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Soccer Poet

Divas and Cheaters

general : Divas and Cheaters : Wednesday, October 6, 2010

It’s been a while since we led with the Monkey of the Day. This one comes from a bag that appeared in our training room. Tomorrow the Dawgs take the show on the road for the first time in a few weeks as we head west to Oxford, MS for a duel with the Rebs of Ole Miss. Yeah, there will be some undeniable subplots in play this weekend, but we’re going to do our best to ignore them and focus on playing the best game we can play and letting things fall where they may. But before we [...]

general : The Splits : Saturday, October 2, 2010

So Friday night was interesting.  The Dawgs had a bit of a knock-down, drag-out with the Kentucky Wildcats.  In the end the best we could manage was a 1-1 draw.  You know, as the game was being played I wasn’t exactly thrilled with the way we were performing.  Not that we were awful… just thought we looked a little lackluster.  But now having had the chance to watch the video, as it turns out, we were actually pretty darn good.  As a matter of fact, [...]

general : Oh The Irony : Monday, September 27, 2010

I used Saturday night to watch the video of Arkansas v Tennessee to prepare for Sunday’s match with the Razorbacks. About 20 minutes into the video I was thinking, Wow, they’re gonna cause us a lot of problems. They had a couple of dynamic attackers that I was particularly worried about. When those players can receive the ball and face up, it creates a lot of havoc because Arkansas loves to interchange positions as they go forward. There’s no straight up and down. It’s [...]

general : SEC Opener v LSU : Saturday, September 25, 2010

It is with a heavy heart and great restraint that I regretfully celebrate the Phillies sweep of the Atlanta Braves this week. As a Phillies fan who lives in Georgia, I can assure you that I was disappointed more than most that our 11 game winning streak and our white-hot play of late had to fall upon the good people of Atlanta. I assure you I take no joy from going up 6.5 games in the NL East and must assume that poor officiating and perhaps a grander MLB conspiracy were to blame for the [...]

general : Good Passers Gone Bad : Monday, September 20, 2010

Happy Belated Birthday Katmo! Have you ever started cleaning, like, just intending to straighten up your room a little bit, maybe put some socks in their designated drawer, just to feel like you’re taking on some semblance of responsibility before you move onto doing something enjoyable with your day, and then the next thing you know it’s a few hours later and you’re scrubbing the tile grout with a tooth brush, you can see your reflection in the dresser, your kitchen [...]
10 In The East

general : 10 In The East : Sunday, September 19, 2010

I’m starting this entry on Sept. 15, 2010. Sorry it’s a little tardy. The trip to California has popped a spring in my body clock and for the past two days I’ve been mostly sleeping or, when my eyes were open, just mostly asleep. Beginning with our 10:25 P.M. return flight out of San Jose (that’s 1:25 A.M. in the east), I got 3 hours of good-for-little plane sleep. We touched down at the ATL at 6 A.M. then got on the bus to Athens. On the bus I stayed awake playing Name [...]
Redemption Song

general : Redemption Song : Sunday, September 5, 2010

Today’s Monkey of the Day was mailed in by subscriber Reggie and it’s a beaut! You can see his contribution on the Things My Phone Saw page. Thanks Reg! Friday was a good night for SEC soccer. The Dawgs survived the Mercer mayhem; Kentucky upended Virginia Tech; Arkansas topped Miami; and Auburn upset Florida State. Good for the SEC! There are days when, even four hours before kick-off, you know your team is going to play well. When one of those days settles upon you, life [...]
Lessons for Free

general : Lessons for Free : Saturday, September 4, 2010

Today’s Monkey of the Day goes to the Piano Man from Oyster Bay, Long Island... Billy Joel. On my pre-dawn drive to Atlanta I heard We Didn’t Start the Fire, which incidentally holds the world record for most non-repeating lyrics in a song. Here are a few of them: Buddy Holly, Ben Hur, Space MONKEY, mafia… Now, if I could only get him to subscribe. Okay. Onto our show…. Here’s the thing… I don’t like being a public figure. Yeah, strange [...]
Things We Can039t Say

general : Things We Can't Say... : Friday, September 3, 2010

This entry was actually written on Aug. 31. Came home from the office early this evening and took from my fridge the Teriyaki chicken I’ve had marinating since Sunday. Wanted to let it settle to room temperature before sticking it on the grill (little grilling tip for you right there). So I set it on the counter and figured I’d kill 20 minutes on the sofa. Well, seems I was asleep before Tony Kornheiser could say the ‘I’ in PTI. I was literally asleep 5 seconds after I [...]
Separation Anxiety

general : Separation Anxiety : Wednesday, September 1, 2010

Today is a big day in the world of college soccer recruiting because on Sept. 1 the NCAA officially recognizes high school juniors as well, high school juniors. That means it becomes permissible to write/email your prospects. And for the prospects, it’s a little like Christmas morning as they get to look under their tree (In this instance ‘tree’ is a metaphor for computer, IPhone, what-have-you) and see what Santa (college soccer coaches) have left for them. Pretty cool day [...]
Urgency

general : Urgency : Sunday, August 29, 2010

When I woke this morning there were certain things I’d never expect to happen. Like me running a four minute mile (or a 5, 6 or 7 minute mile for that matter). I never would have expected to see a hummingbird play the oboe and I certainly never ever imagined that we would hang five goals on a Big 12 team. But sure enough, the Dawgs put on a pretty convincing performance to beat Kansas 5-0. Before the game I spoke to the team about how flat we looked coming out of the gate on Friday [...]
On The Board

general : On The Board : Friday, August 27, 2010

The drive home on Friday night is so much more enjoyable after a win. Sincerely. Top down, cool breeze and the feeling of satisfaction from a job well done. It’s a little slice of heaven I tell ya. Tonight was our first win of the season and for Steve and me, our first as coaches at Georgia. And from the moment we potted our third goal, my life has been the most wonderful and relaxing thing a coach could hope for. I’d guess that 90% of the games I’ve been involved with [...]
Sleep Deprivation

general : Sleep Deprivation : Monday, August 23, 2010

Monday. Late. I hope this is a short one. Came home from work today and the craziness of preseason and these 7 A.M. training sessions finally caught up with me. I hit the wall to the tune of a 15 minute nap that magically turned into a two hour one. Thus explaining why I am up two hours past my bed time and why I’m dreading tomorrow morning. If I fell asleep right this second I would get a max of 5.5 hours of sleep. Except we both know that I’m not falling asleep right this [...]
Duke

general : Duke : Sunday, August 22, 2010

It’s Sunday. Preseason has officially ended which means the lives of coaches across the country finally fall back into a rhythm with some semblance of normalcy, relatively speaking. To be fair, not having a Sunday game made today the least hectic Sunday I’ll see for a while, but I wasn’t worrying about that when I walked barefoot onto the back deck and threw that ribeye on the grill. For the first time in a long time, today there was no rush to do anything. Today offered up a [...]
College Bound

general : College Bound : Monday, August 16, 2010

This weekend my oldest nephew, Justin, begins his days as a college student at the University of Hartford. So WooHoo to that! When I left for college no one gave me a whole lot of good advice (or any advice really). To be fair, I was the first in our brood to actually go to college so there wasn't a lot of life-experience to be passed down. But I know I could've used some pointers. So tonight I took it upon myself to flatten out the learning curve and pass on some pearls of wisdom. [...]