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WELCOME TO MLS, WHERE THE RULES ARE MADE UP, THE POINTS DON'T MATTER, AND EVERYONE'S JERSEY IS BLUE It's Thursday, March 5, 2015, and tomorrow begins the 20th Major League Soccer season, the top mens' league in the US and Canada. A new collective bargaining agreement, good for five years, got signed yesterday at the last minute just as planned, averting a strike that players totally had you fooled into thinking would happen. NYCFC and Orlando City join us this year, and poor Chivas has been made into cabrito al pastor. Conferences have realigned to place Houston and KC back in the West, leaving an even 10 per conference, which you'd think would allow for a nice balanced 38 game home and away schedule for everyone but no of course not this is MLS. For some reason people still have that "euro savior" complex thing riding and are posed to let Frank Lampard (NYC) and Steven Gerrard (LA) come in once the English season is done. Kaka (Orlando) and David Villa (NYC) are already here, and several USMNTers came home, sort of, in that Altidore is at a team in Canada and Diskerud didn't live here before. Nobody loving cares how you feel about Altidore, let's get that outta the way right now. San Jose will open their new stadium at the end of this month, but will still be saddled with one of the league's standout hoolie LARPer teams, which, in MLS, takes work. WHAT'S AT STAKE Trophies and tournaments to be won, besides MLS Cup: CONCACAF Champions League, Multilevel Marketing Canadian Championship, Supporters' Shield, US Open Cup. All-Star Game is in Colorado so expect Arsenal to be the opponent because of the shared ownership. Gold Cup year, so if you have any good CONCACAF players on your team, and it's more likely than you think, expect them to be gone for a spell in July. On the chick side it's a World Cup year, and it's in Canada this time. WHAT'S ON TV Nationally, Fox networks, ESPN networks, Univision networks, and TSN/RDS networks. Don't speak Spanish for Univision? They're doing an SAP English audio option, although you miss a lot of fun of inane Spanish language chatter and player middle names (MORGENSTERN!). How you get those channels is up to you, your cable/satellite/internet provider, and your favorite computer herpes-riddled pirate stream site. Locally and online, MLS Live, which is traditionally a free preview over opening weekend. League TV and streaming schedule with instructions on how to use SAP SHOULD I GET MLS LIVE? Probably. (You won't get any Fox, ESPN, Univision games on it, and a few teams still black out games that are covered locally, but otherwise, this is a service worth your subscriber dollars, especially if you just like having any ol' game on or your team is one that does not black out local coverage.) SHOULD I GO TO A GAME? Hell yes. If you've got an MLS, NASL, NWSL, USL, PDL, NCAA, etc team in your area, get out to a game if at all possible. It ain't gonna be Bayern Munich vs Barcelona, but you'll have a good time and meet fun people. Likewise, if there's folks in your neighborhood who meet up at a bar for viewing parties, drop on by. The best way to experience American soccer is to show up and have a good time. WHAT'S IN THIS THREAD News, views, discussion, running jokes, and CascadiaChat about MLS. Probably gonna see some NWSL. NASL/USL/PDL, the lower divisions, get their own thread. NCAA soccer chat--Tomorrow's Draft Picks and Waiver Claims Today!--might show up in the fall, might not. Live weekly or monthly in-game threads for your game day OH loving HELL commentary will be posted separately. Beyond the introductory fantasy section below, ongoing fantasy threads will be in the Armchair Quarterback. ... FANTASY Mix was playing with his hair and reading poetry and-oh, not that fantasy. B.B. Rodriguez posted:
... REFERENCES: MLS AIN'T JUST A LEAGUE, IT'S A DEGREE Boys Girls Schedule, boys Schedule, girls Transactions Du Nord, Soccer Insider, The Equalizer and everybody's on twitter, instagram, snapchat these days for your social media needs The coolers are packed. The jerseys are bought. The banners are painted. The mohawks are bleached. The driveways are shoveled. The stars have aligned. New teams, new contract, new stadiums, new logo. Let us celebrate the opening of the 2015 MLS season with the adding of chocolate to milk and the team intros and running jokes to this thread.
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Mar 6, 2015 01:15
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Soccer is tomorrow.
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Mar 6, 2015 01:24
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I for one am excited to welcome the Jozy hegemony. Also, gently caress every team except DC United. Bill Hamid will eat your children after Perry Kitchen slide tackles their shins off.
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Mar 6, 2015 01:29
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Come on Colorado let's suck slightly less this year.
