The best 0-0 draw i've ever seen..

In soccer they say a 0-0 draw is like kissing your sister, well this afternoon's game in the 2008 African Cup of Nations between Mali and Nigeria was the best 0-0 game ever. I had to watch it over the internet using P2P software, but despite a few break ups the quality was just fine. I do think I will be going to Little West Africa for the Ivory Coast vs Mali game on Tuesday January 29th.

Tournament favorites and heavyweights Nigeria are now out of the tournament after losing to the Ivory Coast (ok i know the official name of the country is Cote D'Ivorie) and now drawing again Mali, the Super Eagles of Nigeria only have 1 point and i think have no chance of making it to the final knockout round.

Mali might be one of the poorest countries in the world with a GDP per person ranking 166 out of 179, but I give it up to their soccer players for playing with heart and passion. The same passion can be heard in their music, check out any CDs from Malian artists.

They do have what I think is the best soccer jersey in the world, I want one of those as seen up top for sure.

While I thought i was going to root for Senegal in this tournament as its a country I have visited, now I think my spoiler team is going to be Mali. Lets go Eagles!! If you are not watching this years African Cup of Nations you are missing out on some of the best soccer in the world right now. Forget the boring FA Cup, or the Premiership as heck without the African players in England now, the game is boring.. fire up your Sopcast and tune into the African Cup of Nations!!

Weekend at Bernies Part III

You simply can't make this shit up. Folks if this is not the sign the USA is already in a recession I dont know what other than the 4 horsemen riding through the street will tell ya tough times are ahead..

From the NY Daily News yall Let the man Rest in Peace

So for $355 bucks, folks are now arrested and in jail for who knows what crime. And folks are renting places for $1700 in Hells Kitchen for a tiny space, oh no thank you.

Well I guess since the Screen Writers are still on strike, someone needed to come up with new ideas for Sitcoms..


and the NY Times link All the News that is Fit to Print

But on the real, I would rather talk about sports, soccer, drinking, and hot Czech vs Brazilian supermodels right now I dont have much in that aspect. We are all up into elections, recession, housing crash.. I know that the lil bit of money I have in the stock markets is FAR FAR away from the Financials. They are about to take some massive writedowns in the 4th Quarter 2007 earnings. Like over 10 Billion each for Merrill Lynch and Citibank.. If you bought a house anywhere outside of Manhattan in 2007 its going to probably take you 2-3 years just to get back above-water. Real estate is fucked in most of the country, and then in NYC-Manhattan its the opposite shoeboxes with showers in the kitchen cost $500,000 bucks, hell you can't even get a non-jumbo mortgage for that price..

So as one investment bank said in their 2008 outlook, "There will be blood" (in the streets).. Keep your money closer to your mattress than to Wall Street..

Ahhhh now just looking forward to see if Beckham will get his 100th appearance in an England uniform for the upcoming Feb 6th game vs Swizterland.. but more importantly anyone have picks for the Africa Cup of Nations starting on Jan 20th.. I don't know enough about the other teams, other than I'll root for the Ivory Coast, as i love me some Didier Drogba and got plenty of Ivorians living up by me in Harlem...

2007 Tale of 2 Countries: England vs Brazil

Everyone wraps up 2007 in a different way, so i thought I would add my 2 cents to the mix. In 2007 2 countries England and Brazil had totally different years on and off the sports fields. They played each other once on June 1st at the newly opened Wembley stadium, the game was a 1-1 draw, but Brazil scored their goal in the 90th minute in Injury time, snatching what was surely going to be a rousing England victory in their first game at the National stadium.. The rest of the year went decidely in Brazil favor.. Lets start with the England shortcomings, hang on the list is long!!!

England had a horrible year in 2007 plain and simple. Ricky Hatton the only decent fighter of recent memory from England was undefeated going into a match with Floyd Mayweather Jr in Las Vegas, due to the cheap British pound, they flocked to Las Vegas to support their man in droves. As usual they drank the town dry and made buffons of themselves booing the USA national anthem before the fight. Well after Hatton was knocked on HIS ASS not once but twice in the 10th round, they went out to drink some more, probably try to screw some whores and left the USA with their tails firmly planted between their legs..

Lewis Hamilton was a rookie smash sensation on the Formula 1 racing scence for 2007. Never had a rookie won the Season championship for most of the season Hamilton was winning and beating his teammnate and rival defending 2-time World champion Fernando Alonso. Well during the last 3 races of the season Hamilton basically choked, with his first non-finishing performance, and then an 8th place in the last race to lose the title by 1 point. I must say I knew nothing about Formula 1 before my trip to Montreal during the Grand Prix, but I will do my best to stay in tune with it from the start of next year to see if Hamilton can win the championship and the riches and bitches that will go with it!

A sport I know NOTHING about, the Rugby World Cup was this summer. England which won it won the whole tournament in 2003 were underdogs in 2007, but made it to the finals where they lost to South Africa by a score of 15-6, knowing nothing about Rugby, i'm not sure if this is a close game or an ass-kicking, whatever the case England lost..

I've written about England crashing out of the Euro2008 in the qualifying phase, so not much more to say, other than England is not as good as the players or the fans think, they are like the Chicago Cubs, but not as loveable.

Liverpool, 5 times champions of europe lost in the Champions League final to AC Milan. While Liverpool has many foreign players, they are still an English team

In other news, Queen Elizabeth II became the oldest ever serving monarch at a whopping 81 years old, now in power for 55 years her son Prince Charles is wondering if he will ever be King, I think this year he is going to invite his mom Skydiving for her birthday!

The most talented soul singer to come from England in years, Amy Winehouse while this was her breakout year it was not her first album or first year. Yet she became an international star singing about how she won't goto Rehab, well after seeing her walking in the streets like this i think she needs to take her ass to Rehab, let see how she does on the Grammy Awards coming up in a month.

Ok the good coming out of England, well I have to say they have a bumper crop of large boobied glamour models, girls i dig like Keeley Hazell, Michelle Marsh, Lucy Pinder, Danielle Lloud, feast your eyes on them.

Ok now Brazil had a totally awesome year in sports, finance, and naturally supermodels. Lets start out with Brazilian IndyCar driver and 2 time Indy 500 winner Helio Castroneves winning Dancing with the Stars. Go go Helio and enjoy that young 19 year old partner of yours

Soccer the national passion of Brazil also had a bumper year, they won the 2007 Copa America, the semi annual competition of all the national teams in South America, beating their rivals Argentina in the Finals 3-0. Also the FIFA Beach Soccer World Cup, yeah I bet you didnt know they had such a beast, but it was held in Rio and Brazil beat Mexico in the finals for another title. Along with winning the right to host the 2014 World Cup, and starting out their 2010 qualifying campaign with 8 points from 4 games, not the best start but easily in 3rd place with still 14 games left to play over the next 2 years.

Kaka (known to his mother as Ricardo dos Santos Leile) won the FIFA World Player of the Year award, along with a champions league crown playing for AC Milan. While many feel he was not the best player in the world, he won, so whatever the powers that be feel he was.

Outside of the sporting arena, Brazil had a great year in the financial markets. The Brazil Bovespa stock exchange was up huge, while its hard for americans to buy stock in Brazil companies not listed on the US Exchanges thanks to ETFs, the ETF that tracks the Brazil market symbol "EWZ" had a banner year up some 76% over 2007. Starting at 46.85 per share it ended the year at 81.00 per share. Check out the graph and wish you had invested at the beginning of the year.

Also Petrobras the national oil company announced the discovery of the Tupi oil field, with an estimated 8 billion barrels of oil, it would be the 2nd largest oil find in the last 17 years. When it is finally pumping oil in 2014 or so, those 8 billion barrels when extracted could be worth over a trillion dollars on the open market. But dont get any idea of invading Brazil, as the USA in a single years uses almost 8 billion barrels of oil, so this would just be a tiny drop in the bucket.

