Category: Soccer

My 48th Soccer Birthday Weekend

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Let me tell you about this past weekend…

Sasha had a soccer tournament all weekend. Two games on Saturday and a game on Sunday. I remember laying in bed before the weekend began, talking to God and saying, “Wouldn’t it be cool if she actually won this tournament?” I knew it was sort of impossible because the team hadn’t been doing that well as a team and the last tournament we went to they lost all three games. That said, they had been getting better.

Bright and early Saturday morning in Sunnyvale they played a team they’ve lost to twice already (the Mustangs). It was a well-fought game. Our team scored a goal to go up 1-0 in the first half, then the other team was charging and charging and charging the entire game, but they couldn’t score and the game ended. So we won 1-0.  Wow, that was nice.

The second game, the same thing happened. We scored a goal early and then we held on to the very end to win 1-0.

That was the end of Sasha’s first two games. Then I went to go coach Hunter’s game in the afternoon. Hunter’s team is the worst team in the league, and the team we’re playing is one of the best teams in the league. Last time we played them, they scored four goals in the first five minutes, and then they had to start taking players off and stop trying to keep from running up the score. So, I was not excited for a shellacking.

On the car ride to the game, I had a conversation with Hunter, and we agreed that as long as he tried hard and stayed positive, no matter what the score, we’d both have a good game. When I got to the field, I conveyed that to the rest of the team saying “Hey, this is a good team, but if we try hard and stay positive, we’ll have a good game.” And as luck would have it, the other team ended up scoring two goals in the first half, but we were battling and we were fighting and we weren’t getting our asses kicked like we had before. At the end of the game, it was 4-0, but our team was happy. We all left the field thinking “Wow, that was the best game we’ve ever played and we’re really getting better.”

Then Sunday came around (my birthday). I was distracted because we didn’t know what to do with Hunter and Diane for the day. We were up in Marin and Sasha’s game was down in Sunnyvale. We didn’t know whether we should drag them 2 hours down south to watch Sasha’s game, just to turn around and drive back. Seems like a waste of time for a 13-year-old who’d rather be doing anything else.  But ultimately I decided, “You know what, this is my birthday and I’ll be really bummed if I’m sitting in an office park in Sunnyvale talking to random parents for hours and not with my family on my birthday.” So I got the full team into the car. We’re all going. We may be in Sunnyvale but at least we’ll be together.

Sasha had her game at 1pm and we got off to a good start. In fact, Sasha scored the first goal to put us up 1-0. And we fought hard but the other team was a good team and really put the pressure on us. They scored another goal towards the end of the game and were about to score at least one more when the game thankfully ended and so we escaped with a tie, 1-1.

Because we had won two games and tied one, we made it to the finals to play the best team of the tournament, Marin FC, who are really good. We’ve played twice already this season and they’ve beaten us each time. So again, we had the attitude, “As long as Sasha plays hard and stays positive, we’ll have a good time.” Sasha had already anchored on how fun it would be to get a second-place medal. She’d never gotten a single medal before (in her life) and even getting the second-place one would be really fun. She was excited.

The game started and they were indeed really good but we were scrappy.  We were scrappy in a way we hadn’t been scrappy before and we battled as they were bigger and more physical. The other team was good and they scored a goal to have us down 1-0 at halftime. But we fought back in the second half. We had a chance here and there and we actually scored one goal towards the end of the half to make it tied 1-1.  CeCe scored the goal – it was kind of a long shot that dipped right inside the inside post.

And then with the game winding down, probably two minutes left, we got a corner kick. It came straight to Skoog who one-timed volleyed it right into the goal for us to go up 2-1. We were all sort of amazed at what happened and then before we knew it the game was over.

I had forgotten about my small request to the man above from the beginning of the weekend. But it’s amazing that we won the tournament. It seemed so impossible. The joy on Sasha’s face was really something.

It was a great experience for her and for us as a family. Hanging together rooting for each kid at each game and for each to compete hard and to emerge with big smiles on their faces.

Someone asked me what I got for my birthday, and I had to reply: I got everything I could ever wish for, and maybe a little bit more.

130: Home Schooling Pods

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We want our kids to have social lives but also for them safe, and we can’t imagine an in-person school experience really being that. That means we’re probably keeping our kids at our house for the next year. Ideally, we have them at a house with a few other kids so they can socialize. A few kids is a lot different than the hundreds they’d interact with at the elementary school.

How we’re doing it:

  • We found a former teacher who doesn‘t want to go back to work at an in-person school. We’ll pay her monthly.
  • We have a family we’re close with who has similar social-distancing values as we do who wants to join. They’ll bring their kids over to our house every day.
  • We set up a dedicated space as a schoolhouse – our garage – and we will have the kids and teacher use it to teach the Zoom classes or whatever the curriculum is.

