3rd Degree the Podcast #313

[00:00:00] Speaker A: Hit the button. Buzz. Buzz. Did you hit the button? [00:00:02] Speaker B: Yeah, I already hit the button. [00:00:03] Speaker A: Hit the button. [00:00:04] Speaker B: I mashed the button earlier today. [00:00:06] Speaker A: Mash. Mash that motherf ing button. [00:00:08] Speaker B: Oh, that I gotta cut. [00:00:11] Speaker A: Yeah. [00:00:19] Speaker C: Third Degree, the Third Degree nepa. [00:00:24] Speaker A: Third Degree, the Third Degree NEP Podcast. Third Degree the Third Degree ne. Third Degree Third Degree Podcast. [00:00:35] Speaker B: Third Degree the podcast is brought to you by listeners like you. If you enjoy what we do on this podcast or on third degree.net or any of our social media, why not join [email protected] thirddegree or just share what we do. Share our podcast with other FC Dallas fans. People, you know, people that are curious about professional soccer and dfw. Send them our way and we. That's the best way you can support what we do. Enjoy the podcast. [00:01:02] Speaker A: Well, hello there, DFW area soccer curious fan. You welcome to Third Degree, the podcast. This is episode 313. And we have him again today. Dan Crook. Howdy, Dan. [00:01:14] Speaker C: Hello. That was a very curious way to open things. [00:01:18] Speaker A: Would you like me to try something different next time? [00:01:20] Speaker C: No, no. It was glorious. [00:01:22] Speaker A: Okay. You like that? All right. And your hero, My hero. Everybody's hero. Editor, Founder, third degree.net and the original soccer influencer, Buzz Carrick. Come in, Buzz. [00:01:34] Speaker B: Peter, as an official Newcastle United fan, I would like to thank you and your club for saving my bacon on the Champions League. [00:01:46] Speaker A: Yeah. I can't believe you guys lost to Everton, for Christ's sake. [00:01:49] Speaker B: I know. I was watching that game going, what are we doing? [00:01:52] Speaker A: Somebody explained to me how Newcastle and Aston Villa have everything to play for and they both turn out two of the worst performances of their seasons. That's really crazy to me. [00:02:05] Speaker B: If I knew pressure, I guess. [00:02:07] Speaker A: I guess you could kind of make an argument that maybe Everton's got, you know, some sort of fight in him. United was just there for the taken. And yeah, it almost was like Aston Villa was trying not to. Like they would rather not play in the Champions League next year. I know everybody's going to try to make. Hey. About the. The. The call. But that's not the reason why Aston Villa is not in the Champions League. Sorry, kids. So no. [00:02:31] Speaker B: And. And I even was at the start of the Newcastle game. The commentary even says something about Everton had brought in some young guys for the game. And I was like, I guess they were fired up because they played really well. So Newcastle did not. [00:02:42] Speaker A: Congratulations, Buzz. It's been a good season for you. My palace friends, my spurs friends. If I had some Aberdeen friends, I could root for them too. All the Scott McTominay fans. Boy, it's been a good season for underdogs. Well, except for one, Luton Town. [00:03:02] Speaker C: I have no idea what you're on about. At least not. No, Forest bottled it. [00:03:09] Speaker A: They did bottle it for sure. What's Watford up to? Because I know that's like your. I know that's your nemesis. [00:03:17] Speaker C: Yeah. Fortunately, they've still never won a major trophy and probably never will. [00:03:22] Speaker B: Okay, very looking forward to stomping Sunderland twice next year. [00:03:26] Speaker C: I hope they break the record. [00:03:27] Speaker B: I know. [00:03:29] Speaker A: Boy, talk about underdogs. That would apply to one football club, Dallas, who are. This episode comes on the heels of one of the worst, worser weeks. Worse is a word right, in club history as Dallas gets knocked out of the US Open cup up at Red Bull and then go to their personal hellhole of Seattle and get tonked there. One nothing. And it's not a good week, Buzz and I, you know, every time I watch this team play of late, I think my biggest issue with them is I just have no idea what this team is, you know, even with Nico, you know, with Lucho and Nico, there was Lucho Ball and Nico Ball and we didn't like either one of those things, but at least we knew what it was. And when I watch Quill's team, current team, I can't tell if they're a transition team, a possession team, a sit back and park the bus team. I honestly have zero clue, Buzzy. [00:04:30] Speaker B: Well, I'm not sure that they have. [00:04:31] Speaker A: A clue, but that's a problem, right? [00:04:33] Speaker B: Yeah, it's definitely. [00:04:34] Speaker A: That's a problem. [00:04:35] Speaker B: I mean, it's pretty clear that Quill is still searching for whatever magic he can sew together and get this thing going the right direction, you know, and, and from game to game, depending on the shape and depending on who's in there, you know, whether they have those three guys covering the back or not, or when they actually find some width or not. You know, there's sometimes that they, they look better and lose and then there are times that they play this really boring, conservative sit deep and they scrape out results. So it's like I, you know, he's got some problems on his hands trying to figure out how to play. And like anyone who wants to yell at us because it's like, no, this team's got this potential, that potential. Dude, your record is what it is. You know, you're one win ahead of where the last coach got fired. You know, you're basically right where the previous question for that Got fired. And I know it's his first season, and I know they'll probably give him some time, but, you know, we also hear this club talking about playoffs at a minimum. So, you know, he's fighting for his job, probably. Maybe. We don't know, but he's certainly fighting to get his team in the playoffs. You know, all I can say that the. The best thing I could say about this week is that it doesn't look like the team has quit. Like, they rotated a bunch in Seattle, and those guys all fought and played pretty hard. It doesn't look like they're turning on each other or anything like that. Like, no one's yelling each other. I mean, we get some moose at Acosta, whatever, but those guys are like that all the time. You know, there's not any extra finger pointing happening. So I feel like they're still emotionally in it together, pulling and fighting and. And maybe that's a positive on the other side of the coin. Like, you're right. Every time we watch it, the team looks completely different. I did another thing today, and they were like, what's it going to look like? And I was, man, I have no idea what's going to look like. You don't know what you're going to get, you know, with this team. [00:06:19] Speaker A: Yeah. You were talking about records, and we were bringing this up, or you brought this up on your discord. You know, it was this time last year, we were tracking this to be the worst team in club history, and yet Quill is only three points better, has a worse goal differential, and got knocked out of the open cup around earlier. [00:06:38] Speaker B: Yeah. [00:06:38] Speaker A: Not good. [00:06:39] Speaker B: No, it's not good. I mean, it's not. It's not on track for that worst season ever, you know, not at this point. But there have been some bad seasons, like the season. Lucio. Sorry that Lucci Gonzalez got fired. Where it started out okay, and then it fell off. So, like, there's a lot of soccer left. So it's far, far from determined what this season is going to look like. [00:07:00] Speaker A: And the west is cramped. [00:07:02] Speaker B: And the west is cramped. I mean, you know, there's. There's. There's a couple wins different from the top part of the group. So there's no reason to, like, bail out on the season yet in those terms. And. And from the fact that we have seen. Not lately, but we have seen positive road performances. We have seen moments where they look good, and then we see moments where they look absolutely horrific with, like, the 5, 0 loss. And then you have a game like Seattle where they lost one nothing. But like that actually looked like a pretty competent, you know, shut it down kind of performance with a bunch of rotations. So it's like you just don't know what you're going to get with this team. And I think you're right that they don't know what they have yet. They haven't figured it out yet what they're going to be doing. [00:07:40] Speaker A: Dan, in your fancy English accent, would you like to try to describe the current state of FC Dallas? [00:07:49] Speaker C: Oh, I think the perfect way to sum it up is their away record versus the home record in a league that explain advantage is so, so, so huge. They somehow have a great away record and absolute dog at home. Like obviously the, the pieces are there, they're able to get results. But where you, you cannot afford to give up results. They are giving them up. It's beggars belief. [00:08:21] Speaker A: Well, Buzz, let's start off with the US Open cup game, which was up at Red Bull. And it appears Eric tried to go all out with a lineup. [00:08:30] Speaker B: Oh, for sure. [00:08:31] Speaker A: Significant lineup and an interesting performance in many ways. I don't know what, what is your, what are your big takeaways from lo ks? [00:08:43] Speaker B: Well, it's obviously a bummer to to lose, but you know, they, they did play quill shape that he would like to play the 4, 2, 3, 1. You know, it did open the game up a little bit and it provided them, you know, with better, I thought, chance creation than we've seen in quite a while. But this is the real dichotomy of this team. Like it looks