The Brazil currency the Real had one of the best years against the dollar advancing some 17% year to date, while this is great for the country, it makes going to Brazil and enjoying those awesome caipirinha, the national drink of Brazil.. I mean what other country has a designated National Drink??

Brazil also kept their bumper crop of super hot supermodels taking over the Victoria's Secrets catalog and runaway show, gotta give props to Adriana Lima, Alessandro Ambrossio, Isabeli Fontant, Izabel Goulart and all the other hotties. Enjoy

All in all it was a good year for many people, I hope everyone out there reading has a safe and good New Years eve and may 2008 be better for you than 2007.

England demands that Yugoslavia reunite as a country...

Ok its taken me a few days to get all my thoughts together on the disaster in London Wembley Stadium from last Wednesday. I will say i'm sure all bars in the country did a bang up business and no one went to work on Thursday. Basically you can blame the problems on England's national team on many things, but i see as it comes down to the fact nations of the former Yugoslavia beat the snot out of England and caused the loss.


The game itself was a great game, my P2P connection did not kick in well enough to watch till about the 18th minute, by the time that England was already down by 2 goals. While I thought all hope was lost, the half-time substitution of Mr. Golden Balls himself David Beckham can be thought of as saving things. A few points first... What the HELL was the deal with the condition of the field/pitch? for a 1.6 BILLION dollar newly opened stadium the grass looked wrecked, spotty and the cold rain made it play like ice. They love to claim that Wembley is the largest stadium with all the seats covered, ok so great the fans stay dry and the pitch turns into an ice rink. While the first goal was a total disgrace of a goal that Carson gave up, it skipped like a hockey puck at an NHL game. The NFL game was over 3 weeks ago, plenty of time to replace the sod. Next up what is the use of having a lone striker in Crouch if you dont have anyone to deliver the ball to him, it was only when Beckham in the 2nd half could feed him good crosses. Regardless England lost, they are out of Euro 2008, and suspect for World Cup 2010 qualification. Now onto the reasons the breakup of Yugoslavia has been horrible for England.

In 1991 when Yugoslavia broke up as a country and started upon a path towards a genocidal war complete with good old fashion ethnic cleansing it broke into what is now 6 or possible 7 countries(If Kosovo get full independence).

We have Slovenia which feels more like its neighbor Italy than communist eastern bloc russia, I had a blast in Slovenia i recommend anyone to visit there, and if you wanna party check out the nightclub Global and the cute dancing Slovenian girls.

Ok back to thinking after that needless whail tail shot.

Next up we have Serbia which boasts a quality team that qualified for the 2006 World Cup and are no slouch themselves as they did not make Euro2008 but were in a group with Portugal, Poland and Finland all who finished with over 24 pts. As a city the capital Belgrade is a great party city with their barges, but i must say the sight of bombed out buildings that were bombed by the good ole US of A that are still standing years later felt sort of post-apocalyptic movie set.

Bosnia and Herzegovinia is another of the former countries and its capital of Sarajevo is one of the most historic in the 20th century, being the city that Archduke Franz Ferdinand of Austria was shot and killed leading to World War I, and the start of a century of war and death. Most people of my age remember it as the host of the 1984 Winter Olympics featuring american Bill Johnson winning the gold medal in the downhill, a virtual unknown at the time he jumped onto the world scene, take a lesson from him Mr. Bode Miller. Sadly Johnson as i recently saw him on Real Sports with Bryant Gumbel has gone thru a whole lot of hell in his life since 1984, sort of like Sarajevo. Sarajevo is a lovely city located in the valley with outdoor cafes on almost every street with great views

It was also the scene of some of the worst crimes during the Balkan war. It has recovered and is totally peaceful now, but yet every mention of the country in the news media seems it has to have the adjective "war torn" before mentioning the name. It has totally since recovered and the women of the town are some of the best dressers i saw in all of eastern europe. Great beer and pizza also, worth a visit but a mid-table soccer team.

Montenegro just became a sovereign country in 2006 and is technically the newest country in the world, in fact which i saw recently on final jeopardy and I knew the answer, yeah sitting at home doesn't win ya anything so big deal. I have no visited, but have talked to people that the beaches on the Adriatic sea are not as crowded as neighboring Croatia, and that the city Bar is up and coming and shit just from the name only sounds like a town I need to visit. People have described it as the next big thing for beach town, so get in there now and buy up as much real estate as you can. As for a football team they have just begun competing in UEFA, so not sure how well they will fare.

Now comes the countries that caused England to stay home Croatia and Macedonia. In 4 games against these teams England managed to earn 4 of a possible 12 points. The worst game had to be the 0-0 draw vs Macedonia at HOME at Old Trafford. In the span of 5 days in October of 2006, this draw and a loss at Croatia and at this point England should have fired Steve McClaren. The next game was not till March 2007, giving them 5 months to get their shit in shape, but nope.

I went to Croatia and while it was one of the countries I was most looking forward to, I must say I was disappointed. I should have managed to travel the extra miles and gone to Split or Dubrovnik. If you are looking for the fun summertime party, DO NOT HEAD to Pula. I arrived in August and it was full on family vacation season, cars from every country in Europe were in parking lots all over town. The Hostel had an amazing location on the water outside of town, but there were no bars really in easy access for nighttime drinking, thankfully the hostel served big liter bottles of beer . The water was the clearest water i've ever seen, but it was one of the rocky european beaches that I dread. Pula the city was great with its ancient roman ruins.


As for a football team Croatia is a top class European side. Their 3rd place finish in the 1998 World Cup surprised everyone, and they qualified for both the 2002 and 2006 world cups. They are in the same group as England again for the 2010 World Cup qualifying and you have to expect them to be the favorite top seed. A second place finish from England in the group would get them into a playoff. Expect great games between England and Croatia for the 2010 qualifying campaign.

FYR Macedonia (Former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia) is a country that I did not visit and don't know much about the cities. Its landlocked so no beach action, its capital is Skopje, a city that strangely enough I know in my head as my father has played a song called "Nights of Skopje" before. Possibly on a future trip to Greece or Albania I will stop by this country but as of now I dont know enough to talk about it.

So there ya have it, a breakdown of the 6 former Yugoslav countries and my thoughts. They have defeated all the hopes and dreams of England, looking back this might finally get them a good manager and no longer give spots in the starting 11 to old guys who don't deserve it.. can you hear me John Terry, Frank Lampard and Steven Gerrard???? Next summer the Euro2008 will still be well watched, great games and a blast of a time, even without 50,000 drunken Island people invading the European Continent..

Today is the day for England...

England.. all of England will be glued to the TV in about 3 hours to watch the England vs Croatia soccer match. It costs $24.95 on PPV here in the states, and while I would like to see the outcome, no way i'm paying that so i'm hoping that my chinese P2P bootleg TV hookup works.. BUt one question, Shawn Wright-Phillips??? WHY... you gotta play beckham, he might be old and have lost a step, but he manages to find a way to represent his country at those clutch moments, think Injury time vs Greece..

As for what I expect, I expect England to win somehow, they managed to find a way to pull out a win in there last minute situations, from the Beckham goal vs Greece in 2002, to the win vs Poland in 2006 to make the world cup, they find a way to pull the rabbit out of the hat...

Rooney wont be playing, so you wont have to see this picture... wow the possibilities for the caption for this could be so so many things...

Plus England has to win, so we can have 50,000+ drunken English invade continental europe this summer during the Euro2008.... The other game i'll be watching

Blame it all on Gisele Bundchen!!!!!

The stock market had another bad day today, oil pushed to close to $100 a barrel, Gold closer to $100 and the US dollar continued to sink.. reason why, supermodel Gisele Bundchen and her big mouth..

