tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-37815547381865514122024-03-13T19:39:28.817-07:00Sports talkEstevāo Maximohttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13198759462983118646noreply@blogger.comBlogger100125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3781554738186551412.post-82819918473492414142020-01-21T21:57:00.002-08:002020-01-21T21:57:44.589-08:00Larry Walker made it to the Hall of Fame<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
<span style="font-family: inherit;">Revisiting an old article.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: inherit;">The baseball Hall of Fame is a joke by now, the voters have butchered so many things in so many ways that as we stand today, no fan really cares about it.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: inherit;">Example: Joe DiMaggio, not a first ballot Hall of Famer.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: inherit;">But nevertheless, there's still some discussion about player's cases, why is that.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: inherit;">Because in baseball, just like in all other sports, everybody loves to compare the great ones, even tho in most cases it's completely pointless, and the media encourages it, how many segments in sports shows have you seen about who's the greatest QB ever, is it MJ or Lebron, for a minute there when it was barely plausible, you saw the Harper/Trout debate, decades from now you'll hear the Seager/Correa debate, anyway my point is, we all love it.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><br />So when you heard for years, the sabermetricians of the world stating that Tim Raines was clearly a Hall of Famer, it was mostly about him being an underrated player, whose production came from his OBP and base running which got overlooked by the old school voters, same goes for a guy like Mussina now, in the opposite side you have s guy like Jack Morris who received his support mostly from the veterans, the numbers show he was basically Bartolo Colon for a shorter but nevertheless long period of time, but the postseason performances, throwing a 10 inning shutout in the World Series, eventually got him in.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: inherit;">Before i get into Larry Walker, there's something i want to say, for all of you who support Barry Bonds, here's why there's no way in the world he should make it, first and foremost, to this day he has not publicly admitted his use of PED, much less apologized for it, even Mark McGwire did it for crying out loud, it's obvious his stats are mind blowing, his WPA number blows anyone else who ever played baseball out of the water, so what, who cares, most people who defend him say he'd have made it even without the PED, so he should be in, that's pointless.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: inherit;">The guy was great enough to receive the highest honor the sport offers, to be immortalized alongside the very best, despite that he cheated the game, you know what that is called, greed, i once made this analogy, it's like a kid smart enough to get an A, cheating to get an A+, it's an insult to all the other players, as it is an insult to all of the other students.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: inherit;">Now let's get into Larry Walker, first let me explain why i chose him, anyone with remote knowledge of baseball knows Scott Rolen and Mike Mussina are Hall of Famers is just nonsense to argue otherwise, so i wanted to something a little more debatable, more off the radar, a guy that to me is a victim of the voters inability to properly evaluate success by a hitter in Coors Field.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><br /><br />Larry Walker's career numbers<br /><br />313/400/565 Slash Line<br />11.4 BB% 15.3 K%<br />.252 ISO .332 BABIP<br />.412 wOBA 140 wRC+ 68.7 WAR<br />2160 Hits 383 HR 230 SB 1988 Games 8030 PA</span><br />
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><br /><br />If you ask me, those are Hall of Fame stats. To kick it off, a few interesting takes.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><br />Do you know how many hitters in the history of baseball, have a .310+ AVG with a K% of at least 15?</span><br />
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><br />3, Miggy Cabrera, Joey Votto and Larry Walker</span><br />
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><br /><b>He is 1 of 2 players ever with an ISO of .250 or more, a .400+ OBP and over 200 Stolen Bases, the other one is Barry Bonds.</b></span><br />
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><br />Let that last one sink in.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><br />Lastly, he is one of eight hitters in all of baseball history to get at least 67 WAR with less than 2000 Games played.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><br />Moving on from the amusing facts, let's contextualize his stats</span><br />
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><br />Walker's .313 career average puts him ahead of legends such as Ichiro Suzuki, Manny Ramirez, Edgar Martinez, Derek Jeter and Mike Trout,, I know about Coors, but among all of them, the lowest BABIP belongs to Larry, that does not change much, but it is noteworthy.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: inherit;">He's one of just six players in MLB history who finished with a .300-plus average, .400-plus on-base percentage, .550-plus slugging percentage, 450 or more doubles, 60 or more triples, 350 or more homers and 1,250-plus RBIs. The other five -- Stan Musial, Babe Ruth, Jimmie Foxx, Ted Williams and Lou Gehrig -- are Hall of Famers.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><br /><br />His .965 OPS is 16th on the all-time list, that's also helped by the rarefied air of Denver, correct, but consider this.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><br /><br />Walker's 140 wRC+, sits ahead of Vladimir Guerrero, Joe Morgan, Ken Griffey Jr, George Brett, Fred McGriff, Wade Boggs, Rod Carew, Tony Gwynn, Jim Edmonds, Carl Yastrzemski and several others, it places him right in line with Alex Rodriguez (141), Chipper Jones (141), Mike Piazza (140), David Ortiz (140), Duke Snider (139) and Reggie Jackson (139), how about that for company</span><br />
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><br /><br />Note: Most of you guys probably know this but maybe someone doesn't, wRC+ is not only one of the best stats to measure a hitter, but also is park adjusted.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><br /><br />The final point to completely shred any, "it was Coors" argument, yeah it is clear that his numbers were significantly better at home than on the road throughout his career, but that's more a testament to how awesome he was in Colorado than any bad outcome on the road.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">Career numbers:</span></span><br />
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><span style="background-color: white; white-space: pre-wrap;"><br /></span></span><span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><span style="background-color: white; white-space: pre-wrap;">Larry Walker </span><span style="font-family: verdana, sans-serif;">on the Road:</span><span style="background-color: white; white-space: pre-wrap;">
278/370/495
.865 OPS
Beltran’s career:
279/350/486
.837 OPS
Beltran was a CF, different evaluation of a player’s value, i get all of that, but the numbers show, only as a hitter, Walker’s road numbers are an improved version of what Beltran’s career was</span></span></span><br />
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><br /><br />From 02-05, FG advanced splits (wOBA, wRC+) only goes back to 02</span><br />
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><br />At Home<br />337/449/592<br />.356 BABIP .255 ISO .441 wOBA 150 wRC+</span><br />
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><br /><br />On the Road<br />271/377/487<br />.305 BABIP .216 ISO .373 wOBA 126 wRC+</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: inherit;"><br />There's a significant difference there, but his career road OPS of 865 is better than the career marks of Carlos Beltran (836), Buster Posey (850), Darryl Strawberry (862), Paul O'Neill (833), Don Mattingly (830), Chase Utley (828) to name a few.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: inherit;">Walker overall in his career hit .278 on the road in his career, which is higher than 33 position players in the Hall of Fame. And among Hall of Famers whose career began in the Expansion Era (beginning in 1961), it's higher than those of Craig Biggio, Willie Stargell, Ken Griffey Jr, Reggie Jackson, Joe Morgan, Carlton Fisk, Carl Yastrzemski, Mike Schmidt and Johnny Bench</span><br />
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><br />With all of this information can you even remember the time you thought Larry wasn't a Hall of Famer?</span><br />
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">Hope you guys enjoyed it, feels good to be back, tons of interesting content coming soon, let's spread the word, comment, suggest, subscribe and anything else you feel like it.</span></span><br />
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Estevāo Maximohttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13198759462983118646noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3781554738186551412.post-34271736088539900232019-12-11T17:07:00.000-08:002019-12-14T11:41:29.047-08:00Querem um treinador português, mas estão discutindo o nome errado<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">A contratação de um bom treinador é um processo complicado, meticuloso e capaz de radicalmente mudar os rumos de uma equipe. Lembremos das condições nas quais Jurgen Klopp assumiu o Liverpool, por exemplo, e como ele transformou aquele time no atual campeão europeu. A escolha de um novo comandante se torna óbvia, quando o timing de seu auge se alinha com uma grande oportunidade, mas às vezes, a escolha errada neste momento de ápice, pode causar grandes danos na carreira de um treinador. Pensando neste fenômeno, um nome vem em mente, o atual treinador do Monaco, Leonardo Jardim.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">O treinador português virou sensação na temporada 16/17, após conduzir uma equipe muito jovem a um chocante título da Ligue 1, desbancando o todo poderoso PSG, e alcançando de forma surpreendente a semifinal da Uefa Champions League. Aquele time titular tinha:</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Subasic</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Sidibé</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Jemerson</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Gilik</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Mendy</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">B. Silva</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Fabinho</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Bakayoko</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Lemar</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Mbappé</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Falcão</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">João Moutinho.era boa opção no banco.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Naquele momento, Leonardo Jardim era o bola da vez, e o seu nome era cogitado em diversas equipes. Ele escolheu seguir no Monaco e viu este time espetacular ser dissimado na janela de verão. Qualquer trabalho de reposição era uma missão impossível. Sim, o time caiu demais, mas é injusto o criticá-lo de forma veemente pelo que aconteceu em seguida, diante destas cirscunstâncias.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Neste período de 2 anos e meio desde aquela temporada, o técnico português perdeu muito espaço no mercado, ele saiu e voltou do Monaco, tentando reconstruir algo que foi completamente demolido. Quem sobrou dqquele time? Ninguém.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Estamos vivendo um momento de contestação e incerteza em 2 times da Premier League, Everton e Arsenal. Ambos em busca de um novo comandante e sem grandes idéias sobre quem contratar. Se especula Vítor Pereira e David Moyes nos Toffees e no Arsenal a coisa é tão feia, que nem especulação se encontra. Olhando para essa cenário, só consigo imaginar o quão óbvio seria a procura pelo português, se estivéssemos nesta mesma situação 2 anos atrás. Acho até que o Everton precisaria de um certo convencimento para o trazer para o Goodson Park.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Se eu estou no comando de qualquer uma destas equipes, Leonardo Jardim seria o primeiro nome na minha lista. É fácil olhar agora para Mbappé, Bernardo Silva, Fabinho e outros, e dizer que os jogadores eram bons e diminuir o feito que ele conseguiu, mas devemos olhar para o contexto da época e reconhecer que se tornaram um grande time com ele.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Refletindo agora, não consigo me recordar de um treinador que tenha perdido tanto espaço, o seu trabalho foi ruim, mas existem óbvias justificativas para explicar esta queda tão grande. Não o isento de culpa da campanha pífia, que quase resultou no rebaixamento do Monaco, mas a responsabilidade maior é do clube, que vendeu toda a espinha dorsal daquela equipe.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Se é pra cogitar David Moyes, Marceliño Toral e Vitor Pereira deem uma chance ao Jardim, ele já mostrou do que é capaz em situações minimanente favoráveis ao seu trabalho, Everton e Arsenal podem conceder estas condições para ele.</span></div>
Estevāo Maximohttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13198759462983118646noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3781554738186551412.post-72776561068220530282019-11-16T10:46:00.003-08:002019-11-16T14:13:15.813-08:00Manchester City, a club under an ideal situation with a situation less than ideal<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">It's time to talk about what we all thought at the beginning of the season. Manchester City lack centre-back depth There were minor discussions at the end of the last transfer window about Vincent Kompany's lack of replacement and how serious an injury would be for Manchester City's defense but because of how much Pep Guardiola is respected around the football community nobody was too critical of City's unwillingness to really pursue a world class defender and most assumed they'd find a way to cope with that lack of depth at that position.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">Early in the season the best defender of the team Aymeric Laporte was injured and that really complicated things for the defending Premier League champions with his return likely to come next year leaving the side with only two defenders in the squad, Otamendi and Stones. It is important to make it clear that City is still a great team and you cannot summarize the possible failure to win the English title this season in the absence of Laporte for much of the season, just look at City's competitor and how good they are plus everywhere else on the pitch Klopp has backups that are not of the same level as Guardiola. The Citzens' squad are still the best in the Premier League and superior to Liverpool but this is a mere obligation in my view considering the significant difference in investment capacity that exists between the current Premier League champions and current European champions who can spend but not at City's level just consider that their biggest signings came right after the biggest sale in Premier League history.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">My point is this Man City started the season with three centre-backs in the squad, and that is far from ideal for a team that works under ideal conditions, it becomes even worse when we consider that two of them do not inspire much confidence (Stones and Otamendi) if someone had said 4 years ago that Nicolás Otamendi would go through long periods as a starter in the best team in the world without being a liability, no one would believe it and it actually happened but that period seems to be over.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">F</span><span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">ernandinho can fill that void at centre-half even more now with the arrival of Rodri and has been acting there frequently but this says much more about the lack of confidence in other defenders than the instantaneous adaptation of the Brazilian defensive midfielder to his new position something that did not happen and in fact I'd argue that he should only play there temporally not only because of how good he is at his original position but contrary to what one might think playing as a centre back in Guardiola's system is a tougher task physically than the one of the holding midfielder, plus if you play him as a defender in that case the team has no backup for the CDM position as Guardiola rarely uses Gundogan there and I guarantee he never will in a big game except like the last one at Anfield unless he is under extraordinary circumstances. It is bizarre for a team with so many financial resources to not have better options in defence or at least a couple more players at the same level just to provide cover.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">Manchester City are the side that:</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">Their third left-back in the squad was a undisputed starter and a key player of PSV last year.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">To provide some context Liverpool does not have a backup left back if Robertson can't play Milner fills in.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">Using the team that played the last match as an example you could put together a reserve-only attack with Mahrez, Jesus and Sané who is hurt but even when healthy often sits on the bench.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">The Manchester City centre-back group needs reinforcements to try to match the level of the team in other sectors of the pitch but I do not have the same opinion regarding the fullbacks. This is not to say that the menu of players available to Guardiola in that position is the best in the world but let's be honest which right fullbacks today are better than Walker and / or Cancelo, very few in my opinion and none who might be could realistically be bought today, the same goes for the left full-backs, however looking at the middle of the defence the situation is different. Leaving aside names that City did not seek or sought without great efforts such as De Ligt, Maguire, Van Dijk who were sold recently and only looking at the current market we have names available like Reuben Dias or Romagnoli who can like I said earlier provide depth and maybe evolve into regular names on the team sheet but if we raise the level a little we will find two players who would represent a solidity that now you can't find in their squad, those two are Koulibaly and Skriniar, I admit that today only the Napoli defender is a real possibility, with the arrival of Conte and what seems to be a head to head battle for the Italian Scudetto there is no way to get the Slovakian defender from Internazionale in the winter window but if we are looking further ahead it cannot be denied that this is a plausible signing for a summer window because even with this resurgence of Inter Manchester City is on another level.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">Koulibaly would be the perfect defender for Guardiola's team he has all the attributes needed to play in his system that's based upon a very high defensive line just look at his speed and just sheer talent in one on one clashes combine that with the fact De Laurentis himself already seems to be resigned to the likely sale of the Senegalese in the near future as long as the value is good which cannot be such a hindrance in this case.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">To conclude I consider that Manchester City needs a reinforcement at the centre-half position but not because with that signing the team would be Premier League favorites again after all Liverpool is so good they lost 1 match of the last 50 in PL play they need a centre-half because there is a discrepancy in quality and depth in relation to any other position in the squad and in relation to other major European football clubs at that position and to me is something to be corrected.</span></div>