better, but they didn't get a result. You know, they tied the game. That's decent. But remember too that New York didn't have their big guns in. They went with a little bit of a lesser team and then brought in their guys midway through the game. So, you know, maybe one of Lucho's better games, his goal was absolutely fantastic. But then yet he blew the first pk. And you know, we talked when he scored that first goal, I was like, man, that's a great dp Big player, big moment goal. Because it put them back up. I think it was. Or tied at either one. Whatever it was, it was a big moment play and then the next big moment, he bones it trying to Paninka and puts his team in a hole and you're starting off the. The pks down on a goal. [00:09:49] Speaker A: What is it with Dallas Argentinians trying Panenkas in critical PK situations? [00:09:54] Speaker C: Oh, normally they work this time. [00:09:59] Speaker B: But the takeaways from that game is like New York, of course, is a pressing team. They don't press quite as much as they used to, but they still, still press. A lot of Dallas was absolutely horrific at getting past midfield and that press, they just, they pause's feet were the worst I think I've seen them. They just really struggled to build out at all. And they were resorted to like a really one dimensional game, except that they were in the game and you ended up with this 2, 2 game. You know, you compare that with the next one and it's very, very different. So Quill talks a lot about how they deserve to win. I don't know, man. You know, I, I think they were in the game and they had a chance to win, but that's not the same as deserving to win. When you have guys making mental mistakes like Ramirez turning away from the shot and let, and deflecting it into the goal, that's the game tying goal, you know, and just general bad decisions here and there and mistakes here and there, that doesn't make you deserve to win. That's why you didn't win, you know. And then on the other side of the coin, Bernie Camungo looked the best he's looked since 2023. Paxton came in and immediately had three or four, just absolutely stunning, you know, multiple line breaking passes. That makes me so excited for when that guy's back in and playing consistently. So it's, it was just a real uneven performance collectively, you know, you did think, I thought going late in that game and they got a chance to win this and then they commit that stupid foul, you know, and give that free kick and then Romaro turns his, Romero turns his back and then later he gets the red card, you know, so he'll miss the next Open cup game. He plays for Dallas, whatever that is. If ever he might, that might be one of the great jokes going forward is, oh, don't forget Ramiro has a red card. [00:11:40] Speaker A: He's our version of Clint Dempsey. [00:11:41] Speaker B: Yeah, yeah, I mean, because I mean, no saying he's back next year given the way things are going, so. [00:11:46] Speaker A: And the problem, Dan, is, is that this was really Quill's only real chance probably. I mean, maybe we're being, I'm being overly pessimistic about the league season, but. [00:11:55] Speaker C: It'S the best chance. [00:11:56] Speaker A: It was their best chance to win something this season and to go out this early is kind of. [00:12:01] Speaker C: Yeah, yeah, it's, it's, it's annoying because there's a Sense of oh, it was unlucky. Yeah, sure it was. You lose penalty shootout, you. You tie up a game because of a, you know, a deflection. Yeah. On face of it, that is unlucky. But you started against a B team, you shouldn't need luck. I thought they did well to identify that New York does not know what to do with the ball. So you know, seed possession, that, that was great. They definitely switched to the back three a few minutes too early. Again, understand the reason. You want to give them the ball, you want them to panic, you want them to overthink it. But Dallas doesn't defend well with a back three. I thought maybe going into extra time that you may have bought Pedrinha on for Lalas to. To kind of bring it back to a back four. They did very well. Second half of extra time to kind of get back on the front foot. But yeah, ultimately they, they went and played a weakened team and they, they didn't look like they played a weakened team. They looked like the weakened team. [00:13:18] Speaker B: This game was an example of when one of the real dual states of FC Dallas, they only had like six shots in this game. Dallas did. They got out shot like 15 to 6, I think it was. But of Dallas's shots, four of the six were on target and you're forced to save or got a goal. So this is what we talk about all the time. Like the quality of the chance, the quality opportunity. Like this is where XG comes into discussions. You compare that to the Seattle game where they had. Dallas had 15 shots but only five of them were got got on goal. So that's only one in three when you had. Instead of having like 80% on target previous game. Right. So it's just not. It's a real he Jacqueline Hyde team when they are patient enough to get in the box and get good scoring opportunities, you get multiple goals. Like the two goals in New York when you go to Seattle and you're just blasting it from everywhere. And the best scoring chance was the Abubakar chance late in the game when he pitted off the post from like 40 yards out. Not 40. It's exaggeration, but those games just were total opposites of the nature of this club and every game being completely different. [00:14:19] Speaker A: The best part of the Boubacar moment was the first touch to set himself up to hit it on this half volley, which I thought was. I think that was the shocker of the moment, which it was a really. [00:14:29] Speaker B: Nice play from him, especially because we ripped him a couple weeks ago. When he didn't shoot, when he tried to cross to nobody. Well take. He looked learned his lesson. Didn't he pull the trigger. So. [00:14:37] Speaker A: So Dallas, obviously to your point, Buzz goes to Seattle and has at this point has done a lot of travel. [00:14:43] Speaker B: Yeah. [00:14:44] Speaker A: Trying to manage all this since this is like the. This is the third or fourth game in 10 days, something like that. [00:14:49] Speaker B: And yeah, three in a week. [00:14:52] Speaker A: And it's just going to continue this week obviously and we'll talk about that here in a little bit. But it's a day game. It was. It was. The game was going on while we were doing the radio show. So I didn't. I didn't get to see it live or anything. We were kind of watch the score. The score bug on the computer in the background. And I was. I kept thinking, oh man, this starting lineup was such a rotation heavy. Yeah, you know, it was weird. It's almost like that is the lineup at the beginning of the season. I imagine Quill would use in I don't know like an early round open cup game or you know, that kind of situation or maybe even this is. Maybe this is a prime example of why you would want to use this lineup. But there are other parts of me think that, you know, this is. There's a lot of guys in there. He's having to use his starters too. [00:15:38] Speaker B: Yeah. Mark Faran's coming back, you know, and gets a start and we can have a discussion eventually probably about whether Faran or Norris is the way to move going forward. Or maybe they'll just share time. Right. Irot is playing Iaga came back into center back and Abubakar went out to right back to give more game off. Ramiro's in as the sixth and he went with the triple. You know the. This diamond for. We call that has three holding mids, three sixes in there with Delgado and show Cafe Mana with Ramiro. Which is why you get a game where Seattle had very limited opportunities, only scored because of the PK they got by Irad's flapping chicken arm. Pedrinha was in for acosta at the 10 because acosta was on yellow card suspension and Julio played in Farrington rotated in formusa so it's like a 50% rotation. But again because they played this, this deeper block four three. When they have the three guys across, they were able to really limit the other team. Padrino had a pretty good game. All thinkings consider trying to fill in. It's one of the first times that he started and I thought, well, that Actually looked pretty good, like six shot creating actions, four key passes, you know, four progressive passes. He was two for two on take. Like a solid Padrino game in the neighborhood of the way Lucho Casa plays. Because ordinarily Pedrinho has been bad in starts. For me, he's much better off the bench. But, you know, Farrington, you know, worked hard but didn't really do much. My biggest complaint about this game, I think was that they had zero open play crosses, zero crosses into the box, in action, live action. And I just don't really understand quite why when you have strikers like Musa, who's a great box post up goal poacher, can get in there on those crosses. Farrington is super active, super dynamic, pulls guys out of shape, but also gets back in there and gets for both. Like why you're not getting any crosses in when you have those guys. And it may just be that when they're playing with a right back who's really a center back and Marco Farfett a left back who's not an adventurous attacker, all you have three sixes in there and no real wings under the Anderson Julio, who's not playing as a wing. There just wasn't anybody to provide any real width in Seattle. And so you end up with this tactic where there's no crosses and it just seems really one dimensional again. So Quill's got this horrible decision to make in a way of do I go with a double pivot, open the game up and try and play when maybe I don't get those results as good, or do I go with this really stingy, really