Seems like Gisele or her agent came out and said she did not want to be paid in US Dollars but in Euros instead. With her currently making some $33 million bucks a year, the 9.1% drop the dollar has against the Euro so far this year, would be oh just under $3 million lost, might be pocket change to the top earning supermodel of the world, but to you and me that could be our lifetime wages! Hell i'm sure Linda Evangelista who claimed to not to wake up for less than $10,000(how bout $10k in loonies you canadian hottie would that get you up?) is wishing she was born about 15 years later, as $10,000 heck I don't even think today's supermodels would bend over to pick that up on the ground, that is one time when if i was walking behind her I wouldn't mind of her not bending over for me!

Well this story made all the news, on every station from some folks calling her unpatriotic(uhh folks she is BRAZILIAN, she just earns her money and fucks her honey in the USA), to a savvy business woman.. naturally all stories got a chance to show her in her bikini, in her victoria's secret, and hey i'll do the same with a pic of her at the beach.. Just for full disclosure, Gisele is not my favorite supermodel(goes to hockey loving Karolina Kurkova), heck she is not even my favorite Brazilian supermodel, with Alessandra Ambrosio getting that nod.

Yet with that news breaking and the constant talk of how the US dollar has sunken, and boy has it ever sunken. Today we get Gold on a mad rush to $1000, probably wont even stop at $900 an ounce, Oil on its way to $100, and the US dollar setting all time lows against the Euro, Canadian Dollar and other currencies. Oh yeah and the stock market had another %2.6 percent tanking on all major averages. For anyone who travels the pain is HARSH on the currency front. Back in 2006, it was costing me about $1.27 to buy a Euro, today its $1.47 or about 15% worse. Who knows what it will be in 2008 when I get back to Europe.

So if today is the beginning of the end with major banks declaring huge losses, GM posting a ridiculous $39 BILLION dollar quarterly write-down, China saying it will think about holding so much of its foreign current reserves in dollars and move to Euros and other more "stable" currencies, we can think of the day the sky fell, as the day Gisele opened her mouth. She just stick to walking around in her thong, and making ungodly sums of money.

2014 FIFA World Cup.. the winner is Brazil!!!

While it should come as no suprise to anyone today it was made offical that Brazil will host the 2014 FIFA World Cup. I say no suprise as FIFA had a stupid rotation system to ensure that each continent got a chance to host it. So we went from Asia, to Europe, next up Africa and then South America. Yet for the South American bids, no country other than Colombia even put together a real bid, and they dropped out back in April, so it was just a matter of pulling the one name out of the hat that was in the hat. Yet it was made official today.
Now i'm extremely excited for this on many reason. First Brazil is near or at the top of my list of countries to visit. I know I will get there way before 2014, and realistically if things go well, by 2014 I hope to have a vacation home in Brazil, and be speaking Portuguese. Yep its that special of a country, between their smarts to get Energy independent back during the 1970s oil shock, to the bevy of just insanely beautiful super models, to its Football/Soccer tradition, this is a country on that on the upswing. In fact I think i'm going to buy some shares of ticker EWZ, the iShares NYSE ADR that tracks the performance of the Brazil stock market, heck by 2014 at the current kick ass rate of return, a small $1000 investment might pay for your whole World Cup trip.
While the 2010 South Africa World Cup is seemingly right around the corner, heck many nations have started their qualifying campaigns already, I'm just not as excited about that world cup. The 22hr flight from USA is a killer, plus their issues with crime, lack of infrastructure, etc still have me believe that the World Cup will be pulled from there in a few years. While i've recently read that stadium construction is going well, with the poverty and issues that Africa faces, one must honestly think could that money be better spent for clean drinking water, AIDS programs/prevention/drugs, hospitals, education, transportation etc. Yet the USA squad for 2010 is something you can start to take shape in your head now, with players like Altidore, Adu, Feilhaber, Bradley, Howard all having shines recently and only getting better in the next 3 years.
Brazil while the country is one of the fastest growing economies in the world, will also have to do some work. The fact that it is the 5th largest country in the world in area and population, transportation is going to be an issue. Brazil never developed a rail system, and the road system is shoddy at best. The country surely will use this chance at the world cup to start to work on these systems. With a booming growth in exports, they can use better roads and rails, way before and after any soccer games are played. Right now the best means of transportation thru the country is by planes, and with 2 large catastrophic plane crashes in the last few years, even this system is not up to standards.
The distances between potential host cities is LARGE as you can see in this map I made with cities in consideration marked. FIFA will narrow these 18 cities, down to between 8 or 10, but still some trips might be over 1,200 miles between cities and currently taking buses might take up to 2 days for some of these trips. Yet with a soccer-mad nation, and recent success in hosting the Pan American Games, and always in the running for a summer Olympics, I know Brazil can do it!!!

View Larger Map

If Anyone is still out there.. yeah i know it sux...

If there is anyone still out there reading this blog, yeah i know it has sucked of late. simple reason, no travel this year.. I've been to Montreal twice, and while I have enjoyed some fine Canadian Beers, long with others from around the world, montreal is no Slovakia(where a pint of great beer could be had for about 75 cents) in terms of beer prices. Its not uncommon to spend $7 CAD on a draft beer at any bar, with the current exchange rate the lowest in 30 years, as it now takes about $1.02 US to get a Canadian Dollar... so all the things that have been cheap in the past in montreal, from lap dances to beer are now insanely expensive.. Yet the city itself is affordable to live in, with rents way way below $800 a month...
Anyway, so yeah until I can get to travel more, this will probably be a slowly updating blog.. I do drink plenty of beer while at home in NYC, but I want to write about the same places, same drinks, same folks that make up weeks in NYC..
Yet travel will be coming soon.. Summer 2008 plans are being made for a whirlwind trip starting in Europe hitting some of my favorite countries, and possibly a few new ones.. with stops in the middle east, asia and untimely ending up in China for the Olympics.. that trip should provide many many drinking possibilities...
My current issue before the trip, is with the qualification for the Euro 2008 soccer championships nearing a close, is who to root for to make it, and who to support. The games are being held the month of June in Austria and Switzerland, and with all big soccer tournaments should be a blast. So far the teams that are in are Czech Republic, Germany, Greece, and Romania.. Yet some big name powerhouse teams are on the bubble. England has to win vs Croatia later in November and get help from Russia and Israel. While i would not root for England, if they dont make it, its going to be a rather big story in europe and england.. also the federation is going to miss out on an expected 100 million POUNDS in revenue they would get from the TV, Radio, etc rights. A fun team to support would be Scotland, as they are having a good run of luck, but losing in Tbilisi, Georgia last week was a tough blow and now have to face Italy in Glasgow, but also will need help to get in... Norway would be a nice choice to make it, they have a tough game vs Turkey, and I could root for Norway fairly easily... anyway once the 16 teams are in, a decision will have to be made on who to support...
Alright.. just wanted to write something, so people would know i'm still alive and around...

The Road to the Century Club(100 Countries)

The United Nations lists 192 Member Countries, FIFA the world football federation lists 208 countries. If you average it out you get 200 countries, so by visiting to 100 of them, you can say that you have seen half of the world. FIFA has more countries listed as they break up the United Kingdom to its 4 home nations(England, Scotland, Wales, Northern Ireland). Also FIFA recognizes places that while many would say are sovereign nations, under the U.N are considered as commonwealths or other properties, places such as Puerto Rico, East Timor, Macau, Guam, U.S Virgin Islands, Taiwan can all attempt to qualify for the FIFA World Cup, but are not fully sovereign nations. The Traveler’s Century club lists a ridiculous 315 Countries, but many of these are just Islands in the middle of nowhere, yet with their very generous definition of a country they have many members who have been to all 315 countries.. I’m just trying to get to my first 100, after that I’ll worry about the next 100.

Ok so I am going to go with the FIFA list, as well since Soccer/Football is the world’s most popular sport and I’ve seen it played basically everywhere from a beach on Goree Island off the coast of Dakar, Senegal to huge packed stadiums in Germany. Also the FIFA list is grouped beautifully by region, so lets have a crack at where I’ve been, where I want to go and when I think I’m going to get there!! In Alphabetical Order, here we go.Coutries already visited will appear in Italics.

