sure they do, either. Have you gotten back to me on the onion thing yet? This riddle might be solved. Please, help me, help you.

I had this other friend who spit every time he said something. You literally had to put your bathing suit on to have a conversation with him (ok, not literally had to, but I did because it really annoyed him). Are you a spitter? Because I have to tell you, people hate that.

Do you do bad celebrity impressions at parties? You look like you do a bad DeNiro. “Are you talking to me? Are you talking to me?” That’s like the most played impression ever and yes, we are looking at you, and we are not pleased.

Do you own even one David Hasselhoff cd? Don’t fucking lie to me, Cristiano. Every single one has a serial number and it’s logged into a database. I already have the answer, I just want to see if you’re a liar. People don’t like liars, Cristiano. Remember that. They don’t boo you in Germany. Why is that? Tell us.

* * *

I started playing soccer relatively late: a awkward nine-year old lured to the sport more by the promise of Little Debbies and Hi-C juice boxes after games than any real draw to running and kicking. But in the early 90’s, especially in Iowa, it didn’t take much for a girl playing with boys to eventually get immersed in the game through club soccer. As my skills improved and my exposure to women’s soccer increased, I slowly fell in love with the beautiful game. How could you not, as an adolescent back them, be enthralled by the story of the founding mothers of US Women’s Soccer? How could you not want to be like Mia Hamm, a star so dominating, so prodigious, that she made the US Women’s National Team before she was old enough to drive a car? How could you not look up to Michelle Akers, dominating the midfield in the air, despite looking like she could be my mom? How could you not be inspired by Tiffany Milbrett, who gave hope to 5’2” girls everywhere that they could knock around the best defenders in the world?

By the time I was a gangly teenager, I was hooked. And I was also lucky. I came of age in a time when Title IX made women’s soccer the fastest growing collegiate sport at the time. If you had any amount of game, let alone decent grades to go with it, you could play soccer in college, and it could pay for your time there. So that’s what I did. I ended up playing Division II soccer at Truman State University, which ended up being the perfect place for a player like me to spend their career. I sat the bench for a year, all the while working my ass off to earn the right to start and learning what it mean to play at that level. In fact, it was the summer between my freshman and sophomore seasons, that summer I spent running and lifting and getting as many touches on the ball so that I could be in the starting 11 come fall, that the United States hosted the Women’s World Cup. And it was July 10^th, one day before my 19^th birthday, when Kristine Lilly cleared an almost-sure goal by China off the line with her head. When Briana Scurry saved one, just one, penalty shot during the shootout. When Brandi Chastain scored the winning penalty shot and ripped off her jersey in jubilant celebration, revealing the muscled, finely-honed physique of an athlete. And those same founding mothers celebrated and hoisted the championship trophy, they did so with their children, because the founding mothers were, in fact, actual mothers with small children.

And so, 12 years later, I watched a different US Women’s National Team, one filled mostly with players younger than me, but still filled with the same heart and guts and hustle instilled by the women who created the legacy. They were playing Brazil in the quarterfinals of the 2011 Women’s World Cup. My heart sank as break after break seemed to go to Brazil. But even after a questionable call essentially gave a goal to the Brazilians and took a US player off the field, leaving them a woman short for much of the second half, these new stars, Solo and Wambach and Lloyd and O’Reilly, never, ever, ever gave up. When all hope for victory seemed lost, after over 120 minutes of pure hustle, in one last push, Megan Rapinoe—who came off the bench, the bench!—served a perfect ball across the mouth of the Brazillian goal and there was Wambach, through two defenders, heading the ball in for a truly last-minute goal to send the game into penalty kicks. And there was no way that Hope Solo, the keeper with ice in her veins, or the rest of these women, would not finish this game with victory. 12 years later, to the date, another shootout, another victory for the team that refuses to quit. I found myself, tears streaming down my face, goosebumps on my arms, remembered just why soccer was—is—so important.

I went on to start for the rest of my career at Truman. My experiences with that team were formative to the woman I became—the woman I am. I learned the power of drive, of heart, of hustle, of hard work and delayed gratification, of loyalty and pride and integrity and grit. I learned what can happen when women work together and lift each other up. I made friendships that are still with me today: I held two of my former teammates babies this weekend; I will stand up for another at her wedding in October. I have a forged bond with some of these women. They are my sisters.