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Mar 6, 2015 01:33
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gently caress Orlando, for now and for always. Yay soccer!
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Mar 6, 2015 01:38
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CaptainYesterday posted:gently caress RSL and Seattle, for now and for always. Yay soccer!
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Mar 6, 2015 01:39
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The Columbus Soccer Crew Soccer Club SC 1996 America’s Hardest Working Team https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ySbL1eB-EXg Team Overview Mapfre Stadium  Welcome to the first team announced in Major League Soccer History. The team was created to embody the hardworking salt of the earth routine of the Midwest and its respective hardnosed approach to life. The Crew initially began its tenure at Ohio Stadium as a tenet beneath the money-making behemoth that is The Ohio State University. They got up to ~35,000 asses in seats, but the correct decision was made to move on. Built in 1999 from $28.5M, the first soccer specific stadium in America exists thanks to the efforts of one Lamar Hunt. If your favorite memories involve painting and displaying a gender-neutral Brad Davis-as-Sonic-the-Hedgehog at your local SSS, you can thank the Crew. It’s barebones as hell seeing as it was a test piece for the rest of the league. It isn’t ritzy, but it gets the job done; you can get drunk with 9,000 other likeminded fans and watch your team bumble along towards something tenable. It currently holds 20,145 people for games and up to 30,000 during concerts. This blogger based in Cincy has a good write up should you travel to the stadium. Unofficial Home of the USMNT, seeing multiple bouts of 2-0 games against Mexico as well as an overall 7-0-3 record. Ownership 1996-2013: Lamar Hunt / Hunt Sports Group  (The statue, not Alexi Lalas being a creeper) Lamar was the initial investor for the team who shifted impetus to push the sport to the forefront. He was the primary instigator to get a soccer specific stadium in America and a catalyst for American soccer as it is currently known. His son, Clark, took over when Lamar died in 2006. 2013-Present: Anthony Precourt. A young owner who came from San Francisco. Recently took over the team midseason in 2013 (This hilarious event was his first visit to the stadium as a prospective buyer). While Clark Hunt was seen as an owner in absentia, Precourt is the most hands on and involved owner the team has seen in years. In his short tenure, the team has re-established a new sleek logo, greater fan-based inclusiveness, and a model that holds close the identity of the team and the city. Coaching Staff https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5Ky-ucoeU6A  Head Coach/Sporting Director Greggggg Berhalter: former MLS/USMNT/shitton of other leagues defender who started his coaching chops under Bruce Arena as an assistant. He then went on to Hammarby IF as the first American to manage a European side. He was released from Hammarby due to a lack of offensive production from his players. When he arrived at 1 Black and Gold Blvd he had a powerpoint in tow showing what his system for the Crew would entail. In short it read: don’t be as garbage as the previous year. Berhalter has taken the team into a markedly different system, shifting from an antiquated 4-4-2 w/ a diamond backline to the more modern/sexy 4-2-3-1. He’s accompanied by really smart and good soccer people in assistant coach Sixten (candles) Bostrom, goalkeeper coach Pat Onstad, and offensive assistant coach Josh Wolff. Team Expected Starting XI
 2015 Schedule 2014 Recap The 2014 campaign held an overall record of 14-10-10 for the team, good enough to make the playoffs as the third seed in MLS East (7th overall). The season came to an end in the Eastern semi-final to the New England Revolution when enough gaps in the depth chart showed through and both Adam Bedell and Tyson Wahl were legally allowed to kick a ball. In the second leg Hector Jimenez stood in for Federico Higuain, Ethan Finlay got a criminal booking, and Bob Kraft personally deflated Jermaine Jones’s balls. The aggregate score line was 3-7 in favor of NE. It was a shoddy affair that looked terrible and embarrassing in real time and also in retrospect, much like 90% of the things that happen in the league. Outside of that series the team did much better than anticipated and look to go into 2015 as contenders to many tasty pieces of hardware, such as the Memorable highlights
The Crew moved on from the veritable tire fire that is the Dayton Dutch Lions and onto veritable USL powerhouse Austin Aztex. New/Notable signings/players for 2015:
Notable Departures
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uvfOmGI7LJE Titles
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Mar 6, 2015 01:46
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This is my favorite part of the season because I still believe Toronto FC can make the playoffs! Great OP Hoover Dam
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Mar 6, 2015 02:02
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PK loving SUBBAN posted:This is my favorite part of the season because I still believe Toronto FC can make the playoffs! didn't you hear? this year is our year
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Mar 6, 2015 02:06
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imagine the tfc writeup is a deviantart picture of bradley and altidore kissing with their shirts off
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Mar 6, 2015 02:06
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I was about 100% sure that we weren't going to have soccer this weekend. I'm quite excited that we are starting and to celebrate I'm going to post the most MLS picture that I have. Go MLS. Go Sounders.
