Columbus Crew Offside Contest + Schelotto + Perspectives = …

By: Jeff | April 18th, 2007

Serendipity. That’s what you have when a contest concept that’s been percolating in your head meets the lead from the report on the Columbus Crew’s latest, fancy signing:

“The wait is over.”

“Not for the Crew’s first goal of the season, but for the person who might score it.”

And there you have it: the basic concept for the first-ever Columbus Crew Offside contest: Who will score the first goal of the Columbus Crew’s 2007 regular season? Here are the contest’s parameters:

- This contest applies to league games only - e.g. goals in the Lamar Hunt U.S. Open Cup don’t count.
- I’m only looking for the name of player. Off the top of my head, I think I’ll use the game in which said player scores as a tie-breaker in case everyone votes, say, Eddie Gaven.
- The minute on which the game is scored will count as a second tie-breaker. And I’ll use “Price Is Right” rules for that - e.g. the “prize” goes to the person who comes closest to the minute the goal is scored without going over.
- This means that “bidding” the 1st minute has its advantages and disadvantages.

So….in order to play, participants’ entries should look something like this:

“Joseph Ngwenya, April 28 v. DC United; 35th minute.”

Here’s the Crew’s 2007 schedule to help with selection.

The announcement of this contest had to wait on the prize…I’m still working on that. Sort of. I’m leaning toward a home-made plaque, something kind of crafty, but not super-crafty - e.g. it will look like crap. But I will mail it to you; the winnder, assuming he/she is brave enough and interested in collecting, can visit my personal site, click on my profile, and send their street address my way over email.

Returning now to the Guillermo Barros Schelotto news, it looks like the Crew finally got their man. No disrespect to Columbus, but I’m still wondering how the Crew’s new Argentine will take central Ohio after life in Buenos Aires. Maybe he’ll like the quiet. But one thing the article (the link at the top of the page) does help with is the reason why the Crew kept dancing around confirming this signing:

“‘This is a big moment in his career and he deserved our respect,’ [Crew general manager Mark] McCullers said about why the Crew refused to acknowledge the situation during the past week. ‘We wanted to give him the opportunity to speak first, but, on the other hand, we had to be able to speak on behalf of our club.’”

That is, on the whole, an admirable position, one that I hope will sweeten Schelotto on both the Crew and life in Columbus.

Before going, I thought I’d pass on the latest first-hand views from the guys at Hunt Park Insider. A guy named Paul Vancouver posted player ratings - and, let me tell you, this guy is one tough grader. And elsewhere, Robert Novick wrote up some general commentary on last Saturday’s game; his material on Andy Herron is particularly worth the visit.