What some people don’t understand—can’t ever understand—is how soccer, for women, is more than just a game. They don’t understand that thousands and thousands of girls and young women will remember Sunday’s game for the rest of their lives, and some part of that game—maybe Wambach’s goal, maybe one of Solo’s saves, maybe Ali Krieger’s final penalty kick—will forever remind them of what they can accomplish. What they can accomplish might be on the pitch, but it might not be. It might be becoming a doctor or starting a nonprofit or running for office or being a mother who empowers her own daughters for greatness. It can be really, truly, be anything. All these women,  who worked their asses off and held day jobs while training and even mothering, they did this because of what the game means to them and to the rest of the girls and women who look up to them, without the promise of million-dollar contracts at the end of their journey. They did it because of the journey. This—THIS—is why women’s soccer is the beautiful game.

[photo: Andrew Mills]

He’s so excited he can’t see straight.

He’s also not very good at it. That’s fine. The boy isn’t all that athletic. Maybe he’ll grow into it. Maybe he won’t. But he’s having fun, and he thinks he’s good and loves it. To me, that’s what it’s all about at this stage in the game.

I will freely admit I had my cell phone out, texting a girlfriend while they were getting organized at the beginning of practice. I had a book, I had my great big old picnic-style blanket spread out, purse half dumped and was putzing around doing this and that. But as practice got going, I set down my phone and sat to watch the shenanigans.

Eight-year-old boys who don’t have a clue how to play soccer trying to practice playing soccer is sort of a hoot.  They’re uncoordinated, they don’t pay attention and I just find there to be something joyous and hilarious about them. They’re playing a game in its least competitive form, and it’s just fun.

So all this parental musing about the nature of sport aside, I notice a kid shoving another kid out on the field. Being a completely judgmental parent, I look around to see whose jerkwad kid this is.

And that’s when I noticed.

Everyone is on their phone except me.

Texting, surfing, talking. They’re doing anything except watching the field. So I sit and observe the parents. Thumbs are flying and smiles spread over their faces as they continue to communicate with their digital world that they’ve brought with them to the soccer field.

They are missing it. They are missing the sucky dribbling and passing. They are missing the boys’ total inability to weave in and out of cones. They are missing the corner shot that knocked a kid down.

They are missing their boys being 8 years old and trying to learn a sport. This moment won’t come back. As a matter of fact, it’s over.

I’m not a perfect parent. I text more than I should and hell if my phone would surf the web I’d be snagging content from it as well. But if I believe sports are important enough for my child to play, then they ought to be important enough for me to pay attention to while they learn.

Get off the phone. Jerks.

The week began with this tweet from NBC Sports.No joke. They didn’t even delete it later.

We also heard about a Jacksonville man who ended up in serious condition with a compound arm fracture due to a missed high five while leaving the Jaguars game last Sunday. It has since been determined he was trying to leap from a gridlocked stairway to a moving escalator. As of Wednesday, he was still in the hospital.

Taking the cake in the moron department has to be news that the Ravens ejected a lesbian couple from their stadium during the Sept. 26 game against the Cleveland Browns. Security claims they were ejected for lifting a plastic cup from a concession stand that they took to use for ketchup, and not kissing, as the couple claims. Either way, it’s just plain stupid.

Who is more off-base, Terrell Owen or the NFL and their Twitter policy? T.O. tweeted inside the 9o-minute pre-game window with the critical information that a fan wearing his jersey at today’s Bengals-Tampa Bay contest would win a signed football from him and buddy Chad OchoCinco. OchoCinco has been Twitter-law abiding since a $25,000 fine in August, and kept today’s tweets about his pet pigeon (seriously?) and the dreadful state of the world to well before kickoff. No news yet about a fine for T.O., but an NFL spokesperson says they’re looking into this possible careless breakage of an arguably rather stupid rule.

Lest you think there was no humor this week, I leave you with this video. Not smart, but also pretty silly. With thanks to Google’s translator:  Peter Niemeyer touched the breasts of referee Bibiana Steinhaus. Niemeyer, “They stood a little further away than thought, I wanted to give her a shoulder pat, but you have to entertain the crowd a little ….”

Cincinnati Bengal Chad Ochocinco was trying to help Feed the Children by having their phone number for donations printed on boxes of his cereal, “OchocincOs.” A typo sends callers to a phone sex line instead. If Chad were not a Bengal, would this be as funny? I think not.

Premier League players are accused of hiring 15 hookers for a post-match celebration party. This probably wouldn’t be news if one of the hookers had not been a transvestite. He kept that little tidbit to himself while doing “some oral stuff” with Fulham defender Carlos Salcido. Salcido intends to sue the transvestite. That will be fun.

