Post script

Decided tonight, in the midst of some serious procrastination, to check on the old blog and see how it’s gone.  I’m very pleased to know that my post regarding the average number of minutes of actual playing time is the most commonly cited post on here.  While I enjoyed the momentary notariety that came with predicting Jorge Larrionda would red card an American midfielder in our Confederations Cup match against Spain in 2009, I didn’t start the site to criticize refs.  So I’m glad that something useful to others (typically folks making the argument that soccer is boring, unfortunately) has come from the hard work.

When I come across defunct blogs, I often wonder what happened to them.  My story’s about the same as others: the blog started while I was between jobs.  I had lots of free time on my hands, so I began writing about something that I felt wasn’t adequately covered already.  Eventually, I lost all semblance of television access, so I missed lots of games.  Between the missed games, the play of the MNT, and the feeling that soccer was easily (if not often) manipulated, I just lost the passion.  Tried to rekindle it last summer, but the World Cup wasn’t enough.  I barely watch the MNT anymore and find myself relying on updates from my coauthor, wjmooner.

To those MNT fans who still have passion for the team and game, I hope you’ll keep it alive.  The team’s transitioning into something that will ultimately be amazing.  My passion’s faded, but there truly is something wonderful there.  Just don’t dig too deeply into it.  Soccer’s a great game when you truly believe it represents a competition between two teams (or nations) that can be understood through stats.  It’s much less exciting when you look at all those statistics and find how easily the game can be manipulated and how often it actually is.