It will take a while to go thru all 208 countries, so some patience please, but unlike the Brackets(which will be revisited sometime soon), this is going to get done at a decent pace. Why? Well cause all summer being stuck in NYC, I’ve been thinking a lot about travel and this is a good way to get my thoughts out..

Today’s Segment is the formally known as the FIFA West Asia Region, or basically to most folks these make up the Middle East Countries.

Bahrain – Ok this small island nation is right off the coast of Saudi Arabia. You might have heard its name in the news cause after Michael Jackson was found not guilty by the state of California but told “Don’t let us catch you in bed with little boys anymore” he escaped off to Bahrain, where he could probably do whatever he wanted with no worries. Bahrain is listed by Lonely Planet as one of the best introductions to the middle east, as its liberal, modern but yet retains its arab heritage. They host the F1 Grand Prix race in early April, and after my recent experience having fun in Montreal at the Grand Prix up there, this would be a great time and reason to Visit Bahrain. With plenty of flights into the airport from all over the region, and currently building a bride all the way to Qatar, that at 28 miles long it will be the longest fixed link in the world. This is a possible destination for me in 2008 if I manage to do a round the world trip. Plus one of the few middle east countries to allow anyone to drink a beer!!!

Iraq - Ok this has been in the news lately for all the wrong reasons. Its possible one day this country will be split into 3 countries, Kurds, Sunni, Shia regions. At that point there might be some peace and quiet. Yet there is NO chance I will be visiting Iraq anytime soon. Plus you can’t get a beer there legally as it’s a dry country!!

Jordan – Recently in the news as Petra was named one of the 7 New Wonders of the world. Most of us just know it as a scene from the Indian Jones and the Last Crusade move. Known as a very safe middle east country as all the US News bureaus use Amman as a base and launching point to get back and forth to the USA. Royal Jordanian airlines has joined OneWorld, the alliance that American Airlines is part of. Plus an amazing roman amphitheatre in Amman that looks stunning and still hosts concerts and other events. There is a very good chance in 2008 if I stop in the middle east that I’ll get to Jordan.

Kuwait – This is the poor little country that got invaded in 1990 by big bad Saddam Hussein and started the USA into the mid east hell we are currently stuck in. This is a popular country for US workers as contractors in construction, oil service and other industries. While I have no plans to get here, again it’s a dry country, I did meet a cool American working there on a break when I was in Estonia. While he was making good money and staying at the Four Seasons, the fact there was no drinking and no sex to be had was driving him crazy. Sorry Kuwait for those reasons I think I’m going to pass on ya!

Lebanon – Beruit, Beruit!! From talking to fellow backpackers I’ve been told this is the most happening, party spot in the middle east short of Tel Aviv. Even in summer of 2006 when the war started, at night folks when out in their finest clothes and partied up, I like that spirit. Between the beautiful coast, the stunning women, and good nightlife party scene I will definitely be in Lebanon hopefully sometime in 2008!!!!

Oman – This middle east country looked great on the various episodes of the Amazing Race that its been featured on. Yet it’s a little off the beaten path when you see where it is on the map. Yet Muscat the capital is suppose to be a tourist hub, the the coast has some beautiful beaches on the Arabian Sea and Gulf of Oman. A little out of the way, so no plans to get there soon, but not ruling it out by any means.

Palestine – FIFA calls this a country with a team that competes(and loses) in Asian soccer events. I think of this as a pawn in the middle east peace process. I enjoy having 2 arms, and 2 legs, so no plans to risk them by visiting Palestine.

Qatar – Doha is the capital, and has gotten recent attention as host of the successful Asian Games and a potential candidate city for the 2016 Summer Olympics. While drinking is mostly banned for local, expats and foreigners are allowed to drink here. While it would probably be more fun to have a Heineken in the Netherlands, or a Corona on a Mexican Beach, its still a beer, and would have to do since there is no local Qatar made beer. If the Bridge from Bahrain is ever completed I would love to ride across that bridge and say yep I was on the longest fixed link in the world. Plus the airport in Doha is a major hub for the middle east, so yeah there is a good chance Qatar will be on my list in 2008. If I knew much about natural gas, there is always a chance of getting a job here. But I think the burning hot summers, and lack of local beer would steer me away from here.

Saudi Arabia – Suppose to be the USA friend and ally in the middle east, I think they still have a very repressive society. Plus no drinking. Sorry not going to support a country that was home to 15 of the 19 hijackers from the 9/11 attack. No plans.

Syria – The USA does not even want to talk to Syria in terms of peace talks as G. W Bush feels they are EVIL doers. I’m not so sure how safe it is here, so going to have to pass on this country.

United Arab Emirates – Dubai! Dubai!! While Dubai is only one of the 7 Emirates that make up the UAE it gets all the love. This is a definitely stop, I’ve never been skiing in my life and there is a good chance the first time I ski it will be indoors in Dubai, while its 122 degree outside. While everyone else goes to Aspen to ski, hell I’m going to Dubai.. Definite stop on the 2008 world tour!!

Yemen – From what I hear still dangerous as a terror hot spot. Yet going to any Bodega in NYC and you feel like you have visited Yemen already. With no plans to join Al-Qaeda anytime soon and it being off the beaten path on the map, I have no ploans to get there righ tnow. Yet I will give Yemen its props for being the link between people migrating from Africa 50,000 years ago went to the Middle East and Asia.

So at the end of today's list we listed 12 countries, with 5 of them hopeful for 2008, so far off to a good start. Thats all for today folks, next up the East Asia Zone.

What You Need to Know about David Beckham

Ok so Beckham-mania is hitting our shores. While I don't claim to be any expert on soccer/football, I will say that I've enjoyed watching Beckham play in the past, and seeing him in the MLS is going to be great. I'm not about to become a Los Angeles Galaxy fan cause of him, but if the game is on, I will watch it..
For those out there who have no idea or don't care about Beckham, here is a bit of information about him..
He is 32 Years old as he comes to America. While in Europe 32 might be considered over the hill/on his last legs yet the last big soccer star to invade the USA, Pele was 35 when he came to the Cosmos. Beckham has been playing professionally for almost half his life, and in the premiership since age 20, yet there is still life left in his legs i'm sure. Things you will not see while watching Beckham includes any use of his Left Foot, he is solely a one footed player. You will also not see him use his head on a ball ever. What you will see are some of the most lovely, on spot, crosses using his deadly Right Foot. Also some amazing Free Kick goals, if I was a goalkeeper in the MLS right now i'd be dreading being the first one to give up a Beckham free kick goal, as its going to make every highlight reel from now to eternity.
Sure there are more complete players, faster player, heck some might even say better looking player.. but you can't deny this guy is good, not at all past his prime. It was just last summe, he was collectively saving England's ass against Ecuador in the World Cup, with one of his trademarked wicked free kick goals. He gave everything in trying to beat Portugal, but it was those penalty kick idiots like Lampard and Gerrard who could not find the net.
The hype is unreal in the states, and don't expect him to score too much, as its not his game, he is not a pure striker like a Drogba, or even Theirry Henry will score more than Becks.. but man oh man those Corners, Crosses and Free Kicks are wicked.. just check out any of the thousand of YouTube compliations..

250 free American AAdvantage Miles

Ok.. i know blog updates have been less than few and far between. But its weird to not be traveling this summer, so I have no idea what to say.. Anyway if you are reading this blog, i'm sure you enjoy travel... So here is a way to kick another 250 miles in your American Airlines Aadvantage acount, not much, but it might put you over the hump for a free ticket.. Just fill out this short 3 page survey(alot of optional fields). Takes 8 to 10 Weeks to post so be patient..


Free 250 American Aadvantage Miles

Bracketology: My Version 32 Countries, 1 Winner!!

