So I’ve been asked a bunch of times, what it will take for the US to advance to the next stage.
Here are the tie breaking situations regarding advancement (top 2 teams advance).
1. Total points after three games (3 points for a win, 1 point for a tie, 0 points for a loss).
2. Goal differential after three games (total goals scored – total goals given up)
3. Greatest number of goals scored in all group matches
So after two games, here are the standings of Group C:
Team
Points
Goal Differential
Goals Scored
Slovenia
4
1
3
United States
2
0
3
England
2
0
1
Algeria
1
-1
0
I’ve had a lot of questions about what needs to happen for the United States to advance.
The US will advance if…
The United States BEATS Algeria regardless of the outcome of England vs Slovenia
or
The United States TIES Algeria AND Slovenia BEATS England
or
The United States ties Algeria AND Slovenia ties England AND the United States scores more total goals over 3 games than England (after 2 games, the US has scored 3 goals and the English have scored 1 goal)
To sum everything up…if the US wins…they’re in. If they lose, they’re out. If they tie, they need help from the other game.
Basically, the US is in the best possible position. Their advancement to the next round rests solely in their hands.
They need to take advantage of it and get that win against Algeria.
It could have been worse. Once again, the US found itself in an early hole, and struggled to earn a hard-fought tie. It should have been a win at the end of the game, if not for some lame refereeing. But again, a loss would have killed the US’s hopes for advancing to the next round. With a tie, they still have a good chance of advancing, but definitely need a win against Algeria to advance.
Moving on to some quick thoughts from today’s United States vs Slovenia game…
1) Robbie Findley is just plain horrible. He’s absolutely TERRIBLE.
All along, I never believed he belonged on the World Cup team. I understand coach Bob Bradley’s decision to include him on the team though: he provides a speed up front that Charlie Davies provided before he was injured. But that’s where the similarities end. Findley is nowhere near the player Davies was before his accident. The entire first half, the defense tried sending long balls for Findley to chase down, but he never put himself into position to receive them, and when he did, he screwed up every opportunity. He lacks the experience, expertise, and skill to correctly make the right decision.
He picked up a yellow card today as well, so he wont be able to play against Algeria. THANK GOODNESS. GET HIM OFF THE FIELD!!!
and I still stand by my belief that Brian Ching should have made the team instead of Findley.
When the World Cup group draw was released last year, many people got lost in the excitement that was “England vs United States”. Many people mistakingly thought that this match-up was the most important/biggest game that the United States would play in the group stage. Lost in the hype and excitement surrounding the build up to the game was the fact that many analysts had the US losing, yet still advancing to the 2nd stage.
Contrary to popular belief, the US’s most important game is their upcoming game against Slovenia, the #25 ranked team in the World (US is #14). After the Slovenia gained 3 points with a win over Algeria, this game has become nearly a must win situation for the US. Why? Let’s take a look at the standings after the 1st game. After the 1st game, Slovenia leads the group with 3 points, while England and United States has 1 point. Algeria is last with 0 points.
One has to “assume” that the #8 English will beat both Algeria and Slovenia. Yes, weird things have happened (Switzerland beating Spain), but on any random day, the English have to be considered HEAVY favorites against these two teams. If they do beat these two teams, the English will finish with 7 points.
Now lets take a look at the following scenarios making the assumption that the English beats both Algeria and Slovenia
The US LOSES to Slovenia
Slovenia would finish with 6 points. Even if the US beats Algeria, they will only finish with 4 points. The US would fail to advance to the next round.
The US TIES Slovenia
Slovenia would finish with 4 points. The US would have 2 points following 2 games. Their game against Algeria would become a MUST WIN situation.
The US BEATS Slovenia
Slovenia would finish with 3 points, and the US would have 4 points after the first two games. There would be less pressure against Algeria in their final game to get a desirable outcome.
To note, there are many external variables surrounding these outcomes, and it is very possible that England will choke like France or Spain and lose a match. In order to minimize the impact of external situations regarding the US’s advancement to the next round, the US needs to take advantage of what they’re given and win.
The US is a far better, more skilled team than Slovenia, and they SHOULD win this game. Anything less will definitely be a disappointment.
I feel there are 4 type of teams: a bad team, average team, good team, and a great team.
A bad team can’t beat anyone. An average team is the unpredictable one…they can beat good teams and lose to bad teams. A good team consistently beats the bad/average teams, yet can not consistently beat fellow good/great teams. A great team consistently beats everyone (or can beat anyone on the biggest stage).