Estevāo Maximohttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13198759462983118646noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3781554738186551412.post-16566589305494091632019-08-19T17:36:00.001-07:002019-08-19T17:36:43.256-07:00An interesting theory regarding Real Madrid<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
Hi I'm here today to talk about Real Madrid and their current state as we get ready for another season of exciting football in the European continent. There is so much going on in the transfer market everything from the whole Neymar debacle to the surprise signing of Nicolas Pépé from Arsenal which I alongside pretty much everyone never saw it coming, you have Tottenham bringing in Ndombele a player some would assume should be joining a bigger club is this the beginning of a new chapter for Spurs just to give my take quickly I love the move for both the player and the club and right now Tottenham is a top side with a real chance against any club in the world obviously Pochettino's side must improve significantly in order to compete for the Premier League title against a side like Man City for instance but on a Champions League draw I see them competing with anyone and that's what they have done for the last couple of years.<br />
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Moving forward now as I got off the topic which we are here to address, I have a theory on Real Madrid and their squad and I'm very interested in hearing what you guys make of it.<br />
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It's beyond denial that Real Madrid changed their history after Ronaldo arrived and despite a round of 16 exit in his first year at the club against Lyon if I'm not mistaken they spent every year since the exception being last season making all the way to the Champions League semifinals and if that's all you knew you would think well Real Madrid has been playing the best football in years period and for the majority of those years that hasn't been the case even when they were at their best in seasons like when Mourinho led them to 100 points in LA Liga or when Zidane won both LaLiga and the Champions using that 4-1-2-1-2 with Isco as a number 10 and Ronaldo joining Benzema as a striker isntead of being a winger like he used to even in those seasons Real Madrid never really stood out as a side that played the best football.<br />
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The truth of the matter is that Real Madrid in the last 10 years has been known as the side that rises to the big occasion even in underwhelming seasons they seem to flip a switch and turn up for the big Champions League matchup whether it's against Guardiola's Bayern period and for the majority of those years that hasn't been the case even when they were at their best in seasons like when Mourinho led them to 100 points in LA Liga or when Zidane won both LaLiga and the Champions they seemed to always scrape by in the group stage and then manage to drastically improve their play when it matters the most.<br />
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Let's just reflect in their last Champions League trophy and how that season went down.<br />
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Under Zinedine Zidane in what would later become his last season at the helm during his first spell an already aging side that despite coming off back to back Champions League trophy was under some pressure to improve, pressure on Zidane to deliver Real had a melancholic exit on the Copa del Rey being e liminated by Leganés, their performance on LaLiga was as he has been for the majority of the seasons since they began this run quite underwhelming never really challenging Barcelona and the title and due to the lack of competition beyond Atletico Madrid they never saw qualification for the Champions League being threatened and that's the script for a lot of their past seasons. I am certain that if Real Madrid with the exact performance they delivered during the last 10 years played in the Premier LModric for instance we would have had a couple of seasons with no Los Blancos in club football's biggest stage.<br />
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Now at this point you are probably thinking what's his point and can we get on with it but slow down as I said this take some elaborating and all of it is important in making my point.<br />
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Moving forward the fact that Real Madrid continuously showed up and elevated their play in decisive Champions League matches with very little change to the starting eleven, James started for a while with Kroos and Modric playing further back on the pitch but Zidane quickly inserted Casemiro in the lineup taking James out and gave Modric and Kroos more freedom to create and distribute that worked for a while but with Gareth Bale's recurring injury woes and a lack of a replacement at his level the Frenchman made another change to the formation and gave Isco a starting job playing the role of the number 10 transitioning from a classic 4-3-3 to a 4-1-2-1-2 sliding Ronaldo to the middle alongside Benzema and rBenzema<br />
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on Marcelo and Carvajal to provide width as the team didn't have a winger nor a wide midfielder, Isco had the freedom to roam across the field but he always ended up coming to the middle of the field this formation really explored the ability to attack from both fullbacks.<br />
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What I am trying to say is that for the most part under Zidane in the big games Madrid rolled out with one of these two lineups.<br />
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4-3-3<br />
Navas<br />
Carvajal<br />
Varane<br />
Ramos<br />
Marcelo<br />
Casemiro<br />
Kroos<br />
Modric<br />
Bale<br />
Ronaldo<br />
Benzema<br />
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4 -1-2-1-2<br />
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Navas<br />
Carvajal<br />
Varane<br />
Ramos<br />
Marcelo<br />
Casemiro<br />
Kroos<br />
Modric<br />
Isco<br />
Benzema<br />
Ronaldo<br />
<br />
This was pretty much the entire variation tactically that Real Madrid had over the last 4 years give or take it goes without saying that I'm not including last season given that Florentino Perez fired two managers and each one of the three had a different philosophy.<br />
<br />
Considering all of these factors I just mentioned and looking at the team right now under Zidane who deployed a strategy of doing a lot of man managing<br />
and not altering the starting eleven often like we see with managers such as Unai Emery for instance we can assume that he won't look to make wholesale changes but despite that argument being most likely true I also have a theory to explain Real Madrid's lack of renewal in their roster inspire of spending literally more money than any other team in the history of the world on a single window for transfers.<br />
<br />
Stop and marvel at this. Florentino Perez splashed out the cash and when it comes to the overall that of money spent on a single transfer window this year's Madrid sit at the top of that list displacing PSG spending spree a couple of years ago when they bought Neymar and Mbappé and regardless of that whenever we see a probable starting eleven for Los Blancos in the 19/20 season the top only change we see from the squad that won the Champions League against Liverpool is Hazard replacing Ronaldo and the uncertainty of who plays in the place of Isco not the actual option given that Real no longer display that f ormation. Before you get all worked up I know Hazard will play on the left wing unlike Ronaldo during his last few years in Spain and that they will most likely use a 4-3-3 formation and that Isco will I assume be a bench piece since he's not a winger and even less so a right winger and right now with no Asensio for the season and Bale out of Zidane's plans Vinicius Jr. seems to be the one who'll get nod by default.<br />
<br />
Also if you want to go back to an era in Madrid when Gareth Bale wasn't the scastarted Madrid used the classic 4-3-3 with CR7 on the left wing the exact position Hazard will play and Bale on the right, the only change from that team that's not mandatory due to an exit is the fact Bale is no longer viewed as an viable player and while Real isn't short of candidates to replace him there is no one that jumps out at you.<br />
<br />
All of that means Real Madrid have been against change to the starting eleven now anyone will feel the same with their recent success but even after an awful season that started with based on most reports Zidane leaving his role because Florentino Pereslz didn't want to make moves that Zidane deemed necessary and culminated on a melancholic end when in a matter of days they were eliminated from both the Copa del Rey against Barcelona and got thrashed at home against Ajax in the round of 16 of the Champions League which led to an unanimous belief amongst fans, pundits and anyone that follows football to state that this was it Real Madrid has delayed this for as long as they could b ut now the results on the pitch are there for anyone to see it. The end of an era, Madrid need a big overhaul, the midfield looks slow, Marcelo's offensive abilities no longer outweigh his lack of defending a lot of people completely ignored the fact that Benzema actually had a pretty good season and all that frustration they accumulated over the years for his lack of scoring it all came out, his critics often felt handicapped by the results of the team.<br />
<br />
The consensus was that a handful or so of players needed to be shown the door and you had to bring fresh faces in, that happened but why as we get set to begin the season Real Madrid look as those they will start the season with the exact same starting eleven of years past outside of Hazard replacing Ronaldo and the uncertainty surrounding the right winger unless Zidane pulls something out of nowhere like that formation with three centrebacks that he experimented with against Roma something I doubt he planned on doing when he first started planning for this upcoming season but after seeing bad performances that worried even the most optimistic Madrid fan Zidane had to try something new even if they exclusively played friendlies.<br />
<br />
I'll tell you why.<br />
<br />
This Real Madrid squad with the amount of success it has had in the past few years reached a level where most of their players were and still are viewed as the best players in their position and even now after a down year no matter who Real bought that player would struggle to be in the starting eleven right from the get go.<br />
<br />
Let me elaborate.<br />
<br />
Goalkeeper: They didn't need a goalkeeper but nonetheless no goalkeeper would be a starter with Courtois as the goalie. Maybe De Gea.<br />
<br />
Fullbacks: Carvajal and Marcelo are excellent fullbacks but especially with Marcelo even at his best I always considered him amongst the great fullbacks and by far and away the best attacking fullback but his bad defending was always an issue and just to name another player I always liked Alaba more viewing as an all around better option and even now with Farland Mandy easily one of the more promising fullbacks in the world arriving at the club for a large sum every probable starting eleven we saw throughout the summer window had Marcelo as the left back to begin the season. I cannot think of one player that Real could have bought for their back line that would be viewed as a starter. Some might say De Ligt but would you bench Varane because Ramos is the highest paid player in the entire team. I can see few player benching Varane for De Ligt but I attribute that a lot more to the hype surrounding De Ligt than to his actual play on the pitch.<br />
<br />
Think about that there was pretty much no one that Florentino Perez could buy to be in the starting eleven from day one for this Madrid side. That's not my opinion there's a lot I would do differently but based on the popular opinion what I said at the beginning of the paragraph.<br />
<br />
The same goes for the defensive midfielder role that Casemiro plays despite how bad Kroos and Modric looked last season beyond Pogba and maybe Eriksen no other midfielders would join the club as regular starters from day one. Madrid has been linked with Van De Beek in these last few days and he is another name I'd bring in and put him in the starting eleven from day one but that's not what you will see from most people. I doubt a sports show would do a preview of Real Madrid for next season with Modric or Kroos on the bench and Donny Van De Beek as a starter.<br />
<br />
With Hazard already in the squad that right side was open for a big acquisition but even there a guy like Vinicius Jr. or Gareth Bale who after the season opener looks set to say provide good options but look at the number 9 role, Benzema has been contested for years but coming off a season in which he was by far the best player for Real Madrid even with a guy like Jovic coming in most previews have him as an option off the bench with Benzema starting.<br />
<br />
What does all of this mean?<br />
<br />
It means that even after an awful season Real Madrid have a great squad and in most positions you would struggle to find better options anywhere at least if you go by name recognition.<br />
<br />
In my eyes bringing Zidane back was a mistake not moving on from a few players like Modric for example, loaning Ceballos and selling Llorente all very questionable decisions and I would not view other players like Marcelo or Kroos as untouchables.<br />
<br />
Despite how crazy it may seem Florentino Perez managed to spend the most money in a single transfer window ever while seeing a handful of players leave the club permanently or on loan all of that without doing an overhaul in terms of the roster</div>
Estevāo Maximohttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13198759462983118646noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3781554738186551412.post-21765071298346904692019-06-01T10:45:00.000-07:002019-06-01T10:45:02.294-07:00The Uefa Champions League Final<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Hi I am here to do a quick preview before this year's much anticipated Uefa Champions League final at the Wanda Metropolitano between Tottenham and Liverpool</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Much has been discussed about this game, will Harry Kane play if so what happens to Lucas, how about Winks and Firmino, the midfield trio for Liverpool and very shortly all of these questions will be answered.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Let's begin with Liverpool, II'm pretty sure Firmino will start and that Klopp will use his usual 4-3-3 formation with Fabinho, Henderson and Wijnaldum in the midfield even in times where the 4-2-3-1 worked for him he always turned back to that 4-3-3 in the big games.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Now when it comes to Tottenham's starting XI things aren't as easy to predict, Harry Kane is not 100% fit but we don't know how fit he is which is obviously the key factor, if hhe plays it is almost certain that Lucas starts on the bench to play them both you'd need a 4-3-3 with Sissoko, Alli and Eriksen in the midfield and Lucas, Son and Kane that's virtually impossible with one of them on the bench the question becomes who plays alongside Sissoko, Wanyama had a extremely poor game against Ajax in the second leg, if he's fit Winks plays but we also don't know what his status is. In my opinion if Harry Kane is fit for 60-75 minutes you play him from the start he is the best striker in the world you cannot leave him out of your lineup, I get what that means leaving Lucas on the bench to come in at some point in the second half just to reiterate this is all assuming he's fit for that amount of minutes. Just think about this what does the Liverpool fan rather happen, Lucas playing with Kane on the bench or the other way around, I have a tough time believing that they rather see Kane playing from the start, now no one should base their decision on that but it certainly tells you something.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">The key to the game is how will Tottenham cope with the intensity that Klopp deploys with that trio in the midfield can Dele Alli and Eriksen get in behind them and manage to escape the pressing without ridding themselves of the ball. There are other factors like can Trippier provide some good crosses and still cope with Robertson and Mané on his side, with Kane on the field but even more with Lucas in his place there won't be much of an one on one battle with Van Dijk since there's a lot of movement in the Spurs' attacking front, can Matip keep up his good form.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Overall I'd give Liverpool a 60% chance of winning the title as much as anyone will agree that Liverpool have the edge in this game, just look at their previous encounters and almost always it's a close game. Anythijg above 75% for Liverpool is not really justifiable for just one match.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">We'll just have to wait and see.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">A rundown of everything that happened in this final will come tomorrow. Stay tuned</span></div>
Estevāo Maximohttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13198759462983118646noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3781554738186551412.post-39167655206163876272019-05-20T11:47:00.000-07:002019-05-20T11:47:36.771-07:00Champions League delayed article<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
The Uefa Champions League is down to its last four teams.<br />
<br />
1 from Spain: Barcelona<br />
<br />
1 from Netherlands: Ajax<br />
<br />
2 from England: Tottenham Hotspur and Liverpool<br />
<br />
The semifinals begin tomorrow but before we get to that, let's discuss what happened in the previous round.<br />
<br />
Porto 1 x 4 Liverpool<br />
<br />
Porto 1 x 6 Liverpool on aggregate.<br />
<br />
After the first leg in England everyone more or less felt like this was a done deal and that comes with no disrespect towards the Portuguese side, considering the roster talent on each side, the level they are currently playing in and the result of the first leg this was the Reds' trip to the semifinal to lose and in a somewhat more pragmatic style of play than the one they employed last year they managed to keep Porto at bay throughout the 180 minutes.<br />
<br />
Virgil Van Dijk continues his extraordinary run of form that has turned him into undoubtedly the best defender in the world and at least to me a lock to be amongst the top 3 for the Ballon D'or award, Messi is also a lock that goes without saying, he maybe should be even a lock to win it regardless of what happens from now until the end of the season.<br />
<br />
Getting back to both teams this seemed like Porto's ceiling and it would take something truly extraordinary for them to go through as for Liverpool accounting for every factor in play I really see them as the favourites to win the competition and also obviously favourites to beat Barcelona in the semifinals, this doesn't mean that there is too much between the two sides and beyond Messi pulling something out of nowhere, there's not that much more to rely on for Barcelona fans, I just see Liverpool at a higher level collectively, individually it's a coinflip but for anyone that's seen both of them this year it's clear there's a gap there.<br />
