It’s not the first time a college marching band has played off an Internet meme. That does not make this any less awesome. It also gives me an excuse to post this photo of me playing with the N.C. A&T drum line.

They’re all Internet dorks like me now. This warms my heart.

If you’re unfamiliar with the meme, click here.

(Spotted on Every Day Should Be Saturday.)

Because let’s be honest. If David Villa and Fernando Torres were on their game in the 2009 Confederations Cup semifinals, how impressive would Bob Bradley’s 4-year run be, really?

Yes, there are positives to Bradley’s tenure thus far. He’s encouraged a number of U.S. national team players to build their skills in Europe. He won a Gold Cup in 2007 and was arguably 45 minutes away from beating Brazil in a cup final two years later. He managed to get some tough opposition for his squad to cut its teeth on in 2008. His tactical nous has been hit-or-miss, but when he hits it, boy, it flies out of the park. Just ask those two dudes in red up there.

When he misses, however, it’s a colossal bungle. Yes, the USA won Group C at the World Cup, but it wasn’t that strong a group, really, and it took a stoppage-time goal against Algeria to get us through. And what happened when we got there? Bradley put his faith in Ricardo Clark. It was the sort of decision that made you wonder if Bradley’s only real contribution to the U.S. national team was fertilizing the egg that grew into our best central midfielder. (Good job, Bob! Rex Ryan salutes you!)

Some would argue that this is the right decision for now, and that a guy like Juergen Klinsmann would be better for the job after the 2014 World Cup. Maybe that’s true. By bringing back Bradley for four more years, however, U.S. Soccer risks suffering the same fate in 2014 as it did in 2006 — allowing the atmosphere around the team to get stale, resulting in another early World Cup exit. U.S. Soccer is taking the easy road here, which is just what you would expect from someone like Sunil Gulati, who seems eager to sell us something while making only minimal effort to get us excited about it. Keeping Bradley is not exciting, and it means expectations for 2014 will be muted at best.

But hey, we got this goal and this goal, and we knocked Spain — champions of Europe and, eventually, champions of the world – out of a major international competition. So there’s that.

If Bradley is to take this team any further in 2014, he might need a Carlos Queiroz-type behind him — not the guy who made the Portuguese side so ineffectual, but the guy who sat behind Sir Alex Ferguson and helped Manchester United win multiple Premier League crowns and a Champions League trophy. Hell, Queiroz might be available to play that role for Bradley soon, and given that his Q-Report was the basis for U.S. Soccer’s Project 2010, he’d be a pretty good guy to have around.

Then again, maybe all Bradley needs is a stronger group of players from which to choose — something that should be the focus regardless of who this team’s manager is. We certainly have a better chance of making that happen in the next four years than we have of beating Spain again.

Already, I find myself 41 points off the pace, thanks to a handful of questionable roster moves — starting the season with Carlos Tevez instead of Didier Drogba (a move I quickly rectified), dropping Andrei Arshavin after a poor performance at Liverpool, thinking Ryan Shawcross would once again be a fantasy bargain in defense, forgetting about Everton’s traditionally slow start to the season (grumble), and so on. It’s not nearly as exact a science, this fantasy stuff.

Thus, it seems likely that I’ll have to hand out a prize this year. Luckily, for me and for you, someone has stepped up to offer one.

The winner of this year’s Dave’s Football Blog Fantasy Premier League will receive a $100 gift certificate from SoccerPro.com, which offers a wide selection of soccer equipment and licensed apparel. SoccerPro.com is a supporter of Dave’s Football Blog, and we thank them for providing this gift certificate.

By the way, if I manage to make up this 41 point difference and win this league, as it was during the World Cup Fantasy League, this gift certificate is mine. If you want the prize, you must beat Off Constantly FC. So there.

In fact, we might have a second $100 gift certificate to SoccerPro.com to give away in a separate fantasy contest, which will be announced later — as soon as I figure out who’s running a UEFA Champions League fantasy league around here. ESPN seems to be shunning the Champions League on SoccerNet these days. (What? The Worldwide Leader playing down a league for which it doesn’t have the TV rights? Why, even Barry Melrose would scoff!)

If you already have a team and would like to join the Dave’s Football Blog league, click here to find out how.

I don’t pay much attention to the NFL pre-season, in part because it’s filled with games that don’t count, and I’m not that into watching practice squad (and UFL) fodder compete for jobs. These games aren’t anything to take seriously.

That said, Lions rookie Ndamukong Suh is clearly taking the mere presence of Jake Delhomme very seriously here. The more I watch this, the more I wonder if Suh had a wager on that Panthers-Cardinals playoff game a couple seasons ago — you know, the one where Jake threw four interceptions, somehow didn’t get benched, and then threw two more. If I were a broke college student, and someone cost me a hundred bucks, I might want to smack them down, too.

