Happy Holidays

'Tis the Season

Ok so we are down to the crunch (2 more sleeps!) and per usual I have left all Christmas related shopping, requests, plans etc ... to the last second. Most importantly I left my TFC CHRISTMAS WISHLIST right to the wire. But I was always told Santa's some sort of crazy magician and I pretty much have up until 11pm on the 24th. So many things to ask for, so many things that would be great to see in the next season. Will I get a DP? Or maybe a NutriLite Championship!? I've thought of a few things I want want want for my TFC experience in the 2009 season that Sant ... ERRR, TFC can deliver to me - ok I'll be giving - to all of US!!

#5 ROAD WINS

Aye aye. This will be what will make or break us next season. How many games will TFC blow in the last few minutes, or even worse, injury time? We've made one key addition which already has improved the outlook dramatically, but regardless of the sport, if you can't win on the road then you are just another average team. The only thing to take from last season is that those losses were often from a last second lapse, so it's not like they were blow outs, but mental breakdowns. We correct that and points should start to add up.

#4 BETTER WEATHER
Ok obviously nobody can deliver on this one, but considering I didn't have season's tickets last year, it seriously seemed like it rained for the vast majority of the games I attended. This isn't England and we're playing football from March to October, right in the summer! I can think of only 3 or 4 games where it didn't rain. I have no real beef with Mother Nature, and hey I like crops and want them to grow, but man for real I don't have a TFC poncho and it sucks biking home not only in the rain but with soaked jeans and sneakers.

#3 A FEW MORE DICHIO GOALS
I consider myself pretty lucky that I was able to attend two games that Danny scored arguably his best ones for TFC. The guy who was brought in here to do what took us 4 games, scores goals not always in quantity and not always in quality but when they go in, I am jumping up and down. May 12 and October 20 sealed Dichio's status in TFC history as our first fan favorite, resulting in a 24th minute chant every home game. As much as you want everyone else to put it in, there's something extra that goes into celebrating one of his goals. It seems like next year will be his last season, so I hope 2009 is injury free and we see a few more corner flags ripped out of the ground and waved high to the fans in red.

#2 MORE BITCHY
That's right, I said it. We need more from Bitchy the Hawk. Come on, that hawk is a celebrity and a mean mofo. All smaller birds FEAR Bitchy AND it earned a spot during the All-Star Game on ESPN. I don't remember what was said during that interview but rest assured it was quality reporting from the good people at ESPN. For 2009 I'd like to see Bitchy "spread her wings" if you will - maybe some half time tricks, flying around the stadium, flying upside down, maybe even a few matchups against a seagull or two. Better yet, we need a Bitchy song! It might go something like this:

Oooooooo Biiiiitchhhhy
Whoooaaa Biiiiitchhhhy
Bitchy the Hawk! Oooo What a Hawk!
Bitchy the Hawk! Oooo What a Hawk!
Bitchy the Hawk! Don't need no flock!
Oooooooo Bitchy what a hawk!

That'll win us games, you wait and see.

OK AND THE #1 REQUEST FOR CHRISTMAS THIS YEAR *DRUMROLL* ...

WOOOPS. I mean



Alright this isn't happening this season but I just don't want this to become a dead issue. I'm just hoping we hear more about this and some sort of ball gets rolling on whether we're getting grass and when. No Argos coming in, we get added seating, real grass and we can say this is a 100% legit "Soccer Specific Stadium". Over the last few months I've read more footballing books than I have in my entire life and the one thing that is sticking with me is TRADITION. The history of football is so amazing, deep and rich that I can see how someone looks at artificial turf and thinks it's insane.

Well that's it. Nothing over the top. I know all these Christmas wishes will come true! Happy Holidays to everyone out there and get stoked for the new year!

Save the date!

Well ignore my picture below but for the sake of recent rumours (my favorite!) I'll keep it as is. For the last couple of weeks it has been leaked to a few news sources that we are for real going to drop some cash to acquire some new talent. When we picked up DeRo over a week ago, with his salary, it looked as though he was the big move - BUT - turns out there is more and the date that is being thrown around is January 6. According to my 2009 Sports Illustrated Swimsuit calendar that is a Tuesday! Danica Patrick perhaps? Siiiiiigh.

There are many scenarios that could play out for us in the next three weeks. Whoever it is that comes in January, this will directly effect our current line-up and our draft choices. By that I mean don't be surprised if the addition of DeRo and a DP results in some pre-draft wheeling and dealing by Mo to shore up some weak spots or shed some baggage. Expect alot more exciting things to happen to this team in the next month than we've seen over the last two years.