<br />
<br />
Barcelona 3 x 0 Manchester United<br />
<br />
Barcelona 4 x 0 Manchester United on aggregate<br />
<br />
Before we address anything I have a small rant to go on.<br />
<br />
For anybody that follows football closely and even more for all of the Manchester United fans aren't you just sick and tired of hearing about Paul Pogba transfer rumors I mean enough, either stay or ask for a transfer. This is a guy that's been there for three years and every other week we get the same stuff whether is Real Madrid, Juventus or even Barcelona is just exhausting.<br />
<br />
When Solskjaer came in and they improved their level of performance while still maintaining a counterattacking style of play that's for those of you who said United should never hire a manager like Mourinho and also praised the good job Solskjaer has done since taking over mid-season because they can't be a counterattacking team, did you see the win at Wembley against Tottenham if that game happened with Mourinho at the helm I can already imagine the headlines and none of this is a knock on Ole Gunnar Solskjaer but merely acknowledging that in the end of Mourinho's run as United manager they were a bad counterattacking team that didn't defend well andalso weren't effective while counterattacking and with Solskjaer especially against good to great opponents they became a good or at least a better counterattacking side.<br />
<br />
Now getting back to Pogba for all of his time at United the one big game against a world class opponent where he actually has shown up is the game against City at Etihad last season when United came back from behind 2 x 0 and won the game 3 x 2 delaying Manchester City's celebration of the Premier League title and that ganey didn't have much meaning beyond pride really, he got sent off in the first leg against PSG which means he didn't even play in the match at Paris and he was a complete no show for both legs against Barcelona as well as the match against City in the Premier League and </div>
Estevāo Maximohttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13198759462983118646noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3781554738186551412.post-53828607850117449682019-04-30T07:40:00.002-07:002019-04-30T07:40:41.015-07:00Discussing the second legs of the quarterfinals and looking ahead to the semifinals<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">The Uefa Champions League is down to its last four teams.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">1 from Spain: Barcelona</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">1 from Netherlands: Ajax</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">2 from England: Tottenham Hotspur and Liverpool</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">The semifinals begin tomorrow but before we get to that, let's discuss what happened in the previous round.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Porto 1 x 4 Liverpool</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Porto 1 x 6 Liverpool on aggregate.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">After the first leg in England everyone more or less felt like this was a done deal and that comes with no disrespect towards the Portuguese side, considering the roster talent on each side, the level they are currently playing in and the result of the first leg this was the Reds' trip to the semifinal to lose and in a somewhat more pragmatic style of play than the one they employed last year they managed to keep Porto at bay throughout the 180 minutes, Virgil Van Dijk continues his extraordinary run of form that has turned him into undoubtedly the best defender in the world and at least to me a lock to be amongst the top 3 for the Ballon D'or award, Messi is also a lock that goes without saying, he maybe should be even a lock to win it regardless of what happens from now until the end of the season.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Getting back to both teams this seemed like Porto's ceiling and it would take something truly extraordinary for them to go through as for Liverpool accounting for every factor in play I really see them as the favourites to win the competition and also obviously favourites to beat Barcelona in the semifinals, this doesn't mean that there is too much between the two sides and beyond Messi pulling something out ofof nowhere, there's not much more to rely on for Barcelona fans, I just see Liverpool at a higher level collectively, individually it's a coinflip but for anyone that's seen both of them this year it's clear there's a gap there.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Barcelona 3 x 0 Manchester United</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Barcelona 4 x 0 Manchester United on aggregate</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Before we address anything I have a small rant to go on.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">For anybody that follows football closely and even more for all of the Manchester United fans aren't you just sick and tired of hearing about Paul Pogba transfer rumors I mean enough either stay or ask for a transfer, this is a guy that's been there for three years and every other week we get the same stuff whether is Real Madrid, Juventus or even Barcelona is just exhausting.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">When Solskjaer came in and they improved their level of performance while still maintaining a counterattacking style of play that's for those of you who said United can't be a counterattacking team because of their history all while praising the job Solskjaer had done, did you see the win at Wembley against Tottenham if that game happened with Mourinho at the helm I can already imagine the headlines and none of this is a knock on Ole Gunnar Solskjaer but merely acknowledging that in the end of Mourinho's run as United manager they were a bad counterattacking team that didn't defend well nor was effective while counterattacking and with Solskjaer especially against good to great opponents they became a good or at least a better counterattacking side but getting back to Pogba well for all of his time at United the one big game against a world class opponent where he actually has shown up is the game against City at Etihad last season when United came back from behind 2 x 0 and won the game 3 x 2 delaying Manchester City's celebration of the Premier League title and that game didn't have much meaning beyond pride really. He got sent off in the first leg against PSG which meant he didn't even play in the match at Paris and he was a complete no show for both legs against Barcelona as well as the match against City in the Premier League and several others, okay I'm done.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">The actual game it didn't start off in the way you'd assume given the final outcome, if United were by any means going to pull through and reach the next round they were going to have one chance, not one single goal scoring chance but one chance as in there was not much room for error and the first 15 minutes saw United with its chance to pounce on Barcelona and they didn't, the efficiency that they demonstrated at Paris didn't made the trip to Spain and in those moments where things went their way in Paris well they didn't this time, in the first act of the game Marcus Rashford on a beautiful piece of finishing hit the crossbar, De Gea killed any sort of chance they had of coming from behind by conceding that ridiculous second goal by Lionel Messi who once again put the ball in his back pocket and decided the game like he so often has done this season and in his whole career.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Barcelona advances through the quarterfinals with some questions marks and they will most definitely have to improve if they want to go through to the final but they are still Barcelona and Jurgen Klopp's side will do all but underestimate them. Just notice that even in this set of circumstances Barcelona is still widely considered to be the favourite.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Juventus 1 x 2 Ajax</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Juventus 2 x 3 Ajax on Aggregate</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">The dutch side pull off another major upset, if you have been following my articles you know that I didn't share the opinion that Ajax beating Juve was an upset by any stretch of imagination, what they have managed to do in this season is beyond words really, they dominated matches against Real Madrid, Juventus and Bayern Munich in those encounters they've looked like the shot callers, time and time again proving people wrong, they especially in the midfield made Real Madrid and Jiventus look old, Tadic seems to have mastered the art of controlling and dribbling the ball in extremely short spaces and I'm sure you can find individual merits for each player.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Talking about Juventus especially for a moment, in the last 4 matches in the Champions League, the two against Atletico and these two against Ajax no one other than Ronaldo has scored a goal and that's concerning mostly because Dybala is completely out of sync and seems to be playing without a position at least not an effective one he just seems to be in there, Kean is still too young to carry a big part of the load, I really like Douglas Costa but he is always hurt, Bernardeschi is a fine option but not much more than that Mandzukic is getting old and if you look at the midfielders literally none of them have great finishing skills, now Juventus is still a terrific side that should be able to eliminate Ajax and this is more about praising Ajax and Erik Ten Hag than anything else but it'd be negligent on my part to not address those minor issues that the Italian side has.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">One last note, despite all the quality they have presented to us in these 4 games, Ajax conceded the first goal in 3 of them including both ones at home so this is a group of players that does not get fazed by the moment even when they get knocked back.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Manchester City 4 x 3 Tottenham</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Manchester City 4 x 4 Tottenham on Aggregate. Spurs go through on away goals</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">A night to remember at the Etihad, 4 goals in the first 10 minutes set the tempo and the rest of the match did not disappoint.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">This City side showed an ability to bounce back and be resilient that we haven't seen before, conceding two goals in a span of a few minutes both on defensive blunders by one of your better defenders in Laporte this could have easily gone sideways but right afterwards Bernardo Silva scored the fourth goal of the game and gave the Citizens some momentum and in the end despite their best efforts Tottenham go through on away goals which is to me a completely arbitrary rule that should not exist but that's a debate for another day.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">It's obviously a disappointment for Guardiola and his side to once again be eliminated in the quarterfinals but to me this is the most honourable defeat out of the 3, against Monaco despite being the first year they really looked bad in the second leg and after winning the game at home 5 x 3 I expected that they'd qualify for the semifinals but a 3 x 1 caused their elimination also on away goals, last season not so much the elimination but they were embarrassed by Liverpool in the first leg and the duel was pretty much decided there. Overall they probably deserved at least as much as Tottenham to be amongst the last four, Kevin De Bruyne showed why he is one of the 10 best players in the world and Lloris once again proved just how important he can be.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">A side note to think about, when Pep looked at his bench he saw Stones, Fernandinho, Sané, Mahrez, Jesus and when Pochettino looked at his bench Llorente was his best option to replace an injured Sissoko unless he wanted to put Skipp in a baptism by fire that gives you an idea of the difference in terms of investment on both sides.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">As for the matches against Ajax, Harry Kane will surely be missed and Son being out for the first leg will also hurt Tottenham chances but given what we have seen so far this is as much of a coinflip as it can be, maybe just a slight 52-48 % chance in favor of Ajax strictly because of the aforementioned absences, but what levels the playing field to me is that I see room for improvement in terms of what they performed so far in the Champions League for Dele Alli and Christian Eriksen, especially the latter which would give Spurs a huge boost where as for Ajax this is pretty much their ceiling nonetheless it is a very high one.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">The fact is we are in for two great matchups that I can't wait to watch.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">See you all for the next article debating the first leg matches.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Spread the word, comment, share your opinion let's get some discussions going.</span></div>
Estevāo Maximohttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13198759462983118646noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3781554738186551412.post-70615897019884862392019-04-15T20:04:00.000-07:002019-04-15T20:04:45.845-07:00Reviewing the first leg of this year's Uefa Champions League Quarterfinals<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
The second leg of this year's Uefa Champions League Quarterfinals are fast approaching and I'm here to breakdown and discuss all four matches that occurred last week for the first leg.<br />
<br />
Liverpool 2 x 0 Porto<br />
<br />
The result that all home teams seek, a 2-0 win at home is a realistic objective for any side that's remotely competitive in comparison to their opponent and it's practically irreversible mainly because of the away goal rule, not to say that Liverpool was by any means desperate to get a good result at home fearing Porto's strength at home after all they won there 5-0 last year, but the reason why a comfortable win was so important was the encounter Liverpool had against Chelsea yesterday.<br />
<br />
The Reds are in a title race for the history books, two teams with outstanding campaigns fighting toe to toe for the right to call themselves Premier League Champions and to call the match against Chelsea this weekend a crucial one is an understatement, given what happened a few years back in a very similar situation against this same Chelsea side well they needed all of their strength and knowing the Champions League duel is pretty much done well it definitely helps.<br />
<br />
Now talking especifically about the game itself as far as the result it was pretty much what we expected, a comfortable Liverpool win but there were some shaky moments after that second goal when Porto could've easily and probably should've scored, Moussa Marega had three very real goal scoring chances and on most days he puts at least one of them in the back of the net. To be fair Mo Salah missed a goal that you just can't and Liverpool created chances to score a third, maybe a fourth goal.<br />
<br />
In the end the big takeaway from the game was that the back five that Sergio Conceiçāo prepared for the game didn't really achieve what it set out to, denying space for Liverpool's fast paced line of attack, Corona and Telles didn't produce much offensively and overall you get the feeling that this is quite certainly Porto's ceiling and it would take something way, way out of the ordinary for them to go through unlike any of the other three matchups, at least in my opinion.<br />
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Tottenham 1 x 0 Manchester City<br />
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The first Uefa Champions League match at the new Tottenham Hotspur Stadium was a very big one, an encounter that put together the only two teams left in the competition that have yet to win it.<br />
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On one side Pochettino's Spurs that despite all the compliments it has received there's always the no titles dig by some pundits.<br />
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On the other side Guardiola's side the best team in the world since the beggining of his second year in charge, breaking all sorts of records but there's always the no Champions League success dig from the same pundits and some also point out that he only won the top club competition in the world with Barcelona and Lionel Messi.<br />
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No matter what, one of this morronic narratives will manage to go on for another year and that's a shame but at the same time those who agree with such notion will manage to find another absurd theory support.<br />
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The match itself was a very intense one with both teams taking turns at pressing the opponent and trying to force a mistake, both teams did a good job especially Tottenham taking into account City's ability to create opportunities at limiting the opposition's chances, there weren't many clear ones.<br />
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City controlled time of possession like it was expected but Gundogan and David Silva didn't really perform like they can which handcuffed the Citzens in terms of getting inside the box, especially with David Silva who has mastered that skill, the German midfielder actually plays more in a creative role and doesn't get inside the box as much as he once did. Aguero obviously missed the penalty and really was a non factor in the game, Mahrez had a bad game and Sterling was the only one who actually produced something which is really not a surprise, he elevated his game to another level this year.<br />
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Also don't be quick to dismiss or underestimate the fact that Bernardo Silva was out and De Bruyne hasn't really been on the field this entire seadon, subbing him in alongside Sane with 88 minutes already played was a bad move by Guardiola but overall this wasn't your classical "fiasco" by a rich team with no traditions a la PSG against United or Barcelona, this looked more like a team more pragmatic than usual conceding a goal on a defensive blunder and being really self aware as to what they can do at Etihad.<br />
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Obviously they wanted to win and Tottenham did a great job at keeping City in check but without Kane at Manchester, the Citzens are still favorites to go through and what that means is that it will take something surprising in the second leg for them to be eliminated, granted the away goal gives Tottenham the ability to lose 2x1 or 3x2 which keeps things even more interesting but like I said City are still the favorites just not by much.<br />
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Looking ahead to the second leg something to look out for is how will Guardiola handle the fact that in some way not conceding a goal is even more important than scoring one, 0x0 keeps City closer to advancing than 1x1 or 2x2. A wide open game with lots of chances is definitely not what City wants, 1 goal by Tottenham forces City to score 3 which needless to say it is a tough task.<br />
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Manchester United 0x1 Barcelona<br />
