Premier League Preview

Jack:

Just a quick note, I’m a Villa fan, an eternal supporter of The Heskey, an admirer of the prowess of the ageless Brad Fridel and I have had, and will forever have a total man crush on Gareth Barry. 

“kinda wish I could be Joe Hart right now… (no homo)”

Top 10 Things to Watch

1. Battle for the title between Man City and United, mark April 6^th on your calendar people, it’s going to be an exciting year.
2. The season of young managers, in particular Villas Boas and Brendan Rogers. Two young, determined (as fuck) ideological coaches starting their reigns at big clubs with high expectations. Drama guaranteed.
3. Retards panicking and calling for Wenger’s head after Arsenal goes winless for three weeks.
4. Andres Villas-Boas in London, again. Watch Spurs somehow finish above Chelsea in the table -I’d love to see the look on Roman’s face.
5. The Paul Lambert revival in Villa Park. God have mercy for any fan forced to endure a season of Alex McLeish, makes me almost feel for Birmingham City fans.... almost. Look for Lambert to bring his attacking style of football to Villa, if the combo of Vlaar and Ciaran Clarke can hold the fort, Villa finishes 7^th, book it (Note - Alex vehemently disagrees that Villa will finish 7th).
6. Anything Mario Balotelli does. If they made a Truman show-like program on Super Mario, I’d never leave the TV.
7. Demba Ba and Papisse Cisse. These two will be fun to watch as they are two of the most potent strikers in the league, however I think Newcastle will not match last year and fall to mid table again this year.
8. Playmakers. The number 10. The man in the hole. The trequartista. Kagawa, Cazorla, Sigurddson, Mata. Through balls, deft chips, late runs into the box and 30-yard free kicks. Delicious.
9. Wilson Palacios, Attributes: strong. Weaknesses: passing, tackling, shooting, dribbling, positioning, tactical awareness, heading, anything resembling a football player.
10. April 27th, Robin Van Persie back at the Emirates, can’t wait.

Jack's predictions (Alex pretty much agrees, apart from about Aston Villa)

First Sacking: Roberto Di Matteo

Top Goal scorer: Kun Aguero

Top 4: City, United, Spurs, Arsenal

Surprise Team: If Villa finishing seventh is not surprising enough, look for Norwich to remain top 10.

Relegation: West Brom, Wigan, Reading

Let the games begin!

Ocho Cinco

Well to kick off the random part of the blog who better than Chad "Ochocinco" Johnson. If you don't know by now he got married last month, head butted his wife this month, accused her of head butting him and then got divorced. These events got me thinking and this is what came out of it.

Chad Johnson was one of the most exciting wide receivers in the NFL during the 2000's along with Randy Moss and Terrell Owens. What frustrates me with these 3 is how good they were on the field and how stupid they were off of it. Sure they had outrageous touchdown celebrations but hell if i scored as many touchdowns as they did and made the kind of plays they did I would probably be doing the same thing.

What upsets me even more is how people still talk about talent being more important than character when it comes to Wide Receivers (Athletes in general but that's a 100 separate posts). How many superbowl rings do they have between them? ZERO, None, Love, Nil. Sure you can say they didn't have good team, they got injured or football is a team sport. If you said football is a team sport you are a HUNDRED PERCENT CORRECT so i ask this, if football is a team sport then isn't each player's attitude and character important to the overall success of the team. Is it not more important to take a backseat when needed without complaining, to trust in your teammates and to be able to set your personal bullshit aside and just play to win as a TEAM.

So next time you see your team passing up on a talented headcase and don't understand ask yourself this "Do i want my team to be in the news for winning championships or because that talented knucklehead is mad he didn't get thrown to even though he was being TRIPLED team every play".

Robin Van Persie - He Earns What He Wants

I am writing this while angry. I wouldn't often do that, but in this case I feel it justified.

News of Robin Van Persie's transfer to Manchester United has just broken, and I am left - like all Arsenal fans - feeling incredibly bitter about the whole affair. After his fucking manipulative announcement earlier this summer, we accepted a move was likely. It is the fact that he has chosen to move to not just an English team, but one of Arsenal's great rivals, that really stings. I am as cynical as they come about footballers' loyalties, but I did not expect this from the bloody Arsenal captain who showed so much fight last season. From the man who stated over and over again how much he believed in Wenger's philosophy and playing style. From the man who when Fabregas left, said:

"Keep in mind too he's not left to go to another English team..."

