The San Jose Earthquakes are coming to Dicks Sporting Goods Park (aka The Dick) for the first time in franchise history. Yes, I know that's going to get some Bay Area fans worked up to phrase it that way but it's true. Other than taking the old name, this is a brand new team. If you're looking for their stats on the MLS' web site, you won't find them in the team-by-team drop down on the stats page. Apparently such a minor addition to the user interface has been too much work to bother with for the MLS. Fortunately the way their web site is configured you can trick it into giving what you want in some cases. In this case the key is recognizing that you just need the right URL variable of club=t100 for San Jose. The link ends up looking something like this :
http://web.mlsnet.com/t120/stats/index.jsp?club=t110&year=2008
I don't expect much from San Jose's offense. They're an expansion team and in their first 2 games have looked to be on the same path set by recent expansion teams like Toronto FC and Real Salt Lake. Last year Toronto FC managed only 25 goals in 30 goals. Real Salt Lake managed 30 goals in 32 games in their first season. Kei Kamara and Gavin Glinton aren't exactly names that get MLS defenses worried. Even with the recent loan addition of ex-Rapid Jean-Philippe Peguero it's unlikely San Jose's offense will provide the Rapids defense many problems. That's why I chuckled a bit when Nick over at We Want Rapidman wrote "They may be new, they may be winless but those strikers are dangerous." Maybe it was meant to be tongue in cheek?
Bouna Time!
If you didn't catch it, Brian Forbes has a nice interview with Rapids goalkeeper Bouna Coundoul for the Rocky Mountain News. You can check out the interview here. Seeing the questions about Bouna's dancing makes me with Bouna would do a little dance for us every time he gets a clean sheet (a shutout). What do you say Bouna? A jig for keeping the ball out of the net? Anything less than that against San Jose Saturday will be a bit of a disappointment in my book.