Then again, if I were a broke college student betting on football games, I might need someone to call Gambler’s Anonymous for me…

Here are some other things going on in the wide world of football:

• The NFL and CDC are teaming up to fight 6 decades of “You’re not hurt that bad!” thinking about concussions. Good luck with that, boys. (Playbook)
• Is there really any need to shorten the preseason, other than money? (Shutdown Corner)
• If you’re visiting South Africa, be sure to check out the grand white elephants. (Dirty Tackle)
• If you’re visiting New Zealand, saying the words “Rugby”, “World” and “Cup” together out loud might cost you. You’ve been warned. (Techdirt)
• An American rugby sevens player will take a crack at the UFL. It probably helps that he played football at LSU. (FanHouse)
• Like Boise State’s blue turf? Check out Eastern Washington’s red turf. (via EDSBS, who thinks that red turf is JUST SO METAL!!!)
• Wanna buy a share of Arsenal? Only 100 easy payments of £102.50. (Pitch Invasion)
• Harry Redknapp will not tolerate your insinuations. (EPL Talk)
• Your 2010 AFL Finals series Week 1 fixtures, which make me wish Time Warner Cable would stop being so stingy and give us our ESPN3. (AFL.com.au)

Also, for those of you participating in this site’s Fantasy Premier League competition, I’ll have a prize announcement later today.

(H/T to Will Brinson for the video)

Our pal Brian Phillips of The Run of Play described Manchester City today as “the footballing version of the devastating forest fire that leads to new growth.”

That’s perhaps just a bit nicer than what Sir Alex Ferguson and Jose Mourinho, among others, have been saying about Man City lately. It seems everyone is looking at Sheikh Mansour splashing his oil millions around like they’re going out of style — the club has spent more than £300 million on transfer fees alone since his arrival at Eastlands — and suggesting that the club has simply adopted its business strategy from South Park’s underpants gnomes. Sure, City can collect players, but how is it going to keep all those egos happy?

Of course, this completely ignores the one thing England has been complaining about for the last three or four World Cup cycles — fixture congestion. Our boys play too many games! They get tired out too quickly! We must do something!

Guess what, folks? ol’ Sheikh Mansour and Roberto Mancini are doing something. They are attacking the problem of fixture congestion with what might be the obvious solution — depth.

Take a look at the lineup City fielded against Liverpool. Now look at the lineup City fielded against FC Timisoara in its Europa League qualifier. Immediately, two things stand out:

1. Only four players started both games.
2. Neither lineup sucked.

Mancini’s summer spending spree seems geared toward creating two different sides — a “league side” that can compete in the Premier League, and a “cup side” that can compete in European and cup ties. Players like Carlos Tevez, James Milner and Gareth Barry, who are perhaps more suited to the English game, might never see the pitch in a non-league match. Mancini can swap them out and bring in Emmanuel Adebayor, David Silva and Patrick Vieira, who might be more suited to a European style of play, for every other tie. Similar rotations could happen all across City’s lineup.

There’s no shortage of action for the cup side players, either. Between now and December 16, City has six Europa League matches and, if they win them, 3 Carling Cup ties. That’s 9 games to go along with 15 league games over the same span. Some cup side players might get into league games against certain opponents, but the end result is that just about every player has a role, and more importantly, players don’t wear down between now and Boxing Day.

Of course, not everyone at Eastlands will buy into this concept. Adebayor wants out. Shay Given won’t be too thrilled playing just cup ties, now that Joe Hart’s snatched away his starting spot at goalkeeper. Robinho… well, he’s a completely different headache. Other players, however, might be just fine with never having to worry about cup ties and focusing on winning an all-important Champions League bid in the Premier League.

There’s also the general lunacy of spending £25 million on David Silva and only using him on the “cup squad,” but hey, Sheikh Mansour isn’t telling me how to spend my money.

Man City has bought a deep squad, but as Buffalo Bills coach Marv Levy famously said, “depth is great until you have to use it.” In this case, though, Mancini might have figured out a way to use City’s depth to great advantage. He’ll have to work hard, however, to keep all these egomaniacs happy. The only way to do that? Win. A lot. Even a Carling Cup will settle the riff-raff down, even if leads some pundits to ask, “You spent £300 million for that?”

Now that the gridiron game has proven to be rougher on its players’ brains than anyone realized, designers are taking another look at the football helmet and wondering if that’s the problem. An aerospace designer named Michael Princip thinks he might have a solution: a “multi-component anti-shock helmet design” that absorbs the energy of collisions and sends that energy away from the head.

From Wired Playbook:

Princip has spent the last six months redesigning the football helmet so it can better dissipate energy from collisions. The result is the Bulwark, a design that still features internal padding, much like current helmets covered by a solid shell. But the true innovation lies on top of that shell: a shock-absorbing layer of pre-molded foam. “It’s like an industrial-grade bubble wrap,” according to Princip. That padding layer would then be covered by four separate sections that comprise the outer shell.

The openings between those sections would act like crumple zones, giving flex to the outer portion of the helmet while absorbing a hit, thereby lessening trauma to the head. The design would also lighten the helmet’s weight by using new materials to reduce the force of impact in helmet-to-helmet collisions.

Not that the force if hitting your head against anything can prevent an injury. Eli Manning reminded us of that last Monday. Still, letting the helmet absorb shocks rather than the brain seems like a vast improvement for players who aren’t so eager to follow the NFL’s current policy on brain bruises. The question now is whether this design (or something like it) gets adopted by the NFL or NCAA in the near future.

(H/T: Playbook.)

All apologies to The Run of Play, of course.

Seriously, though, Brett Favre is making me hate the NFL. The more I hear about him, the more I want a full-season lockout in 2011. Just go away, old man.

