By Guest Blogger Randy Hahn
With the Sharks returning to the ice, the Athletics in a pennant race, Bonds hitting splash home runs again and the 49ers and Raiders back on the gridiron, the biggest sports success story of the year is getting lost in the shuffle. The San Jose Earthquakes are the best team in Major League Soccer. And by the way, you better hurry and see them soon because they’re getting ready to leave town for good.
The Earthquakes are moving to Houston. At least that’s what my people in the soccer world tell me and the only thing that’s going to stop that is a guardian angel swooping in at the last minute with lots of cash he or she is willing to lose.
After a 2-1 win over Chivas LA on Saturday night the ‘Quakes are the best team in MLS with a record of 15-4-8. This is a team with a rookie head coach (Dominic Kinnear) and a roster of players that does not include the departed Landon Donovan. Actually not many people gave San Jose much of a chance to be good going into the year but all they’ve done is win baby. Thanks to an uninterested media your probably haven’t got a clue who Alejando Moreno, or Brian Ching or Dwayne De Rosario are. They are the heart of a Bay Area pro sports team that has an excellent shot at winning a championship this fall. The problem is that even winning it all won’t be enough to save them.
The Earthquakes need a new place to play. Spartan Stadium may be charming to some but it’s the worst major league sports facility in the Bay Area. The spectator seating area is uncomfortable, bathrooms are antiquated, and there’s no luxury suite revenue stream available. Throw in the fact that many consider Spartan to be located in a less than desirable neighborhood and you’ve got a recipe for failure.
So if you want to see them before they head to Texas get your tickets now because San Jose’s winning soccer team has lost it’s battle to survive in San Jose.
Randy Hahn is one of the most respected sports announcers in the Bay Area and the long-time voice of the San Jose Sharks.
Who are your “people in the soccer world”? SSV has been working tirelessly to keep the quakes here and we should all remain optomistic they will succeed. Your “information” is nothing more than re-hashed old news articles from the past year. Everyone should come out and see our fabulous Earthquakes Soccer team because they are good and play an exciting game of soccer and will continue to be a hallmark in Bay Area sports. Go Earthquakes!
Politics and power
Politics
It is my best judgment to say that the reason nobody is interested on the Earthquakes (soccer team) is because of most of the guys are not local.
I lot of hard work and dedications had being put on this sport by many young man but without any rewards in return. So,
We would like to see our buddies playing on the professional league, the local guys that went to school with us or family members who play the sport. This is what makes a loving team, the people who are in it. Unfortunately Soccer teams can not be put together as Foot ball teams do; otherwise soccer could be the number one sport in America.
Power
The best promotion is not the money that is spent on TV commercials, news paper or on the radio; it is the emotion of the people. When the fans connect with the team the team is never along, the fans are always there to cheer up the game. This is the power of LOVE.
So, get more local people to be the emotion of the promotion.
Thanks God this is not a spelling bee.
Let me be your voice
Here’s the reality that no one seems to get. San Jose has been through boom and bust. The tech boom ended in 2000. Since then, it’s been bust for the city.
We lost a symphony. We lost our faith in city hall because of Ron Gonzales and Terry Gregory. The Earthquakes will be the next loss.
There is a real threat that the team will be moved to Houston, as the LA based ownership seems to have written off this market, despite its obvious potential. But we’re working hard to keep them here. We need some leadership, and we’re hoping to find some in the South Bay. San Jose should do everything it can to keep the Earthquakes, who have a thirty year old tradition here in San Jose, give or take a few in the late 80s and early 90s…
Here’s a concept: If the Earthquakes want a new stadium the Earthquakes owners should find a lender, build the stadium, and pay off the loan with future revenue.
Sports franchises should not get handouts. The “guardian angle” Randy refers to with “lots of cash he or she is willing to lose” would be a sucker to enter into such a deal.
The Bermudas triangle
No body knows if it was a myth or a legend, but the true is that Silicon Valley once was the center of the Tech Universe. Here the whole world evolved into what we are today, the wireless IT people.
The rumor is that somebody decided to dismantle the settings for more profit, bringing poverty into the valley. Nobody had the power to stop it so the whole treasure is gone or leaving (who cares).
No art, no sport, no money no honey, no nothing, just whining about what it could be and we didn’t do. We turn into the “me, myself and I” society. We see politicians doing it for themselves, investors for their profits and families for their survival. The mentality of lets screw them before they screw me is the doctrine. Mercy on this old man!
