For the first time this season, Herculez Gomez did not appear in a game for the Wizards. Up until last night, Gomez had appeared in all 25 league games and all 5 in the Wizards other competitions.
Kei Kamara appeared in his 100th game in all competitions in him MLS career last night.
In the 38th minute, Claudio Lopez hit the 5,000 minute mark in all competitions for the Wizards. Click to continue reading...

Aaron Hohlbein's goal last night, was the Wizards 699th in all competitions, the Wizards next goal will be their 700th in all competitions.
Davy Arnaud's goal was his 37th in league play for the Wizards, breaking a tie with Josh Wolff for third place on that list. He's 2 goals behind Chris Klein for second. Click to continue reading...

While keeping track of my regular stats that I always do after every match, I realized that the Wizards are very close to scoring their 600th league goal and their 700th in all competitions. Currently the Wizards have scored 588 goals in MLS play, which puts them in 7th place overall. They are in a race with New York (596) and New England (593) to become the 5th team to hit the 600th league goal mark. Click to continue reading...

Lots of stats from last night's game, milestone appearance, milestone minutes played, milestone goals, almost every kind of stat you could ask for.
Last night was Davy Arnaud's 200th appearance in all competitions for KC.
Last night was also Josh Wolff's 100th appearance for KC in league play. Click to continue reading...

Here are some stats from last night's game against DC United.
Jack Jewsbury's appearance last night was his 145th in league play for the Wizards, passing Matt McKeon for sole possession of 8th place on that list.
It was also Jewsbury's 104th start for the Wizards, tying him with Sean Bowers for 13th on the all time list. Click to continue reading...

Gary Smith is a now officially the head coach for the Colorado Rapids. Smith was signed to a 3 year deal. The Rapids also announced they re-signed Pablo Mastroeni, coming off arguably his best year ever in the MLS, to a 4 year deal. Mike Petke, Bouna Coundoul and Jose Burciaga Jr. are all out of contract with no announcements having been made on their status. Click to continue reading...

New feature I'm going to try to do on Wednesdays now. I'm going to go through former Wizards and give an update on what each player in season has actually done with their new club.
MLS
Nick Garcia - San Jose - Played 81 minutes in San Jose's 1-1 draw wtih Houston
Scott Sealy - San Jose - Played the full 90 against Houston. Click to continue reading...

The match kicks off at Dicks Sporting Goods Park in a few hours. Rapids have only won once in their last five and twice in their last 10. They've been scoring goals, with only Columbus and Houston keeping them out of the net (incidentally both of those games were at home).

Toronto hasn't tasted victory in nearly 2 months.

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One of the best problems a soccer team can have is having too many good players to field them all. That, and the ability to adapt the line-up to different opponents, is a sign of a good soccer team. The Rapids have both.

The biggest question on my mind as we await the game against Houston (with much anticipation, by the way) is who will be starting.

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What a terrible game by the Rapids last night. It was a painful example of the cliche about a team not showing up to play. They didn't last night and instead of getting 3 realitvely easy points at home, they gave San Jose their first franchise win. Nick at We Want Rapids Man was right about confusion in the Rapids back line. Click to continue reading...

So, there I am, watching the clock through my (soon-to-be) 10-year-old's birthday party, figuring I can just wait for the archived footage of the Kansas City Wizards v. Colorado Rapids. While they're downstairs watching Little Miss Sunshine, it's about 10:30 p.m. and I'm looking for the video feed.

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I think this gets it about right:

Things didn't look so bleak for the Los Angeles Galaxy by the end of the first half. And, yeah, one could argue Omar Cummings picked up a soft penalty kick; as Max Bretos noted in his commentary Cummings popped back to his feet ...

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(Dang it! Wrong Stephen Keel! Sorry to be brief, but life is attacking me right now...not much time...)

Looks like the Colorado Rapids ended their pre-season on a high in the lower part of our fair nation: they beat the Chicago Fire 1-0 on a goal scored by ...

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I read somewhere that Colorado Rapids head coach Fernando Clavijo made building a solid defensive corps his top priority for 2007 (here? Yep; it's toward the bottom). I'll leave it to others to explain how taking care of half of the overall equation brought to fruition Clavijo's "Three-Year Plan," but the numbers argue he succeeded in that specific aim: after surrendering 49 goals in 2006, and too often in bunches, the Rapids allowed a stingy 34 goals through 30 regular season games in '07.

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For those unfamiliar with it, I have dedicated myself to follow and, to some degree, conflate the relatively separate fates of the Columbus Crew and the Colorado Rapids for the 2008 Major League Soccer (MLS) season. The idea is to see which of these long-struggling MLS original clubs make progress this season. Click to continue reading...

View From The Couch (VftC) pieced together a plausible starting XI for the Colorado Rapids from a report on an intra-team scrimmage. This came, as all communications regarding the Rapids, from official sources. By combining what looked closer to the first team from the two scrimmage squads with who he expects would take their place [. Click to continue reading...

Here are rounds 7 & 8 of the Wizards fantasy draft.
Previous Rounds
1 & 2
3 & 4
5 & 6
7(1). Team Shook - Alexi Lalas - And with the the first pick in the seventh round, Team Shook selects Defender Alexi Lalas. Lalas played only one season for the Wizards, coming over in a 1999 trade from the Metrostars with Tony Meola. Click to continue reading...

Here are rounds 7 & 8 of the Wizards fantasy draft.
Previous Rounds
1 & 2
3 & 4
5 & 6
7(1). Team Shook - Alexi Lalas - And with the the first pick in the seventh round, Team Shook selects Defender Alexi Lalas. Lalas played only one season for the Wizards, coming over in a 1999 trade from the Metrostars with Tony Meola. Click to continue reading...