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A surprising game with an unsurprising result, anyone would agree that this result is a normal one but on the pitch in the 90 somewhat minutes of game time the one goal Barcelona scored an own goal was pretty much all that they produced offensively, at one point in the second half attempts were 8 to 2 in favour of United, don't get me wrong Manchester United didn't exactly overwhelmed anyone but the way they contained Messi and the whole attack was quite remarkable.<br />
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For all the talk about Pogba he has to show up more often in these big games he really was the low point for me when it comes to expectations being met, even Messi that wasn't at his best was the know responsible for the cross to Suarez that resulted in the game's only goal.<br />
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I expect more offensively from both teams at the Camp Nou and Barcelona must be careful and unafraid to be pragmatic. The only way if not the likely way that Manchester United manages to pull off another upset is by catching Barcelona off guard running behind their defenders with Rashford and Lukaku maybe Martial, it's hard to see them patiently creating chances, Valverde side must be clinical in their finishing unlike PSG and the best thing they can do for periods of the match is to give Man United the ball and say hurt me with ball possession, Solskjaer's side is one likes counterattacking and cab struggle against teams that give them the ball. I don't expect given the talent level of both teams the culture of Barcelona and all that comes with it that they will just sit back and defend but that might not be the worst thing in certain periods of the game.<br />
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Any win is enough for United to go through. Ox1 takes us to Extra Time so this is far from over, but clearly Barcelona are still the odds on favorites to go through.<br />
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Ajax 1x1 Juventus<br />
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The match that I personally looked forward the most to, not only is Ajax the most fun team to watch right now in the world but they are going up against Juventus, a team that with Allegri in charge can behave differently depending upon what the match calls for and obviously they have Cristiano Ronaldo which proved once again to be critical to their result, beyond his goal all that Juventus created was a Bernardeschi shot that was close enough to be dangerous and Douglas Costa showing his skill in a 1 v 1 situation leaving the Ajax defender and finishing with the ball on the post, beyond that there wasn't much. This was a Dutch side that dominated the game, in possession, in attempts, attempts on target, quite literally anything had it not been for the heroic performance of Szczesny this could have been far worse<br />
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This Ajax side can play with anybody, they have proven that time and time again, Tadic's skill in short spaces seems out of this world, Ziyech and Neres are both playing extremely well, Van De Been seems to be everywhere all the time and De Jong what is there to say about this class act of a midfielder, we all know it won't happen but to imagine this team sticking together for like the next 5 years, wouldn't that be something.<br />
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Juventus need to contain this Ajax attack more efficiently and like City they must and probably will try to keep this from being a back and forth shootout because that's just not good for them, I don't see this being a 0-0 affair so I think in order to go through Juventus must win the match, which is certainly doable given their quality but I really don't see a favorite here. It's as close as they come and although I will be all but surprised with a 2x1 win from Juve, a couple of goals from Ronaldo but if I had to bet I'd say Ajax go through.<br />
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This is all I have for right now, the review of the four games alongside a preview of what's to come in the semifinals will come soon so stay tuned, help spread the word and let me know what you think in the comment section, I'd really like to discuss my thoughts with you guys especially if you disagree with me.<br />
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Till the next time.</div>
Estevāo Maximohttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13198759462983118646noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3781554738186551412.post-63042204800007918742019-04-08T21:40:00.000-07:002019-04-11T01:05:56.854-07:00Champions League Quarterfinals are Here!<b:if cond='data:blog.pageType == "index"'>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">Today we are here to talk about the Uefa Champions League's Quarterfinals, it has been a week since the matchups have been defined and as it would have been regardless of who plays whom we are in for 4 great football games.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">PS: It's really a shame that we only get to watch 2 of them live, given that they will be played simultaneously, 2 on a Tuesday and the other 2 on a Wednesday.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">These are the four duels we'll get in the 18/19 edition of the Uefa Champions League:</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">Tottenham Hotspur x Manchester City</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">Liverpool x Porto</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">Ajax x Juventus</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">Manchester United x Barcelona</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">This is a very odd season, for a a while now it has been pretty much a consensus that there's no big favourite that stands out ahead of the pack and thinking about it that does make sense but here is a counterpoint.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">In the last decade or so the Champions League has been dominated by three teams:</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">Bayern Munich of Robben and Robert.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">Barcelona of Messi.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">Real Madrid of Cristiano Ronaldo.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">Obviously we saw other teams shine in the competition, Internazionale won it during that time span but they have been a non factor for a while, only this year that they got back into playing among Europe's best.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">Chelsea also won it, but they should've won it in any other of half a dozen years when they were significantly better structured, more prepared and it didn't happen, so there are other factors that played a role in that season.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">More recently Juventus and Atletico Madrid have been to a couple of finals each, but both failed to beat Barcelona once and Real Madrid three times, so there's always a little bit of skepticism in their ability to go all the way, whether that's a correct perception or not it's another subject.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">Think about those three teams and consider that Ronaldo left Madrid and even before they were categorically defeated by Ajax at the Bernabeu, there wasn't a lot of belief that this Real Madrid team could go all the way and the little belief that there was only existed because it's Real Madrid and in an era of great success in the Biggest stage.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">Let us not forget that Los Galacticos n this century for a while seemed to always be defeated in the Round of 16, that side didn't have what this one now has, the public belief that no matter what they'll go through and at least be a factor until the very end. With this in mind Real Madrid were never the big favourites this season.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">Bayern is enduring the end of an era, a side with aging stars on the decline, Robben and Robert stand out, although Hummels, Boateng, Muller and Neuer are all Declining, thus not playing at a level they once did, which is odd to say the least, taking into account their age.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">Bayern with the signings of Pavard and Hernandez (coming next summer) are in the process of replacing or at least trying to replace some major pieces that were cornerstones for a team that was virtually a lock for the Uefa Champions League semifinal on a yearly basis for practically a decade, a bit of a stretch but you know what I mean, a team that probably should've won more and only didn't because they happened to face two of the 5 greatest players ever and that is undisputable.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">Then again they lost two Champions League finals and neither one involved Messi nor Ronaldo, surely that final at home against Chelsea must be looked at, as the one that got away.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">Even with the tradition and blackness of a clear cut favorite, Bayern never threatenwd to take that position.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">Barcelona remains the strongest of the three this year, now that's obvious given that the other two were eliminated, but even before the round of 16 began that was clear, Why you ask?</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">Because they still have Messi at top form unlike Real who sold Ronaldo and Bayern that's seen its stars decline.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">Because despite a significantly worse performance as a unit from what they once were, Messi seems to always decide games in which they've been outplayed and although Xavi and Iniesta are both gone, individually this roster is not worse than those from the Guardiola days at least not significantly worse, some key players like Dani Alves for instance are very much missed but Rakitic to me is a underrated players, Arthur seems to be made in a Lab to emulate Xavi and you undoubtedly have more offensive firepower.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">A third reason that's probably more or as important as any is that regardless of how that team compares to the one from a few years back, this team in terms of individual talent is as good as any in the world, you could make an argument that with the presence of Messi that they are the best, and the Messi factor can level the playing field when comparing Barcelona to teams that are better trained, tactically better thus performing at a higher level as a unit, like Manchester City or even Liverpool as an example.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">Lastly we have Madrid that especially with Zidane at the helm seemed to always elevate their level of play (which probably was never the highest or as high as it could be) in the big games, it's not that they were often mediocre and happened to win the Champions League three times in a row, there were some great moments especially in that second year but they didn't dominate as often as one would think for a team that accomplished so much, and as we saw this year you can only elude defeat so many times until it catches up to you, clearly there were other factors that played a role in that elimination, no Ronaldo, an even more inconsistent side but you can't deny any of them.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">Considering all of that it was and it is clear that this year's edition was about as wide open as it could be, and with the Quarterfinals set, we see something very interesting.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">All four matchups have clear favourites that can be identified by anyone, not all will agree but the consensus is that if Barcelona, Juventus, Manchester City and Liverpool go through to the semifinals it will surprise no one, but...</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">Looking at each game individually you'll see that a lot can happen.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">Manchester City vs Tottenham</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">We had almost this exact scenario last year, Manchester City with an outstanding campaign in the Premier League, already champion of the Carabao Cup facing an opponent from England with a smaller budget, out of the title race, coming with a manager that's been there a while but hasn't won a title, fighting for a top four finish in the Premier League, a significant difference is that City had already won the League by this time last year, unlike the current season where they are fighting head to head with Liverpool for the title.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">Now most of those facts do not play a role in the duel and can be looked at as coincidence, but one cannot overlook the fact that Tottenham despite what they spend can beat any team any time, a big problem that's cost them a Premier League title in the past is that they can be inconsistent and endure too many ups and downs. One of the keys to the game for me at least is can Mauricio Pochettino come up with a gameplan that disrupts City's tempo, it's obvious that Guardiola's side will dominate time of possession and I don't see Tottenham beating them with 2 banks of four, always compacted, looking for one ball, maybe a set piece and then playing the second leg not to lose, they are not equipped that way and I don't see it working, to beat them I believe they will have to look for periods in the match to beat them in intensity and catch them off guard, if they can do that we'll be in for a great game.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">Manchester United x Barcelona</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">Out of all the four matchups this is the only one where we see two teams with equal conditions, two European giants with massive budgets, surely you could make an argument that Barcelona is better but it's nothing alarming and the problem with Man United was never individual quality, putting Messi aside (like that's possible) they stand in the same level as Barcelona. Solskjaer has repeatedly exceeded everyone's expectation, how much of that is linked to the psychological side and how much to the tactical side won't become clear until later on.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">It's true that United has declined in the recent games both in performance and result, the only victory since that night in Paris has been a 2-1 win against a Watford that impressed no one, but to keep up the level Solskjaer established when he first got in there was an impossible task, at least for the time being.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">I certainly can't and will not argue that this is a 50/50 duel but putting United at 4 to 1 odds as I have seen in a lot of places well that's pushing it.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">How many times has Lionel Messi bailed out Barcelona when they had subpar performances, they have a comfortable lead in LaLiga but that's a testament to the lack of another real contender for the title this season as much as anything else, obviously the fact that he has done that so many times means he can do that again but for a team who relies on one man so often due to its inability to perform well as an unit playing against an United side that for all it's issues can be deadly on the counter I just don't see a justification for such a large favoritism.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">A lot of people think United is going to sit back and try to absorb pressure as much as possible and rely on quick transitioning to catch Valverde's side off guard and I can see some of that for parts of this encounter but regardless of Barcelona's struggle against that type of opposition if United plays like they did in Paris it will be ugly, especially until Dalot came in and moved Young into what became a back 3, yes they sat back and gave PSG the ball but the key is they were extremely passive, they left a lot of space, PSG just failed to convert chances time and time again, with the quality in the midfield that Barcelona has I don't see that happening.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">Solskjaer can do one of two things. He can either sit back as he did but with a much more aggressive posture one that doesn't give the opposition as much space and really do a better overall job at closing the holes and denying chances or he can bw bold pressing Barcelona and occupying the final third of the field at least for periods within the match. We'll just have to wait and see.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">As it is with all four games there is a obvious favorite but whatever happens I see this being a close game over the 180 minutes.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">Liverpool x Porto</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">Here we have a repeat of last year's round of 16 encounter one that was decided pretty quickly when the Reds came in and scored 5 at Porto on a 5-0 win, that's a longshot to happen again, yes overall Liverpool is a better side but that clearly was one of those games where the weaker side is keeping it close and thus maintaining itself in the game but once the opposition manages to break through and score the first, the other team then must change it's position which opens up more space for the team ahead to explore and it just piles on from there but when you look back the play over the 90 minutes it doesn't necessarily reflect what you saw on the field.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">I really see Liverpool amongst the favorites to win this Champions League, behind no one really and their display against Bayern only helped solidify that theory, they won comfortably without being brilliant in that sense they sort of reminded me of Real Madrid in these last few years.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">For Porto the key really is do not give Liverpool's attacking three room to run, make them create chances from the midfield and do it marking Firmino very tightly he is their most creative player probably in terms of finding passes and creating chances, try and take advantage of the attacking fullbacks that the Reds have, staying away from Van Dijk (easily the best defender in the world right now)</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">They really have no better option than dropping back and leaving Liverpool as little room to run as possible.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">Overall given what Ajax have already proven that they can do against both Real Madrid and Bayern Munich in this Uefa Champions League edition I see this rematch of last season as the one with the greatest difference between the odds on both sides.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">Juventus x Ajax</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">This could easily be considered the most interesting matchup of the four especially from a tactical point of view, how will Ajax play, will they keep the same level of boldness, try and be a little more pragmatic, how will Allegri prepare Juve, we all have a general idea of what both teams will try to do but how well they do it will affect a lot of what comes after, whether it's the first 15 minutes, first half or the first game, the adjustments will definitely come.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">Whether Ronaldo will even play or not we don't know, a lot of that I think comes from the fact they are playing Ajax not Barcelona maybe that isn't the case, but I really doubt that. Weather it is wise or not we don't know, ask Sergio Ramos he went through a very similar situation but that's a topic for another day.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">There are a lot of battles within the war that we can discuss like how will David Neres try to explore the hole left behind by Cancelo that likes to go forward a lot will the Portuguese fullback even start is Tadic going to produce at the same level playing as the false 9 dropping back behind the defensive midfielders, Pjanic and De Jong both control the pace of their team they are the thermometers if you like that sort of thing, how will they be marked, who's gonna get more space to work with, if Blind plays as a centre back will Ronaldo or Mandzukic position themselves behind him in on crosses through the area to try and produce headers on his back, something Juve is known for doing. Both representing different alternatives are Dolberg and Dybala bound to get in on the action and play key parts in this showdown involving two former winners of the Champions League.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">Given Ajax style of play and the record Juventus has in the last few years regardless of who wins the first leg this won't be decided until the end of the match in Turin.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">For now that is all I hope you all enjoyed this article, I will see you soon with reviews of each match and what to expect for the second leg.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">If you enjoyed what you saw, spread the word, also I encourage everyone to interact and communicate with me, comment, leave your opinion and we will certainly talk about it.</span></div>