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Mar 6, 2015 02:26
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Hoover Dam posted:Nobody loving cares how you feel about Altidore, let's get that outta the way right now. I care how I feel
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Mar 6, 2015 02:30
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Hoover Dam posted:SHOULD I GO TO A GAME? Just want to echo this a million times. Sporting KC is 3.5 hours away from where I live and I convinced my (now) wife to get season tickets with me last year. We didn't end up making it to every game but all those mini road trips gave us plenty of fun memories even though the team collapsed into oblivion after the World Cup. Going to a game is a blast. The play is better than you are probably giving it credit for and the crowd was more into it than any MLB game I've been too and probably half of the NFL ones. Seriously. Go watch. Now that that's out of the way, it's my great pleasure to remind everyone that Jair Marrufo has the whistle on the opening game.
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Mar 6, 2015 02:30
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Star Man posted:Come on Colorado let's suck slightly less this year. It can't be much more soul crushing then Zat Knight getting the captains armband right...right? Whats the template for the Team Preview if no one else wants to I'll do a rapids one
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Mar 6, 2015 02:40
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LionYeti posted:It can't be much more soul crushing then Zat Knight getting the captains armband right...right? Whats the template for the Team Preview if no one else wants to I'll do a rapids one That's UZ's dominion.
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Mar 6, 2015 02:49
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Star Man posted:That's UZ's dominion. Yeah, I'll let him take it
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Mar 6, 2015 02:53
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chaoslord posted:Now that that's out of the way, it's my great pleasure to remind everyone that Jair Marrufo has the whistle on the opening game. I...I don't know you, but I hate you for reminding me. You've made an enemy today. t 
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Mar 6, 2015 03:01
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Let's not pretend there are more than two refs in this league who wouldn't inspire that reaction.
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Mar 6, 2015 03:06
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True, I mean honestly who would be widely considered consistently decent Geiger, Petrescu, and, uh
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Mar 6, 2015 03:09
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Somehow Baldomero Toledo continues to work in the league. 
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Mar 6, 2015 03:16
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I still meltdown thinking about that Gold Cup call lol
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Mar 6, 2015 03:40
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I still can't believe we are going to have a MLS game tomorrow. This should be a fun season. Go Crew.
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Mar 6, 2015 04:46
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So happy to have soccer this weekend.
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Mar 6, 2015 04:50
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Motherfucker, why are you here? You want a team to root for? You live somewhere between Wilmington, Delaware and Wilmington, North Carolina and need a team? You're an English weirdo looking for an American side to support? Fine. Root for mine. Root for the original object of scorn, the Old Empire, the tenants of the rat's nest. Root for a team who wears black when everyone else wears blue. Root for my bad rear end motherfucking cowboy bad rear end team. Root for DC United.  HOW IT BEGAN Yeah I could copy and paste last year's writeup but I'm not a lazyboy, I'm a man with man parts and a backstory. Here's what happened: they formed MLS when they decided the US team shouldn't be a source of national mockery, and instead a source of international mockery. Everyone got weirdo technicolor jerseys and awful non-plural concept team names that would all get changed or altered at some point in the last twenty years. Not us. We just made our crest slightly less Nazi looking. We got a simple name like DC United, which doesn't mean that we got merged from two teams like all the European teams, but gently caress it, there's a team in Ecuador called Barcelona because they thought it sounded cool. DC United sounds cool and gently caress your dad if you think I'm wrong, because you're wrong. The first four years are a period of dominance unmatched by anyone in North American history, and that includes the Galaxy. The first four seasons found DC in the MLS Cup Final; three of those years, we took the trophy home. You're not going to find a more incredible run of dominance – three MLS Cups, two Supporters Shields, one US Open Cup, one CONCACAF Champions Cup, and one InterAmerican Cup. We weren't just champions of America, or of North America, but at one point, the entire loving hemisphere. Suck on that, LA.  