Scrape away the grime of scandals and sound bites, and the contrast between these two great players says something about the imaginative possibilities presented by this game or by any game. Think of how you approach sports at different stages of your life. Pelé, the best player on the best team who scored the most goals and won the most trophies and was the happiest and the most famous and most beloved, offers the child’s narrative of sports heroism, an exuberant conquest of a just and welcoming world. Maradona, who railed against authority and sabotaged himself and, in 1986, dragged an inferior Argentina team to the World Cup title by sheer force of will, represents the adolescent narrative: an unjust world forced to yield to a superior ego.

It’s these two ways of looking at the world that guide the endless, unresolvable debate about which man was the better player.

Good stuff. Make with the clicky, people.

Dave’s Football Blog is officially opening its Fantasy Premier League Contest today. This is your opportunity to A.) prove your fantasy football superiority to me, and B.) win a fabulous prize that will be determined at a later date — once, y’know, someone steps up and offers to pay for it. (UPDATE (8/30): We have a prize to give away now.)

Here’s all you need to do to enter:

1. Go to fantasy.premierleague.com.
2. Build your fantasy team.
3. Click on Leagues in the left-hand menu.
4. Click the Create/Join tab.
5. Where it prompts you to enter a code for a private league, enter this code: 673397-250679

The Premier League season begins on August 14, so you have just as much time to get your team together prior to the start of the season as Aston Villa has to find a new manager. I’m planning on launching a fantasy Champions League as well, so stay tuned for that.

You have to hand it to Dave Stala of the Hamilton Tiger-Cats. Most CFL players couldn’t play keepie-uppie with a spherical football, let alone an oblong ball with pointy ends. It’s a fine display of showmanship. I fully expect Chad Ochocinco to steal this touchdown celebration, at least during the preseason.

Meanwhile, that play-by-play guy should probably be reminded that the French national team actually got to the World Cup, something the Canadian national team has only done once in its entire existence. But hey, last night Toronto FC got to the group stage of the CONCACAF Champions League on its third attempt. Progress!

(Spotted on Soccer By Ives.)

Earlier this year, an old college pal of mine called me up and gave me a little stick about the Pittsburgh Pirates getting blown away by Stephen Strasburg in his major league debut. I calmly told him the Pirates haven’t cared about winning since they blew it in 1992, and when they start caring about baseball again, I’ll start caring again, too.

I think MLS is hoping soccer fans in America will feel the exact same way about the CONCACAF Champions League. If nothing else, it will help those 500 or so Galaxy fans who actually showed up last night pretend that their team’s comprehensive collapse against the Puerto Rico Islanders wasn’t real. Besides, winning the MLS Cup before Landon Donovan returns to England in January is what really matters, right? Right?

The next day, Galaxy boss Bruce Arena and four of his best players – U.S. national team star Landon Donovan, leading MLS goal scorer Edson Buddle, goalkeeper Donovan Ricketts and defender Omar Gonzalez — will fly to Houston to compete in the MLS All-Star Game against Manchester United.

You would think that MLS would be a little more cognizant of the fact that it’s hindering its top club’s chances of winning silverware this year by scheduling a meaningless friendly one day after a qualifying match in what’s supposed to be a major continental competition. Even Arena has come right out and said the All-Star Game is “secondary.” If Fabio Capello called up Jermain Defoe and Michael Dawson for an England friendly within a week of Tottenham Hotspur’s UEFA Champions League qualifying match, White Hart Lane and half the Premier League would be in an uproar.

MLS, however, still believes it has to sell both the game and its league to sports fans in this country, and let’s face it — the Puerto Rico Islanders won’t put fannies in the seats like Manchester United will. So it will continue to put the emphasis on these media circuses in the hopes that it will bring in new fans.

This post-World Cup period seems like a passing strange time for American soccer. Two of the biggest clubs in the Premier League came to America to face MLS squads and lost. Sure, Man United and Man City played a bunch of reserves and transfer targets in those games, but surely even United’s reserves, who won a Carling Cup two seasons ago, are good enough to run roughshod over a 10-man Kansas City Wizards squad. They didn’t.

The question, then, is does that say more about the quality of play in MLS than it does about the current state of Man United? And if so, then how much longer will MLS continue to put on these dog-and-pony shows before it starts taking winning its top continental competition seriously?

Given the lack of say MLS had in creating the CONCACAF Champions League, I suspect we’ll see them continue to put the emphasis on these friendlies for a long time to come. It’s a shame, too, because the Galaxy right now might just be good enough to win this Champions League, if it can keep its current roster intact through May. That’s too big an if, though, no matter what MLS says publicly. Even Landon Donovan has his price.

No words. Should have sent a poet.

(Spotted on 101 Great Goals.)

His latest challenge? Rugby sevens. How he still had enough working fingers to type afterward remains a mystery.

We trot up and down the field, passing the ball back and forth. The one thing about rugby that isn’t intimidating is the ball: oval, nubbly to the touch, it has the feel of a perfectly engineered ball for its sport, almost begging to be carried. If an American football is a squirrely piece of leather begging to be fumbled, a rugby ball is a good-tempered snuggler, easy to kick, pass, or carry without fumbling.

Chris is taking pictures and video. “Man this looks like fun.”

“Wait until he lights me up on a tackle. You might change your mind.”

