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Showing posts from October, 2017

Will Bosz have to hitchhike back to the Netherlands? Dortmund loses 4-2 to Hannover

Sunday morning and I'm sitting in my living room coping with Borussia Dortmund's 4-2 loss to Hannover 96 on Saturday by listening to this song:   As Stefan Buzcko poignantly noted in his article,  " Pulisic Dortmund's lone bright spot in defeat to newly promoted Hannover ," "Football is just a a game." Indeed, Mr. Buzcko. Though it must be noted that when certain players play the game, i.e. 19-year-olds from Hershey, Pennsylvania, it ceases to become a game an becomes something else entirely. We saw a few moments of that in the game against Hannover on Saturday. These moments were, dare I say, celestial? Exhibit A: Yarmolenko robs Christian Pulisic of an assist, he stole the ball & put it on a platter for him! Awful miss. #BVB #H96BVB #NiemalsAllein pic.twitter.com/ioASU36x4X — GolazoJuice (@GolazoJuice) October 28, 2017 Now, I'm not super fond of the caption: "Yarmolenko robs Christian Pulisic....." etc. becaus

Dortmund vs. Hannover preview, Should Pulisic replace Angela Merkel as chancellor of Germany?

Hello Pulisic Fans, And welcome to the Straight Outta Hershey official preview for the Bundesliga Matchday 10 game between Hannover 96 and Borussia Dortmund. Today's preview will focus heavily on three things: 1) What will happen in the game, 2) What will happen with Christian Pulisic, and 3) Am I moving to Germany? But first, let's start with a GIF: It's been a quiet half for Christian Pulisic so far, but here is a gif of him faking out 2 #SGE players. #BVB #SGEBVB pic.twitter.com/uMuvGpL5I5 — GolazoJuice (@GolazoJuice) October 21, 2017 I'll give you a moment to collect your jaws off the floor or get the urine out of your boxers or whatever it is you need to do, and then we'll move forward. .... Good. What's so special about this GIF? The fact that it's really not that special . Pulisic does this kind of stuff all the time. And I love to use italics  because they make things so much more dramatic. But let's get away from Pulisic for

No Pulisic in Magdeburg?

The goal of today's post is to answer the following question: Why did Christian Pulisic not even travel with the team to Magdeburg for the DFB Pokal match on Tuesday? Was Bosz pissed at him? Did he "not make the cut," as one source I consulted said? Or was it something more benign and obvious, like Bosz wanting to save him for more important Bundesliga and Champions League games? I must've searched "pulisic Magdeburg" 40 times on Google yesterday, trying to figure out what the hell was going on. One source said that Weigl, Götze, and Pulisic, "didn't make the cut," which seemed downright blasphemous considering these three players' abilities. Another source said, more plausibly, that they had been "spared" by Bosz, which is of course a bit vague. Spared what? Spared the hassle of traveling with the team? Spared the hassle of beating down a third league team? Spared the wear and tear on the body? And so I kept searching, while

Frankfurt vs. Borussia Dortmund: A clash of (sort of) titans

Getting ready for the Frankfurt match tomorrow by looking at the various Twitter accounts of various BVB players. Who are my favorite players, you might ask? Well #1 would probably be this kid from Pennsylvania who's, like, kinda good and, like, kinda dribbles past people.  Number two would probably be Julian Weigle because he's handsome and smooth and usually makes passes with the precision of a hand surgeon (though maybe not the hand surgeon who operated on my wrist since he actually broke the bone more). I like Bürki mostly because he's passionate and seems like a cool guy and reminds me of my friend Ross Mckinstry from high school. I kind of like Sahin because, again, he seems cool. Not because he's that great, but because he seems cool. And I would like Toprak if he was a better defender, i.e. faster, because he's also a cool guy. In fact the only one I'm not sure of is Götze, because he seems a liiiiiiiiiitle full of himself. But anyway. The game tomorr

Hey Peter Bosz, play Pulisic in the middle (thoughts on Borussia Dortmund vs. Apoel Nicosia)

This morning I got up to rain and wind here in Seattle. I should've known it was a presage of things to come. I went to the grocery store and had tea and wrote some letters. Basically, I was trying to kill time until 11:45am Pacific time, when Champions League started. And then it started. I'd downloaded Sling TV to be able to watch ESPN 3 and Borussia Dortmund vs. Apoel Nicosia, one of the top Cypriot clubs. The good thing about watching this game was I got to learn the word "Cypriot." The bad thing is it was an absolute abortion. A few times during the first half I actually said, in a loud voice in my living room, "This is an abortion." Other things I said: "WHAT THE FUCK ARE YOU DOING?" -- when Götze, Bartra, Yarmolenko, Toprak, Auba, Pulisic and Kagawa gave away the ball time after time after time. "YOU ARE FUCKING OLD AND SLOW." -- when Yarmolenko could've easily gotten to a ball but was too, well, old and slow "

Will Pulisic start against Apoel Nicosia? and a (fake) quote from Kim Jong Un

Hello all, And welcome to the Christian Pulisic Show, aka life. If you've ever watched Christian Pulisic play soccer you've realized the following is pretty much true: It's Christian Pulisic's world; we're just living in it. ANYWAY, I'm here today to talk to you about the upcoming match between BVB and Apoel Nicosia tomorrow. Last time I checked this game had massive worldwide implications, and not just for soccer. It has been reported (it has not been reported in any way) that if Christian Pulisic scores, Kim Jong Un will "dismantle all nuclear weapons and throw a party in which he will sacrifice a goat." "Also, I'll let Americans come to North Korea visa free," he added. Meanwhile, Donald Trump tweeted (he absolutely did not tweet), "If Peter Bosz doesn't start Pulisic tomorrow I'm going to talk to Merkel about getting him extradited to the Netherlands. Or maybe to the US so we can take him down to Guantanamo."