Look at this loving trophy case. That's more than anyone else in North America. More than the Cosmos, more than the Galaxy. We did it without a Beckham, without a Pele, and without any other hoity-toity Eurofuckers. We poached the poo poo out of South America, took their castoffs, and created a monster. The rest of the league started to catch up in the 2000's, sadly, but we kept winning our share of honors, and still manage to come home with significant silverware in awful years. Some folks claim Tradition and all that; ours is simple. We win. That's our job. Bruce Arena made us beautiful; Jaime Moreno made us legends. HOW IT IS One of those club legends is Ben Olsen, one of those insanely industrious workrate junkies who gives more of a poo poo on the field than anyone else. Concussions ended his career early, and with all of half a season as an assistant coach, he got called on to be a better coach than Curt Onalfo. This task could have been performed by a bottle of hand lotion; Curt Onalfo is a shitlord. Without any proper schooling, Olsen did what he does best, which is inspire people to work their loving guts out. This has continued for the last four and a half years.  Olsen teams work hard, and Olsen teams have no plan. Every year has started slowly, and every year has led to individual players creating the team they want to see on the field. 2011 and 2012 had the magic of Dwayne DeRosario's insane revenge tour against anyone who had ever wronged him, leading to a bloody battle in the streets of Toronto where he held Drake's severed head aloft, stuck an AutoTune machine into his larynx, and reattached said head. Now that DeGrassi motherfucker has hits everywhere and DeRo is old and poo poo and Toronto is a horrible place and they deserve Jozy Altidore. That invented scenario is more nuanced than any tactical prowess Olsen has on the field at any point. 2013 was an awful, awful sight to see, as DC managed to set as many negative single-season records as they have league-wide accolades. Least wins, least goals scored, Own Goal the highest contributor. Really, really awful stuff that would make you question your will to live. Except a funny thing happened: we didn't suck in the US Open Cup. Now, people will poo poo on the USOC, even though they loving shouldn't. We beat our own farm team (in penalty kicks), then ran over three MLS sides on the way to a highly improbable 1-0 win in Salt Lake. That Cup win qualified us for the CONCACAF Champions League, which entitled us to gobs of money that allowed us to completely reshape the team into a solid, at-times terrifying squad in 2014. HERE'S THE loving PROBLEM See this guy?  This is Eddie Johnson. He was good for Seattle, and he demanded a big payday. DC gave it to him, because theoretically, he'd score more than opponents would score on themselves. Which, to his credit, he did. Unfortunately, he didn't score what $6 million contracts would make you feel like he should. Someone else was the best player on our team, and we'll get to him in a minute. Maybe he'll bounce back this year, but he's actually out indefinitely with an enlarged heart. He may not actually play again. So, no big deal, right? Because our ACTUAL top goal scorer...  ...Fabian Espindola, is looking to continue his blistering form. Trouble is, he's got both sides of Luis Suarez Syndrome. Gifted, talented drives on goal, loving head case. He's suspended for the first six games of this season after ending last season (an aggregate loss to the hated New Jersey) by shoving an assistant ref to the ground. Of those six games, four are against Eastern opponents, and two of them are against New Jersey. Because of course they are. No problem, right? Because we have...  ...Luis Silva, acquired two years ago from Toronto FC for a can of magic beans. Absolutely fantastic, and his forward partnership with Espindola created a reign of terror last summer. Alas, he's injured too. So, erm, who's left?  We have the reanimated corpse of Chris Pontius, a young-but-promising-but-recovering-from-surgery Michael Seaton, and Conor loving Doyle. Doyle is actually a pre-Jermaine-Jones bit of MLS fuckery, where Colorado did all the legwork to get a loan deal, but the ways of Major League Soccer are not the ways of men. Naturally, because he's a nobody who doesn't make Clint Dempsey money, he somehow ended up in an allocation waiver who the gently caress knows which draft it is piece of chicanery, and DC landed him. Doyle has repaid the club by being tall and useless. HERE'S THE SOLUTION Doesn't even matter. We have Bill Hamid, King of Kings.  Gaze upon his saves, ye mighty, and despair. No goals allowed: round colossal RFK, the clean and level sheets stretch far away. Seriously, though. I'm gonna post BILL HAMID FOR AMERICA a lot, because he's very likely to be the American netminder of note for many years to come once Tim Howard hangs it up. He's ridiculously agile, and seemingly improving with every passing year. Which is good, because he was a loving head case in the recent past. Hamid is loving amazing, and without him we are nothing. He has a fairly decent central defense in front of him as well, as the veteran Bobby Boswell (Defender of the Year, third place in Nickelodeon GUTS) pairs with Rookie of the Year candidate Steve Birnbaum. Birnbaum was a revelation last year, stepping in for an injured Jeff Parke and becoming a force. He's still a kid and makes kid mistakes, but he's still better today than Dejan Jakovic ever was, so go on with you. WHAT DOES IT ALL MEAN? Oh, I don't loving know, man. We're DC United. We'll make the playoffs and talk insane amounts of trash. It'll be awesome. Seriously though, if you live in the mid-Atlantic, come to RFK. We won't be there much longer, and you should spend a couple of hours in a stadium that never had big money corporate bullshit involved. It's a crumbling hole that's due to collapse in on itself at any moment, but gently caress 'em. There's two sides of the stadium: the Loud Side and the Quiet Side. If you're trying to watch a game intently and analyze all your advanced stats, go to the Quiet Side. If you're trying to have a good time and hang out with friends, come to the Loud Side. If you have any questions about supporters' groups, I'll answer them now: hang out with La Barra Brava if you want to get piss drunk and party, hang out with the Screaming Eagles if you want to be energetic but civilized and pay for better beer, and hang out with La Norte and the District Ultras if you want to hang out by the river before putting up crazy artwork and losing your poo poo for the cause. WHO WE HATE