Drugs

Alberto Contador is blaming his positive drug test during the Tour de France on bad steak. Contador, who won the title, tested positive in a test taken the last rest day of the 2010 Tour. His story sounds plausible. The drug detected is given to cows and meat from Spain that was consumed by Contador and his teammates. The fact that it’s the Tour de France makes this one a bit of a yawn. As Contador said, “It’s almost normal for people to doubt this sport now.” Gee, you think? This surely isn’t the end of this story, especially since Lance Armstrong is a former teammate of both Contador and Floyd Landis, the only Tour winner to be stripped of his title. So far, anyway.

Bieber

Philadelphia Phillies shortstop Jimmy Rollins has purchased the rights to a Justin Bieber song. I have no idea what this means. It’s probably just an Eenie Meenie sign of the apocalypse.

“Shawty is a (sic) eenie meenie miney mo lover?” Who wouldn’t want to co-sign that genius? Um…

None of the Above

Last week I mentioned the sport of wife-carrying.

I would be remiss if I didn’t tell you about the Harris Cup International Miniature Golf Tournament, being contested this weekend in Vestal, NY. Winners of regional qualifiers meet in Vestal to decide a champion. Nobody wins their weight in beer, though.

[source] [source] [source] [source] [source]

Top photo: Robert Seale/TSN /ZUMA Press.

Bottom photo: Eightface.com

There are more rules for parents than for the kids, though. There is no yelling of your kid’s name or any “instructions.” (In our case “Go brown!” is about all I can say.) No keeping score. No winners. No losers.

That would be easier if Oliver were not a bit of a fiend when it comes to numbers and statistics. I once wanted to be the statistician for the Boston Bruins so the apple has not fallen far from the tree. It’s how his brain works, and he’s proud of his accomplishments.

Knowing this was starting to be an issue, I talked to Oliver over the last few days about being a good sport and having fun at soccer. He agreed with me that if he had fun and tried his best, he won. He agreed. After today’s game I asked him if he learned anything. “I learned not to keep score,” he answered, but his face looked like he’d been gut-punched. He said exactly the right thing. I know he’s only 5 but it still felt wrong.

Rewind to a couple of weeks ago. I was at work, chatting with one of the faculty. We were bemoaning the inability of our students to do as they are told, to follow the simplest of instructions, and to do anything that does not involve them being handed everything they need on a silver platter. I asked him how he thought we got here, or why these kids are the way they are. He circled a little bit until I asked him how we keep our own kids from ending up this way. He didn’t have to think very hard before saying the whole “everyone gets a trophy” mentality wasn’t helping.

That conversation reminded me something from the Women and Sports panel at BlogHer. This very thing was discussed and though I didn’t speak up, I sided squarely with those who argued against “everyone gets a trophy.” GoonSquadSarah put it best.

Getting back to my conversation with the faculty member, are we preparing our students for the real world, the very competitive real world, if we only spoon feed them? Do we give them the chance to shine if they never have to figure out how to get from point A to point B on their own, without a detailed map? Would it be any different if they had more opportunities  to experience the thrill of victory and the agony of defeat?

I don’t have any good answers but I can tell you how I’m feeling a couple of weeks in to the soccer season. I don’t want to go anymore. He’s having fun and loving it, so I’ll keep going, but I’m trying to pay less and less attention to what is happening on the pitch. It’s better for everyone.

ClumberKim also posted this on her own blog. It was edited slightly before it landed over here.

As we hit the highway, I checked the crackberry for the World Cup scores:

Me: Hey, Spain won the World Cup. Beat Germany, One-Zip.

Husband: So. The Octopus was right.

Me: Is that someone you work with?

Husband: Who?

Me: The Octopus.

Husband: No. The Octopus is an actual octopus.  He’s in an aquarium in Germany.  His name is Paul and he has predicted the winners for the World Cup all during the competition.  The kids and I watched him on ESPN last well.

To the outside observer our conversation may seem somewhat disjointed, but allow me to explain. My husband is in the military and if you’ve ever seen Top Gun, then you know about nicknames like “Iceman,” “Goose” and “Maverick.”  My husband spent years working in Special Operations, so I had grown accustomed to answering our phone at all hours of the night to disembodied voices identifying themselves as  “Mack,” “Rubber,” “The Mayor,” or even “Beavis.”  Since my husband once worked with a guy he called  “Shark” whose real name was Eric , it was perfectly plausible The Octopus could in fact be a colleague of his at the Pentagon.  But in this case, The Octopus wasn’t some secret spy code for “Steve,” this octopus was the real deal.