Hey all.. I'm back after a rather long lay-off, the reason was nothing bad, just basically I didnt have anything to write about. When I was in Europe it seemed like each day was a different place, different people met, new beers, etc so there was always something to write back. Yet now back in a normal boring NYC life, not much to write about except thinking about where to goto next.. Yet with March Madness upon us and everyone thinking about filling out their Brackets, I decided to do my own Bracket. I'm not much of a fan of college sports, I honestly dont watch either Football or Basketball except for their respective championship games, as a pro sports fan I just cant get with it, and have problems with the fact the teams are making so much money but if a player takes $50 bucks from someone they are branded an evil person and criminal.

So for my version of Bracketology i've decided to rank 32 countries and get down to one winner. I've been more than blessed to have traveled alot of the world, while I know for sure there is more to see as heck i've never been further west of California for the mean time I'll take the 22 Countries visited on my 2006 Europe backpacking trip and throw in another 10 countries i've visited at some point in my life.. Stick em in a Bracket and away we go. I've ranked them based on the only equal issue I could think of which is population. While this is not always the most fair reason take in point Canada with its population of some 30 million gets ranked 9th overall in population. Whereas a great country like The Netherlands with 16 million people gets ranked 11th, yet the population density of the Netherlands is the highest any any place I visited while Canda with a whopping 3.2 people per square mile ranks 219 out of 230. Anyway the easiest I went with was by population...

I will do my best to have at least 3 posts per day. Criteria for determining who wins is strictly in my warped mind, so it could be anything form number of topless beaches, to the quality of the beer, from the most picturesque country to the dirtiest beaches, I hope you find it enjoyable and stay tuned..

Up tomorrow the first 2 matchups. Number 1 Seed Russia vs tiny 32 Seed Guadeloupe, along with 2 Seed Germany vs 31 Seed Luxemborug. Here is the entire Bracket stacks up..

2006 You Were A Good Year See Ya!!!

Ok I know I haven't really written much of anything over the last few months. No reason, other than one of the main reasons before this year i've never considered being a blogger. Overall my life is boring, I'm not a good writer, and who would care about the boring mundane details of my life. While I was on my whirlwind trip Blogging was the best way to stay in touch with folks, let people back home know the trip was going well, or in some cases not so well.. Anyway as 2007 approaches I plan on finishing up the country by country reviews of still at least 15 countries that I have not written about. Also hopefully I'll be able to take another trip in '07 that will provide more material for a blog if anyone is interested in reading..

Yet as 2006 comes to a close as with most people its a time to reflect on things of this past year. For sure 2006 was a great year for me, as I was able to take an amazing trip that left my passport with very few empty pages for future stamps, and it doesn't even expire until December 2008, so if I am able to travel as much as I want to over the next 2 years, extension pages will be in order. I am grateful for alot of things things this year, most my all my family and myself in relatively good health.. I saw relatively cause I think my Liver is still wishing it was in Europe where the beer was very pure and the liver was able to process the toxins very well and left my head clear most morning afters. Yet back in the old USA it seems like any beer, even Imported beer is hitting me HARDER than ever.. Yeah it could be cause I'm a year old, a year wiser, whatever you want to call it.

Yet as with all years there are some things to look back on as not so great and want to change for 2007. While Death is not something you can control, the world lost alot of great people this year and I myself was touched by the death of someone who was too young to have made her transition to the other side. So for all the good times, memories, pictures, stories.. For all the great people I met around the world on my European trip who I hope I am able to stay in touch with there are still all those people who have passed us on.. So below I will try my best with the help of Wikipedia to list those who have left us this year.

January 19 - Wilson Pickett, American Soul Singer. While not as well known as many of the other greats, Wilson could sing. Probably best known for his song "In The Midnight Hour", he was one of the great soul voices of the 1960s. Also a great songwriter in his own regard, tunes of were recorded by everyone from Led Zeppelin, The Grateful Dead, The Rolling Stones, Creedence Clearwater Revival, Bruce Springsteeen. Practically a who's who of world music. 1991 Inductee in the Rock n Roll Hall of Fame. If you want a lesson, check out his 2CD Greatest hits from Amazon for only $19.99. Wilson Pickett 2CD Greatest Hits

January 30th - Coretta Scott King. Wife of the legendary Dr. Martin Luther King Jr, Ms. King had the duty to be a strong woman and stand by Dr. King's side during the tumultuous 1960's civil rights movement. Also raising their 4 young children after Dr. King was assassinated in 1968. The Civil Rights movement could go down as the most important movement of the last 100 years, and its surely not over yet. Great woman for sure.

March 6th - Kirby Puckett. Minnesota Twins great Outfielder, and MLB Hall of Famer. While never a twins fans growing up, there is something to be loved about Puckett. Standing probably 5"8 inches tall, as almost as wide in girth as he was in height, he was the ultimate competitor. Be it climbing a wall in CF to make a catch, hitting a clutch HR when his team needed it. Elected into the HOF in his first year on the ballot which was a shock to many. When you look at his numbers vs Don Mattingly they are incredibly close, yet Puck won those 2 World Series with the Twins. Youngest ever HOF death at age 45(except for Roberto Clemente who died before being elected but had his 5 year waiting period waved)

May 3rd - Earl Woods. Sure he was only Tiger's father, but he was a US Marine and war hero in his own right. But what should be looked at, is despite the fact his son was a sports prodigy at such a young age, both father and son always kept their diginity. In these days of fathers of 8 year old pee-wee football players being violent against their coaches, ref's, other parents, even other kids its great to see someone raise a child star and both the star and father being well adjusted.

June 6th - Billy Preston. The 5th Beetle, or sometimes known as the Black Beetle. The only person other than the Fab 4 to receive performance credit on a Beetles record. John Lennon wanted to make him a group member, while he never got that in the end, he performed with him during their last ever performance in 1970. Also a FONKY man on his own in the 70s, he played with probably the other most famous group from the UK, that being The Rolling Stones. For some true 70s funk check out his tune from 1972, Outa-Space. Definately check out for only $7.49 at Amazon his Millennium Collection with Outa-Space and You Are So Beautiful on it. Billy Preston Greatest Hits

June 7th - Maria Puppin-Boyd. This was was hard, my good dear friend Maria passing at only 31 years old from Cancer. I've said about as much about Maria as I already can, but lets just let it be known, she was by far one of the strongest people i've ever met. To fight cancer the way she did, always have a positive attitute and never question "Why Me?" well not many of us would ever be able to live with that dignity that she shows. You will be missed always Maria.

Below from (L to R), Patti, Myself, Daniel Boyd, Maria Puppin Boyd, Ingrid. During a dinner for her birthday in 1998.


September 4th - Steve Irwin. Always entertaining, always fun to watch on TV. The Croc-Hunter died young, and considering his line of work, it was a shocking death. While I've been told from friends in Australia this was on the level of a national tragedy, here in the USA while Irwin was on TV, he never fully reach Rock-star status. Yet we all will learn a lesson about swimming above sting-rays from his death.

October 6th - Buck O'neil. One of the great ambassadors for the game of baseball. A great player during the Negro Leagues. The first ever African-American coach in the major leagues, Buck become enormously popular during his latter years. Always in demand for an opinion, as a speaker, or just as a great guy. Sadly he wasn't elected into the baseball Hall of Fame when they elected 18 other Negro League legends. Hopefully the book hasn't closed on his chance to get into Cooperstown. Even if he never makes it, he was instrumental in establishing the Negro League Hall of Fame Museum in Kansas City. A place one day I will surely visit.

October 11 - Cory Lidle. Well anytime these days you hear of a plane hitting a building in NYC, people will freak out and worry the next attack is coming. Yet in Lidle's case it was probably a combination of bad weather and pilot error and nothing of the terroristic scare. Yet from a journey-man pitcher he will now go down in history for alot of people as a trivia question as to where they were, when they heard a plane crashed into an apartment building on the Upper East Side of Manhattan.

October 28th - Trevor Berbick. The only man to ever fight Muhammad Ali(beat him in 10 round in 1981) and Mike Tyson (got his ass knocked out in 1986). I have only seen highlights of the Tyson knockout, never of the Ali fight.

