yazan07

De Rosario uses captains armband as motivational tool

I figured it all out. He obviously stole the credit cards to help his dad, displaying the extreme hardship faced by him and his family, and furthermore showing the need to move home and play for the Zips.

Oh boy, this was the second thing that popped up when I googled his name. Make sure you don't leave your purses lying around the JAR next year. Let's just chalk it up to "white collar crime" and say he's better than any Can't State players because it wasn't domestic violence or driving under the influence.

DeLeon was on fire at the beginning of the season but has slowed down a bit. Ryan Meara is another possibility, he is NY's keeper and although he hasn't really done anything too remarkable in my opinion, his case for rookie of the year is based on being a rookie keeper and NY being towards the top of the table despite a rotating cast of defenders. To me, he has been consistent, but not great. I would much rather see Mattocks get it, and if he continues the way he's been playing, it's definitely a possibility.

Last year CJ Sapong scored five goals and five assists in 34 matches and went on to win rookie of the year. Mattocks has already surpassed him in goals scored and will likely score more. Rookie of the year could end up being his award to lose.

Eh, I don't know if original 10 necessarily = high profile: Colorado Columbus Dallas DC LA NY New England Sporting KC San Jose Tampa Bay Out of those, some that immediately pop out to me as not being high profile and not being destinations I would want Porter to go to would be Colorado, Dallas (even though they were in the final two years ago), and probably right now New England. I would rate Seattle higher than all of them right now. I like Porter at DC but not really because that would mean Ben Olsen would have to leave. I also think Sporting could be a good fit and I'd say they are fairly high-profile.

I believe his gig with Atlanta is only temporary, he's an interim coach while they hire a permanent one, and he'll be back with fox soccer afterwards. The guy clearly has aspirations of coaching, so I wouldn't be surprised if he's back on the sideline shortly.

Good point about the field being small, hadn't though about that, wonder if it could be a factor. That top five list is just Simon Borg's ramblings, he also thinks Bob Bradley could leave Egypt for Portland. Interesting though, Portland have said that they aren't looking to rush for a replacement and just want to hire someone by the end of the calender year. So theoretically Porter could finish up this season for us and then go there. I would prefer if he just didn't though.

Okay, I just know sometimes there is an issue of if a player is not happy they may not perform as well. I guess that is definitely more of an issue for professional players as oppose to college players though. So I guess we could have: Yedlin, Souders, Barson, Serna Trapp, Gallego, Caldwell Quinn, Koroma, Derschang/Brenes/Schmidt/someone

btw, I read months ago that Serna can and has played left back, but doesn't really like playing there. I also heard that Gallego prefers not to play in the midfield. I wonder how much of these preferences Porter takes into consideration or if he just tells players "this is where you're playing."

Didn't we see Quinn play in the midfield last Spring? Another versatile player. Seattle guys, help me out, where has he been playing this summer? and in what type of formation?

Well, that's a little bit deceiving. Yeah, he's the No. 9 because he wears the number 9, but he's not a number 9

Brad Friedel in goal. Though I imagine if he's too good to play international soccer, he would be too good to play hypothetical interstate soccer.

Soccer America did this article on Perry Kitchen last week. It was also published on GoZips.com. I thought it was pretty cool how he said Porter has been his best coach to date, which is especially meaningful considering he is currently being coached by Ben Olsen who is great and he has probably been coached by some other good coaches as well. The only weird thing about this piece was that he says his favorite movie is 'Man on Fire.' While there is no arguing the undisputed fact that Denzel Washington is the best actor ever, I'd say he definitely has some better movies, my favorite being American Gangster. Also you can't forget Remember the Titans. I think Perry Kitchen will go down as one of the best players to pass through the Akron Soccer program. It shows how great he is that he has helped DC go from being bottom of the table last year to first in the East this year. I think it's only a matter of time before he winds up in Europe, and I also think that if he doesn't make it there soon, it would not be out of the question that within a few years, he could end up captaining DC, which I think would be really cool.

The 3-4-3 we saw in that game was very interesting and really could make sense for this team as we are going to have three very good centerbacks in Barson, Gallego, and Souders. I'm not sure if it would alter the personnel a lot though because I don't think playing with three defenders puts Dr. Dre (trying so hard to force that nickname on everyone) on the bench, it just relieves him of some defensive responsibilities, as we saw in that Wright State game. If we do go with four defenders, he plays at his usual right back spot and then we have one of those CBs, probably Gallego, play LB and not push up as much, or have another winger play on the left and maybe Gallego plays as a destroyer. Can't really see Souders on the bench, cause as much as you can make an argument that Porter will just sub more, we really know he doesn't do that and he definitely won't sub centerbacks out unless it's necessary. All three of those guys play, and one of them might be playing slightly out of position. It really does help that we have such versatile players. I still can't see guys like Stevenson, Portillos, and maybe even Brenes starting regularly, but we've seen each of these guys as outside backs, central midfielders, and wide forwards. Those kind of utility players are very helpful to have. This team is going to be sick.

