Sports report

I love the Boston Red Sox baseball team. But one of the annoying traits about Sox fans is that they are as aggressive in portraying themselves as persecuted martyrs than even the right-wing Theocracy Brigade. While I like Beantown as a city more than the Big Apple, Bostonians' inferiority complex vis-a-vis New York City can become insufferable at times.

The most recent cause for Sox fans to whine was the return of Johnny Damon, the former Boston fan favorite who defected to the hated New York Yankees.

T-shirts were made with slogans like, "Damon: Hair like Jesus. Hits like Mary. Loyal like Judas." At least that's a bit more clever than the typical anti-Red Sox chants proferred by Yankee fans

Damon was offered a $40 million contract for 4 years by the Red Sox. The Yankees offered him a bit more money, so he switched sides.

Personally, I didn't care. I would've preferred he stay in Boston but I wasn't going to jump off a bridge just because the self-described 'Idiot' left the team. In modern sports, that's the way things go. There's almost no loyalty in sports anymore, at least by the players. That's old news. If you can't deal with it, don't be a fan.

But Damon couldn't let things roll off his back.

Before his return to Boston, Damon was quoted as saying, "I expect them [Boston fans] to boo the fact that I'm here. That I went over and that I'm playing with a team that truly needed me, truly wanted me."

I have no objection to Damon selling himself to the highest bidder. The Yankees offered him $13 million a year and he took it. I don't for one second begrudge him that.

But to imply that the Red Sox offer of $10 million a year to play 162 games of baseball was derisory? To imply that such an offer to a player who's pretty good but hardly one of the all-time legends was a slap in the face? An indication they didn't truly want him? Give me a break.

Was he trying to pander to the average fan's stereotype of the obnoxious, spoiled, grossly overpaid athlete who isn't within the same solar system as reality? Or was he trying prove to everyone that he really is the idiot he claimed he was back during the team's 2004 World Series run?

Either way, he should've kept his big mouth shut.


***

The coaching situation in English soccer has become almost more entertaining than the games themselves.

First, you have Chelsea won another English Premiership title and completed a second consecutive undefeated league season.

You might be confused by the above statement. According to the official stats, Chelsea have lost 5 league matches (out of 65) in the last two years. But all 5 of those defeats were due to poor refereeing, cheating opponents, a malicious press, a conspiracy by English and/or European soccer administrators or some combination of those factors.

At least that's if you listen to Chelsea's manager Jose Mourinho.

After his team clinched back-to-back titles on Saturday, you'd think the self-proclaimed 'Special One' would've been happy. But Mourinho is never one to pass up a chance to engage in whining or self-pity.

He complained that neither he nor the club were getting enough respect. In the last two years, he was only named manager of the month twice, he sniffed. You'd hardly know he became the first non-British manager to win consecutive English championships.

And that's the rub with Mourinho. He's a great manager. In the last three seasons, his teams have not lost a single home game in the league. Sure, he's been succesful with Chelsea, who are bankrolled by a Russian oil shark. But he was also successful with the FC Porto. Porto are a big club in Portugal, but an extremely modest side by continental standards. Yet Mourinho won the two most prestigious European trophies with Porto despite far fewer resources.

Mourinho's a great manager but an obnoxious person. He claims he's not out to make friends but snivels whenever someone criticizes him or his team or his style of play.

Too often, Mourinho acts like a petulant child who didn't get 'enough' Christmas gifts instead of a world class manager.

Maybe that's why he's never stayed more than a couple years at any one club. No one can stand him longer than that.

***

Then, you have the fiasco over the English FA's (soccer federation) search for a new national team coach. While most federations would've waited until after the upcoming World Cup to find a successor to the outgoing boss, the FA is far too senseless for that. They engaged in a long, drawn out process that has only distracted everyone's attention from the England team's preparations for the upcoming World Cup in Germany, which should've been everyone's focus.

Then, they decided on Brazilian Luis Felipe Scolari as the new guy. This caused an outrage as much of the country's soccer community wanted an Englishman to manage England, even though Scolari won the World Cup with his home country four years ago. The English coaching fraternity complained that they went through all the coaching courses and got all the qualifications but were passed over for the ultimate job. It was, they said, an indictment of the FA's own coach development system. The problem was that the most prominent English candidates simply didn't have the big time experience because all the big time clubs have non-English managers. (The highest ranked team with an English manager will finish 7th)

Then, the English press jackals feasted on Scolari's private life and prompted him to withdraw his name from consideration. The loathsome English tabloid press have a very long tradition of fattening up their sporting and political heros with praise before eating them. They make Bill O'Reilly look like Walter Cronkite.

Now, the FA appears to have settled on an Englishman, Steve McClaren. But of course, McLaren is now seen as second rate. His coaching record at the club level is distinctly unimpressive considering the resources he's had at his disposal. But even McClaren has has been warned against taking the job by a former mentor because of the lunatic press scrutiny that accompanies it.

In most soccer mad countries, the soccer press criticizes coaches for tactics and player personnel decisions. The English press delves deep into coaches personal lives. During the build up, it was revealed that McClaren had had an affair with his secretary at one point. Similar sexual revelations have been made against the current England boss. Though in fairness, neither was impeached for their actions.

It looks like McClaren will get the job if he's foolish enough to want it. And England fans will be stuck with a coach who's even more boring than the current coach who's boringness they complain about. But at least the current FA chief has ensured that the next job search will be for his own position.

Cheers!

***

US boss Bruce Arena has so such distractions. While hardly devoid of petty politics, parochialism and incompetence, at least the US Soccer Federation leadership was wise enough to wait until after the World Cup to contemplate Arena's potential successor. It's not that often you hear the words 'US Soccer leadership' and 'wise enough' in the same sentence.

Arena, the longest serving national team boss who will be in Germany, announced his 23 man World Cup roster*. The only surprises were forward Brian Ching (who plays in Houston) being taken over Taylor Twellman (New England). Twellman was the US' leading goal scorer during 2006 but Ching is the leading scorer in the domestic Major League Soccer. The other surprise is that of Kansas City defender Jimmy Conrad going ahead of the more internationally experienced Gregg Berhalter, who plays in Germany.

I think this underscores the unprecedented depth of the talent pool Arena had to choose from. While I would've taken Berhalter and Twellman, I don't think anyone could argue that Ching and Conrad are poor or second-rate choices.

This surely the best US World Cup team ever. But it will need to be as the US is facing two of the best teams in the world in the first round: Italy and the Czech Republic. The other challenge is that the US is unlikely to sneak up on anyone, like they did during their 2002 World Cup quarterfinal run (where they deserved to go one step further).

The other cool thing is the interest that was generated in the run up to Arena's announcement. It seems like everyone and their grandmother was offering their 23 suggestions to Bruce and arguing with their friends about it. It almost felt like we're becoming a real soccer country.

(*-Note: Injured defender Frankie Hedjuk has been replaced by Chris Albright of Los Angeles)


Update: USA Today has a nice profile of Sunil Gulati, the new president of US Soccer.


Clarification: It should be noted that it has not been announced if Arena will continue as US boss after Germany. I assumed he would move on because he has already held the job for 8 years, which is an extremely long time at the national team level.

CNNSI's Grant Wahl has an excellent profile on Bruce in which he speculates that Arena will continue to 2010 (barring a first round disaster or an unexpected run to the semifinals or beyond). Bruce has done a fantastic job transforming not just the quality of the national team but the mentality and the expectations.

I'd love for him to stay four more years.