With regards to basketball last season, bad team = Washington Wizards. average team = Golden State Warriors. good team = Cleveland Cavaliers. great team = Boston Celtics and LA Lakers.
The United States is definitely not a bad team, nor are they a great team. However, I dont know whether to label them an average team or a good team yet. The US has shown flashes of brilliance in world cup qualifying as well as pre-world cup warmups, but they have also shown inconsistency at times.
It’ll be interesting to see what kind of team shows up for the game tomorrow. The US is heavily favored against Slovenia and Algeria. Let’s see if they play like the favorites.
So after this morning’s two games, the first set of games of round 1 is finally complete. Here’s a look back at this week’s games.
Biggest Mistake: Serbia’s Zdravko Kuzmanovic handball in the box against Ghana
While the English will argue that Robert Green’s error against the Americans was the biggest mistake, in the overall big picture and given the circumstances, the error wasn’t THAT big.
1) The US only tied the game early in the 2nd half. The English didnt come away with a loss
2) The English had plenty of time remaining to win the game and had numerous chances that it couldn not capitalize on.
3) A tie doesnt screw over the English. They still have two more winnable games against Algeria and Slovenia to advance.
The following handball by Zdravko Kuzmanovic against Ghana was much more devastating.
1) It came in the 85th minute, so the Serbians had very little time to try to get an equalizing goal.
2) Serbia needed a point against Ghana to advance to the next round. Now Ghana has 3 points and Serbia has 0. Unless Serbia can pull a shocking upset tie/win against Germany, it’s very likely that this hand ball play will deny the Serbians passage to the next round.
Best Goal: Germany’s Miroslav Klose’s goal against Australia
close runner up: Brazil’s Macion goal against North Korea.
2nd runner up: South Africa’s Siphiwe Tshabalala’s goal against Mexico for the first goal of the 2010 World Cup.
Biggest Upset: Switzerland 1. Spain 0.
What a shocking win for the #24 ranked Swiss over the #2 ranked Spaniards. Is it nerve-wrecking time in Spain? Not yet, since I still feel this is one of the best teams in the world. I predict they’ll have wins over Chile and Honduras to qualify for the next round.
close runner up: Japan 1. Cameroon 0.While there are 22 spots in rankings between Switzerland and Spain, there are 26 spots between Japan and Cameroon. This was a Cameroon team that was 2nd in the 2008 African Cup of Nations and a finalist in this year’s 2010 ACN. Many people considered Les Lions Indomptables to be Africa’s best bet to advance the farthest in the tournament.
Most Impressive Team: Germany
Germany by far looked the best after their 4-0 win against Australia. Before the tournament, I had written in a previous post that the Germans might struggle from a lack of goal scoring because of poor form by some of their star players.
Well as we can see by this year’s Boston Celtics, you can never disregard great veterans. They always know how to come through in the clutch. Even though, Lukas Podolski and Miroslav Klose had very very bad club seasons, they came through on the big stage and scored Germany’s first two goals.
A very very impressive showing from the Germans.
close runner ups: Argentina, Brazil, Netherlands, South Korea: All these teams got necessary wins against quality opponents and all showed flashes of brilliance. These teams should all have a great tournament.
Most Disappointing Teams: Tie between Italy and France
The French and Italy both drew ties against Uruguay and Paraguay, respectively.
They played ugly football.
Enough said.
Random Thoughts and Musings
1. The most talked about object from the World Cup: the vuvuzela…the most obnoxious object ever created. Can someone please buy me one?
2. According to some reports, the England vs USA game drew more viewers than each night of the first four games of the NBA Finals. It’s finally great to see Americans interested in soccer. You dont know how many friends I have who are watching and following soccer for the very first time.
3. The Group of Death has to be the most interesting group, with Brazil ahead with 3 points and the Ivory Coast and Portugal tied with 1 point, and North Korea with 0.
After the game, I had thought that it will come down to either Portugal and the Ivory Coast advancing on goal differential. Basically, who beats North Korea the most and who loses to Brazil the least. I really dont think they have the ability to beat Brazil. However, I wont be surprised if the North Koreans pull off an upset and either tie/beat the Ivory Coast or Portugal.
4) The Asian teams (except for Australia) look very good, with Japan and South Korea getting wins, and North Korea playing very respectably against the top team in the world.
On that note, I think South Korea has to be a dark horse to make it the late rounds. This is a team that was a semifinalist back in 2002. They are a very strong and well-discipline team led by one of my favorite players in the world, Ji Sung Park. I’m very interested to see how they play on Thursday against a strong opponent in Argentina.