Avery grins and nods. “Oh, that’ll happen.”

You can read the rest at SB Nation.

But I know what you’re really wondering. You’re wondering who won the Dave’s Football Blog World Cup Fantasy League. Aren’t you? Of course, you are. Well, no further delays, then. The winner of the Dave’s Football Blog World Cup Fantasy League is…

(drumroll)

Me.

I challenged all comers. Some put up valiant fights. Jason Krim, in particular, put up a furious challenge during the knockout stages. Alas, even he came up a bit short, proving once again that won’t accomplish anything if all you do is try to beat Off Constantly. Yes.

So as I said when I launched this contest, if Off Constantly FC wins, the scarf of victory is mine…

Except, of course, that there is no scarf. I’ve decided to donate the prize money to the Nicole Murphy Family Support Fund instead. I already have one scarf for my club and another for my country. I don’t need a third. Some things are more important than that.

In the meantime, there will be plenty more opportunities for you, dear readers, to challenge this reigning fantasy champion. Keep an eye on this site for future contests involving the UEFA Champions League, the NFL, and maybe more. Maybe next time, you can be the one say that you beat Off Constantly. Good luck!

Any day now, Paul the Octopus will have a one-hour special on ESPN in which he announces that he’s headed to South Beach — just like everyone else who wears that damn swoosh.

(Photo spotted by @BinahSophia)

If a football match is, in part, a metaphor for a battle, then defeat is a metaphor for dying, and victory is a metaphor for … not dying. I trust that at some stage of your existence hitherto, you have discovered that you are one day going to join the majority. (If not, it’s time to have a word with your folks as to the precise nature of this “puppy circus” they told you Snuggles had run off to join.) We are the only animal equipped with this awareness, and it bothers us. We are programmed to fight our own mortality — by, say, making babies, or taking pictures of each other. It’s a form of madness: a madness that makes us human. But we cheat death in an altogether more basic way: we stay alive. The universe will kill us if we stand still. It wants us to sate its entropic appetite; it wants us to fulfill our fate and return to the chaos whence we came. We inevitably will, of course — that’s what fate means. All organisms may possess a mechanism for self-preservation, but our foreknowledge gives our fear of death a unique profundity. Merely to hold our destiny off for another day, to postpone it until some indefinite point after now, is a triumph and a matter for celebration. If this appears meagre to you; if it appears doleful; defeatist, even … well, you lead an existence either most lucky or most unlucky.

Fredorrarci nails it, people. Make with the clicky and read the entire piece.

(All you Baltimore Ravens who want to use this video as an argument, please sit down. We’re talking about hard-coded rules, not judgment calls, and if this World Cup has proven anything, it’s that judgment calls work both ways, often to devastating effect.)

Of course, a basketball player has to break a specific rule — in this case, goal tending — in order for the other team to be awarded the points. This rule exists in part to allow a more offensive game and to give both teams a fair opportunity to score.

Football codes don’t have a rule like this. If a defender illegally stops a player from scoring, the player and team are penalized, but points are not awarded. The onus is still on the offensive team to score. Period. That is simply how football works.

Let me set out an example for you:

The Ravens are leading the New England Patriots by 4 with just a few seconds left on the clock. The Pats are on the Ravens’ 8-yard line and have one play left. Brady drops back, sees Randy Moss open in the end zone and passes to him. Ed Reed, meanwhile, realizes he’s caught out of position, and he can’t make a play on the ball. So Reed grabs Moss and pulls him away from the pass as time expires.

The ref throws the flag. Of course, he does. That’s pass interference. Ed Reed prevented the touchdown illegally. The touchdown, however, is not awarded automatically. By rule, the ball is placed on the 1-yard line, and the Pats will get one more play, since the game cannot end on a defensive penalty. However, the Pats still have to score the touchdown. If the Ravens stuff them on the last play, the game is over, the Ravens win.

Did Ed Reed break a rule in order to help his team win? Yes. He committed pass interference and was penalized for it. The rules of the game, however, allow for this, just as the rules of basketball allow a team to foul its opponent constantly at the end of the game in order to get the ball back and try to erase a deficit. Points aren’t awarded for fouls, though; you have to make your free throws. Thus, if you know a team struggles at the free throw line, tactical fouling becomes a legitimate strategy in order to win.

Which brings us to Luis Suarez, who caused something of an uproar yesterday.

With Uruguay and Ghana tied at 1-1 in the 121st minute, the Uruguayan striker illegally stopped Ghana from scoring a goal by slapping it away. He’s not the goalkeeper, so he can’t do that. Like Ed Reed in our example above, Suarez was properly penalized as the rules stipulated — he was shown a straight red card and sent off. By those same rules, however, the goal is not given automatically. Ghana still has to put the ball in the net.

They did not. Asamoah Gyan missed the ensuing penalty kick, and extra time ended at 1-1. Uruguay won the game on penalties and advanced to the semifinals.

Some have reacted with outrage to what Suarez did. They claim he’s a filthy cheat, just like Thierry Henry, and that he should be ashamed of himself. They also claim that Uruguay should not be in the semifinals because of this.

Here’s the thing, though — unlike that France v. Ireland game, the laws of the game worked exactly as written here. Suarez was properly punished for his handball (red card and suspension), just as Reed was penalized for his pass interference in our example above. This was, in essence, a tactical foul — a deliberate breaking of a rule in order to help your team try and win a game.

