Episode 248 - Suárez, Saydee, Soto, and 248 years of Independence!

[00:00:20] Welcome to the Cannon Crue pre-match podcast and I'm joined by Pat, sitting out by the pool on the water. What's up, Pat? What's going on? Should I get a little tan in before this... Fourth of July night? Kaboom! That's what Ryan says. How you doing, Ryan?

[00:00:39] Doing fantastic, Granite. How about yourself? Hey, I'm doing okay. Whatcha grillin'? We had to wait on ya for like forever. Yeah, I just got done doing a hot honey teriyaki pineapple. Marinate on a pork tenderloin. That sounds really bougie.

[00:00:55] I want to be the classic hot dog and hamburger. Perfect. You are American, sir. America. I put a sparkler on the top of each burger too. And speaking of America, the other night we were talking about USA vs. Uruguay match and Ryan shows up with a USA jersey.

[00:01:16] But underneath that jersey was what, Ryan? It's my Uruguay jersey. Benedict Arnold. That's all I'm going to say. Benedict Arnold. Thanks, Ryan, for your faith.

[00:01:25] It's hard because it's one of those things where growing up, US soccer wasn't that prominent in a lot of tournaments and stuff like that. So what we did growing up was that me and my sister and other people around us, they would have their own team.

[00:01:47] So she supported Italy, my dad supported Argentina on the side. My country was Uruguay. I loved how Uruguay plays against the South American teams. They play more systematic similar to Athletic Co Madrid. But anyway. Patrick, do you have a similar story to that? No, I'm American.

[00:02:06] Like I supported players growing up. So I fell in love with France, but that led me to Arsenal. And then fell in love with Portugal just because it's a similar style of play. But end of the day you play America. We're World War Champs, buddy. We're out here.

[00:02:23] We're winning everything and everything. Just to let you know, I'm on the Burr-Halter out train. Let's get it going. Also, let's develop youth soccer a little more.

[00:02:36] Let's get a little more like intensity into the youth programs and develop them to create players so that we don't have to talk about coaches as much.

[00:02:46] Yeah, we've really got to just re-examine and not even reimagine because there's a lot of examples of youth soccer development across the world that we can just emulate. There's no reason sometimes to reinvent the wheel. Bain's got a 16-year-old playing in the Euros, scoring goals leading the team.

[00:03:04] You know, Uruguay could eat their way through another team. What's his name? Luis Suarez on the Uruguay team? Yes he is. They're facing the bitch to get on the field, right? What would you say? I can't hear it because my ears hurting. What?

[00:03:22] He was chomping at the bit to get on the field every game. He just had to take the last game off. He said we didn't need to win. He said when a lose, we're still through and they still won.

[00:03:32] He's pumped. He's ready for the next round against Brazil and then hopefully we get to go see him in Charlotte. You know, he stopped biting people? That's what I'm really worried about. I mean, in daycare, they'll kick you out of daycare for biting other people.

[00:03:48] I mean, who cares? It's entertaining. Right? I mean, gets the other team absolutely going. Is it in the laws of the game? He gets booked for it? He doesn't complain about getting booked for it? I don't see what the problem is. Feed that boy!

[00:04:11] Give him a snack before he goes out there. It's almost like how Maradona created his fancy move on the field and they stormed this. Now we have the Maradona. Now we have the Suarez. You just take a chunk out of someone's shoulder. You're just doing the Suarez.

[00:04:27] Doing the Suarez. Okay, let's focus on something that's a lot less appetizing or a little more appetizing. So tomorrow night, this is 4th of July of course. Tomorrow night we're going up against the Birmingham Legion. This is the reverse match. We played them already.

[00:04:45] We won, I think it was 1-0 in Birmingham. Now it's coming here to Charleston and we're coming off a win. What's your predictions? You know, after the success following the North Carolina game, coming off putting four away or five away in the second half of the loan.

[00:05:05] So, you know, playing with two full halves in front of us and the expectation of now we've, we know what it feels like scoring in a half of the game. Now let's try saving a score in both halves. So I'm hoping for a 3-0 win.

[00:05:22] Birmingham just come off a loss where they were up at 0-0 at halftime against. I think it was Louisville and then Louisville come back and beat them 4-1. So they can leak some goals. And if we can keep scoring second half like with the last match,

[00:05:35] I think 3-0 is a fantastic prediction. Yeah, I'm going to go with the super positive 1-0. This is a tough team. They can lock in. They're the best road team in the league right now. I mean that's one thing to look out for.

