Great weekend of World Cup soccer.  It seems the quality of play in this tournament is much better than recent ones.  Two out of 4 games went to penalty kicks which is not best way to decide the game but was tremendously exciting.  The thought that Brazil could easily have been knocked out was just unbelievable.  CONCAFCAF earmed a lot of respect with the showing of Mexico and Costa Rica.  Mexico should have won but I think they made a mistake of packing it in with the lead.  Playing defense was right but you have to have a counterattack.  By taking out Dos Santos, they couldn't counter and let the Dutch attack at will.  Costa Rica almost suffered the same fate but hung on to penalty shots despite being down a man.  If someone watching this weekend do not like soccer afterward, you will never convert him.

The Holland-Mexico game was decided on a penalty shot.  It was a foul although as I talked about before, the punishment was much too great for the crime.  The Alexi Lalas said that it was an accumulative call. In other words, there were maybe possible penalty shot calls earlier on Mexico that was not called and so finally this one had to be called.  Other commentators also said that a play in the first half involving Robben should have been a penalty.  Interestingly, Robben said that the deciding call was correct but that he had dived on the first one.  So if you believe Robben, then the referee got it right.  But even in slow motion, the commentators felt that the first one was a penalty.  This goes to show how difficult it is to referee these games.  So again I call for more fouls called but less penalty shots so that the referee is not the deciding factor in these big games.

Obama is sending "advisers" to Iraq.  I hope they are not the type of advisers Kennedy sent to Vietnam.  Those advisers became a big military operation.  I trust that this will not happen.  But you never know.  As Vietnam proved, supporting a brutal dictatorship will not be successful even if the enemy of that dictatorship is a worse alternative.  So unless Obama can convince Maliki to change his way and bring the Sunnis into the government, the "advisers" we are sending will be of no value.

The U.S. was 30 seconds away from clinching a spot in the second round of the World Cup today.  I don't know how they allowed that last goal.  Shouldn't they all be back in the box to defend?  Even though we are still likely to advance, a crazy scenario is now possible.  If Germany and the U.S. ties both will advance regardless what Ghana and Portugal do.  Klinsmann is German and the German coach is his good friend.  If Germany and the U.S. play to a listless 0-0 tie, I will bet that there will be an uproar about an agreement between the two teams before hand!

A busy weekend in sports.  First the World Cup.  There has been more scoring.  Also couple of upsets, particularly Spain losing 5-1.  There were also a few games where a team comes from behind to win, not very common in soccer.  The new goal technology seems to be working well, without slowing down the game.  So a lot of positives so far.  There are still the usual problems with the game, however.  One is the calls on possible penalty kicks.  Soccer is still very low scoring,  So a penalty shot which is successful over 80% of the time, can very well decide a game.  Brazil benefited from such a call in its game against Croatia.  Then there are a lot of times, particularly on corner kicks where everybody is fouling each other and no calls are made.  In basketball where there are two hundred points scored, one bad call does not make that much of difference.  In soccer where there are only about 10 legitimate chances of scoring in a game,so one bad call is a big deal.

I suggest a rule change where unless there is an intentional hand ball or a vicious open field foul, the penalty will not be a direct shot from 12 yards.  Instead, you get a regular free kick from the spot of the foul.  If it is less than 10 yards from goal, the wall can be set up half distance from the shot.  In exchange for the less harsh penalty, the defense will be called for fouls in the box where maybe the referee would have let go in the past because he thinks a penalty shot in this instance is too harsh.  So basically I am calling for more fouls called in the box but less penalty shots.

The other controversy is the offside call.  It is very difficult for the side judge to see a pass that starts from 40 yards away and at the same time see if anyone got behind the defenders at the exact same time the passer strikes the ball.  Unless they come out with something similar to the goal line technology, I suggest that each coach gets one challenge per game for a video review.  I don't think that would slow down the game too much.

The U.S. starts their World cup chase tomorrow.  Klinsmann said that it is not realistic for the U.S to win the cup.  I agree with that.  But then I also agree with Bruce Arena who said that if we have 23 players better than Landon Donovan, we should be able to win the World Cup!

Alert!  Above paragraphs were written yesterday.  I decided not to publish till after the U.S. game today.  It appears to be a good move since the U.S. won!  Without jinxing the team, I think we have a very good chance to move out of group play with Portugal losing badly today.  If we can tie Portugal, I think we will be in because Germany would have locked up advancing before they play the U.S.  They may well play their B team.  We have beaten their B team before and even if we lose, it should not be anywhere close to 4-0!  So we need to tie Portugal!