So really, if you have no issue with basketball players fouling at the end of a game in order to try and win it, you shouldn’t have any issue with what Luis Suarez did here. Tactical fouling exists to give your team an opportunity to win when no other option is available. So you commit those fouls, because you want to win. Is it cynical? Yes. Is it cheating? No. You do what you have to do within the rules of the game in order to win the game.

Perhaps because of Henry’s handball is so fresh in our minds, Suarez’ handball is skewing our sense of justice. The difference is that in the case of Henry, justice was not served. France was allowed to commit a clear violation due to officiating incompetence, and Ireland was given no recourse. This is why the NFL has instant replay — to give teams recourse in case the officials appear to make the wrong decision.

There were no wrong decisions at the end of the Uruguay v. Ghana game. Suarez accepted his punishment as the rules stipulated. There was simply the tactical foul and, sadly for Ghana, Gyan’s blown penalty kick. Had Gyan converted, we probably wouldn’t be talking about this. Ghana had the opportunity to win the game after the penalty was committed, and there’s nothing really unjust about that.

Tactical fouling is simply part of football, as it is part of nearly every sport. This is how it should be, too. We should not get into the habit of simply awarding one team the game every time the other team breaks the rules, or else we open our games up to all sorts of ugly unintended consequences. Victory needs to be earned in our games.

Need a break from the World Cup? Want to start getting your gridiron fix early, brain studies be damned? You’re in luck. It’s Canada Day north of the border, and our neighbors are celebrating properly — with football. The Canadian Football League season kicks off tonight at 7:00 PM, as the Montreal Alouettes travel west to take on the Saskatchewan Roughriders in a rematch of last year’s Grey Cup Final.

What’s more, if you’re in America (and you aren’t stuck with Time Warner Cable), you can watch. Our pal MJD over at Shutdown Corner alerts us that NFL Network will be showing CFL games this season, including 14 regular season games between now and November. Games will air on Saturday nights in July, and Friday nights from September through November. The press release did not indicate whether NFL Network would show the Grey Cup Final, but if the ratings are good enough, they probably will.

So if you’re ready for some 3-down, 110-yard, giant-end-zone, endless-pre-snap-motion football, NFL Network’s got it for you tonight. In case you’ve forgotten, MJD has a quick breakdown of the rules differences between the NFL and CFL. He’s a little too excited about the rouge, really.

Seeing an old fellow leatherhead led Uncle Johnny to tell us a few gridiron war stories. Most notable among them was one story about an opposing lineman who was one of the biggest, meanest kids in the area — and Uncle Johnny had to line up against him. It was pouring down the rain that day, and when they got down in their three-point stance, my uncle looked up and saw this ferocious beast of a man staring him down, breathing angrily, and looking determined to maul him and the quarterback.

So my uncle met his gaze and quietly grabbed a chunk of muddy turf in his hands. When the ball was snapped, he shoved that mud right into that big kid’s face. And he kept right on doing it until that kid couldn’t see straight anymore.

Uncle Johnny and I chatted a bit about the NFL. He lives in Tampa, and he’s as frustrated with the Tampa Bay Buccaneers as everyone else down there is.  I told him about how the Glazers bought Manchester United with nothing but debt, found themselves in a bad spot when the economic downturn hit and probably diverted resources from the Bucs to avoid getting their debts called in. The next day at breakfast, we chatted about football again, and he repeated what I told him about the Glazers as if I hadn’t said anything about it the day before. I let him talk. It was good just to talk to him, and he deserved at least that much respect. Besides, he’s 80. Finding someone at that age who hasn’t had a mental slip or two is challenging.

The scary thought, however, is that my Uncle Johnny’s brain at 80 is probably still in far better shape than Chris Henry’s was at 26.

Whenever people talked or wrote about the long-term brain injuries of football players, the focus was always on the linemen — players who took the most hits and suffered the most physical abuse. Former Pittsburgh Steelers center Mike Webster struggled mightily with brain trauma before his death eight years ago. A coroner named Bennet Omalu got permission to study Webster’s brain and found large accumulations of proteins clogging his brain cells. Omalu called it Chronic Traumatic Encephalopathy, or CTE. His crusade to get NFL officials to recognize his work was chronicled in this must-read GQ story.

Webster’s brain was just the first one Omalu and his colleague Julian Bailes studied. They looked at the brain of Philadelphia Eagles safety Andre Waters, who committed suicide in 2006, and found CTE. They looked at the brain of Steelers lineman Justin Strzelczyk and again found CTE. For the most part, though, these were the guys in the trenches, guys willingly suffering repeated violent collisions for the glory we showered upon them. Many of them probably knew going in that they were trading years of their lives for that glory. It was their trade to make, so we let them, because we loved to watch.

Then it came out this week that Chris Henry, a wide receiver who played only two seasons of college football and a grand total of 47 games in the NFL, also suffered from CTE.

Chris Henry didn’t play in the trenches. He had a history of bad decision-making before he died, yes, but he had no known history of concussions. Receivers in general don’t suffer the sort of abuse that linemen and linebackers subject themselves to regularly — at least, we didn’t think they did.  Yet there’s the scientific proof that Henry had the exact same brain trauma that Mike Webster and Andre Waters had.