The solution is so simple.
Investor investing on transportation
We can be the center of attraction again if we invest on transportation, expansion, relocation, living cost (affordability), and cheap labor. All of this without leaving the bay area, a 4 (four) point communication and distribution system.
Starting from Sacramento, Oakland San Francisco, San Jose Salinas, Fresno Modesto and the rest of what is going to be the world largest industrial park. All connected with the fastest trains that we known today. Just imagine the power of attracting new companies again. This is what I call visualization,
Solution! my friend
Solutions!
Thanks Got this is not an IQ test!
Let me be your voice and your friend
SSV and the Earthquakes’ fans aren’t looking for a handout. They are looking for help from San Jose’s leadership to help them get an owner who WILL build a stadium, which will be profitable. You can sit around and be defeated and have pipe dreams of a baseball team while one of the best things about San Jose slips away, or you can actually do something to assist SSV’s effort.
I just wanted to respond to Mr. Guerrero’s comment above. Sir, the Earthquakes have lots of local ties. The head coach, Dominic Kinnear, is a native of Fremont. His assistant, John Doyle, is a local native as well and is active with a number of leagues in the Pleasanton area. Goalkeeper coach Tim Hanley grew up on the Peninsula.
Among the players, Ryan Cochrane went to Santa Clara.
Troy Dayak grew up in Livermore and lives in Tracy.
Robby Fulton, Roger Levesque, and James Twellman went to Stanford.
Kevin Goldthwaite grew up in Sacramento.
Kelly Gray is from San Jose and went to Leigh High School.
Aaron Lanes grew up in Mill Valley and went to UC Santa Cruz.
Julian Nash grew up in San Leandro.
Orlando Ramirez grew up in Fresno and went to Fresno Pacific University.
Brett Rodriguez is from Saratoga and went to Bellarmine Prep in Santa Clara.
Chris Wondolowski grew up in Danville and went to high school at De La Salle in Concord.
That’s 12 players on a 28-man roster with significant local ties, not to mention the entire coaching staff. I would be very surprised if any the Sharks, A’s, Giants, 49ers, Raiders, or Warriors could come anywhere near that percentage. The Earthquakes have done a great job bringing in local players and there are many more with Northern California roots playing in the league.
If you know of young players locally whom you think could contribute to the team, I recommend you contact the front office.
Judging from what I’ve seen of the soccer world, what San Jose lacks most is not an adequate stadium but an adequately maniacal fan base. Locals here simply lack the characteristics that the sport has demonstrated as necessary to really support a team. We certainly lack the crazed, unwarranted national and local pride that, along with gallons of beer, seems to energize soccer fans throughout Europe and Latin America. Now, that’s not to say we don’t have our lowbrows around here, but obviously not enough of them to support both soccer and the Oakland Raiders.
Or is it just possible that a game based on not much more than keep-away and dramatic acting is too boring for the sane and sober?
How can we expect San Joseans to support a team if our fans can’t even generate a single soccer-related riot or murder?—not even an assault on a hated official. We are hopelessly deficient in hooligans and half-wits, and our cost-of-living has left us severely short of men irresponsible enough to give-up their wives and children for their beer and team. In reality, most San Joseans are so confused that they think they can call themselves soccer fans just because they show up at their children’s games.
Our only chance for soccer greatness lies in a future as economically bleak as found in Manchester or as wildly lawless as in Bogotá. That’s what it will take to get our soccer stadium filled with raucous, drunken fans and surrounded by nervous, helmeted riot cops.
I guess one can only dream.
But don’t give up hope, soccer fans; I suspect we voters have put the right people in place to eventually make your dreams come true.
When the Sharks first played in the Arena, how many of the seventeen thousand people in attendance do you think even cared about hockey? And even today, how many of them do you think even try to understand what icing is all about? They were all there because the Arena was the in thing. It was a place to see and be seen. Same thing with SBC Park.
So get the hint, all you soccer aplologists. San Jose needs a new venue where we can party- a place where the latest food craze is served together with the hottest brand of pinot noir.
I can’t help but believe that if Tom McEnery or Susan Hammer were mayor, there would be action from city hall to save the team. The gang that can’t shoot straight in office now just don’t care about San Jose.
What should we expect from a carpetbagger from sunnyvale.
From line # 6
I forgot to mention that in the Bermudas triangle there was a city called Atlantida . It was (supposed to be) the center of civilization (schools of thought) and the heart of civilization.
