That Will Do

A Soccer Primer

Congratulations to CF Indios, Apertura champions of Primera División A in Mexico and now on their way to the Primera División proper. Which raises all sorts of questions.

At least, these are questions north o' the border. Things like, "What does CF stand for, Coconut Flapjacks?" and "What's an Apertura? Did I have any on my last trip to Pancho's Mexican Buffet?" and "Is the difference between Primera División and Primera División A like the difference between the masculine and the feminine?"

The answer to these questions is: No.

I do speak soccer, though, so if soccer scares you, trust me. I am a trained soccer professional, having played the sport all through middle school and followed it ever it since, even in the 1980's when it was broadcast only in languages I did not speak.

To be sure, the world of soccer can be confusing to the uninitiated, especially when we're talking soccer in a different country. Spooky images of shirtless men in a fog of flare smoke jumping in place simultaneously make some want to brandish and wildly fire the word "hooligan" even though they've never been properly trained in its use.

First, don't even think the word unless you're willing to use it. Only Englishmen can say "hooligan" and even sound like they mean it, so just keep it holstered if you don't want to be thought a doofus.

I don't know about you, but "hooligan" brings to mind an image of a grouchy little old lady shaking her fist while shouting that word at the kids who won't get off her lawn.

Now, to the essential questions regarding the recent promotion of CF Indios, beginning with what "CF" stands for.

The answer: Club de Futbol, which is not an anti-theft device for your soccer ball. In essence, it's Football Club. This may be one of the key drawbacks in getting Americans to like soccer.

In English-speaking North America we have franchises and organizations and teams -- all very business-sounding.

In the rest of the world they have clubs.  Very chummy and exclusionary. Soccer might think about changing this, although Football Franchise Indios would just not sound right.

Apertura is not a pre-dinner snack served with tostada chips. It means opening, as in the opening season, because there are two seasons. The other one is Clausura, or closing.

The different between La Primera División and La Primera División A is the the level of play. It's not major league-minor league like it is here in many pro sports. This is because soccer teams around the rest of the world can be promoted and relegated.

If you're a good team at the second level of the game, you can win promotion to the top league. This is what Indios did.

If you play bad and wind up at the bottom of the league, you're relegated to the next lowest division, which would be great for, say, the Miami Dolphins. Maybe play Arena league until they're ready to compete again.

That's all for now. Let me know if you have any other soccer questions. Cranks will be answered crankily.

Until then, congrats to Indios. Good to see at least one city is putting up a new facility.

UEFA Champions League Haiku

Chelsea and Man U.
world's biggest game played mid-week
Super Bowl Wednesday?

Lakers-Celtics? Good Times, Oh Yeah

Can you imagine, here we are in y2k8 and it's the Boston Celtics and the Los Angeles Lakers with home court advantage going into the conference championships.

Well, zip up all the pockets on my parachute pants and call me Shabadoo Quiñones.

Ahh, it is truly a chance for those of us who now cut loose the top button on our trousers after we eat to revel in the glory days of Magic and Bird as folks are paying some attention to the NBA again. Much like Magic and Bird got 'em doing back in the 1980's after nobody was paying much attention in the 1970's.

There is nothing new under the sun, sayeth The Teacher. Including the Suns setting early on the NBA playoff horizon -- as always, eternal playoff disappointments.

Do you doubt? How about Mike D'Antoni following in the footsteps of John MacLeod?

Yikes.

You had to think the Lakers would get back sooner or later. For whatever reason, LA has never been without a superstar; it's just that these days the guy who wears that cape needed to realize that he doesn't fly alone.

It perhaps took a little...Magic, if you will, to help Kobe Bean to see the light. That, and realizing nobody else really wanted him and the half of his locker he'd already cleaned out in Los Angeles.

Suddenly, Showtime isn't just a cable channel anymore...or again.

Boston's road back was harder, but Celtics fans probably wouldn't have it any other way. These are people who can celebrate misery. Good reason to drink.

Now, with the addition of Ray Allen and Kevin Garnett to already-solid Paul Pierce, Boston is happy again. Good reason to drink.

The more things change, the more...you know.