That begs the question — if football caused Chris Henry to suffer from CTE, just how many other football players have this condition? What about all the kids playing this game on the high school and college level? Hell, what about the kids in the pee-wee leagues? Is it possible that the gridiron game damages the brains of everyone who plays it?

It’s kind of question that makes even a lifelong football fan such as myself step back and think, “My God, what have we done?”

Football, in all its forms, is an evolutionary thing. Rules change. New tactics and strategies develop over time. The game that my Uncle Johnny played back in the 1940s is miles away from the game everyone plays today. These brain studies, however, suggest that American football has evolved into something very ugly, and as Omalu learned when NFL doctors initially rejected his report about Webster, getting the powers that be to change their ways, especially when billions of dollars are on the line, is never easy — especially when one of the biggest selling points of football is this:

This is what we, as fans, pay to see. We want to see the gladiators do battle. The NFL gives them to us. So do countless high schools and colleges. Never mind that the gladiators will all suffer from debilitating injuries that can eventually wreck their lives and the lives of everyone around them. These men choose to play football, and they willingly take everything that goes with it, good and bad. And we cheer them for it.

Chris Henry’s brain changes all that. If Chris Henry had CTE, then it’s possible that everyone who plays American football will develop CTE — and not just NFL players. The more people start to consider that information, the more parents will start asking, ”Should my son even be playing this game?” Sure, the powers that be will invest in new helmets and make new rules to soften the blows and ease people’s fears, but ultimately, those are cosmetic changes. American football players only know one way to play football.

American football, however, is not the only football in America.

Last week, when Landon Donovan scored the game-winning goal for the USA against Algeria, it felt like one of those pivotal moments in American sports history. It was as if people in this country all started to realize that, yes, the Association game is a great game, too, and we should watch it. Just one day after the USA-Ghana game smashed TV ratings records in this country, 18,755 people went to see the Philadelphia Union’s first game in its new stadium. You can sense the shift happening, even if it continues to move at a snail’s pace.

I wonder now if this revelation about Chris Henry might end up shifting things just as much. I wonder if the parents of the next Randy Moss will look at these CTE studies and start thinking, “You know what? Maybe we should look into this other football instead. Maybe there’s an opportunity here. Maybe we should direct him this way…”

That’s a simplistic notion, of course. As Juergen Klinsmann will be the first to tell you, U.S. Soccer still has yet to develop the resources necessary to attract inner city kids to that game. Still, these CTE studies seem certain to lead some talented young athletes from poorer backgrounds away from the gridiron game. Those kids will be looking for an outlet. They can’t all play basketball, and they’re not so interested in baseball. Why not soccer?

Perhaps 20 years from now, we’ll look back on this summer as the real turning point in the history of football in America — and not just because the USA gave us a couple of  magic moments in South Africa. Landon Donovan and Tim Howard brought the fans to the game, but it might be Chris Henry who ultimately brings the players to the game. Perhaps in death, Henry will have a far greater impact on football in America than he did in life. Wouldn’t that be something?

]]> http://www.davesfootballblog.com/post/2010/06/30/what-price-football/feed/ 2 http://www.davesfootballblog.com/post/2010/06/27/knives-out-for-bob-bradley/ http://www.davesfootballblog.com/post/2010/06/27/knives-out-for-bob-bradley/#comments Sun, 27 Jun 2010 15:57:23 +0000 Dave http://www.davesfootballblog.com/?p=5684 It was a memorable four-year cycle for the United States national team. They won the Gold Cup in 2007. They beat Spain in the Confederations Cup semifinals and played well against Brazil in the final. They gave us possibly the most pivotal moment in American soccer history with Landon Donovan’s late winner against Algeria in this year’s World Cup.

That said, the 2010 World Cup is over for the USA, who were eliminated by Ghana for the second straight World Cup, and the loss has turned this team’s (and this country’s) moment of unbridled joy into a flat keg of bitters, and everyone is pointing their swords at the manager.

Grant Wahl of Sports Illustrated is suggesting that Bradley started the wrong players throughout this World Cup, while Mark Lincir at 90:00 came right out and said it. Brooks Peck at Dirty Tackle has accused Bradley of “chronic mismanagement,” while Paul Gardner at SoccerAmerica is asking whether it’s time for “Banality Bob” to step aside. (I would tell you what’s being said at BigSoccer right now, but quite honestly, I’m afraid to look.)

Perhaps the most stinging assessment, however, is this neutral and even-handed review from Zonal Marking:

Bob Bradley has shown that he’s very good at identifying problems on the pitch and finding a solution with a change in tactics and/or personnel midway through games, but he doesn’t seem to learn lessons from game to game. The starting XI tonight was wrong, evidenced by the fact that he was forced to make two changes before 46 of the 120 minutes had been played. Had he fielded Edu and Feilhaber from the off, and been able to make changes to freshen up the side in the second half, who knows what might have been?

That pretty much sums up this four-year cycle under Bob Bradley. When he gets it right from the start, this team produces great results, but he gets it wrong from the start as often as he gets it right. The selection of Ricardo Clark over Maurice Edu was a disaster, as Clark’s turnover in midfield allowed Ghana to expose American defenders’ lack of pace and score an early goal. Robbie Findley should not have been in this lineup, either, as his finishing was poor, and he contributed little else to the side.