Is Christian Pulisic Jesus?

Today I would like to pose a question: Is Christian Pulisic the second coming of Jesus of Nazareth, Christ our Lord? You might think I pose this question in jest. I assure you I do not. The men have many similarities: They're both miracle workers; they both have ties to the Mediterranean; and they're both capable of wicked changes of pace (with JC I'm kind of just assuming; since he could walk on water and turn stone into bread I'm assuming he also had a pretty fast first step, too). But is Pulisic actually the second coming of Jesus Christ? Let's look at today's game against RB Leipzig in which Peter Bosz decided to start Pulisic on the bench. This might've been tough for Pulisic: In the last game that mattered, against Real Madrid, Bosz also left him on the bench. And now there was this game, the one pundits were saying was the first real challenge for Borussia Dortmund this season and a chance to see what they were really made of. Turns out, not al

Advice Column -- Ask a real Pulisic fan

Dear RPF, The other day my girlfriend and I got in a fight because she wanted to go out to dinner and I wanted to stay inside and watch the Univision broadcast of the Panama game in Spanish even though we had just finished watching it in English. After some heated comments back and forth she got frustrated, yelled "You're pathetic," and we haven't talked since. Should I try to win her back? --Pulisic Fan in Training Dear PFinT, This may be hard for you to hear, but the simple answer is no, don't try to win her back. In fact, stay as far away from her as possible, and until you can find a woman who understands your passion for this 19-year-old wunderkind, divide your time between watching highlight videos and taking shots from the top of the 18 with your weak foot. You'll forget about her in no time. Dear RPF, The other day at work my boss caught me scrolling through a Pulisic-rich Twitter and also watching various Pulisic highlight videos on YouTu

USA beats Panama 4-0, Pulisic convenes with soccer gods

On Friday the USMNT played Panama in what had been called a must win for their World Cup qualifying chances. In truth it wasn't a must win; given the softness of CONCACAF the US could still draw or even lose and there were still about 600 scenarios that would allow them to go to the World Cup. In CONCACAF if you want to go to the World Cup you basically just have to ask. Though at this point Panama might have to ask pretty insistently. Everyone knew the first 20 minutes of Friday's game in Orlando, which saw Altidore, Pulisic, and Wood start up top, would be pivotal. Would the US come out and roll over like they did against Costa Rica? Would they look tentative like against Honduras? The answer was a resounding no. In the first two minutes Pulisic did a compound (where you hit the ball on one side of the defender and run past him on the other), quickly letting everyone know who was watching that, "My name is Christian. I am here to play soccer. I don't know what

Thoughts before USMNT vs. Panama

I think I might just not care about the USMNT anymore.  I think I really might just not care. Shame on US soccer for playing crappy players when better players are available. Shame on US soccer for playing the veterans -- for as long as I can remember -- and thus never realizing the potential of our youth talent. There's an article out right now called " Christian Pulisic doesn't play for the best American soccer team ," and you know what? I think they could very well be right. At the very least I would say the US would be BETTER tomorrow against Panama if they were forced to play a U-25 or a U-23 team. Ethan Horvath in goal. Pulisic and Kellyn Acosta running the show. Weston Mckennie bruising people in the back. And also it would be about 800 times more fun to watch. Alexi Lalas was right on the money when he called the USMNT soft underachievers. The thing is, with the exception of Bradley and a few others, they could be hard. The could be dangerous. They coul

Panama prep, a Michael Bradley "highlight" video

Yesterday my roommate and I were talking about how terrible Michael Bradley is and how he shouldn't even be on the USMNT when my roommate said, "Let's just watch a Michael Bradley video. Let's see the best he's capable of." My first reaction, of course, was, "There is no thing on earth I would less rather do. I would literally rather get my arm run over by a bus than watch a Michael Bradley highlight video. What would a Michael Bradley highlight even be? Four minutes of back passes? Him shaving his head?" But then we were sitting there on the couch and bored and had watched enough South Park and after showing my roommate this video:  The #USMNT arrives for day 1️⃣ of training ahead of #USAvPAN on Friday. pic.twitter.com/7Hb29AIP6t — U.S. Soccer (@ussoccer) October 2, 2017 (who's the last player to walk into the frame, looking lost and confused and maybe even a bit depressed?) I said, "OK, let's do it. Let's wat

Pulisic on 60 Minutes, Michael Bradley conspiracy?

It's a quiet night here at my parents' house where I've come to spend Sunday night and get a good night's rest before starting this week. Tomorrow is Monday, which means all that needs to happen is for the week to fly by so it can be Friday and we can watch the USMNT take on Panama in Orlando. And of course, so we can watch Christian Pulisic. I'm not getting my hopes up anymore with the USMNT. They played like absolute garbage in the last two games, and there's no reason to think the game on Friday will be any different. I will be getting my hopes up with CP though, since he's a bright spot even when everything else looks pretty grim. I might as well just let you all know now: I think there's some kind of conspiracy going on with Michael Bradley , his dad Bob Bradley, and US soccer. Bradley is a horrible, horrible, horrible soccer player. Ninety-eight percent (rough estimate) of his passes are back passes. He gives away the ball constantly. He's