As much as I want to speculate who this mystery "BIG SPLASH" is, I've decided to have some Christmas spirit and let this present from TFC remain a surprise. I think I can hold out until early January and simply enjoy reading the rumours. Why bother weighing out the pros and cons of it being Radzinski or Stalteri (who now apparently has signed with Borussia Monchengladbach (points for trying??). Sure it's fun - hey we sign a striker and look for a defender in the draft? Or draft another striker and trade him for a CB?? The possibilities are endless and the last thing I want is to write a ghetto MLS Rumours blog. I didn't think it would be either those two Canadians, but don't forget it wasn't long ago that one of our DP targets was Iain Hume - so put that into perspective.

So for now I'm leaving it at that - hang tight for another crazy 15 days where fine speculating's abounds!

Counting down to January

Well for once there is real, tangible optimism in Toronto (Go Raptors!). The addition of DeRo has already made everyone's "fantasy line-up" look 10X better than last season and every player is now twice as good with our new addition!! BUT THERE IS MORE - as our favorite Saturday morning (ok by morning I mean noon) character Gerry Dobson has noted, it seems to be almost certain there will be another announcement in the new year, and the term being used is "big splash". Dobson notes it's strange that there has been no "official" press meeting to introduce DeRo to Toronto. Can we maybe draw the conclusion that this is because he will be introduced in the new year with another signing? Who is this big splash that we keep hearing about? It is no secret that one of Mo's targets has been none other than Julian De Guzman. Is this the man who will also be wearing red, white, blue and a sorta charcoaly grey with collars sometimes and weird long sleeves?


I feel like the question of De Guzman coming to Toronto is similar to his younger brother playing for Team Canada. It doesn't make any sense but would be great for the team and football in Canada. However, I can't help but be realistic and know that he is in his prime and coming to MLS at this point would not be the best career move. Gareth Wheeler at The Sun sometimes writes the most idiotic shit that baffles my mind and shows he doesn't know what is up when it comes to this sport or being an athlete. Case in point:

If de Guzman believes he's better off being a major player on one of England's or Europe's middle of the pack clubs, then so be it. On the flip side, returning home to become one of the faces of Canadian soccer may be a profitable and worthwhile venture.

Let's think about this for one second. If you had two choices - first, come home and play for your hometown team (ok, amazing) in a league where 13 of the 15 teams play in half empty stadiums and where the competition will be levels below where you are coming from. OR - play for, say Aston Villa or Everton, where you will have an opportunity to play in Old Trafford, Anfield, Stamford Bridge and Emirates Stadium against the best footballers in the world - and play on real grass (zing!). Come on now, how is that any different than us asking Jonathan to give up an opportunity to compete in numerous Euro and World Cups in the name of "becoming the face of Canadian soccer"? And let's be real - we all know that in order to become the face of Canadian soccer it has to be approved the CSA Board of Directors and their meeting isn't for another 3 months which they plan on using that time for giving each other back massages then handing Dale Mitchell an extension on his contract until 2014.

Hey, if De Guzman comes home I will lose my mind, but as I've written before, you have to stay realistic. Huckerby picked San Jose over here because of the turf and the weather. I've been to Spain a few times and if I could live there I would - the quality of life is pretty sweet and I can't imagine Julian would be quick to give that up.

So as much as I'd love this to happen, I'd rather not be an armchair or internet footballer giving him the gears for whatever career decision he makes. Instead, here's hoping Mo brings in a quality player (whoever he is) that will bleed TFC and give us even more optimism and confidence heading into '09!

Yeeeeoooow!

The best part is this isn't even 1 day later an it's old news. Well this blog isn't about breaking news, it's about important opinions - MINE! I can't get to too many in depth blogs during the day as I'm at work and this broke around 2-3pm Friday, but rest assured I was running around the office to the one person who would care about this piece of news.

Mo pulls off ... see? I can't even say arguably! His BIGGEST move to date and no doubt has restored the faith of TFC fans to his abilities as a GM. The best part of this, to me anyways, is this might be the biggest move yet, but might not be the biggest of our offseason! We still have heaps of cash and a DP slot we can fill. So we lose Julius James and a chunk of allocation money but get a valuable piece of offense that with just this one addition makes a huge difference. I mean, Guevara did not have the best of seasons in '08 but I remember Jason De Vos making the comment that he strongly feels that his skill set easily matches up with Schletto's and if you watch Honduras play, you can see he is to them as Julian De Guzman is to Team Canada. So my point being we now have to non-strikers who are serious offensive threats, and if Johann Smith has more than just speed and cross-overs, picking up that potential DP Striker and things are looking pretty good. Losing Julius James, well this is the conflict I was writing about below. At 24 you should know where most footballers (in the rest of the world anyways) are heading in their career. James is athletic but showed many deficiencies in his position. Maybe he'll work out but hey, we're looking for some results NOW and Mo pulled the trigger!

The Value of SuperDraft

Well I've said it before, starting an MLS blog with a week to go in the season probably wasn't the best idea in order to keep this daily. It's all quiet in TFC and Team Canada 'land' but you gotta find something to go on. With rumours still flying around who TFC is going to sign this offseason, I started thinking of something we can at least have a guarantee on - new players from the draft.