defensive thing? And when, and try with Acosta and Musa to win games when you get a chance, one chance and win the game, that's, you know, tough call. [00:18:10] Speaker A: I feel like we had this conversation about Estevez last year, last couple years, like just that's why he's playing defensively, because this is the team that he's been given and the only way he's ever going to grind out a result is to play this kind of ugly, boring thing. [00:18:24] Speaker B: And this is exactly the same discussion because in the off season, remember Quill was like, we're going to play really attacking, really open, we're going to get forward fast. Yeah, and we talked a lot about the games are going to be high scoring because he's going to be really offense, this offense is terrible. And the way this team competes at its best is when they bunker in with this, you know, very defensive shape until maybe you get a couple million dollar midfielders. Back down the next month or so, maybe it'll change. But for now, he doesn't, he doesn't really have the team to open it up and he doesn't really have the defense to play behind a team that wants to open it up. [00:18:55] Speaker A: Yeah, and I, I think what's concerning is if you just kind of take a moment and take stock of the season, especially trending over the, over the last, you know, April into May, you know, when was the last time Dallas beat a team? Well, it was Miami, but that was a very rotated Miami game, Miami team, and then before that, the three other teams they've beaten this year are two teams behind them in the standings and the opening game against Houston. And that's it. [00:19:29] Speaker B: Yeah. [00:19:29] Speaker A: And then what's really concerning is our friend Armin in your discord a little while ago, earlier today, we're recording this on Monday evening, posted some really alarming Armin stat nerd stuff about, you know, the team's status in terms of XG and XD differential and all of that. And he's. I mean, I won't get into it because of everybody tired head. And I can't explain it as well as Armin did, but the, the spoiler alert is, is Dallas is really bad. And it's, and it's, it's bad in a very concerning way because there isn't really anything consistent to hold on to that says, okay, don't worry everybody. This is, this is a work in progress. Things will get better. Unless we want to go back and say all of this is going to hinge, because I think this is the craziest part of this story. I think a lot of what we're dealing with is the fact that Sebastian Legette got hurt and he's been like this missing talisman that they've somehow been really reliant on. And maybe him coming back and Paxton coming back to full health are the little tiny elements they need to unlock some sort of positive run this season. [00:20:37] Speaker B: Well, when we think back to the beginning of the season, we talked a lot about the team's inability to play through the middle of the field, and it went drop a cliff. When Legit went out, it got even worse. You know, with him, they were 3, 2 and 2, which was 11 points, and without him they were 14 and 2, which is 5 points. So, you know, it's not, I don't think at the end of the day, just that they lost Legit. If you'd have had other guys, if Paxton wouldn't be healthy, we wouldn't have this conversation. It's, it's the ability that he has, not necessarily like some innate, you know, superstar value in, in legit himself. It's 2 million dollar central midfielders that are missing that could, you know, one you knew was going to be out for the first half of the year, but the other one you were hoping was going to be available and it really has hurt them and made them one dimensional when he went away. You can just think about the three guys if you're playing these three guys across. If two of those guys are two way players that can really pass and link, that team might look completely different in terms of its ability to play through there. Or if one of them is a really heavy six and you, and you go with a double pivot and you have a guy with a lot more, you have two guys in there because Ramiro is really static. This is the problem. Like when you're playing Ramiro, you need those other two guys to help him cover up for him and box him in. If it's not him, if it's Kaike, excuse me, Kaik, and somebody else who's equally energetic and mobile, like maybe it's Paxton, maybe you can get away with the double pivot and all of a sudden you can bring back in a Bernie or bring back in a legit or bring back in a second winger of some kind and have a cost to be more free and things might look really, really different. You know, it's when you have a balanced league with a cap. Missing two players of this caliber is going to tear the heart out of your midfield when it's the same position. [00:22:20] Speaker A: Wow. Okay, well, Dallas, it was not a good run. Anything else about the. Hey look, Jesus Ferrer didn't score. He had a couple of that wild crazy scramble in the box. I still haven't figured out how Ferreira didn't score in that particular one. [00:22:35] Speaker B: Well, great Martin, pause, double save, I guess. [00:22:37] Speaker A: Yes. I still think that ASUS should have roofed it or something, but he kept hitting it right. Pause from six inches away. Very weird sequence. I don't know man. I, I, Is there something else about that game you want to get into? [00:22:56] Speaker B: No, I don't think so. You know the, I think it's a funny concept. Like I've been talking a lot about today about or of late about this team not having an identity. We started the podcast with what are you going to get from this team? You know, and then I was reading a quote from a really famous coach today, Brain Fart, Brazil's coach Now, Ancelotti. Yeah, thank you. Where he was talking about, I don't want my team to have an identity because I want us to not be able to get pegged down. Well. He coaches with a different level of talent than, than an MLS team does. Like when you're a bad MLS team, I, I still believe that you want to be really good at one thing, your one tactic or not. Not one tactic. Excuse me. One way that you want to play like this is how we're going to do it and we're going to really good at it. We're going to make you adjust to it. You can be versatile in that way, way, but you want to have become good at something, you know, and right now I don't know that this team is good at anything in particular. It's okay at a lot of things and bad at some things. You know, they need to find a way to get good at something to try and move forward. [00:24:04] Speaker A: Well, don't look now because the team has to make a run to Cincinnati to play play against the second place Eastern Conference team and Lucho's last team that he, Lucha, previously played for. It's a midweek game. 6:30 buzz. I, I don't know how you want to preview this or anything like that. [00:24:26] Speaker B: Well, at this point, I, you know, what Cincinnati is going to do, I don't think is going to make all that much of a difference because at this point, Dallas needs to be concerned with Dallas. They'd be concerned with what they're doing. And I think given the rotation that we saw, it seems pretty clear that like what he did in New York is probably more likely going to trend towards what he'll want to do in Cincinnati. Except that of course, we talk about this, the double pivot versus the triple and you know, Ramiro will be in there more than likely. You know, Kai's going to be in there more than likely. So then you get to that point of okay, is, is Paxton ready to go? Can I start Paxton as one of those three guys or a second guy in there? You know, that really becomes a pivot point for everything you're going to do, you know. [00:25:14] Speaker A: Do we have any idea what the time frame on Paxton is? [00:25:18] Speaker B: Well, he's. They've been ramping up his minutes and like ordinarily I would say like a guy that you're going to give 45 minutes to, I might wait and just bring him in at halftime. But we've seen Quill start a guy that he knows he's going to have to Lift him at halftime. So, you know, I think it's a good chance that you might. This might be the game where he finally is like, okay, kept backs and you're in. And then in that case you can. You really have to ask questions about what who else she would do. We know he wants to play 4, 2, 3, 1. And if passing him being a double with maybe Kaik, I don't know. So far, Ramiro has been a lock starter and a deep into the game player for coach Quill. So like at some point will that start to change as he gets a passing leget back? And I don't know the answer to that when that's going to come. I mean, Musa should be back in. Acosta should be back in off of suspension. Anderson, Julio is a lock starter too. So it really comes down to do I want the extra wing which opens up the play, allows me to have width, but then exposes my defense, or do I want to go with this triple play that helps me lock it down? I think in Cincinnati, who's a pretty decent in my head offensive team, you probably want to go with that triple formation, you know. And so then it comes down to I think Abubakar should be in a center back. And then. Okay, is it Paxton time or not? Because if it's not, then it's Ramiro Kai can show if it is packs in time. That'll be absolutely fascinating to see how that changes the game. You might start with Ramiro, Kaik and Paxton and see how far you can get. See what Paxton can do. Freeing you up at some point. If you could. If he. If he's looking good, you can leave him on and bring off somebody else. [00:26:58] Speaker A: And I, and we mentioned him earlier and I have seen that he's been throwing some rather thirsty topless shots of himself working out of late. Any word on when