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Estevāo Maximohttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13198759462983118646noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3781554738186551412.post-43961931103852523642018-10-29T21:33:00.001-07:002018-10-29T21:33:49.336-07:00Debating the Tottenham vs Man City matchup<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Hi everyone today we are here to talk about the match between Tottenham and Manchester City that was played out on Wembley this monday.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">It was a match that saw an unusual low number of completed passes from both clubs and that's whar you get from playing on a stadium used for an american football game the previous day, the pitch had damage you rarely pretty much never see.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Both teams had significant players of their iddeal starting XI on the bench still recovering from injuries.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Dele Alli and Christian Eriksen for the Spurs and Kevin De Bruyne for Manchester City.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Right out of the gate City scored on an weird play I still don't know wgat Trippier was doing when that ball was coming down and then he gave Sterling way too much room to find Mahrez penetrating the box and scoring the only goal of the match, the only other real scoring chance in the first half came when Tottenham took advantage of a City side that was positioned really high up the pitch, Lamela got the ball with plenty of space and found Harry Kane wide open and he couldn't quite control the ball it got away from him and that was pretty much all the action for the first half.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">The game seemed to be in control for Guardiola's men with his side keeping Tottenham with less than a handful of total attempts through a good part of the second half.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">After Harry Winks came in midway through the second half the Spurs became a little more dynamic and with Alli and Eriksen coming in a little bit later on Tottenham improved their play, Dr Bruyne looked put of sync and lost a ball in his own area which created an opportunity for Tottrnham but their best chance came when they recovered the ball with a City defense that wasn't set and Alli fpund a great pass to Lamela that missed a wide open shot and that was the game.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Now assessing a couple of individual topics regarding the Spurs.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">With Sissoko, Dier and Dembele all starting the match, the Spurs become a much more physical side.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Lucas struggled to find his way out wide in the left, his natural position is on the right.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Trippier's error obviously cost them the game but there was pretty much no action on the other side, Ben Davies was no where to be found.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">I'll see you all later</span></div>
Estevāo Maximohttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13198759462983118646noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3781554738186551412.post-75998154537047361412018-10-09T13:16:00.001-07:002018-10-09T13:16:27.221-07:00Como os grandes times brasileiros jogam<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">Um pequeno resumo de como os grandes times brasileiros jogam</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">Existem várias pequenas variações em termos de formação e características de jogadores no futebol brasileiros mas analise os times de maior expressão e em 99% dos casos vc encontrará a seguinte escalação</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">Goleiro</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">Linha de 4 com laterais q atacam rente a linha de fundo dando amplitude, nunca por dentro</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"></span><br />
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">Primeiro volante responsável praticamente só por marcar e proteger a linha de zaga com quase nenhum envolvimento nas jogadas ofensivas (Ex: Cuellar, F. Melo, Jucilei, Ralf etc...)</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">Segundo volante responsável pelo início das jogadas ofensivas, ajudando na transição ao ataque de acordo com característica individual alguns finalizam mais outros buscam mais o passe, outros marcam mais, mas sem nenhuma diferença tão grande (Ex: B. Henrique, Paquetá, L. Silva...)</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">Dois meias/pontas jogando pelo lado aqui se vê variações de jogadores q são meias e cadenciam mais o jogo como o Arrascaeta e pontas mais incisivos como o Everton mas tds trabalham fechando a linha de 4 junto aos dois volantes quando o time se posiciona no campo defensivo</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">Times como o Flamengo tem seus meias jogando quase q exclusivamente por dentro sempre afunilando o q abre ainda mais espaço para os laterais Vitinho pela esquerda e E. Ribeiro pela direita e msm times como o São Paulo com dois pontas buscando mais a linha de fundo</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">Rojas pela direita e Everton pela esquerda n usam tanto os laterais por dentro, em algum momento do jogo pd até acontecer mas mt por conta das circunstâncias e ambos os times usam seus dois meias/pontas para fechar a linha de 4 quando o time se posiciona no campo de defesa</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">Além de Flamengo e São Paulo, outros exemplos: Arrascaeta e Robinho, Everton e Ramiro, Dudu e William)</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"></span><br />
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">Mais a frente quase sempre vc irá encontrar um meia/meia-atacante e um centroavante mts vezes com o time atacando vc encontrará esse meia/meia-atacante atrás dos meias/pontas</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">Isso pq esse jogador tende a ajudar na distribuição do jogo tbm mais ainda para times q usam meias de origem nessa posição mas repare q sempre q o time se posicionar no campo de defesa esse jogador se encontrará 99% do tempo à frente da segunda linha de 4 e atrás ou ao lado do 9</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">Formando assim um 4-4-1-1 isso quando se defendendo no seu campo, o Palmeiras inclusive usa um volante nessa função, (Reveja o primeiro jogo contra o Cerro e repare no posicionamento do Moisés sem a bola)</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">Outros exemplos desse meia/meia-atacante: Nenê, T. Neves, Diego, Luan</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"></span><br />
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">Mais a frente sempre tem um centroavante com raras exceções aonde se vê um jogador mais leve nessa posição, msm o Corinthians do 4-2-4 no ano passado não fugiu tanto dessa linha, n tinha 9 mas havia outras similaridades</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">Ex de 9: Borja, Barcos, Uribe, André, D. Souza entre outros</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">E com isso n se vê:</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">3 zagueiros</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">Laterais q trabalham por dentro (Assista jogos do City, especialmente do ano passado)</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">Meio campo q jogue por dentro assim como o Real de Zidane com o 4-4-2 losango de Casemiro, Kroos, Modric, Isco e 2 atacantes de origem CR7 e Benzema</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">Claro que nada disso com a mesma qualidade.</span><br />
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Estevāo Maximohttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13198759462983118646noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3781554738186551412.post-74724446773446285492018-09-27T21:01:00.000-07:002018-09-27T21:01:27.125-07:00Stay Tuned<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">New article coming tomorrow on group C of the Champions League</span></div>
Estevāo Maximohttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13198759462983118646noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3781554738186551412.post-41141851779916911652018-09-26T21:56:00.000-07:002018-09-26T21:56:00.930-07:00Uefa Champions League Group by Group Breakdown Part 2<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">Hi everyone today we continue our breakdown of each group in the Uefa Champions League.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">This is part where we'll discuss Group B.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">If you missed part 1 about Group A you'll find the link down below.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">This group has some exciting matchups we already had a peak of what's to come in that thrilling 2-1 victory for Internazionale over Tottenham and yet again the Spurs fail to capitalize on a game they should've won and end up with a loss to an italian team allowing back to back goals in a very short stretch as most of you will recall that''s how they were eliminated last season, flatong out dominating Juventus for about 170 minutes counting both matches but allowing in the rougly 10 minutes left 2 goals in each game, a terrible job but we'll get to that in further detail a little bit later on.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">PSV is an interesting team but right now facing teams like Barcelona is just too much for them, don't get mr wrong it's possible for them to at least cause some trouble for Barcelona back in their home stadium but the logic indicates something more along the lines of what happened at Camp Nou last week.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">Down below is how I predict this group will finish. I'll explain everything.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">1, Barcelona</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">2, Spurs</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">3, Internazionale</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">4, PSV</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">Before I get to why I believe this is the way this group will turn out let me make this very clear:</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">No one and I mean no one can argue against the fact that the order in terms of talent level in each team's roster is this. You may like internazionale but they are not better than Tottenham the same goes for the Spurs with Barcelona mostly because of Messi in fact I believe the Spurs are closer to Barcelona than Inter is to the Spurs.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">Wait a minute, didn't the Nerazzuri beat London's only representative in this year's Uefa Champions League edition?</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">Indeed they did, so am I nuts no let me explain why.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: verdana, sans-serif;">After years of struggling ib their national competitions enduring a long drougt of consecutive years without a Champions League appearance, Internazionale is back, and they came back only after a thrilling come from behind win in the last game of the season against Lazio, I believe qualifying for the UCL is an achievement to be recognized if not celebrated by the Spurs' fans but that's more about the quality of the Premier League than anything else, so what does all of this mean?</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: verdana, sans-serif;">That these are two clubs in different stages, with different expectation levels and their squads show that.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: verdana, sans-serif;">Think about this, take away the centre-.back trio for each team (not regarfing starting 11, just these 3 being the 3 main options at that position)</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: verdana, sans-serif;">Skriniar, Miranda, De Vrij.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: verdana, sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: verdana, sans-serif;">Vertonghen, Sanchez and Alderweireld.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: verdana, sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: verdana, sans-serif;">And also the main striker.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: verdana, sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: verdana, sans-serif;">Icardi</span><br />
<span style="font-family: verdana, sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: verdana, sans-serif;">Kane</span><br />
<span style="font-family: verdana, sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: verdana, sans-serif;">Those postions you can debate which one is better and it's not absurd, in fact some of the answers depend on the team's strategy and form of play.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: verdana, sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: verdana, sans-serif;">Everywhere else on the field especially in terms of depth, Tottenham holds a significant advantage, sure Perisic is a fine player and the same goes for Handanovic and Naingollan but each one of the four full-bscls in the Spurs' roster:</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: verdana, sans-serif;">Rose, Davies, Trippier, Aurier</span><br />
<span style="font-family: verdana, sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: verdana, sans-serif;">They'd all be starters for the Nerazzurri easily.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: verdana, sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: verdana, sans-serif;">The midfield options that Pochetino has:</span><br />
<span style="font-family: verdana, sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: verdana, sans-serif;">Alli, Eriksen, Dembele, Dier,</span><br />
<span style="font-family: verdana, sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: verdana, sans-serif;">Would any see the bench if they were to play for Internazionale.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: verdana, sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: verdana, sans-serif;">How about further ahead on the field:</span><br />
<span style="font-family: verdana, sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: verdana, sans-serif;">Son, Lamela. Lucad Moura</span><br />
<span style="font-family: verdana, sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: verdana, sans-serif;">Anyone that wants to see it will see that the Spurs are better now that doesn't mean they can't be beaten by Internazionale, Barcelona lost to Leganés today, crazy stuff happens.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: verdana, sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: verdana, sans-serif;">I'd have trouble to visualize Inter taking points away from Barcelona under other circumstances but I don't see this Barcelona team right now coasting through them, they can it's possible, but Internazionale have a real shot, against Tottenham it's a more evenly matched duel and I do not expect either team coming out with more than a 3 point edge in between both fixtures.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: verdana, sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: verdana, sans-serif;">What does all of this tell you, we are in for some great matchups in this group.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: verdana, sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: verdana, sans-serif;">A team trying to rerurn to the top of Europe</span><br />
<span style="font-family: verdana, sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: verdana, sans-serif;">Another one fighting to reach it</span><br />
<span style="font-family: verdana, sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: verdana, sans-serif;">Third one trying to get back to competing amongst the best</span><br />
<span style="font-family: verdana, sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: verdana, sans-serif;">And lastly a team with a great history, now working as a bridge, buying promising players, developing them and you know the rest. Achieving domestical glory along the way.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: verdana, sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: verdana, sans-serif;">Anyway that's about it, I'l see you all tomorrow, share, comment, discuss, I want to engage with you guys and discuss these subjects knoe what you think of my opinion.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: verdana, sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: verdana, sans-serif;">Note: Eden Hazard has arrived.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: verdana, sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: verdana, sans-serif;">Once again doing this on my phone, no spelling correction, I apologize for the spelling errors but the important thing is that you understand what I mean and I believe that is pretty clear.</span></div>
Estevāo Maximohttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13198759462983118646noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3781554738186551412.post-2774802086526610242018-09-25T21:52:00.001-07:002018-09-25T21:52:23.110-07:00Quick update<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Hi everyone it has been a frustating day to say the least, I los5 out on a chance to work for Fansides apparenrly they do not have the appropiate license ro pay a writer in Brazil they are quite simply not allowed to do that without the proper licensing and who knows how long that will take thaf's if they ever actually do it considering that the demand just isn't there. I was planning on posting part 2 of pur UCL breakdown but I just don't feel like writing now, it's about halfway done but there's a lot I want to discuss so i just feel like it's better for me to finish it up tomorrow. Also expect a little review of the Chelsea Liverpool match tomorrow. What a game Derby County against Man United was. Congrats to Frank Lampard, terrific job.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">See you guys later</span></div>
