bullets13

No offense taken. I didn't mean third rate or that they are not good athletes. The point is they are not the best athletes in the USA. I am not a soccer fan. But I watched that match today and it was obvious to me that the Brazilians were stronger and faster than our guys. If our strongest and fastest athletes grew up playing soccer like the rest of the world we would dominate the sport. it has nothing to do with the quality of athletes on the field. the difference is that maybe 10% of kids in the US play more than a year or two of soccer growing up (at least those that are now old enough to play for our national team), while in brazil it's probably more like 85%. that doesn't mean that the athletes are any better, but it definitely gives them an advantage when they have infinitely more players to choose from to find the most talented. also, the massive popularity of the sport in brazil ensures that every child growing up who plays is going to be playing in a much more competitive atmosphere. i'd wager that their youth soccer leagues are infinitely more advanced than the leagues that the vast majority of our kids grow up playing in. on the flip side, our youth basketball leagues are far more advanced from theirs, and we would pound them at any level if we played them. that being said, we're slowly catching up. the young players that are coming up are for the most part considerably more talented than the players we had 10-15 years ago. a 2-0 win over spain to make it to a FIFA tourney final is a pretty clear indication of this.

this one was a heartbreaker... the goal 38 seconds into the 2nd half killed us! still, a 3-2 loss to a full brazil squad is a VERY respectable result, even if we blew that lead.

I don't know of any but I would love to have a Bullmastiff. i've wanted one since i was a little kid. once we move out to our land, it's the first purchase i plan to make (after the riding lawnmower)

speaking of dogs, if anyone knows of a local breeder of mastiffs, please let me know.

after struggling for awhile and losing their lead in the division, the rangers appear to be turning it around. they've won 3 in a row, and they've scored 21 runs in their last two games.

it pisses me off when athletes who are facing millions of dollars in salary refuse to play for the team that drafts them. why not just skip the draft and let players pick which teams they want to play for (you listening, Eli?)... I say let him go back to Spain and never allow him to become eligble for play in the NBA again.

It's pretty clear that he doesn't want to play for Minnesota. He's talking about returning to Spain for a couple of more seasons. What do you guys think about that?

that's a lot of dingers!!!

one of the best hitters of all time...

nah, no camera trick, he's a soccer player. that's a somewhat common way to throw the ball in if the player can pull it off. you can throw it a long way like that. the length of the court would be nothing. of course, there's no telling how many tries it took him to make it.

i gotta agree with Bon on this one. We had a game plan that nullified the space to a large degree. If we try to man up on these guys, they would've just destroyed us one on one, and then you want to talk about space!!! with a team that talented, i think the contain approach was proper, and it payed off well.

agreed... losing Lee might hurt them some in the long run, though. He has a TON of potential. Alston won't really hurt much since they have Jameer Nelson coming back from injury.

my mother in law's house. dang, gabe, just scrolled back and saw that you had already made a post on this train of thought... i'm not trying to steal your thunder.

The New Jersey Nets have traded Vince Carter and Ryan Anderson to the Orlando Magic for Rafer Alston, Tony Battie and Courtney Lee. [Hidden Content]

i don't think hejduk or marvelous are better. i DO think Spector is notably better, and i'd prefer Bornstein on the field as well. those two, Gooch, Bocenegra, and even DeMerit are better than stevie. i'd rather one of those play out of position if need be than see Cherundolo on the field.

Just know bullets, my hands were on my sides. It was like he thought I was Erin Andrews. He ruined my favorite blue jeans and blamed it on the dog. :D :D :D now that's pretty sick. i'd feel bad for you if i didn't already have a drawer full of ruined pants thanks to him.

Hahaha

it's like he's made of china.

Shaq will do the same thing in Cleveland as he did in Phoenix, slow them down yeah, but phoenix was all run-n-gun before he got there, and quite good at it. when he joined, it slowed them WAY down, and it really hurt them. Cleveland plays a lot more in the half-court set, but usually LBJ has to do all of the creating himself. I can see how Shaq would actually help them without slowing them down much.

I did hear of some hugging going on between you and Joesbros. ;D yeah, mouth hugs.

apart from scrub time like this, cherundolo has no business ever starting a game at defense again as far as i'm concerned. IMO he's 5th or 6th on the depth chart now, even healthy.

i'm just messing with you... and yes, the red card (actually, all of the red cards) have been BS this tourney

should make things interesting...

probably, and there might be some issues with some of the players from foreign clubs missing basically a month and a half from their club... who knows. if you read the espn article about the game, they actually refer to the USA/Russia hockey game ;D