WHO WE LIKE
I could give you a list of supporters on the forum, but we're pretty obvious about it. Shut the gently caress up and get to the stadium. We have a full-season TV deal this time around, but it's just not the same. Get to the stadium instead. Be a part of the scene. Hurl verbal abuse at play-actors. Be awesome. Be champions. I'm hype as balls. Are you hype as balls? Your Boy Fancy fucked around with this message at 06:19 on Mar 6, 2015 |
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Mar 6, 2015 04:59
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Cannot loving wait for fancyposts.
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Mar 6, 2015 05:03
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Look at those colors being disrespected on the first page. Shameful.
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Mar 6, 2015 05:04
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Jermaine Dildoe posted:I still meltdown thinking about that Gold Cup call lol if you don't rip up your passport imo
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Mar 6, 2015 05:29
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It's gonna be funny as hell if Montreal win the CCL, meaning not only is it a Canadian side that'll win the first honors since they restructured the tournament, it'll be the French one.
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Mar 6, 2015 06:21
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But the tears from Liga MX fans will be delicious, I will consume them like fine cerveza
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Mar 6, 2015 06:23
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This is nice and all, but it's missing your finest trophy. 
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Mar 6, 2015 11:32
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Don't really care about the MLS but I want Orlando to win all of the trophies because it's owned by a fella from Stoke.
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Mar 6, 2015 12:19
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CaptainYesterday posted:gently caress Orlando, for now and for always. Yay soccer! Yes. Uck Forlando. Truly a Mickey Mouse club. For the first time in years, as a New England Revolution season ticket holder, I look forward to the upcoming MLS season without a gnawing inner sense of dread. #COYR Fortuitously #COYR also works for my true one and only club, the Tampa Bay Rowdies. See USA/Canada lower leagues thread, and if you live near an MLS/NASL/USL/whatever soccer team, you should support your local FC. Now let the tailgating begin, for those of you not still digging out from several feet of snow that is.
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Mar 6, 2015 13:07
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I'm pissed because I'm up all night smoking a brisket tonight and it's going to dip below freezing. In March 
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Mar 6, 2015 13:16
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SOCCER IS TONIGHT!!!!
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Mar 6, 2015 13:24
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Here's the Red Bulls write up: Henry isn't on the team anymore and they fired their first good coach in a decade because he didn't win the Cup. They're still going to make the playoffs because 60% of the league does but they won't make it out of the first round. Enjoy the season everybody.
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Mar 6, 2015 13:25
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A fantastic representation of NJRB effort, right down to their coaching hire and attempt at supporter pacification ("Erm, uhhhh, ummm, policy is no refunds guys  ")
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Mar 6, 2015 13:39
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Your Boy Fancy posted:A fantastic representation of NJRB effort, right down to their coaching hire and attempt at supporter pacification ("Erm, uhhhh, ummm, policy is no refunds guys Lol yeah, can someone please post that town hall video as well?
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Mar 6, 2015 13:44
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YIKES Stay Gooned posted:Lol yeah, can someone please post that town hall video as well? WHYDIDYOUFIREPETKE.mov https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Rpj96hv5euw
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Mar 6, 2015 14:06
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 Chicago Fire SC If you want a picture of the future, imagine a 1-1 draw in Bridgeview - forever. Plus Shaun Maloney
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Mar 6, 2015 16:10
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Will the game be blacked out on MLS live? Because loving lol if I have both cable and the live subscription and I don't get to watch the game because its on Unimas.
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Mar 6, 2015 16:22
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