[00:05:53] They made the most points going on the road. So I think we'd be lucky just quick away with the win. I mean it's always harsh to say that like getting a draw at home, you're okay with it.

[00:06:07] But in this case, I know we're going to get the win, but I know it's a tough opponent. So I'll say 1-0 and I'm going to continue on with a... I think Prince is going to get the goal for us.

[00:06:20] I want to see him get in this team and get off to a hot start. I like that idea. What worries me about the legion is what we've been facing is the physicality of the main players. Enzo Martinez is just a ball of energy 100% of the time

[00:06:40] and he's in everybody's face and he's very physical and he's in referee's faces. They did a good article about him on the post on USL Championship website. Very interesting. We've got to be able to contain his energy or use it in our favor, something like that.

[00:06:59] So I'm thinking it's going to be a 3-1. I'm thinking in Kaz is going to get after them. Them two are going to banter all night with each other. And that's what you want because if you're looking at it from the battery side,

[00:07:10] you have a more solidified midfield to back you up. Whereas you're just looking on paper at the Birmingham team. Martinez is the top goal scorer with three goals in the season. You contain him. No one else on paper is looking like a threat right now.

[00:07:28] So that's very positive for the battery going in. Yeah, I think we're going to do all right. I think we can contain him. We've got to win the battle with the referees. We can't let somebody dictate what the referees are going to do next by the energy

[00:07:44] or in their faceness that we've seen from, was it Detroit City, their player and now Martinez or Martinez, where he pronounced his name. So interesting. I think Patrick you mentioned Seidi. I think he's a good energy speaker in the new signings.

[00:08:04] But before we talk about new signings, let's talk about a past signing that was 17 years old that went to Real Salt Lake and has now went on to achieve us and what does that mean for the battery?

[00:08:18] And if you don't know, I'll tell you the article says the batteries return when it's all said and done including performance based bonuses and a cell on clause stands to be well into seven figures. Is this something new?

[00:08:33] If this is true, even if it's in the six figures, is this what we're doing now? Because I think it's great management, great foresight. And is this what our new signings going to be kind of on the path with in the future? I think it's a one off.

[00:08:52] A one off? Yeah, I mean, you don't you don't hit lightning all these times. And you can see it when you do hit lightning and you get these players, they don't stick around because they are such a good talent. Higher level teams want to recruit these guys

[00:09:07] and will offer the salary where we get these kickbacks, right? So I don't think it's something we're going to stop doing and we're not going to stop recruiting talent and try to give talent a chance because this is kind of the bread and butter of the league.

[00:09:21] Like we're not the end all be all. We don't have the Apple TV contract. We're not doing all the high end stuff where every game is nationally broadcast. But like this is how you gain that recognition. You start doing these deals and a lot.

[00:09:38] You don't look at it just as the battery. You look at it for the whole USL championship. You need more of these deals to start going through to gain a little more recognition. And you don't want to be a farm league,

[00:09:48] but you want to be known for developing talent and growing talent because you don't always have to sell the talent in the end run where I think this is a rare case where this kid is just,

[00:10:02] he's really good and he's developing at such an astronomical rate that he's too big for what the battery could hold on to. And I'm glad we got a little kickback from this. But like it's not something that should be,

[00:10:16] hey, we're just going to develop some kids and hopefully we get so long clauses in the end run. It should be, hey, we're going to develop and then hopefully the league does the same thing and we all start to develop and we want to grow our league

[00:10:29] and be known for having the best talent in the USA. Yeah. I agree with you Pat and everything you said. I was just kind of confused in the beginning when you said it was a one off, but like how you kind of said everything at the end,

[00:10:46] that's why I believe it's not a one off. This is something that the battery will continue to do and seek out with future signings just like who we just signed coming up who we will announce after this.