5) The lack of scoring has been an interesting topic around analysts. Out of all 32 teams, only one team, Germany, scored more than 2 goals. Even then, only 3 other teams scored 2 goals. What to make of it? Hopefully its just because teams are being tentative, and dont want to start the tournament off with a loss. Let’s just wait and see if this lack-of-goals trend continues.
Predictions Going Forward
Here are my predictions before the tournament started on who would advance.
After the first set of games, I’ve revised a couple…
Group A: FranceUruguay and Mexico
Group B: Argentina and South Korea
Group C: England and the United States
Group D: Germany and SerbiaGhana
Group E: Netherlands and Cameroon
Group F: Italy and Slovakia
Group G: Brazil and Portugal
Group H: Chile Swizterland and Spain
so after weeks of speculation about this Pac-16 megaconference, it turns out…nothing drastic will happen. it was nice to daydream this past couple of weeks about what could have been, but in the end, I always believed this was too drastic a change that the chances of this happening was pretty unrealistic.
in the end, the University of Texas decided to stay in the Big 12 of only 10 teams. on a side note, the Big 10 has 12 teams now…go figure.
a recap of what’s happened…
1) Nebraska left the Big 12 to go to the Big 10.
2) Colorado left the Big 12 to go to the Pac 10
3) Boise State left the WAC to go to the Mountain West Conference
All along, Texas kept placing the possible downfall of the Big 12 on Nebraska and Colorado for deciding to leave. However throughout this entire ordeal, it was always Texas that was the biggest key to keeping the conference intact. In the end, yes it was Texas’s decision, and they finally decided to stay.
Why? Money, money, money. All along, I’ve always said its been about the money.
By staying, the Longhorns have re-negotiated their contracts to make an estimated $20-$25 million a year, as opposed to $10-$15 million before. They have also been allowed to create their own tv network that will bring in $3-$5 million a year. On top of that, Texas will keep the buyout penalty that Colorado and Nebraska have to pay for leaving the Big 12.
Another reason to have doubted the expansion rumors to the Pac-10 was the fact that Texas has always been the “alpha male” in its conference. If it had joined the Pac-10, it would have had to compete with equally strong schools such as USC, UCLA, and Stanford (who have won the Director’s Cup for the past 15+ years as the country’s top athletic program). No one in the Big 12 dares to put up a fight with Texas and they just bow down to their presence. On the contrary, there are many schools in the Pac-10 that would put up a fight with Texas.
The ramifications of everything…
1) The Big 10 gets what it has always wanted…Nebraska so they can hold a conference championship game. Ideally they would have wanted Notre Dame, but Nebraska has always been there #2 choice.
2) The Big 12 might turn out stronger with this change. Nebraska and Colorado never really offered much lately to the Big 12 in terms of football or basketball, and with the departure of these two, the Big 12 can now play in a single division. Before they had played in two very, very competitively unbalanced divisions, with the South composed of Oklahoma, Texas, Oklahoma State, and Texas Tech, and the North composed of teams like Nebraska, Missouri Kansas State, and Iowa State in the other. How unfair were these divisions? The South has won 10/14 championship games, including the last 6.
3) The Pac-10 has to be the biggest loser here. Yeah they were able to bring in Colorado, but they definitely struck out trying to bring the entire Big 12 south to the conference. They are still one team short of a championship conference game, and will have to go back to the drawing board to see who to invite. All guesses will be the University of Utah Utes.
Yes this is a sports blog, but I will take the time here to talk about my other biggest passion in life: the theater. Last night was the biggest night in all of theater…The Tony Awards!!!
Here are some of my favorite performances from throughout the night (in order of what I enjoyed most).
1. La Cage aux Folles, with Kelsey Grammar and Douglas Hodges. After seeing this last month, it cracked my list of top 5 favorite shows. In this clip, Douglas Hodges has a hilarious encounter with Matthew Morrison.
2. Christiane Noll, a Carnegie Mellon alumni, singing “Back to Before” from Ragtime. If I had the opportunity to go back in time and see ANY show ever, it would have been Ragtime. Absolutely beautiful score. Noll is such an amazing singer.
3. The Cast of American Idiot singing the titled track
4. Matthew Morrison and Lea Michele’s performance.
5. Green Day with the cast of American Idiot
6. Million Dollar Quartet, about the famed impromptu recording jam session between Elvis Presley, Johnny Cash, Jerry Lee Lewis, and Carl Perkins.