If these two wind up in the NBA Finals, well, cue the Yello and call me Ferris Bueller.

Even a Detroit-LA series would bring back bad boy 1980's memories. You know the NBA and Big TV are rooting for either of those scenarios.

Which is why I'm rooting for the San Antonio Spurs.

Chicka-Chickaaaaaaaaaaaaah.

Why DJ Deserves Another Rebound, with Haiku

Stefon's charges dropped
once more his life is a ball
always bouncing back

How is it that we keep thinking of Stefon Jackson as a scorer when clearly he rebounds better than perhaps any Miner ever?

Of course, we are talking about life, not basketball; although there is less difference for Jackson than for you or me. Which is why it is ultimately a good thing for Jackson that the charges against him for harboring a fugitive have been dropped.

Not because it gives a star jock another chance -- something we're all agreed happens enough to make everyone ill. It's because without that basketball ability, the fugitive in the apartment could easily have been Stefon. As it was, it was Stefon's cousin, Willie Harden, Jr.

Harden faces hard time if he's convicted of attempted murder, as will his friend and fellow fugitive Lamar Reid, accused of murder.

How easily did those two just slip into El Paso, bringing with them all the baggage Jackson has said in the past he wanted to be rid of? How easily did they slip into Jackson's life?

How easily could Jackson have slipped into that life himself if forced to exchange his orange warm-ups for an orange jumpsuit?

If star jocks given chance after chance make folks ill, so should yet another kid without a proper family environment made bitter because he can't see past the nose on his face as he sits in prison.

If that kid has made a victim of others, so be it. But Stefon Jackson had no victims and doesn't need jail time, he needs basketball.

How about being separated from the Dark Side by a bouncing ball? I think I'd keep bouncing that thing wherever I went.

The Particulars: Our buddy, The Judge, appears to be right on target.

KLAQ Morning Show legal eagle, former judge and current trial lawyer Luis Aguilar, told us he didn't think the District Attorney's office would prosecute Stefon Jackson.

Aguilar says procedure dictates that an officer of the law must tell a person thought to be harboring a fugitive that the person they're after is a wanted man. You can't be charged for harboring if this is not told to you.

According to the report filed by the deputy to obtain Stefon's arrest warrant, it was not expressed to Stefon that Cousin Willie was a wanted man.

Interestingly, Judge Aguilar says officers of the law don't usually tell this to someone thought to be harboring a fugitive because that removes all legal options for the harborer. Officers would much rather that person be able to return and tell the fugitive the law is after him hoping the fugitive will run -- flushing him out, if you will. This is apparently what usually happens.

But, according to Aguilar, because Stefon wasn't told explicitly that Cousin Willie was a fugitive wanted for attempted murder DA Jaime Esparza's office would be left with no other option except dropping the charges.

That said, kudos to the sheriff's office for getting Harden and Lamar Reid.

The Bigger Picture: Let's not get bogged down in the nuts and bolts of how this or that should have been done. The rivets of an issue do not define it, they just help hold things in place for a closer look.

Say what you will about his decision to give his cousin and his cousin's friend a place to stay, but Stefon Jackson deserves the opportunity to stay out of the legal system.

Sure, you'd think that if you had gotten out of bad circumstances you'd be willing to do anything to stay away from what has held you down for so long. Even if that means throwing your own blood relative under the bus.

But could you really? Who has ever even been in a situation like this?

Not many of us.

A guy who goes through the shooting death of his brother then the death of his father from a gunshot wound suffered years earlier deserves to be free from a bad neighborhood's story that usually has an all-too-familiar -- and depressing -- ending. How Stefon Jackson has been so resilient through these and other trials is truly amazing.

There are also those high-minded individuals who would say that using Hoop Dreams to escape the mean streets is not a fantasy that anyone should support.

If you're that one-in-a-million man fortunate enough to be drafted by the NBA, well, it's not for nothing that you're called a "lottery pick". What lesson do we teach youngsters if we hold up as heroes these flawed individuals with athletic genes?

But that's not Stefon Jackson's concern.

The odds for basketball success are lottery-like against. But when the odds favor prison or death, what choice does a man have but to play?

Barbee Talks Up New Miners

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