This “pod” system seems to be catching on. If you go to NextDoor you can see teachers looking for pods and parents looking for teachers. Others:

  • Myra Margolin, who created a Facebook page to help connect families in the D.C. region interested in “microschooling,” found more than 1,000 people join the group.
  • Andrea MacRae is trying to organize “bubbles” for children and families in the East Bay area. She has interested families fill out detailed surveys about their values and risk comfort, and then matches those families with other like-minded families — including those who won’t be able to pay and those that include essential workers.

If we get this working it seems like a great way to get everyone through this pandemic safely. While this is working for us, I could see how it could be tough for kids of essential workers, those who can’t find teachers, or families who afford it. I feel very fortunate we can do it. Continue reading “130: Home Schooling Pods” →

2018 British Arrow Awards

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It’s becoming a tradition now for me and my family to go to the Walker Art Museum to watch the 2018 British Awards. It’s really pretty great to sit for an hour and watch the best commercials of the year.

This year it was noticeable about how many of them were about female empowerment (including the winner of Best Ad of the Year), which makes sense as it’s a topic capturing everyone’s mind share, everywhere.

My favorites of the year were these 5. They are pretty hilarious, cool, strong and, to use the British term, brilliant.

My favorite of the year was strange, ackward and just so funny. I have no idea what the ad is for but it’s still fantastic:

This next one is probably one of the funniest of the bunch, and I never even knew what Marmite was or that it could be so divisive:

This next one is really cute and captured our entire group. Even though it was the first ad we say, we all remembered it at the end

This one is just really cute and in the world we different it’s a great message of how kids don’t see color, race, etc.. Really well done

This one is just so epic. A move (the “tornado”) in a FIFA video game goes viral such that Ronaldo actually does it himself in a game and then goes even more viral to get other athletes to do it also. Really cool idea.

This final one is about the women’s Euro cup. The girl in the video just does a great job and is shows some great skill. Really liked this one

Knee Surgery

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Last year, on December 1, I decided to run, every day Mon-Friday for at least 3 months. It was part of a not-be-fat program that I needed to go on. It worked out really well and I hit new heights of running enjoyment.  The miles also started increasing. I hit over 80 miles run in Jan, Feb, and March.  All was good.

Then, disaster struck. A few weeks ago, I injured my left knee in a soccer match. I couldn’t walk at all and definitely couldn’t run. t went to the doctor about a week after the event and after an MRI, we had this conversation: 

Me: What are my options, doc?

Doc: You don’t have to do anything or your can have surgery

Me: What happens if I don’t do anything?

Doc: Well, it’ll just hurt like it does now and you probably won’t be able to run

Me: For how long?

Doc: Forever

Me: When can I schedule surgery? 

I had my knee operated on yesterday. On my way to the hospital, I was pretty nervous. I’ve never has surgery before and I know of people who have had some bad problems from routine knee operations. Being active is a huge part of how I live my life. I basically played soccer every day of my life for over a decade until I was 22 and since then have been working out at least 3 times a week. The thought of not being able to run or be active is very scary.

Here I am a day after the surgery and it seems to have gone well. I’m still on painkillers, so I don’t really know for sure, but I’m optimistic. I should be back up and running soon.  

The next steps is to do some rehab and get back on the road.  

 My goal is 80 more miles in the month of August. Looking forward to it 

 

2014 Sport Video Roundup

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The videos and advertisements for sports flowing through the internets these days have been great.  Wanted to capture and share a few for y’all: 

 

Recently, there was a great new ad lauding Derek Jeter in the final year of his career (although it should be noted that Joe Mauer has posted better stats at age 31 than Jeter did at at 31)

Related to that, there’s a send-up of the above ad by Funny Or Die, not lauding Alex Rodriguez:

For the Timberwolves, I’m all in favor of trading Kevin Love for Wiggins to the Cavaliers.  Speaking of the Cavs, there’s a great mock video of Lebron and his “Coming Home” campaign mashed up with Dumb and Dumber.

Finally, this is over a month old, but the Beats ad for the World Cup was definitely the best one of the summer.  It came out right before the Cup started and got me incredibly pumped for it.  A great ad.

(thanks to Kesner and Matt for sharing these first)

USA vs. Ghana

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What a great game yesterday.  After Jozy went down, the US was bad.  Really bad, but escaped with 3 points.  Without the 3 points, the tournament is basically over for them.  

John Brooks scored, soccer fans roared, and minutes later, US 2, Ghana 1 was in the books as a great win. I was sure that Brooks was going to be a disaster, but instead, Brooks, only 21, is a hero.  Nicely done.