Mr. Legit is due to come back? [00:27:11] Speaker B: I think it's not. It'll be after this trip. I think it'll be the earliest will be the home game. Is that against Philly? I think. [00:27:17] Speaker A: Yeah. Do we even know what his. I, you know, I just dawned on me. I don't even know what his injury was. [00:27:23] Speaker B: I don't remember what they said. [00:27:26] Speaker A: Bottom half of human body injury. [00:27:29] Speaker B: Well, at first they were like, guys gonna be out a week or two. [00:27:32] Speaker A: Yes, I know. [00:27:33] Speaker B: It turned into three months. Two months? Yeah. [00:27:37] Speaker A: So you sure it's not been three months? [00:27:39] Speaker B: Yeah, no, it's two. He went out the same time that Farfan went out, so we were expecting them to come back at the same time. So it's been a week or two longer. It just says upper leg. I think it's, you know, it could be quad, it could be hammy, you know, so hopefully that's a kind of muscle kind of injury like that. You can't necessarily rush it, you know. [00:27:58] Speaker A: So I wonder if he banged it on one of his abs. [00:28:02] Speaker B: Yeah, possibly the, you know, I would expect. Not this game. I think, like, if he makes the bench in the next home game, I think might be an appropriate time to see him, you know, so we just have to. It's going to be. We're in an era right now where Quill's fighting for results, you know, and is he fighting for. Does he feel like he needs to grind out points or can he play to try and improve? Like, can I. Can I go into a game thinking I'm not really worried about the result. I'm trying to play good, you know, by getting Paxton back in there and playing the double pivot that I want to do, you know, that's a. The only Quill can answer those questions. I bet you, like, even if you're asking his assistant coaches, like, today, they may not know what that answer is yet either. You know, he's gonna have to make that call in the next day or so. [00:28:49] Speaker A: Well, Dallas, as we mentioned, have Cincinnati on Wednesday, then Philly is in town on Thursday. That is a gauntlet of playing the two top Eastern Conference teams back to back, who have 30 and 29 points, respectively. So, by the way, both those teams have decent road records. Philly. Well, decent records. Cincinnati is undefeated at home. Yeah. Undefeated at home. 501. And Philly actually is the 1 team in the league that, if I'm just scanning the record here, actually has a better away record than Dallas at 4, 2, 0. Dallas sits there at 3, 2 and 3. [00:29:30] Speaker B: So there you go. [00:29:32] Speaker A: All right, let's move on to other topics of that conversation. Dallas Trinity needed to win a game against Fort Lauderdale, and unfortunately, Dan Crook, they were not able to do that. And they have put themselves in a right spot. Predicament. [00:29:53] Speaker C: Oh, yeah, they're having a rough go over right now. That's what, three, three in a row? They've lost. [00:29:59] Speaker A: Something like that. Yeah. [00:30:01] Speaker C: Going into the last game. Now they need to beat Carolina Ascent, the top team in the league. I think they're one big saving grace right now is, I believe, Fort Lauderdale plays Spokane. [00:30:15] Speaker B: Yeah, they do. [00:30:16] Speaker A: The two teams. [00:30:17] Speaker B: Yeah. [00:30:17] Speaker A: In front of them play each other. [00:30:18] Speaker C: You know, with any luck, they Cannibalize each other. And Carolina are sent mails it in. They. They drew with Brooklyn, so there's a good chance that they're resting up players for the playoffs. [00:30:29] Speaker A: So have. I'm of the impression that this. In this injury thing that has absolutely decimated Dallas is not unusual across this new league. Is that correct? Is my perception about that correct? [00:30:45] Speaker C: There's definitely been spells of injuries for all the teams, but Dallas just hasn't had a. They haven't had settled defense all year. They've had so many injuries just in the back line. [00:30:57] Speaker A: Yeah. I just wonder if there's a larger story about the fact that this is a new league with younger players or players that have not been asked to play in this kind of. [00:31:06] Speaker C: You're like, oh, I put money on it. I mean, most of these players have either played winter league in Scandinavia or they've just played college. There's very few players that have played like a full professional season. Played nwsl, played wsl, you know, or Spain, France, Mexico. [00:31:26] Speaker B: Yeah, I mean, they're on 27, 28 games a piece. You know, that's a load that those ladies are not used to playing along. [00:31:32] Speaker A: With the training every day or whatever that regimen is and all of that and all the things you got to learn to be a pro. That's interesting that. Well, so that game against Carolina is on Saturday night at the Cottonmole. It's their last home game of the season. It may be their last game period, if they don't get the result they need and get knocked out because the only the top four teams end up making the playoffs. And it does seem crazy that not that long ago we were. We were actually like, are they gonna end up being the regular season champion? They were going so well. [00:32:04] Speaker B: Yeah. [00:32:05] Speaker A: To start the spring, and then the wheels just came flying off, so. [00:32:08] Speaker C: And this is going to be the. The one weird occurrence where FC Dallas and Dallas Trinity clash with home games. [00:32:15] Speaker A: Oh, that's right, D. That's right. Those games will be happening at the same time. All right. [00:32:20] Speaker B: Yeah. Since Misimo's got hurt, they just really have struggled offensively. They're not being able to put the goals in. Even against some bad teams, they're not able to score anymore. It's like when they started the season, they got a couple of ties early on because they were having trouble punching it in. And then in the middle part of the year, Thornton scored enough goals and they lost. So she was like up for there for the golden boot and like, she hasn't scored in three or four weeks and she's still tied for the golden boot. So it's like it's not. Not getting it done offensively. It's not just her, it's like. It's the connectivity, it's the pieces through the middle that are just not connecting. I think a lot of it is just hitting a wall. You know, they all remind me of rookies in MLS who pass that 20 game that you're used to playing in college start to really start to struggle. And I think that's why it's the cohesiveness of the front attack and the lack of any consistency in terms of personnel in the back is just causing problems for that team. [00:33:11] Speaker A: Well, it was a better week for other North Texas area teams, including our MLS next pro team, North Texas, who beat Tacoma 3, 2 for their fourth straight win. Nice little win. [00:33:23] Speaker B: Yeah, very nice for the kids, the juniors. Tacoma is a good team. I believe this is their first home loss Tacoma's of the season. And Dallas, North Texas sc, sorry, has now won four straight. They've jumped all the way up to second in the Western Conference. They're getting some guys back, healthy, some center backs notably, got a couple more of their signings have showed up. The new striker, Sangin, I think his name is. He scored a goal and then like five minutes later he got his first red card. So that was fun. Straight red debut. Yeah. Welcome to North Texas. Yeah, he played a couple games before, but he's like. He finally got his first goal. You know, Sarver is their captain. He's tied for like fifth in the league and scoring like he's. Which is the third highest number, like seven goals or whatever it is. So he's definitely their best player. He's the player that most looks like, right. Like if it was an emergency and you needed some help, like, he might be a guy you could look at, but he's really the only one on that team right now, in my opinion, that's playing well enough to even consider that, you know, even Dave, Diego Garcia, who got his debut the other day, is just not. He's not dominating those games like he did last year. And so I don't. None of the defenders are playing at that level where you're like, oh, that guy could really help. Sarver is the only one in my mind that is even in that conversation at all of like, you know, if Bernie really continues to struggle and they trade shoe out and then, okay, we need a body on the cheap. Okay, bring up Sarver and let's give him A few games and see what happens, you know, maybe before we're going to go out and get another guy or something, you know, Otherwise there's nobody that team I think right now that could help them. It's nice to see Nico Montoya, who's the 17, 18 year old keeper from the academy that they signed. He's now started too straight and won both of them. So he's the next guy in the pipeline that's produced Clodi and Carrera and Eyestone and whatever. [00:35:14] Speaker A: So good deal, good for them. And don't look now but Texoma is on a streak. They've won their second game, their sec, two wins in a row as they beat two Greenville up in Sherman won nothing over the weekend. [00:35:29] Speaker B: Yeah, Corey wrote this is the guy who covers them for us. He wrote this. I gotta pull it up because it's fascinating. He wrote this stat little thing about their possession and that this is something we're learning in modern football. Right at the beginning of the year they tried to out possess everybody. Well, we've all learned over the last four, five, six years that possession is not that big a deal. And so like over the course of this season they started off their first couple of games with 60% possession and then it's dropping in the 50s and the 40s and the 