Where does this kid fit into our starting XI? We have a pretty stacked pool of midfielders, but Serna sounds too good not to play. Probably depends on what kind of formation Porter decides to roll out this Fall.

Ugh, if anyone didn't hear about the power outages all over Ohio, I didn't have any way to watch the game while I was at my parents' house this weekend. I guess it wouldn't have mattered because during the game, I was at my friend's wedding. There was no way for me to even record it though. At one point during the wedding I went up to my friend and asked if she had heard about the game, she said she had the score and that I'd be disappointed. She thought I was rooting for Italy though! haha sad I had to miss the game though.

Sorry for typing in all caps, it's really annoying but necessary: STEVE ZAKUANI IS ON THE BENCH TONIGHT AGAINST SKC!

I think that people have become so stuck on the on-campus/off-campus discussion and the fact that off-campus is automatically bad, that they haven't thought of the practical implications of those locations. We all know that the Rubber Bowl, located 12 minutes from campus, was not an ideal situation for bringing people to campus and campus life in general. Luckily downtown Akron isn't 12 minutes from campus. Now, it is true that downtown is technically off campus (though if our stadium was there, then technically that would be part of campus haha) and that the corner of Spicer and Exchange is on campus. But besides that one distinction that we have become fixated on, what are the other differences between the areas? Well downtown is close to the Barley House, which is the university pegs as it's "post-game party spot" or whatever. That is just one of several bars down there. Also Lock 3 is down there, nice restaurants, not nice restaurants, and yeah the Polsky deck would make parking there not an issue. That corner of Exchange and Spicer, the surrounding area just isn't very nice right now. If they are going to develop it, then maybe it would be more suitable, but as it is, I don't think so. There is a subway and a funeral home across the street. That's it. I think Manny's would also be a good hang out spot, but still there's not much else there. Downtown, I would feel like the arena would be in the middle of stuff, if it was on that corner, it would have stuff to one side of it, but as mentioned above, that is pretty much an endpoint for the university. To me, that part of campus is like a dead-end, and almost seems more "outskirt-ish" than downtown would. Also, for these two locations, I know everyone is saying the proximity to students is important, but it really is a non-factor. The distance between where most of the residence halls are and that corner of campus is about the same as most of the residence halls and downtown. Just because one has the distinction of being on campus, that doesn't automatically make it closer. Maybe I'm not thinking of the long term effects. But I do think being downtown would be more fun of an atmosphere than being across the street from a funeral home.

Well this discussion has dragged me in, being a recent grad with a political science degree and a current law student. '82, I'd be interested to hear your story, where your degrees have taken you career-wise. I've noticed over the years that people mistake their university having a program that is not a given at every school with that program actually being a "good" program. There are 9 law schools in Ohio, and I was talking to a friend who was an undergrad at one of the schools with not as good of a law school, and she said "oh we have a good law school," and I told her that they really didn't. But because of the large number of higher education institutions in Ohio, and only 9 of them having law schools, she just kind of thought that theirs was good. Because Akron doesn't have a journalism program, that makes Can't's journalism program good? I don't think that is necessarily true. That has been my perception at least.

I'm interested to see what type of "dorm" this will be. It's not going to be university-run, so I would imagine it would just be apartments, but I never recall 22 Exchange (also student specific housing) being referred to as dorms. Has anyone ever heard of non-university affiliated student housing that was actually basic residence hall style?

Yoram Mwila, who was a member of the 2009 runner up team before following Dave Giffard to VCU, died last night in a car accident. http://www.muvitv.com/?p=1118

I saw JR Eskilson tweeted this: J.R. Eskilson ‏@JREskilson RT @zacrigg: Former Earthquakes player Anthony Ampaipitakwong signed for Buriram United in Thailand. http://www.buriramunited.com/th/content.ph...at=3&id=421 #GoZips Here's the article from the team's website. It's not in English and the translation makes little sense, and even though the website has an English page, I couldn't find the article there. That's him in the picture though. Here's another article I found about the move. He's still on the Earthquake's roster though, maybe they just haven't updated it yet though? Or maybe it's just a loan? I don't know. I wonder what sparked this move. He wasn't really getting minutes this year, but he's also still young. I'm sure we'll get the whole story soon. I hope everything works out for him, you can't help but root for him, with what he means to Akron soccer, as nice of a guy as he is, and how he literally had a hand in building our program. Also just looked at Ampai's twitter and he said a few days ago that he was going to Thailand for a week. Twitter is so creepy. I am a creep. Oh well.

Steve Zakuani is starting tonight in a reserve match against the Whitecaps.

Mack Rhodes probably hired him at Akron right? That makes sense now.