Some interesting tidbits from the game:

  1. Here’s a video of a collection of videos from around the world of soccer fans celebrating the Brooks header off the foot of Graham Zusi. 
  2. A cool video fo the tweet volume before and after the goal
  3. John Brooks found his wikipedia entry edited last night right after the game.  Seems a big more accurate now: 
  4. Updated Soccer Power Index odds to advance: Germany 98%, 63% (33% pre-Ghana), Portugal 27%, Ghana 12%.
  5. Some notes i learned about Ghana during the game: 
    1. They were rationing electricity so that everyone in the country could watch the game vs. the US.  (link)
    2. Women in Ghana get 84 days of paid maternity leave (US get zero)
    3. The official language of Ghana is English although the country is divided into small groups that together speak more than 50 languages.
    4. Gold and cocoa are considered a mainstay of their economy

That’s it.  Really looking forward to Sunday’s match against Portugal. 

(thanks to Kesner for some interwebs stuff)

 

 

Open Letter To Bill Simmons – Lebron Can’t Play Soccer

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Bill –

Love the column and the podcast – read/listen religiously.

I used to play soccer in college. I’m just stating so you can see i have some credibility to what i’m about to say.

I had to write because one thing is driving me crazy. You and others keep claiming that Lebron James and other NBA stars like Dwight Howard would be amazing on the soccer field. See your recent podcast with Chris Collinsworth (here). These players are incredible athletes but this is just not the case, and anyone who has played soccer would know that if you see a 6′ 8″ guy playing against you, you would be psyched. There is no way, no matter how athletically talented they are, that would be good players. This is due to 2 main reasons: (1) foot size and (2) quickness.

To shoot or hit a long ball well, you need to hit the soccer ball with your instep, which is the top of your foot. People with big feet are notoriously bad at kicking a ball far and accurately. It’s possible, but if you’re huge (over 6’5″) it would be super tough. Quickness is another issue. Being fast on your first 3 steps is so crucial to a soccer player. You see it all the time at the top of the box, where a player is trying to get just a little bit of space to get a shot off. The bigger you are, the less quick you are. Think of Lebron trying to guard the quickest point guards all day. It wouldn’t go that well.

For both of these reasons, if you’re super small and really quick you can be the best player in the world. See Messi and Maradona (both 5’5″-ish). If you’re gigantic, you probably won’t be.

BUT, i do agree with your general idea that if the best players in America played soccer, we’d dominate. In fact, in 2006 i made up the US starting 11 if we had our pick of the best players and they were super fast, strong and quick dudes (Barry Sanders would have been ideal). That post is here

Anyway, please don’t say anymore how good of a soccer player Lebron would be. It drives me nuts.

Thanks and keep on kicking ass –

Mike Lewis

Big Day for US Soccer

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The score was 0-0.  The ref raised the sign indicating 4 min of extra time.  The US team has wasted chances all day and all tournament. They played both sloppy defense and potent attacking.  But it was all over.  The US had blown its chance.  It was the easiest group in its history.  I could hear all the naysayers talking on ESPN’s PTI  and other radio shows.  We just suck at soccer.  You couldn’t advance ahead of Slovenia – it’s the size of New Jersey!? You couldn’t beat Algeria?.  The ref system is stupid, when’s the NFL start?.  Tim Howard recalls his though when the 90th minute came, saying:

I just thought the crazy thing is we could be on a plane tomorrow. It didn’t mean anything in the game, but I didn’t want to go home. I was kind of apprehensive about losing.

All the progress US Soccer had made over the past 8 to 20 years with the introduction of an MLS team, a quarterfinal finish in 2002 and the beginning of players playing successfully in Europe would all be for naught with a loss and elimination.  It would be the ultimate disappointment and I could tell the American public would once again sour on the sport.  I would dredding hearing Chuck Klosterman and Tony Kornheiser talk about how we suck and will forever suck at the world’s game.

But then the exact opposite happens.  Three minutes from going home, we score.  A fraction from elimination and we become champions setting a record for the fewest total minutes that a World Cup group winner had been leading in its first three games: a grand total of two minutes.

Not only am i happy to watch the US play this Saturday in the 2nd round but i’m happy for soccer in America.  For the first time since i can remember am i hearing people talk about what an exciting and fun sport it is.  People are beginning to understand why the rest of the world loves it.  This game will directly lead to future successes on the pitch in future World Cups.  There’s an 8 year old right now who wants to score the next huge goal in 2032 and because of today’s victory he’s much more likely to stick with soccer than go to football or basketball.  I couldn’t happier about all of it.  As Landon Donvan said after the game,

I used to see this game we play as just a game,” said Donovan, “and I think I’ve realized particularly during this tournament that it’s more than that. It’s an opportunity to inspire. And not only inspire other people but inspire yourself and your teammates. I think tonight is going to do a lot more for me and other people than maybe we’ll realize.

I completely agree.  Congrats guys.  Good luck on Saturday