Unfortunately they have to move to another land in search of one good stadium and a good job, and good friends and good politicians and good of everything.
Case closed line # 8 Your statistics says it all.
Not only does frustrated finfan show his ignorance of – and bigotry towards – The Beautiful Game, he also shows his ignorance of contemporary economics. Manchester economically bleak? Try economically vibrant, my friend, with an art, music and cultural scene to rival even that of the SF Bay Area. On Bogotá, though, I submit that he may be correct.
FinFan is on it as usual.
On the sportsfan intensity meter the bay area barely registers a pulse.
But what if all the other pro soccer teams were owned by Halliburton, WalMart, etc. and say the league commissioner was Donald Rumsfeld and say the local team was owned by a consortium of bay area moonbats led by our own loveable, lefty sweetheart Cindy Sheehan.
That would be the recipe for generating the needed fan intensity to support a local soccer team.
Other than that, it’s turn out the lights.
The fan intensity is already there. Go to a game and see it.
May be this is a job for a man with credentials.
May be Arnold, the man with credentials, can help us solve this problem.
Arnold, the man with credentials, we want more revenue for the City how can we do it?
Arnold, please show me your good will!
Thanks God that I don’t need credentials to write at SANJOSEINSIDE.COM
Evaristo Guerrero II
Let me be myself
I nominate #9 and # 14 as Posts of the Week. (I know it’s only Monday, but I doubt that anyone can top the wit and wisdom of these two posts by the end of the week.)
Let’s face it, there are lots of folks like me who cannot get excited about watching a bunch of guys trot around a field who can’t get a small ball into a very big space very often at all. Back and forth back and forth.
And the players all imitate Rick Barry when a foul occurs.
I went to several games, most notably Brazil games when the World Cup was here ages ago. Sitting in Stanford Stadium with no alcohol watching people trot back and forth, back and forth, back and forth would have been hell except for the fact that we were seated next to a bunch of Brazilians who generated the only excitement in the stadium. There is certainly rarely any excitment on the field of play.
Its the venue! The city should build a sports complex, with a main soccer field with a swanky club, and with adjacent smaller soccer fields for the huge AYSO childrens games. It would be bustling on weekends and families would stay for Earthquakes games at night.
Where is the vision in this town?
There are also lot’s of folks unlike #18’s JohnMichael O’Connor, who have gone to see The Beautiful Game with an open mind and have fallen in love with it and the tremendous excitement of the games. They have learned first hand why it is the most popular game in the world and why The Earthquakes can draw a full house to see them battle it out with the LA Galaxy.
Wow! After reading some of the “words of wisdom” in the comments here (line nos. 2, 9, 14, 17, 18) I think I must have gone to sleep and awoken somewhere in middle Oklahoma or North Eastern Idaho. This is the vibrant San Francisco Bay area, the great melting pot which knows about what’s going on around them and elsewhere in the world?
I forgot the number one rule of the redneck creed – Ignorance rules first, and then spit whatever words with the tobacco out.
Unlike baseball and the other major sports in the US, being an advocate for soccer is not going to mean much for a politician in terms of revenues, votes, poll numbers, or resume enhancement for future runs for public office. Sad to say, soccer in the South Bay will find little or no help from outside its circle with regard to this fight.
Al # 20: I had a very open mind when I watched soccer live. My very open mind was bored senseless, except for the ever-partying Brazilians in the stands.
We like what we like. Winning ways or not, watching soccer just doesn’t make it for me…and apparently for countless millions in the USA.
A winning team like the Earthquakes deserves to be where there are enough fans to make the team economically viable. That may not be here, and local fans will be the losers. I’m just not one of them.
Great Article! Awesome Announcer.
(Last Year) I, went to a excellent event sponsered by Silicon Valley Soccer to promote saving the Earth Quakes in San Jose.
I was suprised to see Santa Clara’s Mayor Patti Mahan there supporting the effort and San Jose’s Mayor Ron absent.
I hope The Earth Quakes mangement is smart enough to talk with Santa Clara to keep the team in the area.
My childrens teams recently played at The new Santa Clara Soccer Park and it is state of the art.
It is funny how the children of one community are training on better fields than the Professional Players of The Championship Earth Quakes.
It is time to build a new Soccer Stadium in a good clean area.
Paul
Although I’m not a sports fan and couldn’t care less about the Quakes, I have to put my two cents in here and state that FinFan has sized things up perfectly yet again. To tie bigotry to his statements is ridiculous. Since when is telling it like it is a bigoted thing to do?
