RHINO DROPPINGS
August 3, 2006
Last time out: Rochester, led by a tremendous effort by the Stampede, staged a two-goal come-from-behind victory against the defending champions from Seattle last Friday night at PAETEC Park. Seattle performed admirably, and continued to look dangerous well into the second half despite being in the middle of a tough three-matches-in-five-days road trip. But facing 19 shots was too much to overcome for the Sounders, whose lack of depth was revealed as they lost each game of their swing through the Great Lakes region.
Johnny Menyongar scored for the second straight match for the Rhinos, and defender Kenny Bertz made the league’s Team of the Week. More important, however, was the return of John Ball, who sat out Rochester’s disappointing 1-1 draw against Toronto one week earlier. Take a look at these numbers for the last six league games:
Average Rhinos shots on goal when Ball starts: 20.34
Average Rhinos shots on goal when Ball doesn’t start: 8.67
The moral of that story is fricking start John Ball!
On Wednesday night, the Rhinos lost a penalty kick heartbreaker to New England in the US Open Cup. It was, because of the heat, an admirable performance from both sides. Scott Vallow kept Rochester in it with a Herculean performance while, on the flip side of things, second have Rev sub Willie Sims’ performance was bad enough to make even Jimmy Tanner point and laugh. RD would have loved to see him miss a PK at the end to lose.
RD’s favorite moment was almost watching Rochester players wringing buckets of sweat out of their shirts between regulation and the first overtime. But then something happened to trump that sight: Laurie Calloway screaming at Rhino sideline employees to turn the fricking (except he probably didn’t use that word) music down because the team couldn’t hear his instructions. On one hand, the near-immediate lowering of the volume is a clear indication that it is, in fact, possible to make it quieter. On the other hand, it sends a pretty clear message that the club would rather jeopardize its on-field performance than take the chance that someone in the stands is momentarily bored by a lack of some type of aural assault.
RD assumed the volume would have been a lot lower last night, so that when season ticket holders stormed the stadium with torches and pitchforks for Saturday’s “town hall” meeting, management could say, “Hey, wasn’t it better on Wednesday? Isn’t that progress?” No such luck. Player intros hit 107 decibels, and just about every that flew out of Rocky’s head was over 100 dBA. Introductions of several Rhino PK-takers cracked 110 dBA. The music got louder and louder, and somebody made the brilliant decision to not only continue the gangsta rap (T.I.’s “What You Know”), but also add Eminem’s “Lose Yourself” into the music mix. Sure, it was edited, but it doesn’t take a genius to figure out Em is saying “motherfucking” a couple of times. Nice job with that family atmosphere.
Next up: This year, RD is proud to partner with soccersam.com to bring you Special New Match Previews, which are going to be the same as the Regular Old Match Previews, only in a different location.
Click here for the match preview (a new window will open)
Around the (A-)League: Atlanta’s first home loss of 2006 came via a Mauro Biello stoppage-time goal as the Impact grabbed three from the S-Backs. Gabe Gervais left the game in the 8th minute with a groin injury, which RD prays will keep the bastard out of action for approximately two weeks. David Hayes scored Atlanta’s goal in the 2-1 loss, and the S-Backs were without suspended defender Antonio de la Torre.
Miami FC toppled visiting Puerto Rico by a 3-2 score, with all five goals coming in the first half. This means that Miami’s last four halves of soccer (dating back to the 5-4 slugfest at PTP) have seen 14 goals tallied. RD’s newest Most Hated Player, Mario “El Loco” Rodriguez had a goal, and assisted on one of Romário’s two strikes.
The most amazing part about the aforementioned Miami-PR game was that there were only three yellow cards handed out. That all changed during Sunday’s rematch – a 1-0 Islanders win with nine yellows and the ejection of Zinho. Between the two clubs, they’ve had a total on nine red cards in 2006. That’s some good old-fashioned Atlantic hospitality!
Seattle had only a day to lick their wounds before traveling up to Toronto, where they were thumped 4-2 by the former bottom-feeders. The Lynx scored twice in the final five minutes to secure the victory, which made Minnesota the new laughingstock of the league. Cameron Weaver scored again for Seattle, but he also picked up his fourth straight yellow card. Because it has to suck being a great player on a lame team.
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