7. Memphis, which won the Best Musical Award last night. Kind of really sad that I wasn’t able to see this in NYC.
8. Promises Promises, which starred Kristin Chenoweth and Sean Hayes. Great choreography.
9. “Send in the Clowns” from A Little Night Music sung by Catherine Zeta Jones, who won best Leading Actress for her performance. This performance was actually quite bad, and was nothing like I saw when I saw her perform last month.
Rumors this entire week have been swirling about what’s going to happen with regards to the Big 10, Big 12, and Pac-10 in the future.
Well in the past 24 hours, two major players made their first move, and now its time to see how the dominoes fall. In a completely unrelated move, another football powerhouse made it huge move.
Here the main things you need to know…
1) Last night, the University of Colorado officially accepted an offer to the join the Pac-10, which I guess will be the Pac-11 right now. Like I mentioned yesterday in a previous post, the Pac-10 had always targeted Colorado because Denver is a significant TV market.
2) Today, the University of Nebraska officially accepted an offer to leave the Big-12 and head to the Big-10 (I’m not sure what they’ll be called. After Penn State joined the conference, they’ve had 11 schools…and were still called the Big-10).
3) Boise State, the nation’s best mid-major conference team (not part of the Pac-10, Big East, ACC, SEC, Big 10 or Big 12), made a move to leave the weak Western Athletic Conference and join the relatively strong Mountain West Conference.
What does this all mean and what’s going to happen moving forward?
1) The Big 12 is officially down to 10 teams, two teams short of what’s required to host a conference championship game. It’s highly unlikely that the Big 12 is going to be able to survive for now, and its more and more likely that Texas, Texas A&M, Texas Tech, Oklahoma, and Oklahoma State will follow Colorado and join the Pac-10 to form the Pac-16.
2) With the Big-12 collapsing, there was talk about what to do with their BCS bid. Since the Pac-16 would be powerful, there was even talk about giving two bids to the conference, one each for each division winner, which I think is a terrible idea.
With Boise State joining the Mountain West Conference, I say the MWC gets an automatic BCS bid. If Boise State was in the MWC last season, the MWCwould have had 4 teams ranked in the top 25: Boise State, TCU, Brigham Young, and Utah.
Year after year, these teams continue to show that they have the ability to compete with the major conferences. It’s about time that we reward them.
3) Basketball and small markets get screwed.
This expansion has always been about money, and unfortunately the basketball schools (Kansas) and the small market schools (Baylor) get screwed.
For a program that has such a rich history like Kansas with regards to basketball, it’s kind of sad to see them without a major conference to play in. However, I believe this “homelessness” will be short-lived as the Big-East (a power conference in basketball already) will come along and invite them.
Two days ago, I had written a post regarding the Big 10 and Pac 10 expansion situation, and it seems that things are moving along ahead for a major shakeup.
Some recent developments…
1) It seems that Nebraska will most likely move to the Big 10, as reported by ESPN here.
2) The Pac-10 is in the process of sending invites to 6 Big 12 schools: Texas, Texas A&M, Texas Tech, Oklahoma, Oklahoma State, and Colorado.
There actually has been a lot of talk recently about who the Pac-10 should invite, Colorado or Baylor. A very prominent Baylor supporter even emailed Baylor alumni in the Texas Legislature to see if they could somehow work to package Baylor with their three fellow Texas schools. If Baylor isnt brought along to the Pac-10, they’re screwed and their sports teams will take a huge blow.
Like I mentioned in my previous post, it all comes down to money and television contracts. The Pac-10 decided to take Colorado because Denver (No 16 in the nation) is a much bigger TV market than Waco, Texas.
3) A report in the NYTimes says that the officials from Texas and Texas A&M will meet to try to salvage the Big 12 Conference.
It’s going to be an exciting next couple of days…that’s for sure!
How will the Pac-16 affect the college football season?
1) There would be two divisions: probably the West and the East. The East would have all the new teams + University of Arizona and Arizona State. The West would consist of the remaining 8 teams from the “Pac-10”
2) Currently in the Pac-10, each team plays all other 9 teams once and 3 other non-conference teams to make up a 12 game schedule.
In the new format, I envision each team playing a 7+2+3 format, 7 teams in their own division, 2 teams in the other division, and 3 non-conference opponents. Furthermore, that would also mean that a) One team would only play a member of the other division once every 4 years and b) they would host this opponent once every 8 years.
3) The winner of each division would play a 13th game in the conference championship.
How will the Pac-16 affect the basketball season?