30s and so the last three or four games have all been in the 30s and 40s possession and it's, they've in the last five, they have two wins and two draws and one loss since they've dropped down to like this 30% possession. When they stopped caring about the ball, it freed them up and they play much better. So it's just fascinating state of affairs in modern football in general and specifically for Tex Alma that that has occurred. So they're up to 10th, which is they got like 15, 16 teams in that league. So that's five places off the bottom. So that's a great charge for them the last four or five games. [00:36:30] Speaker A: I saw a highlight on Twitter somewhere of this game where the Texoma keeper made a really nice save. Greenville breakaway. But the thing that I noticed because I'm a nerd like this is that Texomo was choosing to wear an all black kit in the middle of a Texas day when it was 95 degrees. And I think that's that, that's, that's, that's a lot. [00:36:57] Speaker B: Yeah, obviously usually their home kit is mostly white, you know, with those red white with red stripes. So it was weird to see them in the opposite color. Javier Garcia, by the Way is the goalkeeper's name who had that spectacular save. So maybe they just wanted to wear the black ones at home once and in front of everybody. [00:37:10] Speaker A: But they all look so hot. [00:37:12] Speaker C: Yes, especially lyrics. It doesn't really matter too much. [00:37:15] Speaker A: Yeah, I don't know, man. Okay, maybe I'm a wuss. [00:37:18] Speaker B: I just. [00:37:19] Speaker A: I think that's. That's hot. Especially when that means your opponent gets to wear white kits on a day like that. That feels like you're letting. You're letting them off the mat too easily. Well, congratulations. [00:37:29] Speaker C: I was letting teams wear red up. [00:37:33] Speaker A: Yeah, yeah, exactly. [00:37:34] Speaker B: Yeah. [00:37:36] Speaker A: Tradition. Okay. All right. Well, congratulations to Texoma. It's great to see them get some wins. And then, boy, what a nice turnout for McKenna's home opener. 3,600 people showed up for the game against the Diablos from Denton. That's a really nice result and hopefully they can keep that consistent as time goes on. [00:37:56] Speaker B: Yeah, it's really interesting to see, you know, Hitchcock obviously knows what he's doing in terms of community involvement in gratiation. You know, 3600 is. That's a really impressive number for a USL2 MBSL. Whatever I can. Where they are team like. But he has a couple other teams that are doing that. Like his Annapolis team averages like 4 or 5,000. The. The one out in Lubbock does pretty well, I believe. Two, three or four thousand perhaps. So this is not totally unusual for the teams he puts together. And when you include Denton, of course, which has got a couple of fans too, probably, you know, it was the first ever game for home game for Chupacabras. So really nice turnout, really exciting. I think they lost, but you know, it'll be fun to watch that team play. Hopefully we can get up there for a game this season. [00:38:41] Speaker A: And they're playing at the. One of the McKinney High School stadiums. [00:38:46] Speaker B: Yeah, Joe. Whatever. Ron Poe. Ronpo. Yeah, Ron Poe. [00:38:50] Speaker A: Okay. All right, good stuff. Okay, so earlier this week there was a. A video. Not a video, a podcast posted. [00:39:00] Speaker B: Well, the article was first. [00:39:02] Speaker A: Oh, there was an article. That's right. Dallas Morning News article. And then a podcast posted. I don't know what the podcast is. And it's a young man interviewing both Sam Morton and Matt Valentine, the co owners of Atletico Dallas. And I. And I. I'll just cut to the chase, the big takeaway because I. I kind of just skimmed through the podcast, but the thing that caught me off guard was I was. You know, we had all been under the impression that this lot that is off of 121 in Garland at Holford is that the intersection at whole which is right adjacent to the target on kind of the south side of 121 for anybody familiar with that area. Am I wrong in stating that we all thought that's where this 10,000 seat stadium was going? [00:39:52] Speaker B: No, that's correct. [00:39:53] Speaker A: Okay, so we thought that's what was happening. But in this interview we found out because of the article that in fact it's not a stadium, that it is their headquarters, training facility and auxiliary fields that are going there. [00:40:07] Speaker C: We actually found out because of the city. The city did a presentation. [00:40:11] Speaker A: Yes. [00:40:12] Speaker C: And the, the guy from the city of Garland actually said, oh yeah, the stadium used to be there, but now it's not. [00:40:20] Speaker B: Yeah, so, so, so let me, let. [00:40:22] Speaker A: Me just get to the. My big takeaway which was is that they were saying on this podcast, much to my surprise and a little bit horror, that they don't know where they're going to play when they debut in 2027. But what they do know is that it won't be their own soccer specific stadium. Which then leads me to the question of where in the Dallas Fort Worth area are you thinking about putting a new professional soccer team until you build your own joint point? [00:40:51] Speaker B: Well, there's. They don't have an answer to that yet. I talked to Sam Morton today who's the co founder and the head of chief Commercial Officer up there and I just wanted to sort of confirm like these timeline moments with him so that I. We didn't speak out of turn about exactly what happened. So you're correct. The original, when they announced the franchise from USL1, that was like a day or two after USL announced that. Yes, sorry, uslc, it was a day or two after USL announced they were going to have a Division 1. So at that announcement, this was before the brand. This is just the announcement of the franchise. The Garland mayor's there, all the city council are there. They had this sort of looks at the, you know, the information about the stadium and the complex and all stuff. At that time the Holford location included a 7,500-10k seat stadium at that time. But at this time that's also just sort of a handshake agreement. Like in principle, nothing has cleared any official city council or have a contract or nothing is signed. This is all just, we're all working together, this is the plan. So then of course, right as that same time is happening, this now Division one possibility has come out. [00:42:04] Speaker A: Can we just for the sake of consistency call it USLP for Premier. USL Premier. [00:42:10] Speaker B: Okay, so they announced USL Premier. Well, that effectively makes everybody just pause or perhaps pivot in the sense that like, okay, maybe that changes some landscape. Let's just hold on a second and see what happens. So since then, and part of that. [00:42:29] Speaker A: Is because of the rules that state to be a tier one league in the United States, your stadiums have to be 15,000 at a minimum. [00:42:37] Speaker B: Right. So Dallas Athletico has not officially announced which league they will be in when they launch. Since that like originally they said uslc, but immediately. Oh crap, there's this other option. Part of the problem is that USL has not clarified anything more about this USL premiere. There's no information yet about how many teams, new TV deal, new sponsorship, how it's, any of it's going to work. All they have done is floated this idea. So go ahead. [00:43:15] Speaker A: Yeah, the question I have is no matter what happens with USL Premier, I'm of the impression that Garland is going to have to launch in the championship because they're due to launch in 27 and USL has said this Premier League won't start till 28. [00:43:29] Speaker B: Yeah, so that's the, that's the lay of the land is that Dallas Athletico still anticipates, is still planning on starting in 2027. That means they will start play in USL Championship. It's very possible that between now and then you'll get some sort of clarity from the usl. Some sort of league will be announced. Maybe they'll ask for Dallas with its huge number three medium market United States to be in it or not. None of that has happened. So they're having to move forward with the idea that they're going to be in USL Championship. You'll still see, except that they need the flexibility and the possibility of what are we going to do if we're going to end up in the premier or even if we start in the championship and win our way up, we now all of a sudden we need the flexibility, the possibility of having this 15k seed stadium. Well that, you know, basically it's in a lot of ways it's back to the drawing board. So that 15k stadium will not be at the Holford location no matter what. [00:44:29] Speaker A: Because that's too, that's too big for that particular location or the city of Garland won't let them put it there. [00:44:34] Speaker B: Right. And there's infrastructure wise, there's a little stadium in that new complex that's a 2000 cedar with another room for maybe another thousand people on like on a grassy knoll on the side, you can have like ticketed games in it, like maybe like a big high school or a Dallas cup or a. Oh, that'd be cool. I don't know, reserved here. I don't know what it could be, but it's like a little mini venue, like kind of like what was in the original Moneygram plans. Do you remember the original 5,000 seater, that vibe now with some possible offices, training grounds for Dallas Athletic. Again, this is not past city council yet. This is not sign on the dotted line, but probably is going to be their training ground, their offices, maybe, that kinds of things. Right. So basically my understanding from talking to them is Dallas is sort of in a pause mode about their 