Estevāo Maximohttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13198759462983118646noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3781554738186551412.post-87702347584562278232018-09-24T21:40:00.000-07:002018-09-24T21:42:20.595-07:00Uefa Champions League, Breaking down every group<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">Hi everyone I am here today to do a complete preview of the world's most important soccer tournament at least in a club level the Uefa Champions League, don't get me wrong I like the World Cup but at the very least they carry the same or close to the same importance.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">We'll break it down into 8 parts each one discussing an individual group. I'll do the first one today and the second one tomorrow, and so on so forth, to create an article relatively simple to understand I'll first list the teams in each group in the order I believe the group will finish, give a small breakdown of the group as a whole and then asess each individual team and why I believe they'll end up in that place. So let's begin.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">Group A:</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">1st: Atletico Madrid.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">2nd: Borussia Dortmund.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">3rd: AS Monaco.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">4th: Club Brugge.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<br />
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">This is a pretty interesting group although most of them are for a guy that enjoys soccer as much as me, in it we find three teams that don't come to mind when we think about the top tier (Barcelona, Juventus, Man United, Real Madrid...) maybe Atletico to a lesser degree than Dortmund and Monaco but as after a brief look back at the recent past will tell you, not only they have been almost a lock to be present in the tournament on a yearly basis they all enjoyed unprecedented success amongst Europe's best.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">Simeone's squad has made it to two finals which is remarkable for a side with his investment, they were minutes away from the title the first time around and lost the second one in a penalty shootout, against Real Madrid well that's pretty good, it's heartbresking but nevertheless pretty good.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">Borussia Dortmund had it's glory days eith Jurgen Klopp and that phenomenal squad that took the league title from the hands of the mighty Bayern Munchen but falled to the same in the UCL final, since the german coach had left the building the team hasn't been the same, losing key players and with that failing to produce the same results although their group last year was brutal, Tottenham and Real Madrid were and are ahead of Dortmund and it'd be quite a upset, to me at least if the german side were to eliminate them.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">Remember when AS Monaco went after James Rodriguez and Falcao Garcia and it looked like just the beggining well that was about the whole it and they kind of slipped under the radar for a while and in that time they did a tremendlus job developing players until a couple of years ago they broke out and with the likes of Mbappe, Mendy, Silva, Bakayoko, Fabinho, Sidibe and others winning the Ligue 1 a shocker 8 points ahead of PSG and also making it to the UCL semifinal, unfortunately ot didn't last as the team saw most of it's key players leave in the following summer window.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">Today we can easily put Atletico Madrid significantly ahead of everyone else in the group in terms of investment, expectation and all that comes with it, now that doesn't mean you'll ser them putting up 18 points but nonetheless it is what is, they are quite simply a level above, while Dortmund and Monaco have seen pretty much all of their star players leave once they reached a certain level, and Brugge is clearly the favorite to finiah the last.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">Based on the previous paragraph you can see in my view the first and last place are pretty set. Now the reason I have Dortmund qualifying for the round of 16 is this.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">1, Putting Brugge aside for a second. Monaco already lost at home to Simeone's side, it's quite improbable that they'll beat them at Madrid. You can say that this only matters if Dortmund somehow takes points away from Atletico, which is not a easy task. But consider this, the rojiblancos already won one of the four matchups against these two, they can very well win all four but that's not the likeliest of all scenarios and it is far more likely that they drop points in one of the two matches against Dortmund than in the one remaining.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">2, Better Home Field advantage, if the scenario plays out as I talked about on the paragraph above, Dortmunf can decide at home against AS Monaco even if they oose the away game, a couple of draws will do the job also.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">3, Third and most important, Dortmund to me is a better team than Monaco, they also have better options, just tell mr how many players from Monaco would start in the side from Germany.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">Anwyay that's a wrap. More and more content coming. See you guys later and let me know what you think.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">Anyone that knows a place hiring writers or if you are looking for one let me know. I'm always available 24/7.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">My email is: estevaomaximo_23@hotmail.com</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">It's 1:41 AM my time right now and I'm using my cellphone so ignore the spelling horror that is this article</span></div>
Estevāo Maximohttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13198759462983118646noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3781554738186551412.post-89015293839710280362018-08-27T17:07:00.000-07:002018-08-27T17:07:02.504-07:00I'm Back, and with some Premier League Talk<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
Hello everyone I apologize for my long absence from now on I'll be writing articles about the world's most popular sport, you'll see a lot of reviews and previews of matches, I'll focus more on the Premier League when it comes to national championships but obviously we'll discuss all the major teams. I have a lot I want to talk about so let's begin.<br />
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Today I'll review the Man United vs Tottenham game a very interesting one at that. A few surprises came when the lineups were announced especially with Jose Mourinho's side.<br />
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Within a fee minutes after the start of the match you could see a United team that had a 3 man back-line with Ander Herrera, Smalling and Jones, Valencia and Shaw out wide, Matic, Fred and Pogba in the midfield with the latter two advancing more to help the attacking duo of Lingard and Lukaku.<br />
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As to the visiting team Pochetino opted for 2 instead of 3 full-backs going with the Belgium duo and leaving Sanchez on the bench.<br />
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Trippier as the right back and Danny Rose back as the starter with Davies also on the bench, Dier and Dembele ahead of the defense joined by Eriksen and Dele Alli in the midfield and up ahead another attacking duo with Harry Kane and Lucas Moura the men responsible for all of the scoring in the game. That's how both teams entered the match.<br />
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As the match progressed we saw a United team with an high posession something unussual especially against opponents of the big 6 with that the home team also limited Tottenham to very few chances in the first half the best chance for United came when Lukaku intercepted a ball intended for the goalkeeper and missed a wide open goal, overall it was a game with a lot of individual mistakes.<br />
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Early in the second half Trippier who is just magnificient with set pieces crossed a beautiful ball on a corner and Harry Kane positioned himself perfectly as he most often does and scored the opening goal after that Mourinho's side went completely off the rails and the second goal showed that.<br />
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Shaw leaves his position, Eriksen advances behind him receiving a pass from Lucas who himself goes on to score the goal penetrating United's defense, another mistake in that play is made by Herrera when he doesn't follow the back-line up the pitch preventing Eriksen from being offside. After that even with the changes Sanchez and Fellaini coming in the home side just couldn't produce, not anything<br />
significant at least. The third goal in the end was just the perfect ending for the Spurs and it showed how Kane does a good job of dropping back almost as a midfielder letting Lucas Moura attack the space ahead of him.<br />
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A lesson for United is to do a better job after you surrender a goal especially when your team is playing relatively well and in control of the game at least to some degree and while they are not bad it's understandable why Mourinho was constantky asking for a top flight full back, just consider that all 3 main full-backs for Tottenham would easily start for Man United and none in United would see the field with the Spurs.<br />
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Tottenham shows that they are a top level team capable of competing with anyone the same team that dominated Real Madrid beating them 3-1 in the group stage of the Champions League.<br />
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Stay tuned more is coming soon.<br />
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Also I apologize for the spelling mistakes. Writing on my cellphone once again.</div>
Estevāo Maximohttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13198759462983118646noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3781554738186551412.post-26849388519284642612018-04-12T08:50:00.001-07:002018-04-12T08:50:15.396-07:00I Wrote a Book<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
<span style="font-size: large;"><i>Hi guys I wrote a book and it has some great poems in it. I give out good advice on relatable subjects in life. Go buy it right now on Amazon</i></span><br />
<span style="font-size: large;"><i><br /></i></span>
<span style="font-size: large;"><i>https://t.co/B3eJgRpokY?amp=1</i></span></div>
Estevāo Maximohttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13198759462983118646noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3781554738186551412.post-17426575769107126152018-03-24T11:32:00.001-07:002020-02-06T09:28:56.828-08:00A Walk is as good as a hit or something like that<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i>The phrase that every young hitter hears from Little League all the way to the majors.</i></span><br />
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i><br /></i></span><span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i><br /></i></span><span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i>Be patient, a walk is as good as a hit.</i></span><br />
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i><br /></i></span><span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i><br /></i></span><span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i>There are merits to that phrase, but one must contextualize it, before applying it, here is what I mean. A Home Run is better than a Walk correct, and a HR is a hit therefore a walk is not as good as a hit.</i></span><br />
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i><br /></i></span><i style="font-family: verdana, sans-serif;"><br /></i><i style="font-family: verdana, sans-serif;">The more accurate saying would be a w</i><i style="font-family: verdana, sans-serif;">alk is as good as a single with no RISP,. Ptoducing the same outcome, except for a possible 1rst to 3rd, but who's gonna say that, it doesn't sound good it's weird. When a manager, hitting coach, whoever, says that to a hitter their goal is getting the player to be more patient, take the free base when there's nothing to hit, take what the pitcher gives you and go with it.</i><br />
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i><br /></i></span><span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i><br /></i></span><span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i>As you all probably know by now, I'm a big believer in high OBP players, today I want to explain my thought process behind this belief. I always like to start by stating that baseball game has no clock, it's a game of outs, whoever scores the most runs by the 27th out wins the game ansy how do teams score runs? By getting on base it's the only way. There are multiple ways to get on base, but walking is a good, easy one that has little to no interference with your other ways of getting on.</i></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i>Walking highly benefits power hitters because they usually don't bat for high averages and if you hit .230 and have a low BB% it almost doesn't matter how much power do you have. Now if you have a 15.0 BB% then you are a productive hitter..</i></span><br />
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i><br /></i></span>
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i><br /></i></span>
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i>For the high AVG hitters as I said, a walk is as good as a single with no RISP which is the situation for these guys </i></span><i style="font-family: verdana, sans-serif;">most of the time</i><i style="font-family: verdana, sans-serif;">, how many times does Dee Gordon come up with 2nd and 3rd occupied, rarely, so there's really no excuse for a bad </i><i style="font-family: verdana, sans-serif;">BB%, unless you`re peak, Ichiro Suzuki.</i><br />
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<i style="font-family: verdana, sans-serif;"><br /></i><span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i><br /></i></span><span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i>My second point and here is where the stats come in. I decided to look back at the last 50 years, which to me is a good number, the game before then in the dead ball era and in the Williams/DiMaggio years was so different that i decided to leave them out, plus 50 years is a good sample size right, anyway, take a look at this.</i></span><br />
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i><br /></i></span><span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i><b><br /></b></i></span><span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i><b>(Min. 3500 PA)</b></i></span><br />
<br />
<br />
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i><br /></i></span><span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i>There are 305 hitters since 1967 with a 10.0 BB%, such mark is the lowest standard for above-average walk percentage, among those 305, guess how many have a career wRC+ below 100?</i></span><br />
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i><br /></i></span><span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i><br /></i></span><span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i>Only 38.</i></span><br />
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i><br /></i></span><span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i><br /></i></span><span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i>That's a little under 12.5 percent, the vast majority of them, had low career averages and power who barely scraped the .100 ISO mark, think Robbie Grossman with a much longer career and slightly less power, to name a few:</i></span><br />
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i><br /></i></span><span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i><br /></i></span><span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i>Wayne Garrett, Mark McLemore, Walt Weiss, Jose Offerman, Luis Alicea and etc.</i></span><br />
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i><br /></i></span><span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i><br /></i></span><span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i>Looking at it from a different angle, during the same time span, 79 hitters had a career wRC+ of 130 or higher, a really great mark, left for the best of the best, guess how many of them had BB% below 10.0, just</i></span><i style="font-family: verdana, sans-serif;"> 7, them being:</i><br />
<i style="font-family: verdana, sans-serif;"><br /></i>
<i style="font-family: verdana, sans-serif;">BB% and wRC+</i><br />
<i style="font-family: verdana, sans-serif;"><br /></i><i style="font-family: verdana, sans-serif;"><br /></i><i style="font-family: verdana, sans-serif;">Mike Piazza 9.8, 140</i><br />
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i><br /></i></span><span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i>Ryan Braun 8.2, 139</i></span><br />
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i><br /></i></span><span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i>Vladimir Guerrero 8.1, 136</i></span><br />
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i><br /></i></span><span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i>Buster Posey 9.5, 135</i></span><br />
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i><br /></i></span><span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i>George Brett 9.4, 132</i></span><br />
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i><br /></i></span><span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i>Rod Carew 9.6, 132</i></span><br />
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i><br /></i></span><span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i>Tony Gwynn 7.7, 132</i></span><br />
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i><br /></i></span>
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i>And among those Braun's K% at 18.4, Piazza at 14.4 and Posey at 12.0 are the only 3 with K% </i></span><i style="font-family: verdana, sans-serif;">above 10</i><br />
<i style="font-family: verdana, sans-serif;"><br /></i><i style="font-family: verdana, sans-serif;"><br /></i><i style="font-family: verdana, sans-serif;">Factoring in the league average K% when Piazza played and right now for the other two. those numbers are pretty low. The other 4, all unquestionable Hall of Famers. amongst the best pure hitters in the history of the game, with ridiculous BB/K ratios.</i><br />
<i style="font-family: verdana, sans-serif;"><br /></i><span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i><br /></i></span><span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i>What does all of this screams at you, the certainty that great hitters walk, simple as that, it's so important, and the better hitter you are, the easier it is, the walks are there you just have to take it, can you imagine how great Manny Machado would be if he had better plate discipline.</i></span><br />
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i><br /></i></span><span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i><br /></i></span><span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i>Closing point, consider this, Votto and Cabrera have very similar career numbers, right.</i></span><br />
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i><br /></i></span><span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i><br /></i></span><span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i>AVG: Votto .313 Miggy .317</i></span><br />