Onto 2006.
Previous seasons.
1996, 1997, 1998, 1999, 2000, 2001, 2002, 2003, 2004, & 2005
1. Preki - 81 (71 league, 8 playoff, 1 open cup, 1 international) (-)
2. Chris Klein - 43 (39 league, 3 playoff, 1 open cup) (-)
3. Mo Johnston - 32 (31 league, 1 playoff) (-)
4. Click to continue reading...

Along with the recent departure of Nick Garcia, the news that Jose Burciaga Jr is going to Colorado for more draft picks reveals signs that the Wizards will be looking to play a new formation. The lineup will feature 1 defender (who needs more than Jimmy Conrad anyway?), 6 in the midfield, and 3 strikers.

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The trade of Jose Burciaga Jr. to the Colorado Rapids was finalized today. Yesterday the terms of the deal were unknown, but today we have learned that the Wizards have traded the left back for a 2nd round draft pick in next year's (2009) Super Draft. Burciaga is only a year removed from a Best XI performance in 2006 where he had 8 goals and 8 assists, earning him the team's MVP award. Click to continue reading...

My apologies for overlooking the obvious and not mentioning that Soccer by Ives is reporting that KC will be trading Burciaga to the Rapids for a draft pick. I should have mentioned it in the previous post [link]. A draft pick, eh? Surely the Rapids wouldn't be so daft as to give up their 1st round pick, #5 overall, for Burciage. Click to continue reading...

The Kansas City Wizards are looking to further rebuild their team beyond today's trade of Nick Garcia to expansion San Jose Earthquakes for their 1st pick (1st overall in the draft). That gives KC the 1st pick overall and the 11th overall picks in the draft. The conventional thinking is that KC is positioning themselves to take promising striker Patrick Nyarko with their new pick.

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Nick Garcia is not the only player that looks to be on his way out of Kansas City. According to Ives, Jose Burciaga Jr. is also on his way out of Kansas City. Apparently Burciaga will be heading to Colorado for a draft pick. This pick likely won't another first rounder, more likely to be a 2nd or 3rd rounder. Click to continue reading...

(* Assuming I botched the usage, could someone hep me to the proper term for all persons of Mexican/Mexican-American/Central American descent?) Holy pre-SuperDraft trading, Batman! Between the one player who we all thought would go (Carlos Ruiz to LA) and two that came out of left field - Nick Garcia to San Jose for the [. Click to continue reading...

I've been critical of Jose Burciaga this past season, especially late in the season when I made comments that he was probably on his way out. I still would not be surprised to see him leave, but he's doing a lot of good while he's still here with his Jose Luis Burciaga Foundation. A week from tomorrow, the foundation will be holding a fundraiser at El Patron at 2905 Southwest Boulevard, in Kansas City. Click to continue reading...

Kansas City Wizards Record (W-L-T): 11-12-7; 45 GF, 45 GA Source Material: Schedule/match reports; roster (NOTE: Sorry about the format - e.g. the automatic, uncorrectable double-spacing; I transferred this from Word - which, curiously enough, works on a Mac. CHRIST, I hate when these fucking machines make my formatting decisions for me. Click to continue reading...

Thanks to Sam Pierron, I have the list of protected players by the Kansas City Wizards, for Wednesday's expansion draft. The list that I created was not very far off the list that the Wizards ended up going with. Here's the list of protected players, those bolded were ones that I did not protect in my list.
Davy Arnaud
Jimmy Conrad
Nick Garcia
Michael Harrington
Jack Jewsbury
Eddie Johnson
Carlos Marinelli
Kurt Morsink
Scott Sealy
Sasha Victorine
Kerry Zavagnin
Those two replace Eloy Colombano and Kevin Hartman. Click to continue reading...

Is this one of the last images of Jose Burciaga Jr. celebrating a goal in Wizards blue? It very well could be. Burciaga has not seen the field since he was subbed at half time of the Wizards 2-0 loss at New York. In that game, Burciaga was responsible for both New York goals, giving up a PK for New York's first goal, and then slipping on the ball and giving it up for the second goal. Click to continue reading...

A day after I released the Down the Byline End of the Year Awards, the Wizards released their End of the Year awards in the post season media guide that is online.
Honda MVP - Eddie Johnson
Budweiser Golden Boot - Eddie Johnson
US Soccer Foundation Humanitarian of the Year - Jose Burciaga Jr.
Defender of the Year - Jimmy Conrad
Kansas City Wizards Heart Award - Davy Arnaud
Rookie of the Year - Michael Harrington
Kansas City Wizards Reserve Team Player of the Year - Ryan Pore
I can't argue with any of the choices in these awards. Click to continue reading...

The Wizards broke out of their two game losing streak, coming back to defeat Cuauhtemoc Blanco and the Chicago Fire 3-2 last night at Arrowhead Stadium. Blanco had a chance to give Chicago the lead in the 12th minute, when Jose Burciaga took down Justin Mapp in the box. Blanco's PK, though, was sent right at Kevin Hartman who saved, who didn't move and punched the weak PK away. Click to continue reading...

So I have some random Wizards news to report today. So here it goes.
Wizards coach Curt Onalfo was on Around the League in 90 Minutes, on the Champions Soccer Radio Network. He gives a really good, candid interview with Gary Richards and Peter Brown, including giving more information about new Wizards signing, Eloy Colombano, and some of the things about him that impressed Onalfo. Click to continue reading...