The discussion at Zonal Marking seems centered on why Bradley continued to deploy a 4-4-2 without Charlie Davies available to complement Jozy Altidore up front. In order to maximize the talent on the pitch, Bradley might have been better off going with a 4-2-3-1, with Altidore as the lone striker and Donovan, Clint Dempsey and one other attacking midfielder right behind him. Bradley had far better options in midfield than up front, and when Bradley switched to a 4-2-3-1 to start the second half against Ghana, the USA looked more threatening and more able to cope with Ghana’s packed midfield. The tie score at the end of 90 minutes proved that. So why did Bradley need 45 minutes of play to figure that out?

The fact that we’re asking this question suggests that Bob Bradley is not the right man to take U.S. Soccer to the next level. Some would say this team met expectations this year by winning its group and going through to the knockout round, but the USA lost a winnable game against Ghana, and it lost because the manager made poor decisions from which his team could not recover. What’s more, in three of the USA’s four World Cup games, the USA gave up early goals and had to come from behind to get results.

Oh, by the way, this team held a lead in this World Cup for a grand total of 2 minutes, and that was against a team ranked 16 places lower than the USA by FIFA.

If U.S. Soccer thinks that’s good enough, then this country still has a long way to go. The game will still get a huge boost here from the euphoria of Donovan’s game-winner, but that will carry the game only so far. The USA needs a manager with more refined tactical skills in order to advance further in this competition. Bob Bradley will get us this far. He might even win us another Gold Cup next summer. We should aim a little higher than that.

There are a ton of links I could throw at you today — starting with this epic collection of Landon Donovan goal celebration videos, or Brian Phillips’ Homeric attempt to describe all those videos put together in words (“It’s scary to think how things might have looked if anyone here cared about soccer.”)

Really, though, I’m focused on one thing: USA v. Ghana. Win or go home. And the intoxicated joy in that video of the American Outlaws singing the Star-Spangled Banner (which I shot at the USA v. Turkey friendly in Philadelphia a month ago) is enough to get me going.

If it doesn’t work for you, however, you can do what our boys themselves prefer to do. Crank up the Weezer.

GO GO USA!

Suffice to say, if any of you challengers want that scarf, you will really need to step your game up. I suggest loading up on defense. Seems to be working pretty well for me thus far.

I also suggest dropping Fernando Torres, strictly on principle:

(Video uploaded by @OnTheDLPodcast)

There are a million things I could write about this match — the bogus offside call that denied Clint Dempsey an early goal, Tim Howard’s Peyton Manning-esque outlet pass to the open man that started the break, the 90 minutes of incredible tension in the pub where I watched the game that ended in a joyous explosion, Ian Darke’s fantastic call of that game-winner, etc. — but really, I think this sums it up:

Everyone who saw this will remember where they were when it happened. Every American kid who saw this now wants to be Landon Donovan. This is how a fan base gets built. From here on out, everything changes. If you think this World Cup is fun, America, just wait until 2026.

(Video courtesy of @WillBrinson)

It should have been a goal. It wasn’t. The list of people saying the Americans got jobbed stretches from Grant Wahl to Brian Phillips to Spencer Hall to Ricky Martin. Yes, that Ricky Martin. When Ricky Martin says you’re a bad ref, you are a bad ref.

Nevertheless, it happened, it is done, and there’s nothing we can do about it. Perhaps we should just be thankful that A.) the USA managed to get to that position after being down two goals to a country whose total population is small than the population of Philadelphia, and B.) England laid a big fat emu egg today with that scoreless draw against Algeria.

So with that in mind, let’s try to put this behind us and figure out what the USA has to do to move on to the Knockout Stage — and in all honesty, it’s not nearly as bad as where this team was a year ago at this point in the Confederations Cup.

Here’s how the Group C table looks right now with one game left:

Amazingly, the USA now has the goals scored tiebreaker over England going into the 3rd and final round on Wednesday, England plays Slovenia, and the USA plays Algeria. That tiebreaker is important, because now the USA merely has to beat Algeria to clinch a spot in the Knockout Stage. Here’s how it breaks down:

USA beats Algeria and:

1. Slovenia wins — Slovenia 1st, USA 2nd.
2. England wins — USA and England advance.
3. Slovenia & England draw — USA 1st, Slovenia 2nd.

USA draws Algeria and:

1. Slovenia wins — Slovenia 1st, USA 2nd.
2. England wins — England 1st, Slovenia 2nd.
3. Slovenia & England draw — Slovenia 1st, 2nd determined by goals scored tiebreaker.

Algeria beats USA and:

1. …well, that would be that for the USA, really.

As the old December NFL trope goes, the playoffs start now. The USA’s 2nd half comeback has put them in a position to advance with a win. That’s what it all comes down to now for the Americans — win and advance. Even though a draw against Algeria gives them about a 50-60% chance of advancing, this USA team would do well not to leave this one to a coin flip. Bob Bradley needs to get this one right from the first minute on Wednesday.

Leave it to Jeff Wortman and Paul Hogan, our old pals from Down Under who gave us this classic moment on Arden Street, to find just the right way to put the vuvuzela in its proper context. Bravo, gents.

(Spotted on @Superfooty.)