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i><br /></i></span><span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i>SLG: Votto .541. Miggy .553</i></span><br />
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i><br /></i></span><span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i>K%: Votto 17.7 Miggy 17.1</i></span><br />
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i><br /></i></span><span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i>ISO: Votto .227. Miggy .236</i></span><br />
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i><br /></i></span><span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i><b>wRC+: Votto 158 Miggy 149</b></i></span><br />
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i><br /></i></span><span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i><br /></i></span><span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i>Not the best example but I'm a big Votto fan and wanted to do something realistic, none of the statistics above are cumulative stats, but rather career averages, so how can Cabrera possess the higher average, better power numbers and still fall 9 percentage points behind Joey in wRC+?</i></span><br />
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i><br /></i></span><span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i><br /></i></span><span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i>Basically, because Votto gets on base quite more</i></span><br />
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i><br /></i></span>
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i>.426 to .395.</i></span><br />
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i><br /></i></span>
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i>Walks are almost solely responsible for Votto being ahead of Cabrera as the slightly better career hitter. Joey also better in wOBA</i></span><br />
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i><br /></i></span>
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i>.412 to .400.</i></span><br />
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i><br /></i></span><span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i><br /></i></span><span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i>My main goal in this article was to empathize the importance of BB, I'm positive, that such goal was accomplished, any doubts, comments, and suggestions you have, express them in the comment section and I will clear them, by agreeing with you, if you agree with me, or by explaining it to you, why you're wrong, if you dare to disagree with me, as a wise man once said, "If I was wrong, don't you think, I would've known it."</i></span><br />
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i><br /></i></span><span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i><br /></i></span><br />
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i>Quote of the day, by the great Kenny "The Snake" Stabler: "Throw deep"</i></span><br />
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i><br /></i></span><span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i><br /></i></span><span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i>It's pure, simple and wise.</i></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i><br /></i></span><i style="font-family: verdana, sans-serif;"><br /></i><i style="font-family: verdana, sans-serif;">Hit me up on Twitter i am @E_Max27</i></div>
Estevāo Maximohttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13198759462983118646noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3781554738186551412.post-62023631093472339012018-03-22T18:41:00.000-07:002018-03-22T18:47:04.784-07:00Photos in my backyard<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i>Hi everyone among many things I also work as a photographer. These are just some pictures I took in my backyard these last couple of days. I hope you enjoy it.</i></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i>Note: If you liked the photos and wish to buy any either express yourself in the comment section or send me a DM on Twitter, I'm @E_Max27 if you generally liked the photos but you're looking for something else let me know what it is I'm sure we can get something done.</i></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i>Appreciate the imperfection, after all, that's all you see.</i></span></div>
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Estevāo Maximohttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13198759462983118646noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3781554738186551412.post-44906241015694083192018-03-17T14:27:00.003-07:002018-03-18T08:59:57.539-07:00Hey Man Jump on The Flyball Bandwagon<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i>Hi everyone I am going to throw a name at you, one who unless you're an Indians fan or spend a lot of time on Baseball Savant, will not know, he is a 3B/Corner Outfielder for the Cleveland Indians, his name is Yandy Diaz.</i></span><br />
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i><br /></i></span> <span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i><br /></i></span><span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i>Now what makes Yandy Diaz so special that I am writing a piece about him, he signed as an amateur free agent out of Cuba in 2013 for 300k, you could always find him among Cleveland's top 20-30 prospects but he only went as high as 7th and because his debut at the majors came as a 25-year-old, no one ever paid too much attention to him.</i></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i><br /></i></span> <span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i><br /></i></span> <span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i>Here's how he was graded by FanGraphs as a prospect.</i></span><br />
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i><br /></i></span> <span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i><br /></i></span><span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i>Hit: 40/45</i></span><br />
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i><br /></i></span> <span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i>Game Power: 30/40</i></span><br />
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i><br /></i></span> <span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i>Raw Power: 50/50</i></span><br />
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i><br /></i></span> <span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i>Speed: 50/50</i></span><br />
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i><br /></i></span> <span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i>Field: 55/60</i></span><br />
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i><br /></i></span> <span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i>Throws: 70/70</i></span><br />
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i><br /></i></span> <span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i>Future Value: 45</i></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i><br /></i></span> <span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i><br /></i></span><span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i>Scale: 20/80 Right Now/Potential</i></span><br />
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i><br /></i></span> <span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i><br /></i></span><span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i>No one's going to think too much of that, strong arm, some raw power, but other than that, very meh.</i></span><br />
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i><br /></i></span>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i>Because of my Baseball Savant mention earlier you probably have figured it out that he stood out in some StatCast area, and it actually is very simple.</i></span><br />
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i><br /></i></span> <span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i><br /></i></span><span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i>Diaz hits the ball very hard. Check out some examples:</i></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i>This is a Double Play GB against Zack Greinke at a 105.9 MPH Exit Velocity</i></span></div>
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<i style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">This is a RBI Double against Chris Sale at a 101.1 MPH Exit Velocity</i></div>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i>Lastly a RBI GB single against Jaime Garcia at a 107.6 MPH Exit Velocity</i></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i>He also had 2 Batted Balls against Yu Darvish off 101 and 107 MPH Exit Velocity, a 99 one against Archie Bradley and a 108 one against David Robertson, even someone very skeptical, will admit, this is an impressive feat, but with so many GBs you`ll get results like the Greinke DP on very well hit balls, dude you`re not Dee Gordon, launch that ball up.</i></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i>Among all qualified hitters in the majors this year his Avg Exit Velocity of 91.5 ranks as the 8th highest, sandwiched in between Stanton and Goldschmidt, his problem is very simple he makes Eric Hosmer look like Ryan Schimpf, someone in that Cleveland organization should put him aside and say:</i></span><br />
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i><br /></i></span> <span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i><br /></i></span><span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i>Son, STOP HITTING THE BALL ON THE GROUND. 59.0 GB%, are you joking with me.</i></span><br />
<i style="font-family: verdana, sans-serif;"><br /></i> <i style="font-family: verdana, sans-serif;"><br /></i><i style="font-family: verdana, sans-serif;">Among all hitters with at least 30 Batted Ball Events he was the only one in MLB to avg more than 90 MPH on balls on the ground, 90.8 to be exact and lastly he was one of 6 players to have at least half of their batted balls at 95 MPH+, 50.8% to be exact.</i><br />
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i>You might say well, this is all small sample size, but take a look at his minor league play.</i></span><br />
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i><br /></i></span> <span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i><br /></i></span><span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i>In AAA this year on 85 games he managed a:</i></span><br />
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i><br /></i></span> <span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i><br /></i></span><span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i>350/454/460 slash line</i></span><i style="font-family: verdana, sans-serif;"> on a </i><i style="font-family: verdana, sans-serif;">.412 BABIP, </i><i style="font-family: verdana, sans-serif;">163 wRC+ on a 63.5</i><i style="font-family: verdana, sans-serif;"> </i><i style="font-family: verdana, sans-serif;">GB%.</i><br />
<i style="font-family: verdana, sans-serif;"><br /></i> <i style="font-family: verdana, sans-serif;"><br /></i><i style="font-family: verdana, sans-serif;">Are you kidding me, a 163 wRC+ on a 63.5 GB%, that's insane, he had seasons along the same stat line the year before, split between AA and AAA, 2015 in AA, and 14 in A+.</i><br />
<i style="font-family: verdana, sans-serif;"><br /></i> <span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i><br /></i></span><span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i>His success alone at hitting the ball hard, with nothing pointing towards an adjustment in his Launch Angle, led Steamer to give him the following projection to 2018:</i></span><br />
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i><br /></i></span> <span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i><br /></i></span><span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i>288/373/400 Slash Line</i></span><br />
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i><br /></i></span> <span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i>11.5 BB% 18.9 K%</i></span><br />
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i><br /></i></span> <span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i>.112 ISO .350 BABIP</i></span><br />
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i><br /></i></span> <span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i>.339 wOBA 109 wRC+</i></span><br />
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i><br /></i></span> <span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i>105 Games 422 PA 2.1 WAR</i></span><br />
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i><br /></i></span> <span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i><br /></i></span><span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i>What does </i></span><i style="font-family: verdana, sans-serif;">this show you, is that he is so good and has so much potential that he is projected to be an above-average hitter all while completely pounding the ball on the ground and basically dismissing all the power that resides on that bat, his raw power grade, and his exit velocity numbers are irrefutable evidence he has the power, is just physically impossible to hit for power with this GB%.</i><br />
<i style="font-family: verdana, sans-serif;"><br /></i> <span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i><br /></i></span><span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i>I know fixing such issues is a tough task, but with so, so many hitters adjusting for higher launch angles and the so-called "Flyball Revolution" with the whole the ball is juiced talk, Yandy is literally the perfect candidate and with this adjustment could truly become a great hitter.</i></span><br />
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i><br /></i></span> <span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i><br /></i></span><span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i>Feel free to comment, subscribe, suggest and if you prefer hit me up on Twitter I'm @E_Max27.</i></span><br />
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i><br /></i></span> <span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i><br /></i></span><span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i>I do not own any of these images/videos, they`re a property of MLB and are here for illustrative purposes only</i></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i><br /></i></span><span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i>See Y`all.</i></span></div>
Estevāo Maximohttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13198759462983118646noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3781554738186551412.post-45908415784280305652018-03-13T11:04:00.000-07:002018-03-13T15:24:56.915-07:00Addressing embarrassment and all that comes with it<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i>Hi to all of you reading this. Today I want to discuss the topic of being embarassed. Mistakes and screw ups aside there are two ways of being embarassed. Let's name them shall we.</i></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i>1, You are embarassed for doing something you like but that it's something considered socially awkward, as I said before your taste constantly conflicts with what it's generally viewed/rated as good or bad, the same goes for not doing something, you shouldn't be forced into something you don't like just because the general perception on it is a good one.</i></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i>2, You are embarassed for doing something that conflicts with your personality, through a number of reasons we often find ourselves doing something that it's not our thing per say.</i></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i>In other words everybody has their own view of the world, what kind of music is good, what kind sucks, the same for books, movies pretty much everything and sometimes for a friend, or maybe to prove a point we go outside our views and we often become embarassed while running into someone that sees us doing something we consider lousy.</i></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i>In both cases you shouldn't, yeah it's easy to say it, everyone has heard that nonsense, put yourself in that situation. Embarassement is just shame and no one should feel shame for either of those reasons.</i></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i>Ignoring for a second the fact that attempting to be socially accepted in all you do and avoiding any possible embarassement is a very stupid thing to do, well no one is, ever.</i></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i>Everyone gets shit at some point, that situation when you'll be made fun of, it's inevitable and with that in mind embrace it. Determine your own actions and don't be embarassed of that.</i></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i>Knowledge of a subject that interest you or lack there of the same that does not interest you are equally good things.</i></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i>PS: I am aware of the fact i often struggle to present my thoughts in the best way for you (reader) and that happens for a number of things:</i></span><br />
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i><br /></i></span>
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i><br /></i></span>
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i>1, Writing on your cellphone sucks. That frustates me, the frustation often gets in the way of my writing.</i></span><br />
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i><br /></i></span>
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i>2, When I'm not frustated, I also do not take thid too seriously. Why? Becauee i don't with everything. Why should I? You get my point, if I make an arbitrary writing mistake here and there whi cares. The rules of a language are often arbitrary and constructed by regular people at some point in time. Let's focus on bigger things, better things, than picking on commas and proper phrasing.</i></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i>Find your passion!</i></span><br />
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Estevāo Maximohttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13198759462983118646noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3781554738186551412.post-53154729881659151092018-03-11T22:11:00.000-07:002018-03-11T22:31:13.562-07:00Pile of words that rhyme-ish=Poem from the guy who's writing this<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i>Before I get started let me clarify that I'm not giving up on the baseball articles. I goy some stuff coming in these next few days.</i></span><br />
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i><br /></i></span>
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i><br /></i></span>
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i>Including but not limited to:</i></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i><br /></i></span>
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i>The Mike Moustakas situation and which teams screwed up by not giving him a decent-ish offer. Carlos Gonzalez got more guaranteed money than him for crying out loud.</i></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i>The Greg Holland situation woll be talked about as well.</i></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i>5 over/unders to bet on. 5 to avoid.</i></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i>Award and postseason predictions.</i></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i>That and more so stay tuned. Leave any suggestions in the comment section.</i></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i>Right now I feel like publishing this poem/song/pile of words that may or may not rhyme I wrote. It's quality is of little significance to me. It makes me feel good and that's my objective.</i></span><br />