The Pac-16 would probably just follow the system used by the Big East, which also has 16 teams. Team in the Pac-16 would still play an 18 game regular season. Currently, teams play all 9 other teams, home and away. In the Pac-16, each team would play each other once, and then play 3 of the teams twice. The Big East pairs up teams based on regional proximity and rivalries. For example, the University of Pittsburgh and West Virginia are always paired up because of their deep rivalry.
I can envision the following breakdown of 4 regions where the teams play each other twice.
a) The Oregon/Washington schools: University of Oregon, Oregon State, University of Washington, Washington State
b) The California schools: Stanford, California, UCLA, USC
c) The Texas schools + Colorado: Texas, Texas Tech, Texas A&M, Colorado
d) The Oklahoma and Arizona schools: University of Oklahoma, Oklahoma State, University of Arizona, Arizona State.
Karen: so Tom Izzo to the cavaliers?
Me: yeah, though he has no guarantee that lebron is staying.
Karen: if lebron wants to stay, who would it be to make that decision?
me: his decision?
Karen: i mean. let’s say he wanted to stay but the cavs didnt want him anymore?
me: uhhhh…
Karen: could they technically reject him?
me: yes but they wouldn’t. they’re dying for him to stay.
Karen: im saying hypothetically…b/c he’s incapable of winning a championship.
Today for the first time, I watched a baseball game that wasnt the World Series and didnt involve either the A’s or the Giants. Yes. I watched a baseball game between the Pittsburgh Pirates and Washington Nationals, arguably two of the worst teams this decade.
Why? Two words. Stephen Strasburg.
Strasburg has been the most hyped baseball prospect since Alex Rodriguez in 1993. During his junior year at San Diego State, he compiled a 13-1 record, a 1.32 ERA, 59 hits, 16 earned runs, 19 walks, and 195 strikeouts in only 109 inning pitched. Absolutely INSANE numbers. He was then drafted #1 in 2009 by the Washington Nationals. In the minor leagues this year, he finished his minor league stint with an overall record of 7–2, an ERA of 1.30, 65 strikeouts and 13 walks in 55⅓ innings, and a WHIP of 0.80. Again. Absolutely INSANE numbers.
Tonight, he made his major league debut pitching against the Pittsburgh Pirates. It was a sold out crowd, and the entire nation was buzzing with excitement over his debut. Any boy he didn’t disappoint. 7 innings pitched, 4 hits, 2 earned runs, 14 STRIKEOUTS, and NO WALKS. In his first game, he set the franchise record with most strikeouts in a game.
His feat is so amazing that there are only 5 other pitchers since 1900 to throw at least 14 strikeouts and 0 walks: Roger Clemens, Randy Johnson, Javier Vazquez, Mike Mussina, Brad Penny. That’s some pretty fine company to have!
Strasburg is the real deal, and he brings a sense of hope to a franchise that has struggled tremendously this decade.
However, this was the 2nd piece of really good news for the club this week. Yesterday in the 2010 draft, the Nationals again had the #1 draft pick, and they drafted a kid named Bryce Harper, who supposedly is one of the best power hitters in recent memory. If both he and Strasburg live up their hype, the Nationals will have such a solid foundation to build a team around and become competitive once again.
Elsewhere around Washington
The excitement in Washington isnt only around their baseball team.
Washington Redskins (football) – This offseason, they fired Jim Zorn, their coach for the past two years, and brought in Mike Shanahan, the former Denver Broncos coach who won 2 Superbowls with the team. Shanahan has to be one of the top 5 coaches in the league right now, and will definitely turn around the team. Not only that, they brought in Donovan McNabb from the Eagles to be their new starting QB, replacing Jason Campbell. Yes McNabb is getting older and he’s past his prime, but he’s still a big upgrade over Campbell. Also, McNabb gives the team at least 2-3 seasons of playing, which is more than enough time to develop their younger quarterbacks, Rex Grossman and Colt Brennan. If these two dont work out, they could also look to draft a QB in the next couple drafts.
Washington Wizards (basketball) – Recently, the Wizards have suffered, mainly stemming from Gilbert Arenas and his injuries/legal troubles. The Wizards used to be a force in the Eastern Conference, but now have struggled to make the playoffs these past two seasons. However, their fortunes changed in April’s draft lottery. Since they had the 5th worst record in the NBA last year, they had a 10% chance of getting the 1st pick (the Nets with the worst record had a 25% chance). However, the Wizards beat the odds and were awarded the #1 pick in the draft, where they’ll mostly likely draft John Wall from Kentucky. He’s the type of player that will be a cornerstone for the team and who you could definitely build around.
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