While most Americans’ footballing attentions are focused on Friday’s pivotal World Cup match between the USA and Slovenia, another U.S. national football team of sorts will be playing for some minor hardware on Saturday at Red Bull Arena in Harrison, NJ.

USA Rugby is playing in the Plate Final, i.e. the third place match, of the 2010 Churchill Cup, an invitational rugby union tournament involving the USA, Canada, England’s 2nd team (known as England Saxons) and three invitational teams. The Eagles lost to the Saxons but managed to beat Russia, 39-22. Highlights from that match are in that video above. (Thanks to Simon for letting me know about it.)

All three finals will take place at Red Bull Arena on Saturday, with the USA v. France A game kicking off at 5:30. You can find more info about it here. It’s not that often that you get to see competitive international rugby union on U.S. soil, so if you’re in the neighborhood, you might want to give it a look.

Maybe we shouldn’t have been so shocked. Maybe we had become so accustomed to Spain’s recent dominance — it’s EURO2008 title, it’s perfect World Cup qualifying campaign, it’s run of 47 games with only 1 loss (USA! USA!) — that we forgot just how much a well-organized defense could stifle them. Jose Mourinho proved it against Barcelona in the Champions League semifinals. Spain is loaded for bear with Barcelona stars and lined up in a very Barca-like 4-3-3. Many have suggested they just didn’t know what to do without Lionel Messi out there.

Then again, as Zonal Marking points out, maybe Spain’s problem is one that has dogged Barca in recent months — too much possessing, not enough attacking.

For all their possession, Spain didn’t create that many goalscoring opportunities. Whilst Switzerland defended well, the most notable feature of the game was quite how bad David Silva and Andres Iniesta were when they got the ball, how anonymous Xavi was, and how frustrating the full-backs were to watch. The Swiss can take some credit for forcing them into poor performances, but even the pressure on the man in possession doesn’t excuse constantly bad passes, poor movement and a lack of drive from Spain’s host of top-class players.

Perhaps the biggest surprise in the aftermath of this, the World Cup’s biggest upset thus far, is that we haven’t heard the typical English excuse for Spain’s struggles — fixture congestion. Barcelona, Real Madrid and Valencia have spent the last two seasons competing in both Spain and Europe. Is it possible that after playing 50-60 games per season for the last 2-3 seasons, these Spaniards are struggling with fatigue?

Whatever the reason for this loss, this team has to shake off this loss and focus on what’s now required of it — winning its next two games in order to avoid Brazil in the first knockout round. Beating Honduras on Monday shouldn’t be too difficult. Beating Chile on the 25th? According to The Sports Section’s Josh Dean, that might be a tall order.

Man, the Chileans are fun to watch. The core of this team finished third in the 2007 under-20 World Cup, and now older and complemented with a cluster of experienced players, finished second in South American qualifying, scoring 32 goals in the process (just one fewer than Brazil). They are quick, talented, and entertaining as hell, and this was without their star forward, Humberto Suazo, who scored more goals than anyone else in South American qualifying.

Get your popcorn ready.

Oh, the vuvuzela. Everyone is talking about it. They’ll tell you how annoying that infernal buzzing is. They’ll show you how to cut that noise out. They’ll tell you it should probably be banned from stadiums, just for the sake of world sanity.

Not a chance, says Sepp Blatter. The High Lizard King FIFA President has come out in support of the vuvuzela, saying it’s a tradition in South African football, and the traditions of the host country should be honored. “Would you want to see a ban on the fan traditions in your country?”, he asks of us.

So that incessant buzzing will continue until July 11. And so will the vuvuzelas. Hey, haters gonna hate, right?

1. Meanwhile, the KSK Gay Mafia(TM) has found a buzzing sound more annoying than vuvuzelas — Peter King in Cape Town! Yes, it’s all part of Sports Illustrated’s grand plan: 1.) NFL writer gets sent to cover big event for a different football code, 2.) ?????, 3.) Hilarity ensues! Drew Magary dissects King’s first missive from South Africa, and he throws out this apt line: “Good fucking Christ, can anyone anywhere make a mistake in sports without some Boston asshole immediately piping up about fucking Buckner?”

2. The only thing more difficult than silencing the vuvuzelas? Buying tickets to World Cup games on FIFA’s web site. FIFA seems to have royally screwed the pooch online — not just with ticket sales, but with social media as well. Even Sepp Blatter’s safe and boring Twitter page seems like it was hastily conceived to hide FIFA’s lack of social media savvy.
   
3. While FIFA is blowing it, ESPN is killing it. Over at The Sporting Blog, Dan Levy has high praise for ESPN’s coverage of the World Cup, calling it “the best event ESPN has ever produced.” One thing Dan didn’t mention? ESPN’s 3D coverage. Anyone watching the World Cup in 3D? Anyone? Are those vuvuzelas or crickets I’m hearing?
4. Of course, while nobody’s watching in 3D, the leadership in Somalia is trying to make sure that its citizens can’t watch the World Cup in 2D, either. They hate us for our football, it would appear.
5. Finally, SB Nation shows us photos of Dutch fans, which begs the question: Whatever happened to the Girls of the World Cup web sites? Clearly, there’s some candy in South Africa right now, and not just the players serving as eye candy for the ladies. Someone is collecting and posting those photos to a Tumblr or something, right? Right!?