The Spurs clobbered the Heat again to win the championship.  The Spurs are the ultimate team.  They are so well coached.  But I notice that they have 9 players who were born outside the U.S.  Could it be that these foreign born players are easier to coach than Americans?  I have not done any scientific research on this so I can't say for sure.  But my hypothesis is that foreign born players are happy that they made to the NBA and if they don't work hard and listen to the coach, they will not last.  Contrast that with young American stars who have been pampered way before they got to the NBA.  Also Americans who have poor work ethics are given more chance to succeed.  Witness Andrew Bynum and Kwame Brown.  So maybe the Spurs look for guys who are willing to sacrifice in the Popovich system and as a result they ended up with a lot foreign born players.

The Spur and Heat series also points out the importance of point guard play.  The Heat had none.  Basically, James ended up with the point guard work plus the scoring load.  This failed miserably against a championship caliber team.  Something for the Rockets to think about when they try to use Harden to run the offense while their point guards stand outside the three point line.

A couple of new items today, but first I like to comment on Bergdahl.  Thanks to LBOAYM, I read O'dwyer's article which I agree with almost completely.  It was obviously a PR disaster for Obama.  The news conference with Bergdahl's dad was dumb.  The only thing I can think of is that Obama thinks the dad looks more like the Duck Dynasty guy than a Muslim.  The reason I held off commenting was whether I agree with the trade at all.  This is where I disagree with O'Dwyer.  I don't think I would have traded given the uncertainty of how he was captured.  I understand the ideal of not leaving anyone behind.  I also disagree with the conservatives who say that this makes the enemy more likely to try to capture American soldiers.  I think even if we don't trade, the enemies will capture Americans any time they can.  In fact, if we don't trade, they are more likely to kill them and display them on tv.  So not negotiating will not make our soldiers any safer.  But given the known controversy of this case, I would not have traded at this time.

Eric Cantor loses!  Does this mean the Tea party is back in control.  No, but I guess you should not write its obituary either.  So in liberal California, the Tea party candidate loses to an unknown.  In a conservative district in Virginia, the extreme conservative beats a conservative.  Neither of these have any national significance.  It just means the GOP is split and while they will do well in the mid term election, they will have problems in the 2016 presidential election.

Iraqi militants took over a Mosul, the second largest city.  It seems the current government is in trouble.  It goes to show you, you can't bring democracy to another country by force.  All you are trading is one dictator for maybe something worse.  Al Qaeda was not in Iraq before Hussein.  Now, after billions of dollars and thousand of American lives lost, you have more sectarian violence.  In fact, this militant group is even worse than al Qaeda.  So Obama was right when he was a senator:   The Iraq invasion was wrong.  He is also right in not using military force in Libya, Egypt and Syria.  Until we have a reliable partner, military action in this part of the world will not bring good results.

A few follow ups today.  First, Donald Sterling is going to sell his team for $2billion.  As they say the rich gets richer even if they are not good people.  He made out better than McCourt did when he sold the Dodgers.  But unlike McCourt, who took his money and faded from the public, Sterling still cares what people think of him.  All those ads touting his charity contributions were designed to make himself look good to the public.  So was his rambling attempt to defend himself on CNN.  But no matter how much money he accumulates, he will never be fondly remembered by the people.  So he would fail at the one thing he wanted: adoration from the public.

Neel Kashkari did beat out Tim Donnelly for second place in the California gubernatorial open primary.  So he gets the distinction of losing to Jerry Brown in November.  I am not sure why he tried to win this impossible race and spend a lot of his own money.  I think the GOP in California is relieved that a moderate is going on the ballot instead of the tea party Donnelley.  They helped Kashkari, I think, because if Donnelley is on the top of the ballot in November, it would drive away moderate Republicans and independents who may vote for Republicans in elections that are winnable.  They would not win much anyway but with Kashkari, maybe they win some of the close races.

The U.S. did win all three of the send away games before Brazil.  They looked pretty good without Donovan and the German Americans that Klinnsman kept on the team maybe helpful.  (Except for Julian Green, who is too young to be on such a big stage).  With Ronaldo's fitness in question, maybe we can get out of the group of death.  But I still rather have Donovan in there.

I am rooting for the Spurs.  But all those people who were making fun of Lebron for getting cramps during the first game were not being fair.  Some people even said that he should have stayed in.  People like James, Kobe, and Jordan would play in serious pain and nobody should ever doubt their injury.  As expected James came back today and helped the Heat even the series.  I hope the Spurs win the series but I don't want it being decided by an injury.

Can't anyone be a decent closer once they go to Detroit?  I can't remember a decent closer in recent years on the Tigers.  Saw Al Kaline on the ESPN telecasts tonight.  He still looks good and is as humble as always.  Too bad he can't pitch.  Is Willy Hernandez or Fred Gladding still alive?