15k stadium that they're probably going to have to plan for. Maybe you don't need to start with 15k. Maybe now you're going to start with just 75 or 10, but have the possibility to go to 15 again. That changes the whole thing. So the delay, my. What I've heard from behind the scenes also too is like this delay, this hesitation has sort of allowed other people to notice what is happening. And so other people have called in this, you know, by people, I mean other cities or other possibilities or other whatevers, you know. So nothing is locked in place with their stadium yet in terms of like where they're eventually going to be. Yes, they're still going to start in 2027. So there's a, you know, they're moving forward with Garland on this training setup and this little stadium and they're sort of having to wait for the league in terms of their own big official venue they're going to be in. So that's where we are in terms of a stadium. Nothing is done on a stadium, basically. So you can guess obviously that in 2027 they're going to be playing some more in some stadium that already exists. You know, who. Hell knows what that'll be. [00:46:32] Speaker A: Right. [00:46:33] Speaker B: You know, it'll. It'll be from. From the outside, it'll be fascinating to watch. And I, and I, and Sam sort of has talked several times about the next couple of months, that they've got a bunch of things that are lined up and they're kind of waiting for the league to say, and they think that the league will say something coming up soon, hopefully, and then they can get some clarity and then they can sort of move forward with a lot of their things. But you know, they have a lot of work to do politically with any kind of. No matter who it's going to be to get this 15k stadium over the line. It's going to take some political work in development. It's. They're not, they're not close on that. So it's my understanding from talking to them. So they're moving forward with the Garland partnership in terms of, you know, academy fields, pro training, field offices. Like, that's why the whole plan is going to be there for them. [00:47:28] Speaker A: Well, I just find it interesting because, you know, the excitement level of them having their own place and, and doing all of that changes I think a lot if their debut season is at a high school stadium or maybe they play in the Cotton Bowl. Like, that would seem like the weirdest. That. I don't know. I don't know what you guys think about that, but the idea that this new Dallas team launches inside the Cotton bowl would, I think, be really, really a weird ending to that story or beginning. [00:48:01] Speaker B: They've not told me anything about where they're looking in terms of play, but, like, just the. What we know about the cotton wool. Consider that they, they do have this emphasis on being this Dallas brand, Dallas Atletico, this Garland, this Central east side vibe that appeals. Cotton ball appeals to that. Also. The city is already paying a certain amount of money into the Cotton bowl to maintain it and have it be quality enough for Dallas Trinity. So you could play there for very little additional money, relatively speaking. Right. You don't have to go in there and upgrade the surface or try and bring in, like, if you were to go try and go to a high school field, you might have to spend a whole bunch of money on surface or facilities or security or whatever. And a lot of that could be economies of scale with Dallas Trinity. So it wouldn't be, I don't think it wouldn't be crazy to start in the Cotton bowl, you know, I mean, where else? I don't even know of any other stadiums available that aren't going to just look like, like you're playing it, you know, Dallas Carter High School or something. You know, I mean, I don't. [00:49:05] Speaker A: Well, or, or what's the name of the. One of the two Garland Stadium high school stadiums, Howard? [00:49:11] Speaker B: Sure. [00:49:12] Speaker A: Yeah. [00:49:12] Speaker B: Again, it's just, it's the same deal. I mean, it's like, are you going to go to Ford Field? No. You know, it's like, how many things are available? [00:49:20] Speaker A: There's not. That's the problem. And that's why this, that's why hearing these two guys talk about this and admit that they don't really have a place yet to play in 2027 or a plan to build their own thing yet I found really alarming because they've spent a lot of money so far trying to get this thing going. I'm assuming that all of their business, you know, because they're both business guys, I'm assuming they're desperate to get this thing going sooner than later. And you know how people are around here, man. I mean first impressions are a really, really big deal because there are a lot of options for your entertainment sports dollar in the DFW area. And I think a lot of people are really excited about the premise of having this team here. But man, if they launch at a, in a football stadium. Yeah, I think it's going to have an effect on it. [00:50:11] Speaker B: Well, they might have been tough to get that. Even if they had gotten the Garland thing, it might have been tough to get that ready for 2027 anyway. So you might have been looking at, I mean I'm not a stadium builder but you know, like we're already in the middle of 2025, you know, so you would have had a. Basically a year and a half to be ready for it to be ready. Even a small stadium, that's might be tough. [00:50:32] Speaker A: Wasn't that San Antonio stadium one of those kind of like preformed or pre built things? [00:50:39] Speaker B: Austin Bold stadium, Is that a rector set super fast? [00:50:42] Speaker A: I thought that was, I thought the San Antonio stadium was like that too originally. [00:50:47] Speaker B: I don't think so. Oh, Antonio Scorpions, they. Scorpions built that stadium a long time ago. Before even bought them. No, it's Austin Bold is the one that has the erector set stadium you can put up and down in like two months. [00:50:59] Speaker A: Yeah. See I was thinking what if somebody could find a piece of land to throw a temporary stadium up. That was just their thing, right. So they can build their own experience. And, and, and you know one of. [00:51:09] Speaker B: The words that Morton you say talking to me was flex. They need to have a flexibility built in as they go forward because even if they start in the championship with 7, 500. [00:51:19] Speaker A: Yeah. [00:51:19] Speaker B: They need the ability to go up to 15 if they get promoted or whatever. So like no matter what they do, they need to have some ways to add it. And he, and he even mentioned imagine Texoma. If Texoma gets promoted up from USL 1 to USL Championship, you know they're gonna go from that high school stadium. I'm not. No, you know, like. [00:51:41] Speaker A: No, I'm glad you, I'm glad you brought this up because. And that is the example that I use with people talking about this idea of promotion, relegation with the usl, which is what if, and I realize the likelihood of this is really, really low, but what if Texoma somehow won their way into this new Premier League? Now you were having a team playing in your top division that literally plays in a city that is not even a rated radio market. [00:52:11] Speaker B: Yeah. Well, I would imagine that you will get some leeway in terms of stadium. Like if you get promoted up, you know, obviously Texas would have to be radical, but you know, you're, you're missing my. [00:52:22] Speaker A: My point is, is if you're trying to grow a new top tier league to compete against the other top leagues in the world, that's going to create an advertising sponsor, all kinds of problems for you. It may be romantic and cool, but that's just not. Yeah, yeah. I think that's part of the crazy of the idea. [00:52:43] Speaker B: That's the big question. Like the idea of this promoter relegation has been floated out there. It's like, man, this country is different than others. It doesn't quite work the same. [00:52:51] Speaker A: Yes, correct. [00:52:51] Speaker B: There's lots of really tough questions that have to be asked moving forward with this thing. The least of which is even if, like there's the amount of stadiums in USL Championship that would meet the requirements for usl, this idea of a USL premiere is like two or four. Yeah. Yeah. It's less than a handful. [00:53:08] Speaker A: Right. [00:53:08] Speaker B: So like, you know, forget about just Dallas Athletic. If they want to be in it, it's like all they're going to need, 8, 10, 16 teams to be able to do it for. And then in the minute you start having teams go up and down, it's like you're going to ask. I mean, there's huge questions. So you may be right there. Like it may be that for Dallas Athletico, the best answer is another piece of ground and Garland that's sitting there empty. Throw the awesome Bold stadium, which is still laying around somewhere. See if Donnie Nelson will sell it to you cheap. Throw it together at 7, 500 seats just so you can start playing. You know, maybe that's the answer because then you could erect a set to up to 15,000 or go somewhere else. I mean, you know, or then again, the Cotton Ball's already available and has the nice grass field and super easy. I'm not saying it's good. [00:53:54] Speaker C: Used to be a real nice CrossFit. [00:53:56] Speaker B: Yeah, you soon realize. I'm just saying like. So the answer to the macro question of no, there's not a stadium at Holford anymore and they're sort of the club is Sort of pivoting and waiting for the league to define things, knowing that they're going to have. They're going to go almost 99% sure. We think into the championship that first season they're playing in 2027. [00:54:18] Speaker A: Yes. [00:54:19] Speaker B: So it's like, see, this