[00:10:58] That is a person who we know we're only going to have for like a season or two to sell and then to get the resell off of that, you know the commission off of the next sale because those players are easily going to bounce around

[00:11:12] and get bigger and bigger. And that's the purpose of getting them to come to us and then that way we can turn around and then have our club become bigger and bigger because we're now what we hosted the final last year

[00:11:25] and now we're back up in the top of the league where we're attracting these big players. They want to come here. We're a beautiful city and this is a great stage for them to play at, especially now since the USL had signed with CBS and Paramount Plus,

[00:11:40] Golazo so now the streaming services have taken off and a lot more players are getting signed overseas especially. Yeah you know if you look at EPL teams and some of the academies

[00:11:53] because we don't really have an academy they're trying to set up a kind of an academy like system and we have a couple players that are listed as academy players and I hate to say this and those who know me know how painful this is

[00:12:08] but in the last couple years Chelsea's academy has been producing some great players. Now Arsenal has been doing a lot better over time I do believe but I think the idea is to build some players some of them you're going to keep

[00:12:20] some of them you're going to sell because when you sell them you have the money to buy other players that you need. And so if this is the model I think it's a great model and whoever is making decisions I think this is a great decision.

[00:12:36] I would like to take on all the academy stuff has progressed astronomically through the league so we now have like extra slots for academy players on the bench which we've never had before. I think everything we're talking about now is just giving the entire league a better opportunity

[00:12:55] to develop players which we all want to see right this is the end all deal we want Americans soccer to become better as a whole. We want to see more youth talent state in the United States and develop in the United States

[00:13:10] and not just their best option is to hop ship at 16 and go overseas and have their parents uproot their entire lives and just take a gamble on I hope my kid turns out to be a good prodigy and can develop and become a great player.

[00:13:26] So I think in that end run we're all kind of talking about the same thing we want not just MLS next pro to kind of work but we want maybe the USL championship to have our club say the battery start developing more homegrown talents in the off season

[00:13:43] or like develop these academies that can pull youth talent from the state and into what we have as a club and develop that way too. So I mean I guess the end run we're all looking for the same thing we want the best talent to develop

[00:13:59] and I think it's a good step of what we're doing with these salon causes because we're getting the kickback which you can put back into more youth development which I think we're going to talk about next who we brought in this week.

[00:14:13] Yeah let's talk about the new signing this week some kid named Soto Ryan you know a little bit about Soto don't you? Ziki Soto he is the he was on the US youth national team he participated in the last World Cup for the youth national team

[00:14:34] and they did very well in the tournament now coming here to the battery this is a very very good look for him it's a great city he's excited to be around the beach he's excited for the atmosphere the humidity the heat I think he's going to thrive here

[00:14:52] he's going to excel his skill level everything I think he's going to be a vital piece to our offense going into this postseason I really do I think it's going to take him a couple games

[00:15:03] we're not you know it's going to be a while until we see a good bit but mark my words when it comes to postseason that turnaround right there that's when it's going to start we will have a new looking battery team

[00:15:16] it will be different and it's going to be based on our last just our conversation we just had it's also exciting from that aspect that what happens if he moves up what happens if he gets sold to a team and then keeps moving on

[00:15:29] and we keep you know bringing in that money for the team which you know we're hoping the ownership puts back into the team and makes us a better team and also makes it a better experience and so I like the excitement for both aspects of it

[00:15:44] the other part is from California do you believe LA so he's going from the cold water off the coast off the less coast left coast to the warm water on the east coast I'm excited I think he's the embodiment of what Nick Marcanic was

[00:16:04] at a youth level and I think he just had a little more time to shine through his development out in the west coast the wrong coast as we talk about that have a lot of great youth development structures out there so I really think he's like our next

[00:16:22] while still having Nick Marcanic I think he's the next Nick Marcanic in the squad and he's a striker but he plays winger as well so I'm excited like we just brought in Prince now we're bringing in another attacker because this is what we

[00:16:39] not have been struggling with but it's where we've had a lull in the past couple weeks so it's nice to see the battery are seeing the same things we're seeing and we're just attacking it but we're attacking it with youth

[00:16:54] a little bit more on this case and I think we got a real diamond in the rough in this kid you know I was thinking about the idea that we need some experience in the team

[00:17:07] and part of it was I was thinking about when they brought in Sadi I was like oh here's this guy it's 30 years old he's been around he has played he's going to bring some experience in so when we have those just the advice

[00:17:21] the mentorship somebody that's experienced playing that many years can provide and I was thinking well who does better happen I was like oh well we've got Leland of course he's been around for a while we've got Smith we've got Aaron and we've got Alan

[00:17:38] but all those guys are midfield and we really don't have an experienced person that's up front kind of attacking thing until we brought on Sadi so maybe the mixture of those two that's the reason why they went for some experience up front along with some youth

[00:17:54] and the last two bringing people on Ryan I think this is something you could touch on but Myers came from MLS next bro which is the MLS Academy just like Zeke is coming from so at least he has someone in the team

