October 29th, 2007 . 11:18 pm . By: DJ Walker

I have a confession to make.

I thought we were going to lose this game.

To put it in terms the young people can relate to:

 I made the drive from the 405 all the way down to Frisco Town believing in my heart we were going down.

Don’t lie, you did too. It’s okay, you can admit it. Let’s face it, our boys have not been exactly what the English would call ‘the team in-form’ here of late. And with regard to Houston, one must, to paraphrase the great philosopher Pedro Martinez , tip one’s hat and call them Daddy ever since they made the questionable move from Silicon Valley to Tin Pan Alley.

So let’s not get all haughty and reprimand ol’ DJ for not being in a glass-half-full kinda mood as he made his way past the innumerable Indian Casinos that dot the landscape between the Land of the Red Dirt and the Great Republic of Tejas, m’kay?

Alright then. Just so we’re all on the same page here.

The buzz at the tailgate was that at least one long-time fan was going to cancel his season ticket order if Dario didn’t get the nod in goal. A little extreme, in my view, but I understand the sentiment. RayJ has been stellar. Okay, let’s be crystal clear about that. In fact, I think I was the only one who wasn’t surprised at how good that young man is. I knew it all along, and have said as much. Back when we played Kansas City in the very first Saturn Cup (what’s the opposite of ‘prestigious’?), it was plain to see that he was our ‘keeper of the future. So when the future ended up being, like, this last summer, I was absolutely at peace with the Universe when I heard he got the call.

But, Dario being back to 100% fitness (finally), and this being, to put it with a minimum of hyperbole, a HUGE game, it was not a far stretch to believe that El León was the first choice. Brother Ray will get plenty of chances to carry the boys on his shoulders in the coming years (one hopes . . . he could end up in Europe somewhere without much problem), but this was a night when you need a man who has played against Boca Jr. at La Bombonera a few times, just to so you know someone on the field has some sense of, oh, I guess “context” would be the way to put it.

Ya know what I mean?

And I’ll be doggoned if that wasn’t the exact right choice out of Steve Morrow. Overall, having won this game 1-0, he can scarcely look like any more of a genius on the night. He picked the exact right keeper, and the exact right back line, though a lot of people probably thought he was on some sort of mind-altering substance when they saw the lineup. I only say that because Gbandi’s been on the Gbench for a month, and Bobby Rhine hasn’t been first choice lately either. But, again, sometimes you want a guy who has been around the block a few times on the field, because you know that pressure isn’t a new concept to them, and you know there’s very little chance they’re not going to be ready for whatever comes at them on the evening.

And let me tell you something, my friends (and this goes out to all you playa haters out there – you know who you are): Chris looked good, but I’ll be a Wombat’s first cousin if The Bobby didn’t have the best game of his freakin’ career as a defender. He was truth. He was art. He was all the good things about life wrapped up into one little package, cookies and pie included. I don’t know if he’s eating some sort of special SuperMan food, or if Fatherhood has raised his testosterone to Schwarzenegger-type levels, or what . . . but damn he played well.

You know why we won that game? Because DeWayne DeRosario didn’t get a sniff at goal until the 89th minute. And a lot of the reason is that every time the man came near The Bobby, The Bobby put him in the soccer equivalent of the Figure Four Leglock, got him to tap out and then yelled “WHOOOOO!” just before going all top-rope on the man and applying the ol’ Atomic Elbow to the man’s personal groinage vicinity.

And then, when DeRo did get a chance, right in front of the goal, with full time seconds away, ready to break our hearts like he has done so many times before, Dario Sala was there. And Dario wasn’t having any of that. Not tonight. Not at Uncle Lamar’s house. Not again.

Come to think of it, Dario’s a new father as well . . . Hmm. We may have stumbled upon a secret strategy here. If we can have at least one or two players becoming fathers around playoff time each year, we’ll have overcome one more barrier to becoming a dynasty. Now, I’m not sure what the procedure is carry this out. There may be collective bargaining issues with the Union, and some seriously novel Incentive Clauses built into some conracts and what not, but I think we’re on to something here.

(Memo to Mr. Hitchcock . . . Work on this during the off season; well, not you personally, but, you know what I mean.)

Oh, and really, is there anything else Clarence Goodson can do for this team? I mean short of cutting the grass on Field 1 or doing the laundry after practice or something . . .  is there anything this guy hasn’t done this year to keep us within reach of a championship? The man is a badass. He’s too much. He should be chained up between games; keep the women and children away, the man is dangerous. Not only that, but aside from El Pescadito, he clearly had the best Playoff Beard going.

They’ll be telling stories about Clarence, years from now, at Inferno tailgates, claiming he was 8 feet tall and could score with his little toe and how that one time he beat the Dynamo in the playoffs after everyone else on the team was sent off for dissent in the first minute.

And if, God willin’ and the creek don’t rise, I happen to be at one of those tailgates, all old and frail and just barely having my wits about me (not unlike the way I am now at Tailgates, frankly), I’ll be the first to say, “Yep, seen it myself . . . sometimes he could fly, too.”

Ah, good times, good times.

So, in closing, I’d like to encourage everyone to be very irresponsible this Friday, cancel whatever lame-oid work, family, or school commitments you may have pending, and get your sorry carcass to Houston for the second leg of this series. We need this people – we need this more than the breath of life itself.

The time is now, the time is here, we are here as they are here and we are all together.

Goo-goo-gajoob.

Categories: Stream of Consciousness.

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