Over/Under: Reactions to the January Transfer Window

As we turn our calendar pages from January to February, an amazing sporting endeavor has just come to a close in big-time European soccer.  The so-called “January transfer window” in which clubs can buy, sell and loan players to and from other clubs has just ended.  Essentially, it’s like the baseball trading deadline except that clubs almost never exchange player-for-player, it’s more centered around flea market-type shopping.  You see someone elses wares and make an offer. It was particularly mental in England, where yesterday on the last day of the window, £200 million was spent (approximately $350 million) by clubs in the Barclay’s Premier League.

The English sporting media, predictably, went with the idea that the clubs have gone off the deep end, while the rest of the country sits in a harsh and seemingly-unending recession.

From the back page of the Daily Mirror, the headline “Football Crazy”.  From the Mail, the words “madness” and “craziest day” in transfer window history.  The Guardian calls it a “frenzy of crazy spending”.  You get the drift.  The BBC spent anREAD MORE

DL515: Football & Football; David Akers, Family, Robots & January Transfer Window

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The show is in two parts. First, Nick and I discuss Ashley Fox’s front-page Philadelphia Inquirer story on David Akers, his family, the struggles his daughter has been going through in her battle with cancer and what impact that may have had on two missed kicks in the playoffs. We discuss the story itself and how Fox framed the situation, Akers’ past financial woes and Andy Reid’s post game comments to curry sympathy for the kicker. It’s a terrible situation for his family, but was the story too sympathetic? Is that possible?

Second half of the show is with Jon Tannenwald of Philly.com talking soccer, and specifically the January Transfer Window. Is Fernando Torres the equivalent to Nomar? Why would a team like Blackpool even entertain trading away their captain for a few million euros? And how about the way the media covered the day, with stakeouts and Twitter fights and rumors of helicopters throughout the day.

Thanks for listening, as always.

News@Noon: Bradley to EPL, Strasburg Quits Chew, KD/Bosh, Media, SAGs, Phil’s Layup & Pujols Math

News@Noon is a collection of links from people we know and like or stories about folks in sports we know and like. It is, and will always be, completely arbitrary. If you have something you want linked, send along.

• The transfer window deadline day has been must see reporting and tweeting and reporting about tweets and tweeting about reporting. Plus, news(!) like USMNT midfielder Michael Bradley making the move, reportedly, to Aston Villa. Many people think Bradley is a prototypical EPL midfielder, and finally he’ll get his chance.

• Last week we linked to Richard Deitsh of SI, tweeting about whether or not he’d be interested in Ombudsing for ESPN. Here’s Deitsch’s take on Don Ohlmeyer’s run with the WWL and other media thoughts — including an interview with Mike Mayock — in his Media Circus column.

• Big League Stew posted a story from the Washington Post about Stephen Strasburg trying to quit chewing tobacco because his former college coach, Tony Gwynn, was diagnosed with parotid cancer. Hopefully high school kids who think it’s cool to dip — baseballREAD MORE

DL514: All Star Weekend, Pro Bowl, Bubba Watson, Djokovic, College Hoops, More

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Here’s the email I sent Nick this morning:

• Pro Bowl blowout • NHL All-Star weekend/skills competition/player All-Star Draft • Golf – Watson/Mickelson • Djokovic – Murray • Kevin Durant calling Bosh soft • Insane college basketball games (UConn 2OT loss, Duke smoked by St. Johns) • Soccer transfer window is insane

That’s the show. I was really excited for a great weekend in sports, despite having no meaningful football. Nick was less than thrilled. Where’d you fall and did I convince Nick that the weekend was better than the thought?

Call of the Day: Was Man Utd vs. City “Much Ado About Nothing?”

I sat down in the middle of the afternoon on Wednesday, eager to watch live, mid-week EPL action on seemingly every American sports network. Chelsea v. Fulham was on Fox Soccer Channel, but the big-ticket match of the day had to be Manchester United at Manchester City in an absolute can’t-miss tilt.

The derby (or is it Derby) was a perfect storm for Call of the Day, in that it was a match with huge names and even bigger implications in the standings, not forgetting that newly acquired ESPN play-by-play man Ian Darke was on the call. With a 0-0 score at halftime, we were perfectly set up for a dramatic finish highlighted by Darke’s signature exuberance. A sure-fire Call of the Day and the DVR was set.

Only, nothing happened. Here are three random minutes of action. It’s spirited play, but…nothing…happened.

Ian Darke: “Let’s get it right tonight. A lot of people will be watching this and thinking, well, it’s much ado about nothing. But it’s been much ado about nothing because both defenses have been terrific.”

So…thisREAD MORE

Rafael Benitez’s Rant About Roy Hodgson, Priests & Sugar Is Screaming For This Old Simpsons Clip

I don’t know much about the inner-workings of Liverpool’s famed football club, but I do know this: anytime a team’s former manager, now the head man for another club in another country, gives a quote like this, it screams Simpsons video embeds. Quoth Rafael Benitez:

“I think that Mr Hodgson, he doesn’t understand,” Benitez said. “Every single press conference is even worse than the last one.

“He’s talking about things that he doesn’t know, and some people cannot see a priest on a mountain of sugar.”

The whole controversy is rather he-said/he-said in who is or is not to blame for Liverpool’s current state of disarray. Of course, when one hears the term “mountain of sugar” in America, one things of just one thing:

Why We Should Love the EPL: Vocabulary Lessons with Roy Hodgson

Here’s a big difference between football here and football there: football here has coaches who say “f*ck” a lot. Football there has coaches who say “spasmodically.” Both coaches are officially fantastic.

Liverpool played much of this weekend’s match against Arsenal a man down after a red card to Joe Cole, yet managed to play very well with a man down and take an unlikely lead. In fact, Liverpool held a 1-0 advantage deep into stoppage time when goalkeeper Pepe Reina let a rebound bound off his hands and into the net for a last-minute own goal.

The mistake ripped away a sure victory for Liverpool, but manager Roy Hodgson gave him full backing after the match:

“He will be the first one not to try and apportion blame to other people, so of course he’s taken it hard.

“But I thought he played well considering he didn’t have an awful lot to do – and what he did have to do came very spasmodically. His concentration was good, his kicking was excellent.”

Apportion? Spasmodically? Old British guys talk awesome. READ MORE

Call of the Day: Chicharito’s Man Utd Goal “Bundled…Con La Cara”

There were a lot of great plays over the weekend, but nothing more hilarious than the first competitive goal for new Manchester United star Javier “Chicharito” Hernandez.

Watch the two videos below — in English and then Spanish — as Chicharito scored a goal in Man Utd’s Community Shield victory over Chelsea by re-directing a cross into the corner of the net …with his face.

The calls are totally different, with the English side suggesting Chicharito “bundled” the ball into the net while the Spanish side seemed to have an audible “aye aye aye” while the video showed the kick bounce off his face. Classic.