In our short existence in the league I think all football fans in this city have experienced a steep learning curve on how MLS works and the realities of player movement. In only two years in the league one thing is clear, that is there is not much that can keep a player from moving from MLS to greener pastures. With a limited salary cap and for the most part, half empty stadiums, keeping the best talent here, unless you are the DP, isn't happening. And especially with any prospect of going to Europe, MLS just can't compete.

So with TFC having 3 draft picks in the 2009 SuperDraft I started asking myself exactly what value short and long term does this have for the club? As mentioned above, there must be a real conflict when picking a player - Toronto needs help NOW - so do you want someone who immediately has an impact in the league? If they do, you have a real chance of possibly losing them to European club - Maurice Edu case in point. Edu, in my opinion, was far from a great player for TFC, had his moments but for the most part was not a player I was overly excited about or thought to have had a huge impact on the league (Despite being rookie of the year). Yet after a season and a half, big club with big money comes and he is gone.

Then there are players like Joseph Lapira who go into the draft without any intention of playing in MLS. They would rather play in the Norwegian second division than for TFC. This is something that also must be taken into consideration - do you draft these top players who you hope might not succeed abroad, but develop and gain experience so years later return and immediately have an impact - an investment, though you may never see a return on it. They could be another Rohan Ricketts or Carl Robinson, who have to come here to find themselves again.

A knock on the draft is that when these players are entering the league, in comparison to the rest of the footballing world, they are considerably older yet not as developed skill-wise. Julius James was touted as the top pick in the 2008 draft at one point. At 24 years old he was seen to be lacking many attributes in his rookie year - but this is when many players in the rest of the world have already been playing professionally and should be reaching their prime. As well, the list of players who were touted as the best in NCAA more often than not, can't even hack it in MLS (Xavier Balc!).

You have these different scenarios playing out and can see this isn't like the NHL or NFL where you know more or less what you are getting and that they won't be going anywhere - it's just a matter of their development. You hope to find that diamond in the rough, someone who is good, but not TOO good that they attract the attention from abroad. I see two possibilities that make good sense. First, trade a pick for an established player, so you know what you are getting (win!). Or take the risk on a younger player, if there are sophmores or freshman in the draft, or the odd teenager who you put into the "youth system" (academy?) and can see as a long term investment like Nik Besagno, Abbe Ibrahim and Alditore (ok, he just got too good).



The draft can be great tool for a club as long as you're not banking your immediate success on it. There will be no Crosby, Chris Paul or Ben Roethlisberger. You can find a short term impact player who can make your club some money (and by some, I mean the shitty crumbs left over from the league who takes most of it!) but with the rise of club academies, and players hopefully developing at a younger age this should be where we are getting our new and young talent from, and I don't think the draft but shrewd player moves is where we should be banking our future and success on.

Another piece of the puzzle

It was announced "in principle" that our main man, Danny Dichio will be back for one more season. This goes beyond the pitch, as there are already talks that once his playing days are over, he will be the man leading the academy. He's stated before that coaching will be one of his next moves in life after football and we weren't sure if that would be this year or next. Signing him on is a great move because this is the kind of guy we should want to keep in our organization - someone who came here without a chip on their shoulder, but an open mind and was looking to contribute to TFC. He might not be the most lethal striker, or gifted athlete but for us, but he's done great with what he's had when we've had him 100% healthy. Probably his two most famous goals are the first and last of 2007, however, another one I remember is the first one against Colorado this season off the volley as pure class. Grabbing a beer at half-time we overheard some Brits (So you KNOW they know what's what) discussing how that goal was a strikers goal, and one thing you can say about Dichio is the guy goes into the box hard and has the instinct to put the ball on the net. If some of the other forwards we've had, and have now, used their athleticism and played with his guts and instincts we probably wouldn't be freaking out about our horrible offense.



So now we continue to speculate on who is our DP, when De Rosario is coming, where Wynne is going and if we can get Ricketts back here for another year.

Pony up for the '09 jersey

Ehhhhh probably not. I won't go into the whole "breakdown" of what looks good and doesn't, but personally I just prefer a solid, classic look instead of bells and whistles, which for the most part don't make anything look better but just end up making it look like clutter. 2 colours with one accent as the logo. BAM. The whole story you can check out here and it's funny because this jersey was shown on The Offside TFC Blog in July!

I know this will probably not happen in the near future but I am looking forward to the day where EVERYTHING doesn't have to be controlled and run through MLS head office. Like switching our shorts from white to red needs to be approved?? I hate the whole North American trend of selling jersey rights to one company (adidas, reebok, nike) because they all end up looking the exact same (CFL for example) just with different colours. So for now I'll stick with my red t-shirt and tfc scarf!