November 9th - Ed Bradley. News commentator and journalist. Overall a legend in the African-American community being one of the few black faces on Network TV in the early 70s. Blazed a trail for all who followed him. Also a great sports fan and jazz music fan and supporter.

December 13th - Lamar Hunt. By far one of the most influential people in USA sports over the last 40 years. From helping to form the American Football League(AFL) and lead for a merger that created our current NFL. To his role in USA Soccer, being a founder of both the North American Soccer League(NASL) and Major League Soccer(MLS) and owner of 2 teams. While he was lucky to have come from a wealthy family and can't be protrayed as a rags to riches story, his contributions to USA sports are legendary.

December 25th - James Brown. The Godfather of Soul. By far the hardest working man in show business. To hear his music, or see his dancing feet was something we all have to have done. I luckily had the chance to see him perform live at the Taste of Chicago in the late 90s, while not in his pure heyday, he still put on a helluva a show. I even attempted to go pay respects to his body when it laid in repose at the Apollo Theatre in Harlem a few blocks from my house, but the crowds were simply too big. Loved by all, Respected by Many, his music is simply the backbone of almost anything you hear these days that makes you want to move your feet and shake your ass!!

December 26th - Gerald Ford. While in many ways I am always shocked at how they make it out when former presidents die that they were the greatest thing since sliced bread. If Ford was that great, he would have gotten more than 49% of the vote in 1976 and beaten an unknown peanut farmer from Georgia. Yet in death he is greater than his 28 months in office. Will always be a trivia question as the only man to be president of the USA without ever receiving a single vote from the public for office.

December 30th - Saddam Hussein. My feeling for the Iraq war aside, the Devil is finally able to get his way with Saddam as depicted in the South Park Movie. I hope Lucifier and Saddam are having a blast down there.. If you have not seen Bigger Longer Uncut, check it out by far my favorite Musical ever! Only $7.49 new at Amazon. South Park: Bigger, Longer, Uncut

See ya 2006! Hope everyone has a great 2007!!!!!

Utah! You go live in Utah!!!

I have to wonder if that is what Freddy Adu said when told he was traded from D.C United to Real Salt Lake. In the famous words of NBA star Derek Harper when he rejected a trade from the Dallas Mavericks to the Utah Jazz he told a reporter "Utah.. You go live in Utah, I ain't living in Utah!!"

This past weekend I know of one Ghanaian who had a great weekends, and one who might have been scratching his head. Watching the Chelsea vs Arsenal game, it appeared that arch London rivals Arsenal would be the first team to win at Chelsea's home stadium since Jose mourinho took over as coach in 2004. With only six minutes left, Michael Essien of Ghana struck an incredible 35 yard shot right into the corner of the net, to tie the game at 1-1. Later he almost scored the game winner from up close but hit the crossbar. Overall it was an amazing game, check the video of his possibly goal of the year strike below.


Then later in the weekend, USA citizen but Ghana born teenager Freddy Adu, the former "savior" of USA Soccer, former number 1 overall pick in the MLS, former highest paid player in the MLS(at a paltry $500,000 a year, i think the waterboy on Chelsea makes more than that), got traded from his hometown DC United team out to the middle of Utah. Now while initally it sounds like the end of the career for Adu, some things have to be looked at. He will be playing for John Ellinger, who was his coach on the Under-17 USA national team where Adu first came to the attention of everyone. Second the kid clearly needed a new start, maybe outside of the spotlight, and pressure of DC United, he will get a chance to play his proper position as a central midfielder and develop his skills. His skills are obviously not where he wants them to be, as after his 2 week try out at Manchester United, they told him come back kid when you are a better player, no thanks this time..

While I know the kid at only 17 has plenty of time to shine and become a centerpiece of our 2010 USA World Cup team, the future of USA soccer has others to fall back on. Watching a few of the NY Red Bull games I was totally impressed with the play of Josmer Altidore who is also 17 years old. Less pressure on Freddy might in the end be a good thing. No more clashing with coaches, no more not being the best player on his team, no more mouthing off the way a 17 year old can mouth off and piss off team-mate who are old enough to be his father.. just get out to Utah, help them with attendence and jersey sales, help them get a real stadium cause that thing they play in the College Football stadium is simply UGLY on TV.

Best of luck to Freddy in Utah, but I still agree with Derek Harper, "you go live in utah.."

My Music CD of the Year: John Mayer Continuum

As the year comes to a close, I have to say this year brought some good music to listen to. For the first time in a while, I actually can say there are at least 5 CDs that came out this year that I have totally enjoyed. But yet the best album of the year by far for me, is the new John Mayer release "Continuum". Why? Well its a combination of alot of things..
John Mayer is a great guitar player, simply put. At the same time he manages to write great songs, and had a decent voice. So all around, a complete musician. While most of his fans seem to be women, men should have no problem admitting they enjoy Mayer. His recent CD did not come out till September 12th, a bit after I was home from my Europe trip, which sucks, as it would have made AMAZING music to listen to on numerous 12hr train rides in Eastern Europe.
Along with his great songwriting of his own, he managed to do a cover of one of the most amazing songs guitarwise i've ever heard. From to me the greatest guitar player who ever lived, Jimi Hendrix. Bold as Love has to be one of my favorite of all time hendrix songs, from the colorful images of the lyrics to just the killer guitar work. Its a song that i've never heard Hendrix do it live, yet according to some web sites that list every concert he ever played he played it before. There is an amazing test/demo version on the 4 disc "The Jimi Hendrix Experience" box set, that is suppose to be the 21st take, an all instrumental version. It was Take 27, that we hear on the album that was released..
Anyway check out the amazing live solo performance of John Mayer doing this song below and if you don't have the album, pick it up, you won't be disappointed. Its only $7.88 on sale at Amazon.. check out the link below.

What I will and won't be doing this weekend...

On this weekends list of things to do, and not to do. Not to do, sorry was not invited to the TomKat wedding in Italy. Not that I really care, as i've already seen Katie Holmes nice cans in the movie The Gift, and Tom hasn't made a good movie in some time, Mission Impossible 3 kinda sucked. Plus anyone getting married in a damn HAUNTED Castle in Italy, even if I got the invite, I might have had to send back, sorry can't make it. Not big on Ghosts, I saw my otherwise cool friend Godfrey freaked the fuck outta his mind on the VH1 show "Celebrity Paranomal Project". The Odescalchi Castle is the site of the wedding outside of Rome. Back in the 15th century dude who lived there, his wife would let younger men come in and violate her in ways which must have pissed off her man, so he killed her in the castle. He would later then violate a bunch of married women and wound up killing their husbands. Imagine if they had a NY Post back in 15th century Italy, I can only imagine the headlines that would scream out..

Ok since i'm not invited to that wedding or any wedding for the matter. I'll be watching sports(again)! If you haven't heard there is a certain big college football game this weekend, Ohio State vs Michigan. Now growing up in NYC and going to a college that was not a Division I, II, or even III school I dont really get into college sports. I was told its cause on the east coast, we have not had a college football team that matters in a century by my west coast cousin who is a USC nut. Yet as a kid I did like Michigan as they had Anthony Carter who caught some amazing passes during his days in Ann Arbor. Well this year for the first time since 1975, both teams are undefeated and this is going to be the game of the season, decade, century whatever. With this being the last game of the Big 10 schedule now for the past few years, it usually decides a bowl birth, championship, but rare have both teen been the "only"(save for Rutgers, Boise State, etc) undefeated teams. I can only name about 2-3 guys on each team, but I'll be watching and probably rooting for the underdog Michigan. Having never lived or gone to college in either state, I can't understand the full level of HATRED between the school and states. I just have to chuckle at stories about how legendary Ohio State coach Woody Hayes wouldn't even fill up his gas tank anywhere in the state of Michigan. or how Bo Schembechler a former assistant under Woody Hayes couldn't win a national championship with Michigan and this has spawned a number of hate fight songs. In fact he died today, I guess never being able to win the Rose Bowl, ate at his heart for so many years, it gave out today. I'll be watching this game on Saturday for sure. Saturday at 3:30pm on ABC

Other sports to watch this weekend include the NASCAR Ford 400 from Homestead Florida. Its the last race of the NASCAR season and while it appears that Jimmy Johnson with a 63pt lead has the Chase for the Nextel Cup sewn up. Anything can happen.. Jimmy needs to finish 12th or better to assure the spot, even in some ways a 15th place finish with 2nd place guy Matt Kenseth would clinch the tie breaker for him. Basically unless Johnson blows an engine or crashes, this thing is done. Yet its still the last race of the season, and I'll be watching. Sunday at 2pm on NBC.

