Avoiding the Drop

It’s not for the money, but my story does not exactly fit with the lead in to the original writers’ intros, as I don’t particularly consider myself grown up, or productive, and I certainly don’t have a job that takes up much of my time.  Also I could never get through the Deadspin gatekeepers.  So what exactly am I doing here?  Excellent question.

Nando and I were a package deal

I did not grow up playing soccer.  I did not grow up watching soccer.  In fact, my family hated soccer.  I grew up playing baseball and football.  I don’t think I even kicked a soccerball until I was in middle school.  At that point I was going to school in Davidson NC, which is a fairly soccer obsessed community.  My schoolmates played soccer everyday at recess, so of course I played as well.  By which I mean I cherry picked in front of goal, because lord knows I was not built for soccer, I was built to play left tackle.

My interest in soccer was minimal outside of asking for FIFA every year for my birthday.  Until the summer of 1998, that fateful summer between middle school and high school.  I remember watching most of the World Cup games while talking on the phone with one of my friends who knew much more about soccer than I did, I was starting to get hooked.  And then comes along this young English kid named Michael Owen, and I just had to find more out about this starlet.  Turned out he played for some team called “Liverpool,” who knew?  So twelve years later, my family still hates soccer, I’m obsessed with it, and Michael Owen broke my heart at least twice.  So keep the following bits in mind when reading my pieces.

Club Level: First and foremost, Liverpool Football Club.  Owen turned me on to them, and it stuck.  I remember the Houllier days all too well.  This was before Fox Soccer Channel and myp2p, so I was stuck with reading about games on the internet.  It was not until college that I was really able to get completely immersed.   I shelled out my thirteen bucks a month to listen to the LFC radio broadcasts over the internet, which is one hell of an experience.  Listening to unapologetic homers call a game based on build ups over the radio is intense to say the least, but it was how I loved spending my mornings on the weekend.  One of my fondest memories is having drowned my sorrows in Busch Ice at halftime of Istanbul and hating life, then losing it ninety minutes later as I did irreparable structural damage to my apartment as I leaped around in celebration.  I remember the FA Cup final the next May, listening on the radio as Gerrard took it to penalties on one good leg, yet for some reason I can’t seem to recall any games between then and now, I will just assume they won them all, and that of course Owen is still banging them in on the regular.

I have some peripheral teams of course.  The Fire still have a place in my heart as I am originally a Chicago native.  Galatasaray because they’re my go-to team in Football Manager (I refuse to buy the American version).  Juve and Bordeaux because of Zidane (yet not Madrid, never, ever, ever).  Then there’s  Valencia, because their orange kits remind me of Halloween Oreos.  But it’s LFC above all, I just like to keep an eye on the other leagues, and having a dog in the fight makes it more interesting.

International: Here’s a tricky one.  Obviously I have to support the USA, and every four years I let myself get convinced that this summer will be different (seriously, this summer will be different!).   But with the importance of the World Cup it’s hard to not have another team to support that can, you know, actually compete for the trophy.  As much as that qualifier should eliminate England, I do tend to back them once we’re eliminated, due to the LFC connection.  Though I get tired of English fans giving Americans stick for being bad at the game, it’s not like they’ve won anything since the Johnson Administration.  My ancestry is Polish, but outside of my FIFA saves, they aren’t really lighting up any international tournaments anytime soon.  It would be nice to see The Netherlands win for once; but really, when it comes down to it, as long as it isn’t Italy or a Zidane-less-France, I’ll be happy.  Until recently I had been pulling for Spain due to the LFC presence, but I will not be pulling for any teams with an Alonso on the roster anytime soon, sorry Ivan, your brother ruined it for me.

Odds and Ends:  I’m probably the least employed of the lot here, as I’m a professional student, currently working on degree number three out of five.  If there’s anything I took away from my 140k dollar law degree, it was learning how to use myp2p in class without getting caught (the trick is nodding at the end of every sixth sentence the professor speaks).

I’m a massive Pittsburgh Penguins fan, and have on more than one occasion taken a student loan strictly to buy hockey tickets.   A hockey and soccer fan? Oh yeah, I’m a hit with the ladies.

I don’t wear kits because they’re not designed for barrel-chested Polacks.  But I do rock a mean LFC scarf.

I still watch the Istanbul final at least once a year.  I can be found on many late nights getting misty-eyed watching Gary Mac’s goal against Everton on repeat.

I almost never play with Liverpool in FIFA or FM because I feel bad selling off the players.

My favorite band is Pink Floyd and I cannot believe Fuse hates them.

I have my own blog and my own podcast. I’m a whore.

And that’s about it. I’m looking forward to getting rolling here and lightening the load of the big four.