Timing is everything

Careers, friends, women, and apparently ... books. I picked this one up years ago when I probably had just finished reading (ok watching first, then reading) High Fidelity, How to Be Good, and saw that Nick Hornby’s name was on the cover. I remember only two of the chapters stood out to me, and I’m not even sure (and it was confirmed as I read it again) that I even finished this book. I don't know why I didn’t get through it – schoolwork, another book on the backburner - or perhaps I just couldn’t connect with the authors. Fast forward six years later and I can now understand why.

My Favorite Year is a collection of short stories of just that, the writer's favorite year of their favorite football club. At first take you might think, Oh, I'm going to read about the glory years of Liverpool, Manchester United, Aston Villa, maybe even England of '66. This is where there the major difference for me occurred reading this then and now. Six years ago, there was no TFC and I was resigned (woe is me!) to following Liverpool. Knowing now what I didn't know then, how much a difference it makes to have a local team of your own to follow and physically cheer for live because now I can understand the passion each of these writers have for the clubs they support. Not only that but the clubs that are written about aren't huge powerhouses - so stories of Raith Rovers, Cambridge United, Watford, Bristol City, Norwich City and the Republic of Ireland to name a few, can truly connect with a supporter of TFC or Team Canada.


It all starts off with Roddy Doyle's account of the Republic of Ireland's 1990 World Cup run. This story sets the tone for rest of the book as he is able to capture the emotions of nostalgia, passion and pride. Stories of his youth, following clubs in England and their national team and then discovering that Ireland can have a successful team and finding pride in his heritage through football.

You go through stories of Middlesbrough, Raith Rovers and Oxford United before reaching Olly Wicken's chapter on Watford. This is the one that stood out for me then and still does now. Wicken recounts the 1974/75 season of his favorite club, but through his eyes from when he was an 11 year old ball boy. Stories of idol worship and memorabilia collecting, despite the fact it was a different sport, I remember being the exact same way with the Maple Leafs. This Watford team was far from remarkable but in the eyes of a small boy they were the best. How can you not compare the name Billy Jennings to Rick Vaive?!? Obviously they were the most lethal goal scorers EVER, with the COOLEST names! Wicken's account of that season feels like those 84-87 seasons where I know I thought they were the best team ever but looking back they were totally brutal and barely made it into the playoffs. I mean two words - Ken Wregget ... come on now. For Watford this was before Elton John and Graham Taylor took them from the FOURTH division to the first. Yes, fourth division, so to compare this to Toronto it was no different then going from the Ballard era into the days of Cliff Fletcher.

The other story that really made an impact was Don Watson's 1974/75 Leeds United story. Looking at the ones that I seem to connect to it kind of seem obvious, Roddy Doyle was in his 30s when Ireland was qualifying, Olly Wicken was 11 and Don Watson was 14 - all three of these (to me anyways) periods were so crucial in life. Child, teen, then a man. Don Watson comes across like this guy who just didn't give a shit and followed his club to one of their most remarkable seasons. 73/74 was the season after they won the first division, but this (74/75) goes through their path to the European Cup. It tells you as much about what it was like being a 14 year old football supporter than what was going on with Leeds.



My Favorite Year was something I didn't really think much of the first time around, but reading it now as a TFC supporter and being hopeful towards our national team, it comes across as a guide for what it means to have passion for your club. TFC or Canada doesn't have to be the best ever, or all the time, but if we could experience one season like the ones written about in this book then I think we could consider ourselves pretty lucky.

And so it begins?

Wow, barely two weeks after the MLS Cup and we are now ready for 2009 to begin. Last night, MLS hq released 2009s home opening schedule or "first kick". Seattle Sounders FC will be playing the first match of '09 March 19 vs. New York. TFC, as usual will be on the road, however this years it's in Kansas City, so I'm not entirely sure if we'll be seeing 2,500 people making that road trip. The only saving grace to that is the next weekend is in fact in Columbus.



This is the first season that I've had season's tickets to call my own. Last year I bought a guy's tickets when he moved to Australia, but he wanted to keep them in case he comes back. So for 2009 I'll be in 106, which I know isn't the biggest party but whatever, I'll chill there this year and think about getting to standing room only later. Anyway, the point is I am stoked to be wearing my new scarf on April 4th where we'll be taking on none other than Freddie's Seattle Sounders! I hope buy then we'll have a new and improved line-up (DP INCLUDED), and the only remaining question will be which radioactive uniform will Seattle be sporting.

Gotta stay positive!

I feel bad that any mention of the Men's National team lately I've been super crusty. So at least there is something good to write about for once. Although it's for his achievements at Deportivo it is sweet that a national footballer is up for the Lou Marsh Award. Gotta stay posi and hope 2009 brings our national team back together for a solid run at the Gold Cup!!