is, this. [00:54:21] Speaker A: Is fundamentally a great example of the problem with sports, sports ownership in the United States, which is even in this idea of this promotion, relegation structured USL thing, you are still saddled with ownership groups that are trying to cut deals with municipalities and cities to help get tax breaks and all the other things they need so they don't have to spend the money themselves to pay for these things right out of their pocket, out of private funding to build themselves. And you know, that to me is like, look, you're a billionaire. Just build the. Go get a piece of land and build the stadium. [00:54:59] Speaker B: These guys aren't billionaires. [00:55:00] Speaker A: Oh, I don't mean them specifically. I just, I mean anybody that's trying to start a team. If you, if you are a billionaire, go find a billionaire or whatever. Or Dan and Clark for that matter. Just get the money out of the bank, guys. Break open the piggy bank and build the stadium. Quit leaning on Frisco to do all this for you. [00:55:18] Speaker B: You or whatever. So. Well, you know, there, there, there is some Garland ISD involvement with the place, that thing at Horford, because one of the. There was some talk about this Little Stadium, this 2000 Cedar 3000 seater could be used by soccer. ISD soccer. Not ISD. Great on football. By ISD soccer. [00:55:36] Speaker A: Right. [00:55:36] Speaker B: You know, so a lot of times, especially these complexes where like they're going to want to maximize revenue. So like yes, their youth couple play there, but can you get a Dallas cup play there? Can the ISC play there? Like some men's leagues play there. Like they'll be looking for tenants like everybody else does. You know, I'm sure it'll be very reminiscent of Moneygram in a lot of ways. [00:55:55] Speaker A: Man, that little 25 little berm seated stadium you're talking about idea, that sounds like a great location for the next Borachos Azuri over 50 tilt. [00:56:06] Speaker B: It would be peak. [00:56:08] Speaker A: Yes. Yeah, we've been. That's a game that's been been played in this area for generations. [00:56:14] Speaker B: Generations. [00:56:14] Speaker A: Yeah, they'll make a documentary about this. The Brachos and Missouri's probably after they. [00:56:19] Speaker B: Make the Dallas Roma FC Miami with Romero. Romero playing in the Open cup up there at UT Dallas upset game. [00:56:28] Speaker A: That's probably a little more important. [00:56:29] Speaker B: Yeah, that's A Dallas moment of Open cup legend. [00:56:33] Speaker A: That's an important one, too. Yeah. The original Sting being the original national team, women's national team. So much great legacy of the soccer legacy in the Dallas Fort Worth area, for sure. Well, I guess everybody. They'll have to keep everybody posted on that stuff. And. And I, you know, I gotta say, as much whining as I did about the logo and stuff, I have seen some gear that I like a lot. Like, I saw a hoodie that I bought the hoodie. Oh, did you really? [00:57:00] Speaker B: Yeah, yeah. Black one. [00:57:01] Speaker A: Okay. [00:57:01] Speaker B: Black one. Yeah. I'm a sucker for soccer gear. [00:57:04] Speaker A: I know you are a sucker for soccer gear. [00:57:06] Speaker B: Any local. Local, Local soccer. I also bought the Texel, my kit. I was about that. The black one, the white one. [00:57:13] Speaker A: Oh, come on. Okay. [00:57:14] Speaker B: They finally got it in fat guy size. I'm excited. [00:57:16] Speaker A: So I got one fat guy size. [00:57:18] Speaker B: And they did. Because I asked him, I was like, you guys got to get some fat guy sizes, man. Come on. And they were like, okay, we'll take. We'll get that. [00:57:23] Speaker A: All right, so speaking. Let's do a little kit talk. Yay, kit talk. So, okay, in our dis. In our little group discussion here, Buzz, you have posted a photo of the great Eddie Lewis, who at one time was part of the San Jose Clash. And I am fascinated to know, is this officially their throwback jersey they're throwing out? [00:57:45] Speaker B: Well, Armand posted that. He found that on Reddit. I. I shared it in our little group. Me also. But, yeah, I mean, if Eddie Lewis is wearing it, why would it not be? I mean, I assume that's what I mean. [00:57:56] Speaker A: That's actually wilder than the original Clash shirt. [00:57:59] Speaker B: I wouldn't have thought that would be possible, but it is. [00:58:05] Speaker A: What do you think, Danny? [00:58:06] Speaker C: It's kind of disgusting, but wonderful in that it's disgusting. [00:58:10] Speaker B: It has the awesome scorpion logo and the original class word mark. I mean, it's good. [00:58:16] Speaker C: It's got that awkward, like, petroleum weird. [00:58:21] Speaker A: Greeny, bluey, tealy, and there's some red in there and yellow, and, I mean, it's got it all. You'll have to go, Buzz. You'll have to post it in your Twitter account or something. But it. It kind of goes back to the geometric design of the MLS 96 days, but it's a completely different geometric design. Like. [00:58:41] Speaker B: Yeah, it's just a tribute to those. That 96 jersey that was the Clashes was the most insane of that. [00:58:47] Speaker C: It's a cool, modern interpretation. [00:58:50] Speaker B: Yeah, the Clash one was the most outrageous one of the like, because like four, three or four teams had that. Tampa Bay. Tampa Bay had. They had a different one, didn't they? [00:58:58] Speaker A: Yeah, but you said this. You thought the Clash was the wildest of them. Them. And I was thinking maybe Tampa Bay was. [00:59:05] Speaker B: It was the wildest of the ones that had that. Of the three or four that had like Metro Stars had the same one as San Jose and LA Galaxy did too. They had the one that had like the little angles on it and stuff. Yeah, like Tampa's was different. Tampa's had the other one. [00:59:18] Speaker A: I mean, look, they were all crazy. [00:59:21] Speaker B: Yeah. [00:59:22] Speaker A: Except for D.C. united, which was the only traditional shirt or kit in the entire lot of the 10. Everybody else's was wild ass. [00:59:30] Speaker B: Well, you remember the story with D.C. united was that Kevin Payne, like, they said, here's your branding and here's your stuff. And he was like, no, he's flat out. Nope, not doing that. Not doing that logo. Not doing that. [00:59:44] Speaker A: Have we ever seen what that original concept was? Has anybody ever seen the. The concept? He didn't. He killed. [00:59:51] Speaker B: No, but he's talked about how brutally bad it was. [00:59:54] Speaker A: And like Pablo Maro in the case. [00:59:56] Speaker B: He'S like the only front office GM guy that knew enough to be like, no, we're not doing that, we're not doing that brand, we're not doing that jersey. Here's what we're doing. And his was the only one that was great. Yeah, I mean, they had to redo the logo a couple of times because it was a little too okay, you know, whatever, but, you know, at least like the classic uniform and name and like they didn't have a gimmicky name and a gimmicky kit and a gimmicky logo. They had a more, you know, so. [01:00:22] Speaker A: I've never talked to Dan about this before. So where. So Dan, in 1996, how old were you? [01:00:30] Speaker C: I turned 10 that year. [01:00:32] Speaker A: Oh, you were just a wee lad. Were you aware at all of MLS when you were 10? [01:00:38] Speaker C: Not until the next year when I would, when I would sometimes play as the teams on FIFA 97. [01:00:46] Speaker A: And were you a kit nerd back then? [01:00:50] Speaker C: No, not overly. I mean it was. [01:00:53] Speaker A: But as a. But as an 11 year old British lad, what was your reaction to MLS kits? Did you just laugh at them or did you think they were cool? [01:01:01] Speaker C: Well, it was on FIFA 97, so I didn't really have these kits. Like I remember the. I think it was the Columbus Crew one was just black and then it had like two yellow stripes on the front because they were like generic. But I mean, you know, they used to have MLS highlights and like 99,2000ish that were like started at 1am, which I'd watch sometimes. No, it was before that because they still had the. The 35 yard shootout. [01:01:38] Speaker A: See, this isn't the answer I was looking for. I was hoping you'd say, yeah, we'd all get. Go to the pub after elementary school, have some beers and laugh at how stupid MLS looked in these dumb goofy kids. [01:01:50] Speaker C: I'm sorry to disappoint you. [01:01:52] Speaker A: That's what I was looking for. [01:01:53] Speaker C: But no, I think, you know, Columbus had a cool kit. DC had a cool kit. Those Nike Adidas were good. [01:02:01] Speaker B: Yeah. [01:02:03] Speaker C: New England had that really funky. When Reebok had that weird. Like we're going to put the logo huge at the Chile or Paraguay had. [01:02:12] Speaker A: Yeah, that's right. Yes, you're Chile had a shirt like that at one time. Yeah. [01:02:17] Speaker C: And then. Yeah, and then obviously New England had the, the blue version of it. Yeah, the Nike ones were the batshit crazy ones. [01:02:25] Speaker B: Look at the image I just posted, right? Dallas and Tampa Bay and New York had the same pattern. And then LA and the Clash had that. The janky angles and the slices and the. [01:02:35] Speaker A: It was like a half panel. [01:02:37] Speaker B: It was like a half panel. Yeah, yeah. And then DC's is classic. And then. And 30 years later the Wizards one is a classic and the Cruise is not bad, so. [01:02:46] Speaker A: Well, hell, the. The Burn shirt is still loved now these 30 years after the fact. I mean, I. Retro shirts are such. [01:02:55] Speaker C: A huge thing now. [01:02:56] Speaker A: Yeah, it's crazy. [01:02:57] Speaker C: I mean, I see kids, I see little kids walking around like the