No major European soccer games on this weekend, while if you get Fox Soccer Channel, you can watch Manchester United, Everton and Liverpool all in action. Last weekends game of Arsenal vs Liverpool was a quality matchup. The big news in european soccer this week is that Freddy Adu is going to have a 2 week training stint with the Manchester United team. Most likely he will be playing with the reserves, so i doubt he will get to show off his skills to the likes of Wayne Rooney, Cristiano Ronaldo, and Louis Saha.. it will be interesting to see what comes about his 2 weeks overseas playing with the big boys, as so far in his YOUNG career, remember he is only 17 and most of us were poppin zits on our faces at 17, but so far he hasnt done much in MLS.

NFL Football as usual is in effect on Sunday here in the states, my resurgent Jets hopefully can at least play competitive against the Bears, I don't expect a win, but hopefully they don't get blown out. Their schedules after the Bears is easy with not having a play a winning team. Other good games to watch for include the NBC Sunday night game of Denver(7-2) vs San Diego(7-2). I know that the ratings are huge for these NBC Sunday games, and they are glad they paid as much as they did to get football back.. Fuck those deperate housewives, I know what I'm watching on Sunday.

RIP to Bo Schembechler, i'm sure you'll be watching on the big screen HDTV up in the sky.

How to waste $51.1 Million dollars

You want to know how to waste $51.1 Million dollars, well just be Theo Epstein, the GM of the Boston RedSox.. And not its not like the movie Brewster's Millions staring Richard Pryor of having to spend $30 million in 30 days in order to inherit $300 million. Is baseball turning into European soccer where players are moved for gigantic transfer fees? Was Theo on the phone with Roman Abramovich the owner of Chelsea football Club when he was thinking of how to bid for Daisuke Matuzaka?? Roman probably told him about wasting away $40 Million dollars to sign a player like Shawn Wright Phillips only to watch him sit on the Bench and not score a goal in his Chelsea career but making it right by signing Didier Drogba for $45 Million to have him become the best goal scorer in the Premiership, ya know you win some you lose some...

To play $51.1 million dollars just for the right to talk to a player is in many ways crazy, but in many ways like European Football. Now the Red Sox still have to sign Matuzaka to a contract, and guess who his agent is.. Yep Scott Boras, the man who can get the last dollar out of everyone. While at the time the Carlos Beltran contract looked insane, his recent season and leading the Mets to the playoffs and a great season makes it look like a better return on his 7 year, $119 price tag. Word is Boras is looking for a 3 year, $45 million contract. This would make the 3 year, $21 million that Hediki Matsui signed with the Yankees look to be the far east bargain of the century. I can understand keeping it to a 3 year deal, as if this guy proves himself, he will only be 29 and up for a monster 5 year contract. If it doesn't, it limits the Red Sox losses at just short of $100 million dollars.

Just how good this Matuzaka is remains to be seen. Foreign pitchers don't have the track record of performing great in the USA. Neither expensive imports from Cuba, Mexico and Japan or elsewhere have done amazingly well. Possibly a few years with flashes of brilliance, but overall for a full career its been a toss up. Fernando Valenzuela had his brilliant rookie year in 1981 at the age of 20. He went 13-7 seemed unstoppable. Over the next 7 years the Dodgers would let him pitch 96 complete games, of which an amazing 27 were shutouts. Then at the age of 26 he was essentially DONE. After this point only 17 more complete games for his career, only 1 season of over 200IP, and a career record of 60-71, more hits than IP and an ERA of about 4.50 most season.

The fact that Matsuaka is already 26 years old, and has thrown in Japanese baseball about 1400IP to this point in his career is not a good sign for the future. Its going to take him a year or so to adjust to USA Baseball, and having to rely on your fastball to establish strikes early in the count. On top of it, looking at him he looks built like Pedro Martinez, while Pedro has only begun to start breaking down physically now at 34 years old. Roy Oswalt has a similar build, and while he has been a total stud his first 6 years in the Big Leagues, it will be interesting at age 28 if the Astros get their money worth with his current 5 year, $73 million deal. If I was a Red Sox fan, the slight build would bother me. Obviously there is a sense of urgency to do something after not making the playoffs last year, and knowing the Yankees lack of quality starting pitching, they wanted to make it SURE the Yanks would not get him. Well the Yanks will look in other directions and possibly even let our minor league pitching prospect, 20 year old Philip Hughes. My opinion is i'm glad its the Red Sox wasting $51 million so they can go ahead and raise the already league high average ticket prices, instead of the Yanks spending $30 million or so and ending up with another Hideki Irabu.. who it should be noted has more World Series Rings(2) than the Red Sox franchise have in the past 88 years. Along with his 1.7 Billion yen in Career salary.

What I know about Kazakhstan!

Well like the millions of others Americans I went to see the movie Borat: Cultural Learnings of America for Make Benefit Glorious Nation of Kazakhstan over the weekend. It has made a ton of money, with another $29 million over this weekend, for a total of $67 million and rolling on strong. I'm sure the studio is happy, Sacha Baron Cohen is happy, and even the nation of Kazakhstan is happy despite being portraited in slightly backwards ways. I think the only people who aren't happy are the unwitting "stars" of the movie, who signed release forms for like $150, or $500 bucks for their scenes and now want a piece of the pie.. ahh the American way, don't you love it???

Before the whole Borat takeover I actually knew a few things about Kazakhstan. It being the 9th largest country in the world, larger than Sudan, slight smaller than Argentina.

In sports at the 2006 Winter Olympics, the USA beat Kazakhstan 4-1 in hockey. This would be a huge victory, in fact our only victory in the tournament and show just how much we sucked. We tied Latvia, and lost to Slovakia, Sweden and Russia. So if not for the glorious nation of Kazakhstan we would not have made it to the quarterfinal round(where we lost to Finland).

Also if you follow the annual march through France, otherwise known as the Tour de France, everyone could cheer for Lance Armstrong back in the day but you had to really enjoy the race to root for Alexandre Vinokourov who is one of the most exciting riders. He would attack at any time, any place, mountains, or whatever and even was a guy who would be with the sprinters at the end of the race to win a flat stage. Probably one of the best overall riders of the tour, he didnt compete in the 2006 Tour as his team had 5 of its riders eliminated in the pre-race doping scandal. He was never accused of doping, but at such a late date, it was impossible to enter the race with a 3 person team. He will be 34 in 2007 if he rides the tour, and sadly in the endurance sport of cycling that might be a bit too old to win the whole thing. Still he has had a great sporting career, and possibly the most accomplished athlete in the history of the country, having won an Olympic Silver medal in 2000.

While I was in Europe this past summer, I met a girl from Kazakhstan and let me tell you they look alot different than in the movie. Considering Kazakhstan's location the people are a mix of the Chinese Asian look and Russian. It seemed like the people shown in the movie were poor gypsies from a tiny village. I am not sure if any of the movie was filmed actually in Kazakhstan, I did see in the credits something about a Romanian unit.