Not sure how I missed Paul the soothsayer of the sea, but he’s not missed a predicted winner in 8 matches of World Cup soccer. What motivates the mollusk? Food. Two boxes are lowered into Paul’s tank, each team is represented with a flag affixed to each box which  contains a mussel. Paul then makes his way over to the two boxes, and the winner is determined after Paul slithers into one of the two boxes, and grabs a bivalve.

Behold. Paul!

The Oberhausen Sea Life  Center in Germany has announced Paul is retiring, however he will not fade from view. The Sea Life Center hopes to give Paul the opportunity to teach younger octopods his special skill.  But I’ll tell you what. If the younger eight armed whippersnappers don’t catch on to Paul’s methodology.  I’ll volunteer to be Paul’s apprentice. I am motivated by food, I absolutely love mussels and  I’ve never been to Germany.

Four years is enough time for me to fund-raise for the trip and get my diver certification. Right?

[source]

* * *

Please bear with me. This post is kind of about World Cup but not really. You’ll see.

(DON’T LEAVE!)

(YOU CAN’T GO! WHO WILL WATER THE PLANTS?)

Thank you.

Today was the World Cup Final and of course Spain won, so I was happy, because it fell under my Suebobian rule of “If you don’t really care who is playing, root for the team with better-looking players.” Sorry, Netherlands. Something about wearing wooden shoes has made their faces pinched and pasty.

Except maybe their goalkeeper, Maarten Stecklenburg. Ai yi yi:

Forgive me, Father, for I have done perved.

I was never into futbol before this World Cup. (I call it futbol because everyone else in the world calls it “football,” not soccer, but if I say “football,” everyone thinks of NFL, so this is my compromise. Works for me.)

I don’t know what synapse snapped together in my head on June 11, but suddenly I couldn’t stop thinking about World Cup. And the weird thing was that I was surrounded by futbol fans, but I had never noticed it before.

It was like I had walked through a secret door into another world – like my house had landed after a tornado and suddenly, everything was Technicolor instead of black and white.

With my World Cup fandom, I joined a new club. A club that consists of about 40% of the people on earth. I gained new friends all over the place.

The Nigerian security guards and I bonded over the knockout round. My cube neighbor, Tai, discovered me during the Round of 16. I trash-talked with a German guy in line at the grocery store. A girl in my class at church gave a dissertation on the storied career of Diego Maradona.

Everywhere I went, whenever I saw someone with a futbol jersey or t-shirt, I would start talking to them. Someone once told me that God gave us weather so that we would always have something to talk to strangers about. Now I have the weather AND futbol.

When I first started the month, I didn’t even know how the tournament structure worked. I had heard futbol was “boring” and “slow” because there are so few goals scored in a game.

By the end, I – a former NBA fan who had to quit watching because I was getting horrible headaches from screaming too loud at televised games – realized that futbol is the most thrilling game on earth precisely because of the emphasis on quality of play, NOT on just scoring more than the other team.

Today, when I watched the finals, I was among the 25% of the people on earth seeing the game at that moment. It felt amazing – like I was suddenly a citizen of the world, bonded by this crazy love of the Beautiful Game, wishing for nothing more in that moment than to see some great play.

If you didn’t watch the game, you can see all the highlights here.

Olé, Olé, Olé. I’ll see you in Rio in 2014.

(p.s. My mom gave me money to buy a cute outfit for my birthday. She said “I hope you got something nice with your birthday money,” and I had to admit “Yes, I did, Mom. I bought LA Galaxy tickets.”)

Wow. There’s just no explaining this one away. That’s definitely not a scratch. Definitely not a delicate, necessary pick. This is a full-on, digging-for-gold, rolling-booger-in-fingers, not-his-first-time-at-the-rodeo BOOGER PICK AND EAT. With all the cards given out by referees this tournament, I don’t see why this wasn’t a red-card offense.  Do you think he honestly, truly didn’t realize what he was doing, all caught up in the moment of being on the world stage and coaching the team to beat? Or does he just not give a fuck because he’s on a world stage and is coaching the team to beat?

Either way, Löw is in serious need of some hometraining. I bet he doesn’t wash his hands after he pees and he probably needs to cut his toenails. It’s enough to make me root for the Dutch.