I just finished watching Liverpool play someone on TV while having lunch. I have to admit it was more interesting than listening to Woody Paige and Skip Bayless yell at each other about sports.
But I had an epiphany. For us non-soccer fans, the incredible dullness of watching a whole bunch of guys jog and kick is almost as bad as watching baseball players scratch and spit. For most of each of these “sports” nothing goes on. Baseball and soccer are perfect to TIVO, since there is such limited action.
So, my modest proposal to enliven soccer. Reduce the team members on the field by at least three. Only let one-half of the players go beyond the mid-line, whatever you cal it in soccer. By the way, what’s with that big circle in the middle of the field?
MOST important—only two players from each team can enter that big rectangle outside the smaller one where the goalie can roam at the same time. The maybe we’d get some scoring.
Hey, basketball players from two competing teams put a ball about the same size as a soccer ball into a very small net at least 150 times each game. Soccer players can’t get the same size ball into a huge, honking net area more than three or four times in a game. BORING!
The absolute worst part – bar none – about soccer is when the international types start to “fight”.
Given the players obsession with Keith Cassidy-esque hair, ponytails, coifs, and hair products you can probably guess what happens.
They start running around trying to kick each other like girls in a school yard.
I’ll never forget the US-Mexico game, in LA of all places, where Alexi Lalas and a mexican player squared off and were talking smack – the mexican then proceeds to kick Lalas square in the nutz dropping him on the spot.
The Beautiful Game indeed.
JohnMichael O’Connor, “May the Lord bless you and protect you.”
Readers of this article may also be interested in the blog which was recently launched by Soccer Silicon Valley, the grassroots group which is working locally to make sure that the Earthquakes stay right here in San Jose. The address is http://blog.soccersiliconvalley.com
EricSJ: Lord knows I need protection…sometimes from myself.
But the Lord watches over drunks and Irishmen…or is that redundant?
Novice,
You’re sooooooo right on the mark! I mean, like, masculine role models like Dennis Rodman are what America needs, because they’re like, uhh, American!! And yes, yes, all these soccer players are like, so girly, girly. Vinnie Jones was the ultimate example of that, don’t you think?
Marty,
If you’ll read what I said you will find:
– That I didn’t trash the game, just one of the *worst aspects of the game*. If you want to defend players chasing other players around the field trying to kick them then go for it.
– That I singled out international types because I’ve yet to see an American player chasing another player trying to kick him.
Ok, maybe Fin was a bit harsh – the world cup and the wc qualifiers are definitely worthy. But otherwise – the average game is almost as exciting as watching the Cubs and the Brewers tangle.
BTW, was Vinnie Jones the ex-Piston? Nicknamed the “Microwave” because he heated up and scored tons of points as soon as entered the game.
http://www.sporting-pictures.com/emotions/emotions4.htm
Here’s what the folks in Denver are doing:
http://www.denverpost.com/business/ci_3070139
18,000 person soccer stadium with 24 soccer fields adjacent to it. They expect 1.5M visitors annually, and naming rights from a national company. (Similar to Pizza Hut Park outside of Dallas.) Why can’t we do something like that here?
JohnMichael O’Connor : I meant to say, “May the Lord protect you from early senility kicking in.” ‘Cause, you sure sound delusional with some of your statements.
Well Colin,
Earlier in the blog you said: “There is a real threat that the team will be moved to Houston”, but the latest SSV newsletter seems to indicate local investors are making progress on aquiring the team. This seems a bit contradictory.
But wouldn’t the fact that we could do something like what Denver is doing lure local investors? Or are the current negotiations proceeding independent of any stadium issues?
WOW! What comments!!
Aztecs, upon losing a soccer match, were put to death! So why have we lost that ability to sacrifice. While I would agree with JMO in most of his tirads! Soccer, should reanact the sacrificial offerings!
Unlike Hocky, where the players are allowed to plumet each other untill one drops to the ice, toothless!.
I belive it would be approprite to offer our top political leader to give the game it’s offering to the Gods upon a loss!
Is it not a fact that our leader control the arts, why not allow them to control the soccer legacy of the House of Pain. Step Right Up!
Jason:
It is not contradictory to say that the owners want to move the team to Houston and that local investors are looking at acquiring the team. And yes, a facility like the one in Dallas would go a long way to helping keep the team here.
Wow that is so true.