I was in Bratislava after the World Cup Final game and talking to the few French fans I saw and she was in that group. Knowing the Borat movie was about to come out, I had to trade currency with her and managed to get myself a 200 Tenge bill(worth about $1.50). It will be a nice collectible until/if/I ever visit the glorious country of Kazakhstan itself.

The movie was funny for sure, in fact there was one particular scene where I was crying, tears literally rolling down my face. Yet was it the funniest movie ever? No.. Was the script stupid... Yes.. Is Cohan a genius at this form of comedy? Yes.. Should you go see it? Probably Yes if your not easily offended.. Remember people the actor doing the jokes about Jews is actually Jewish himself. The same way black comedians can make fun of blacks.. but if they talk about jews or whites its TROUBLE. Cohan can make fun of the jews. In fact from some stats i've seen on the web, I dont even think there are many jewish people in Kazakhstan. I've seen the religion break-down as follows: Muslim 47%, Russian Orthodox 44%, Protestant 2%, other 7%.

Alright next post for sure, how the USA can regain a world-wide sporting presence.

Has the USA lost its sports mojo???

Recently I was watching and NHL hockey game, and it struck me just how many of the players are foreign born. The NHL should literally be renamed something like the International Hockey League, as so many of the players are foreign born, and not just from North America countries of Canada and USA. While the Canadian born players are still the leaders both in terms of sheer numbers and in all-time hockey greats, the European born players are catching up. The NHL is already starting to resemble European Football leagues like the English Premiership and Spain's La Liga where players from all 6 continents compete on a weekly basis. For sure the best up and coming young players from the NHL are from Europe, and looking at past draft history that is not going to change anytime soon. All this thinking had me wondering if the USA as a country has lost our sports mojo. While without a doubt we can claim the best players in NFL Football, at the same time we are basically the only country in the world where the game is played. All the others sports that are played on a national basis, it can be argued we don't develop the best players.

The NBA is still dominated by mostly Black, mostly American players, but more and more Europeans and even South Americans are coming to play. While well known players like Manu Ginobili and Tony Parker are foreign born and have played major roles on teams winning the Championship, did you know there are 80 foreign born players making up roughly 20?% of the league from 35 different countries. The Toronto Raptors have not 1 but 2 Slovenian players(Rasho Nesterovic and Uros Slokar) from a country of 2 million people smaller than New Jersey.

Yet looking at recent performances in International basketball tournaments it can be said we aren't the best in the world. At the recent FIBA World Championships our team finished 3rd place. True we have won the 1996, and 2000 Olympics, but the 2004 Olympic performance while missing some of the best players due to "terrorism fears" we lost. Who knows if for the 2008 Olympics our best players will go, or claim the long travel to China as a reason for not going. I mean these players are already making untold millions(just look at the Knicks giving Jalen Rose nearly $15 Million dollars to GO AWAY) and they want to spend their summer vacations driving around their fleet of cars.

Other sports are no better, in Baseball, once thought the dominant sport, in the recent World Baseball Classic we simple sucked. While it can be said the timing of the event was not good during spring training, we lost of Canada and Mexico our 2 north American neighbors. The biggest biding frenzy this off-season is for some Japanese Pitcher, Daisuke Matsuzaka who few fans have ever seen pitched. The best offensive players seem to come from the Domician Republic, Venezuela or other places these days. We won the Olympics in 2000, but this sport with its limited worldwide appeal is being dropped from the Olympics after the 2008 games, the first sport dropped from the summer Olympics since Polo at the 1936 Berlin Games. Not something to be proud of for the game of baseball as it only became an Olympic sport in 1992.

Golf??? Well you can't really consider it a team game, just as much as Speed Skating was made out to be a team sport at these past Winter Olympics with the controversy between Shani Davis and Chad Hedrick. The recent performance in the Ryder Cups shows the USA either doesn't play well on the big stage, or simply aren't the best golfers in the world. That is the 3rd straight Ryder Cup we have lost and in recent memory have only won the 1993 and 1999 Cups. I don't watch the event anyway as this year the time delay coverage was boring and horrible. While I can understand simple stroke play golf, I have NO IDEA what four-balls or foursomes are other than a potential kinky sexual event!

Hockey, well my favorite sport is being overtaken by Europeans for sure. While I LOVE the Czech players on my NY Rangers, looking at the overall stats of the NHL its clear the foreign born players are the best right now. From today's top 20 in league scoring we find 1 American, 2 Czechs, 1 Slovakian, 9 Candaians, 2 Russians, 4 Sweedes and 1 Austrian. You are telling me the best player in the USA hockey is equal to the best Austrian player?(Thomas Vanek for those not in the know). The recent drafts don't show much promise for American players, in the past 3 NHL drafts, there have been 24 out of 90 players of USA decent taken in the first round. While this percentage of 26% is higher than the current 17.7% of NHL players, wait a minute. Of these 24 players taken, only 2.. yes only 2 have even PLAYED for their NHL team.. Only one of these Phil Kessel has even scored a goal. Yet when you look at the Sidney Crosby, Alex Overchkin, Evegni Malkin, Anze Kopitar and the rest of some of the 1st round foreign born players making an impact now its makes you wonder how many of the 24 Americans are going to pan out.. Watching any of these young players is a treat, last week got to watch the Rangers killed by the LA Kings and this 19 year old Slovenian player Kopitar was all over the ice, everywhere you looked he was in on a play.

So where does this leave the USA? Well it basically means that SOCCER, yes some of your call it football, but that Soccer is the USA's only hope of fielding a team that will compete on an International level to sucess. While this past 2006 World Cup as experienced in person the USA put on a totally embarrassing showing, the future is bright. There are many challenges, and by no means are we about to produce as many quality soccer players as a Brazil, its our nations only hope.. more on this on my next entry as to how Soccer can save the egg on the USA face in International sporting events...

Revenge is a Dish Best Served tomorrow!!

The UEFA Champions League group stages continue with Matchday 4 on October 31st/November 1st. The match I'm most looking forward to is the rematch of the game October 18th. Yep Chelsea vs Barcelona, this time the game will be played in Barcelona at the Camp Nou in Barcelona. Back 2 weeks ago Chelsea won the game 1-0 on a great goal by Didier Drogba, who has 4 goals in the Champions League, to go with his 5 League tallies to have an amazing 9 overall goals. This week the venue shifts and with some 70,000 or so Barca fans the home team should have an advantage. Its a very important game for Barca as they are tied with Bremen for 2nd place in their group with 4pts. Barca cannot afford anything less than a victory, as Bremen is playing winless and hapless Levski Sofia who has scored 1 goal, allowed 10 goals and is starting their backup 18 year old goaltender.

On Halloween in the daytime, why soccer?? Well the NBA season is about to start up on Tuesday, but early season games don't do much for me and my team the NY Knicks are plain and simply an embarrassment. While it would be hard to be as horrible as last season with the highest payroll at $126million (next highest team was Dallas Mavericks with 97million, but THEY MADE THE FINALS). While the youth movement is slow in coming to the Knicks, I guess there is always hope... NOT.. I expect Isiah to be fueding with someone by January, and this will probably be his only season coaching the team, as he will quit or be fired. Jeff Van Gundy is sitting somewhere glad he quit when he did or else the last 4 years would have aged him 40, and Jeff had not been aging well since being attached to Alonzo Mourning leg in that fight vs Miami years ago.

So back to the sport that seems to draw the most interest for me right now at this time, yet soccer, football if your not in the USA. While I root for Arsenal, and think Thierry Henry is simply a magician with the ball when it comes to big time matchups i'll watch most of them. Chelsea is an undefeated 3-0 in group stage play, only allowing 1 goal. They are also at the top of the premiership in England and all around having a great season. This will be a great game to watch, if you can find it. Its being shown on ESPN Deportes which I don't get on my DirecTV so I guess its off to a soccer bar to try and catch this clash. I expect Barca to win 2-1, but if you read any of my team USA world cup predictions I was WAY WAY WAY off the money. So sports gambling is not a career i'm looking to go into anytime soon.