Football fans are often fickle, but in some ways that Arsenal fans are upset about the transfer goes to show how shocking and hurtful this one really is. Look at it objectively:

Man Utd have just paid $37m (Canadian) for a 29 year old with one year left on his contract and a worse injury record than Bruce Wayne. That $37m covers the transfer fee alone. Assuming that Van Persie is on wages close to 200k per week, and that he will sign a four year contract, they will have spent another $64.5m (Canadian) on his wages by the time his contract is up. In two years, he will be passed his prime. Lets not forget that United already have Rooney, Wellbeck and Berbatov Hernandez, and that they just bought Kagawa to play in attacking midfield. If they play 4-4-2 to accommodate RVP, they will be overrun in midfield in the bigger games. If they play with one up front, they have an almost unmanageable embarrassment of riches. The signing doesn't seem to make much sense from a United perspective.

And back to my point. Arsenal received a good amount of money for a player who has played one full season in the last eight, and whose chances of repeating last season's form are slim to none. They can use this money to reinvest in the team or to recoup some of what they have already spent on the exciting signings of Giroud, Podolski and Cazorla. And yet. And yet the selling of the club captain and top goal-scorer to an arch-rival is almost impossible to accept, especially with the sale of Alexandre Song to Barcelona seemingly imminent.

The rational side of me knows that this is good business, that the club will go on and may well improve given recent signings, that I shouldn't be surprised because footballers time and time again prove themselves to be mercenary wankers. But we can't be rational all the time, can we?

Fuck off, Van Persie. You were an Arsenal legend in the making. You are now merely a twat. A really, really rich twat.

At least we can take some comfort from this...

Backup Catchers!

First post! Welcome to SportsFan Diaries, we will write a short introduction of us in a bit, but in the meantime, enjoy a little bit of over analysis and panic from this Blue Jays fan.

The Toronto Blue Jays acquired backup catcher Yorvit Torrealba yesterday, and along the way locked up back-up catcher Jeff Mathis to a two year 3 million dollar deal with a club option for 1.5 million in 2015.

Torrealba is a 34 year old catcher who last played for the Texas Rangers this year. In 49 games, Yorvit put up a line of .236/.302/.342 with a wOBA of .284 and putting up an fWAR of exactly 0. Yes, Yorvit is the perfect replacement level player, nothing more. Can’t expect anything else from a guy who was cut for Geovany Soto, not the rising star 2008 Soto (.285/.364/.504), but 2012 Soto (.194/.278/.340), ugh.    

The way this trade could be looked at is with a view to the future. With injuries to JP Arencibia and Travis D’arnaud, the Jays are forced to start Jeff Mathis at the plate with Yan Gomes as the back up. And with injuries in various other positions in the field, rookies who are not yet ready for the big leagues (A. Gose and A. Hechavarria) are forced to play out of position. With the acquisition of Torrealba, the Jays can send Hech back down to Vegas for more seasoning and protect his prospect status. Yan Gomes can fill the void at 3B and be the emergency catcher. It is clear that once again the Jays will not contend for the playoffs this year, so why risk damaging the psyche and status of one of the top prospects in the organization?  Ideally I’d love to see Gose back down in Vegas as well as the past two weeks has shown that he is not ready for the big leagues. Sure, his defense/arm/speed is tantalizing but right now Mike McCoy can make more contact than he can, which is not a good thing for Gose.

Now, the Jeff Mathis extension. Why? This is a player who is clearly a better back-up than a starter. His career line of .196/.256/.312 is laughable for a Major League player. To be fair he has been better this year, slugging a career high of .410, mostly taking advantages of meatballs thrown to him because he is JEFF FUCKIN MATHIS. To commit 3 million dollars to a guy like this is a high risk low reward move that frankly is unnecessary. Assuming both Travis D’Arnaud and JP Arenciebia breaks camp with the Blue Jays next year, where will Mathis play? Does anyone actually think Mathis will get a Major League deal from any other club? The only logic I see is AA trying to move JPA or shifting JPA to a different position, such as 1B or DH. Mathis is an insurance policy, a nice insurance policy which is bought way over the market value. Maybe the drag of another lost Jays season is taking its toll on me, but this combined with the Dustin McGowan extension are deals that are small, but would not be made by winning clubs. There are many other holes in the Jays lineup which are much more pressing than a back-up catcher.

It will be interesting to see what Jays' GM Alex Anthopoulos does this summer with his significant prospect capital. With the three aces in Lansing and various other useful players in a deep minor league system, this winter is the time for AA to acquire a starter and upgrades at 1B/2B. The future is still bright for this Jays team, with a season that started with so much promise and went so wrong just four days into June, once again September will bring meaningless baseball. For even the most rational fans this is a disappointing end to 2012. Hopefully by August 2013 we will be talking about King Felix 2 hitting the Yankees in the Skydome, and not about Jeff Fucking Mathis.