[00:18:11] I guess to kind of transition him into a more so USL championship role that he's going to be playing well one thing I've noticed a lot with these MLS next teams is that if you know you're one of those shining stars

[00:18:29] like for example MD Myers was he was the golden boot winner for last year you know and they say that's a shining star right there and yet he still made the move to come over to USL and it's for those better opportunities for the fact that

[00:18:47] the USL now has more TV rights and more access than MLS does because one thing that a lot of people realize is that MLS is strictly on Apple streaming services and if you don't have Apple TV or whatever it is is on

[00:19:03] you're not going to be able to watch the game everybody's got CBS or Paramount Plus due to whatever and there's different ways you can also catch it on cable TV now so those just those exposures to coaches around the country

[00:19:19] and everything are around the world even is massive for these players because all it takes is for one person to watch you play and your life can change forever and that's what these players are looking for is that opportunity.

[00:19:33] Are we going to start seeing a little more of this over the next two or three years just kids who maybe they don't want to sign from

[00:19:43] MLS next Academy just for the fact that once the end run is you're going to be loaned out to a USL team why wouldn't I just try my hand at going to a USL team and develop there directly.

[00:19:57] That's a great observation and see how that works because it's worked for RAHAS maybe it'll work the same here and so like you said not coming here and loaned and the headline was a multi-year contract so that tells you a couple things right

[00:20:12] we know when you sign contracts that ups the value of the player if you have to sell it. Yup and it also eliminates the fact of trying to lend them a walk for free that's the heartbreaker right there

[00:20:29] and that was one of the reasons why for RAHAS when he did was because he only had one more year left on his contract and if we didn't take that opportunity then there was only one more transfer window mid season

[00:20:41] like during this time right now last season where we could have gotten rid of him for some money but other teams would have just waited a couple more months and then gotten him off the free transfer getting him to a multi-year deal and not on loan is massive.

[00:20:54] So kick off tomorrow night we all just went silent there and gave each other thumbs up on the we all agreed for once and we're just like yeah let's all shut up I'm not one I think I think we nailed it.

[00:21:09] I think we did fantastic 10 out of 10 gentlemen 10 out of 10. Kick off tomorrow at 7 o'clock at Patriots Point gets the Birmingham Legion something with FC that's what I discussed earlier Edmunds-Oce is going to provide a little libations there at the blue parking lot

[00:21:28] with the regiment they're going to be delivering some ice and a couple cold ones so stop by they'll be cooking getting stuff ready it's going to be a great match it's going to be a nice evening and we're going to go away winners.

[00:21:40] Yeah bring your 4th of July celebrations carry them over to the battery game. America doesn't stop partying just because we won we go all weekend. The battery has been slinging out these crazy deals all week for tickets so a couple days ago it was 7 bucks

[00:22:01] for a supporter section, section tickets for a day I think I saw today it was for the premier seats it was like $10 or something like that for seats that usually go for 50 bucks so make sure you're watching send it for the email stuff like that.

[00:22:19] Good shout, keep your notifications on because they sling deals out every week for ticket and you can get yourself a really good deal on a really good night like a Friday night and just get to go enjoy the battery for like essentially half off prices.

[00:22:38] Yeah and if you haven't been to a match please go to a match most of our listeners right now I could probably count them on two hands but if you're having to be listening and you haven't been to a match

[00:22:48] get to one they're fun they're exciting they don't take up a whole lot of time parking is relatively easy so get out there and join us and we'll be up behind at least I will be up behind the in the observation post up behind the supporter section goal

[00:23:03] drinking a beer or two and having a good time. Ryan you bringing the grill? No I will not be there I have to work at the pool Bart's ending unfortunately Man of the people gotta break out my skill always a man of the people

[00:23:18] a quick shout out announcement real quick for those goalkeepers in the Charleston area I will be hosting a goalkeeper camp at West Ashley High School July 15th through the 19th from 7.30 to 9 p.m. So for any of those keepers interested please reach out to Canaan Crew

[00:23:45] Granite is a great contact to get a hold of and he'll get you in contact with me and we'll get it all sorted Absolutely you can get us on Instagram on Facebook or you can email me at granite at canaancrew.com and that's CRUE as in Matle

[00:24:04] That's all I have gentlemen let's go blow some fingers off Yeah I promise to have a shirt on the next spot No more pool sides No more pool sides Bye y'all Peace, happy fourth