France 98 shirt that they've got like a knockoff version. I was like, oh, did you head. [01:03:04] Speaker B: But you should have had butted him. [01:03:07] Speaker C: Why? [01:03:07] Speaker B: Because it's a don headbutting people. [01:03:11] Speaker C: Yeah, but not in 1998, he didn't. He still had hair then. [01:03:14] Speaker B: Okay. [01:03:18] Speaker A: I was at a. I was at Steve Davis's pickup game on last a couple weekends ago and there was a guy that I hadn't seen before. I hadn't been to this in a while, so this guy's probably been there for a while. And I walked up and introduced myself and I said, I'm Peter, what's your name? And he said. I was like, I'm sorry, what? He says, zidon. And I was like, I'm sorry, did you just say your first name is Zidane? He goes, yes, kind of sheepishly. I was like, zinedine Zidane. He's like yes, my name is Zidane. I was like, wow, that's awesome. [01:03:49] Speaker B: That's really good. Did you call him Zizu all game Zizu? [01:03:52] Speaker A: No, I didn't do that to him. [01:03:54] Speaker C: Just imagine if his name was X. [01:03:57] Speaker A: That's right. I may have just passed out right there on the spot. [01:04:00] Speaker B: Peter, your next corgi needs to be named ek, Ted and Ek. [01:04:05] Speaker A: Well, it's got to be two syllables. Yeah, that's right. It's got to be a two syllable. So maybe I just named my next corgi Ted Ek. Yeah. [01:04:11] Speaker B: Yeah, there you go. [01:04:11] Speaker A: Yeah, I never thought about that. [01:04:12] Speaker B: I really should. [01:04:14] Speaker A: Greatest player in the history of ever. Okay, well anything else boys that we need to get into? We did a little kit talk. Oh well, speaking. So speaking of all of this and. And looking at this San Jose throwb an indicator that that's what they're going to get later this summer. Dan Crook where the world is our mock up of the burn throwback that we're getting. [01:04:37] Speaker C: We're waiting funny enough. That and the Nashville one that was posted confirmed a couple of things that I'd seen. [01:04:44] Speaker A: You just draw the damn thing and put it up on the website for Christ's sake. Nobody cares how close you are or not. Just put it up there. [01:04:52] Speaker B: Well, I care how close you are. Yeah. Don't listen to him. Wait what you want, Peter? [01:04:58] Speaker C: I've been doing this for. I've been doing this bit for a decade. Like if I don't scare people at FC Dallas, it's not worth doing. [01:05:04] Speaker A: Okay, all right, fair. I know, I know you like to make Brown happen. [01:05:10] Speaker B: The reunion kit, Dan, was the high water mark of Brown happening. That was caused real panic. [01:05:20] Speaker A: When is that? When is this burn throwback coming out? [01:05:22] Speaker C: July 16th of July. [01:05:25] Speaker A: So we're less than two months away. [01:05:27] Speaker C: First time on June 19th. [01:05:28] Speaker A: Say that again. [01:05:30] Speaker C: They'll be worn for the first time on June 19th. [01:05:33] Speaker A: What game is that? [01:05:35] Speaker C: I think San Diego maybe. [01:05:37] Speaker A: Wait a second. They're going to. Wait, they're going to. You mean they go on sale in July, but they're going to show them off a month earlier? No, wait, you said June 19th is when they're gonna wear them for the first time and they go on. [01:05:50] Speaker C: They're gonna be shown on July 16th and worn on. [01:05:54] Speaker A: I'm so confused. [01:05:55] Speaker B: I think July 19th, Peter, not June 19th. [01:05:58] Speaker A: Okay. Did he not say June? [01:05:59] Speaker B: He did. [01:06:00] Speaker A: Okay, all right. [01:06:01] Speaker B: Yeah. June 19th is like three weeks from now. It's not. [01:06:05] Speaker A: Dan, you have to understand. I'm Getting up there in age. So sometimes I'm not sure it's me that's misfiring. So when it is somebody else, I want to make sure everybody knows it's not me. [01:06:15] Speaker C: They're going to be shown for the first time on May 29th. [01:06:18] Speaker A: Oh, stop it. [01:06:19] Speaker C: Sale on December 20th. Sorry. December 26th. They were just gonna miss Christmas. [01:06:25] Speaker B: Peter. St. Louis is the question. July 19th. This is St. Louis. [01:06:28] Speaker A: The St. Louis game. Okay. [01:06:30] Speaker B: Yeah. [01:06:31] Speaker C: So when San Jose is the away game on the. [01:06:34] Speaker A: So, dad, can you give the curious and ideas to when they can anticipate some seeing your mock up of said Dallas Burn third jersey? [01:06:42] Speaker C: Christ. When I. Whenever I have time to do it. [01:06:45] Speaker B: Yeah. Stuff starting to leak. Damn. We might need to get a little ahead of it. Yeah. [01:06:49] Speaker C: Yeah. [01:06:49] Speaker A: Boy, you're going to feel like such a boob. A bell end. If you. [01:06:56] Speaker C: Good reference. [01:06:57] Speaker A: If you. If. If they. If it gets leaked before you get a chance to post it. [01:07:01] Speaker C: You mean. You mean like what happened in preseason this year? [01:07:04] Speaker A: Yes, exactly, Mr. [01:07:06] Speaker C: When I had it sitting there and then. [01:07:07] Speaker A: Yes. Mr. Cookie. [01:07:09] Speaker C: Yeah. [01:07:10] Speaker A: Buzz and I count on you to help make us look good. [01:07:17] Speaker B: That's impossible to make. Well, me look good. [01:07:20] Speaker A: All right, well, that's enough chitter chatter. I would suggest. Anything else, boys? [01:07:27] Speaker B: I don't think so. That's a lot. [01:07:30] Speaker A: Okay. All right, Dan, you need to exit this group chat and go to work. Sir, do I need to set a deadline? Will that do it for you? [01:07:39] Speaker C: I'm doing any of those at the minute. I'm juggling too many projects. [01:07:42] Speaker A: Okay, all right. Because I'll set you. I'll set a damn deadline for you. [01:07:46] Speaker C: Bud, and I will miss that deadline. Don't threaten me. [01:07:51] Speaker A: Okay, I won't. Hey, you guys gonna come out to the Champions League final watching party next Saturday out at Spectrum psg? We're doing. We're hosting the show. We're doing it live. [01:08:05] Speaker C: That's the first time I've had that. [01:08:08] Speaker A: We've been doing it for the last three years. [01:08:10] Speaker C: There I was dead last year. [01:08:12] Speaker B: The wife and I are going to the Trinity game. Well, the. [01:08:16] Speaker A: The show's at 2, Buzz. [01:08:18] Speaker B: The. [01:08:18] Speaker A: The Trinity game's not till 7. [01:08:20] Speaker B: Well, I've just now been invited, so I'll ask my wife. [01:08:23] Speaker C: Where are you? Are you doing soccer? [01:08:25] Speaker A: Spectrum in Richardson. Right by where you live. [01:08:27] Speaker C: Yeah, so two seconds from me. Okay. [01:08:29] Speaker A: All right. You don't got. [01:08:30] Speaker C: Maybe. [01:08:32] Speaker B: Let me. [01:08:32] Speaker C: Let me consult the. The boss. [01:08:34] Speaker A: I was cheaply promoting my own event here on Buzz's podcast. [01:08:37] Speaker B: I noticed that what, are you unhappy about this? [01:08:42] Speaker A: Am I going to go to talking to afterwards or something? [01:08:44] Speaker B: No. [01:08:44] Speaker A: You're going to send me an invoice for advertising. [01:08:47] Speaker B: Yes. I'm going to dock your pay 100%. [01:08:51] Speaker C: And what time is the game, sir? [01:08:53] Speaker A: Two. The show is at two. Kickoff. Is it 2 soccer spectrum over off of Campbell and 75 in Richardson, Texas. Awesome pizza. Really? Seriously, the pizza's like freakishly good. [01:09:07] Speaker B: Sweet. Nice. [01:09:08] Speaker A: All right, hope everybody comes out and joins us. It'll be a good time. [01:09:12] Speaker C: And that's the. The home for now of Athletico Dallas youth. [01:09:17] Speaker A: That's true. Yes. The owners of Soccer Spectrum also own Renegades, which is merging with Dallas Athletico or Athletico Dallas. [01:09:27] Speaker B: Hey, by the way, since it will be after this podcast and before the next one, Happy birthday, Bobby Hammond on Thursday. Bobby Hammond Burn. Friend of the podcast, buddy. [01:09:38] Speaker A: Oh, better than just friend of the podcast. [01:09:40] Speaker B: Yeah. [01:09:41] Speaker A: Bobby Hammond's one of the best. He is the GM of the Carolina State. [01:09:47] Speaker B: He works for North Carolina, that club. I don't know that he's the GM of anything, but he's worse. [01:09:51] Speaker A: Oh, he might as well be. [01:09:53] Speaker B: He might as well be. He's. Yeah, he's the dean. The other dean. Third Degree. The podcast is brought to you by listeners like you. If you enjoy what we do on this podcast or on thirddegree.net or any of our social media, why not join [email protected] thirddeagree or just share what we do. Share our podcast with other FC Dolls fans, people, you know, people. People that are curious about professional soccer and dfw. Send them our way and we. That's the best way you can support what we do. [01:10:21] Speaker A: All right, boys. There you go. I got nothing else. We will. Thank you, Dan. Appreciate you, dude. [01:10:27] Speaker C: Thank you. [01:10:28] Speaker A: Thank you, Buzzard. [01:10:30] Speaker B: Hey, thanks for being here and running us through the ringer. [01:10:34] Speaker A: You write the run sheet in a crayon. I read it. That's what I do. I'm good at that. And thank you, dfw Soccer curious fan you. We will speak to you next week on another episode of Third Degree, the podcast. [01:10:47] Speaker C: Yeah, I got nothing today. Third Degree, the Third Degree Podcast. [01:10:54] Speaker A: Third Degree. The Third Degree. [01:10:56] Speaker C: NE Podcast. [01:10:58] Speaker A: Third Degree. The Third Degree Podcast. Third Degree. The Third Degree. [01:11:05] Speaker B: Never Careful, Sam.