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i><br /></i></span>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i>Enjoy it.</i></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i><b>You</b></i></span></div>
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<div style="text-align: center;">
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i>I have waited a while</i></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i>How long I don't know</i></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i>Just to see you smile</i></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i>That itself makes me whole</i></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i><br /></i></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i>Forever I have wondered</i></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i>What it'd feel like</i></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i>To love someone</i></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i>More than all in life</i></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i><br /></i></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i>I cannot begin to explain</i></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i>Nor can i hope to comprehend</i></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i>The Truth is, I know that's all</i></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i>I don't need to understand</i></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i><br /></i></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i>You change my perception</i></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i>My perception of time</i></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i>What i was before you</i></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i>Merely a footnote on my own life</i></span></div>
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Estevāo Maximohttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13198759462983118646noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3781554738186551412.post-43352462100209656532018-03-11T19:51:00.000-07:002018-03-11T19:51:47.125-07:00Let’s talk soccer, the Uefa Champions League to be more exact<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i>I decided to bring soccer into the mix as one of the topics in my articles. With that in mind, I'd like to take this post to discuss the UCL (Uefa Champions League).</i></span><br />
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i><br /></i></span> <span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i>As you all know the UCL is the most popular yearly soccer event in the world bring in together 32 of Europe's finest. Meaning 32 of the World's finest.</i></span><br />
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i><br /></i></span> <span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i>We are 3 quarters of the way in through the round of 16, winner advances to the quarterfinals with 4 games left.</i></span><br />
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i><br /></i></span> <span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i>Let's go through each matchup and analyze it. First, the four already decided.</i></span><br />
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i><br /></i></span> <span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i><br /></i></span> <span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i><br /></i></span> <span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i>Liverpool vs Porto</i></span><br />
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i><br /></i></span> <span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i>LIV @ POR: 5-0</i></span><br />
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i>POR @ LIV: 0-0</i></span><br />
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i><br /></i></span> <span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i>As it was the case with other matchups it took only one game to decide this one. Liverpool went into Portugal and shocked Porto with an outstanding display of offense, Porto actually got off to a competitive start in that game but they just couldn't hold up.</i></span><br />
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i><br /></i></span> <span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i>Despite what a lot of people may have led you to believe, Coutinho wasn't the reason for all that was good with Liverpool. Sure he is a good player, sure he is missed but the offense can work without him, especially with Salah playing out of his mind, most of Liverpool'sstruggles came from a poor unreliable defense (unrelated to Coutinho) so as long as they play well the team should perform at a high level.</i></span><br />
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i><br /></i></span> <span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i>The second game was a fill-in basically, not much to take from it. Also, start Casillas. Always start Casillas.</i></span><br />
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i><br /></i></span> <span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i><br /><br /></i></span> <span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i>Manchester City vs Basel</i></span><br />
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i><br /></i></span> <span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i>MCI @ BAS: 4-0</i></span><br />
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i>BAS @ MCI: 2-1</i></span><br />
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i><br /></i></span> <span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i>This was one of the matchups along with Bayern against Besiktas where we all know that a team was clearly outmatched, Guardiola's squad is so superior and it proved that by ending the confront in one game, it was nice to see if Gundongan scoring twice. Very talented player plagued by injuries.</i></span><br />
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i><br /></i></span>
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i>Hopefully, Guardiola is able to give Gabriel Jesus some minutes and eventually he bounces back to form, they'll need him later.</i></span><br />
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i><br /></i></span> <span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i>Basel got a confidence boost with a win at Manchester. But don't read too much into that.</i></span><br />
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i><br /></i></span> <span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i><br /><br /></i></span> <span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i>Real Madrid vs Paris Saint-Germain</i></span><br />
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i><br /></i></span> <span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i>PSG @ RMA: 1-3</i></span><br />
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i>RMA @ PSG: 2-1</i></span><br />
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i><br /></i></span> <span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i>This confront was the big highlight, could PSG get over that hump and win it all after the fiasco last year? Well no.</i></span><br />
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i><br /></i></span> <span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i>The French squad wasted a huge chance in the first game where after scoring on the 1st half giving up the lead on a stupid penalty and dominating early in the second they started to play for the result, opportunities wasted aside, taking Cavani out for Meunier was a bad move and on the blink of an eye Real scored twice taking a commanding lead.</i></span><br />
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i><br /></i></span> <span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i>The second game exposed how badly coached PSG really is, the team's repertoire is:</i></span><br />
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i><br /></i></span>
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i>Give the ball to the forwards and sees what happens.</i></span><br />
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i><br /></i></span>
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i>First off starting with 3 defensive midfielders and two wingers with no one to infiltrate the defense that's just damn and it was very easy to defend for Madrid that used Vasquez and Asensio brilliantly to stop the play in the wings.</i></span><br />
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i><br /></i></span> <span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i>PSG needs a better Head Coach and could use a midfielder. A guy like James Rodriguez not he per say just one with his style of play.</i></span><br />
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i><br /></i></span> <span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i><br /></i></span> <span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i>Tottenham vs Juventus</i></span><br />
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i><br /></i></span> <span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i>TOT @ JUV: 2-2.</i></span><br />
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i>JUV @ TOT: 2-1.</i></span><br />
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i><br /></i></span> <span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i>An injustice was done here as the Spurs clearly outplayed their opponent but got eliminated due to two complete collapses. Sleepwalked through the first 10 minutes in Italy costing them 2 stupid goals where was the defense on the first one, come on, they managed to comeback dominating the rest of the game scoring twice securing a very nice result.</i></span><br />
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i><br /></i></span> <span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i>Back in England it looked like an easy win as Tottenham cruised through the first 60 or so minutes and then they collapsed yet again, it took 4 minutes and it was 2-1 Juventus.</i></span><br />
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i><br /></i></span>
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i>They managed another comeback dominating the last 20 minutes but with zero balls on the net. Which means Juventus advances to get mashed by a Spanish team another day as they always do.</i></span><br />
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i><br /></i></span>
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i>At least Tottenham beat Real Madrid.</i></span><br />
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i><br /></i></span> <span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i>Note: Chiellini's open hand made contact with the ball twice, it wasn't called. At least I think it was him.</i></span><br />
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i><br /></i></span> <span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i>The next four will come right after the matches are over. Probably Thursday.</i></span></div>
Estevāo Maximohttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13198759462983118646noreply@blogger.com4tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3781554738186551412.post-89521763378118401142018-03-09T20:28:00.002-08:002018-03-10T20:25:25.171-08:00The Ultimate Free Agent Signing<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i>In all sports, every GM's job is basically to accumulate talent, all you can do really is build the most talented team and try to win it all, it's no guarantee, but it's obviously the best path.</i></span><br />
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i><br /></i></span><span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i>When acquiring talent you usually have to give up something, it's all about what you give up, the more you give the more you expect to get, for instance, Carlos Correa is great, but he came at a cost, the number one overall pick, a very valuable pick which you expect to get a great player from, Albert Pujols, on the other hand, was a star in St Louis for many years and he came at the cost of a 13th round pick, which no one reallly expects anything from. A lot of the GM's job is trying to acquire talent without giving up talent.</i></span><br />
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i><br /></i></span><span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i>I want to talk today about one of the greatest accomplishments ever in terms of acquiring talent, throughout history you'll find a lot of times, teams getting lucky with fringe players turning into stars, whether is Justin Turner and Chris Taylor in LA or Kyle Hendricks in Chicago, I'm talking about a player who was already great and outpitched his salary.</i></span><br />
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i><br /></i></span>
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i>I am talking about the ultimate free agent signing. What every GM dreams of when that star player signs his name on the paper.</i></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i><br /></i></span><span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i>On December of 2012, the Dodgers and their at the time new ownership made a splash in the free agent market signing the best player available, Zack Greinke to a 147/6 deal with a player opt-out at the end of the third year, now we all know he opted out and wound up only pitching three years in LA, let's analyze those three seasons.</i></span><br />
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i><br /></i></span><span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i>Keep in mind, Zack wasn't compensation eligible, so all that it cost to get him was money and in those three seasons, he made 70 Million Dollars, averaging 23.3 a year. Below you'll see his numbers and how they ranked in baseball throughout that period.</i></span><br />
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i><br /></i></span><span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i>2nd in ERA 2.30</i></span><br />
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i><br /></i></span>
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i>5th in WHIP 1.03</i></span><br />
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i><br /></i></span>
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i>2nd in ERA- .63</i></span><br />
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i><br /></i></span>
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i>2nd in RE24 (Run Expectancy) 96.22</i></span><br />
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i><br /></i></span>
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i>2nd in RA9-WAR 24.5</i></span><br />
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i><br /></i></span>
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i>3rd in Baseball Reference WAR 17.5</i></span><br />
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i><br /></i></span>
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i><br /></i></span><span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i>For some context, that much WAR for that much money equals 4 Mil per WAR, which is off the charts considering 1 Win is valued at the very least 7 Mil.</i></span><br />
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i><br /></i></span>
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i><br /></i></span>
<br />
<i style="font-family: verdana, sans-serif;">To top all of this off for a guy who came for free, who completely outpitched his contract, his departure netted LA the 32nd overall pick in the Draft, who the Dodgers used to draft Catcher Will Smith out of Louisville he now is LA's 11th best prospect, a great defender who clobbered the ball in the Arizona Fall League.</i><br />
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i><br /></i></span>
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i><br /></i></span><span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i>As always feel free to comment, make suggestions and subscribe. Let's spread the word. Hit me up on Twitter i'm @E_Max27</i></span><br />
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i><br /></i></span>
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i><br /></i></span><span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i>See Y'all later.</i></span></div>
Estevāo Maximohttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13198759462983118646noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3781554738186551412.post-29338191845749699982018-03-08T21:16:00.002-08:002018-03-09T18:06:13.365-08:00So i had an epiphany, maybe, I don't know. The point is...<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i>Note: It's way past midnight my time zone and I just had a moment of clarity or maybe I manufactured one, either way, I felt like writing this. Just a heads up, given the time, my sleep deprivation and the use of my cell phone with no auto correct, you'll see a significant amount of spelling mistakes. I'll be sure to fix them tomorrow. For now, just focus on the message</i></span><br />
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i><br /></i></span> <span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i><br /></i></span> <span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i>I have decided to expand my content beyond what goes on in the diamond, from now I'll be addressing other topics, anything that peaks my interest really.</i></span><br />
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i><br /></i></span> <span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i><br /></i></span> <span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i>A very big "principal" I have in my life is to constantly ask myself why I'm doing this, and if it's something I don't want to be doing, What do I want to instead and why am I not doing that. As it is with pretty much any and all philosophies, a way of living, principals whatever you may call it's easy to dismiss it as being just another cliche.</i></span><br />
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i><br /></i></span> <span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i><br /></i></span> <span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i>The thing is it doesn't matter, I'm not here trying to convince you of my beliefs and why you should listen to me, this is not some revolutionary thought, and even if it is, it shouldn't be, there are so many hardships in life so much struggle regardless of who you are that you really should seek what you want to seek.</i></span><br />
<br />
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</script> <span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i><br /></i></span> <span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i><br /></i></span> <span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i>A quote from a movie I once saw, is very interesting: "It's not stupid if you like it."</i></span><br />
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i><br /></i></span> <span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i><br /></i></span> <span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i>That referring to another character's love for comic books.</i></span><br />
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i><br /></i></span> <span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i><br /></i></span> <span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i>How many times have you seen someone apologizing for their taste, that goes for music, books, tv shows, movies, food whatever. Liking something that is mocked by society doesn't make you a freak, it makes you you. Truth be told almost everyone does is just that most tend to hide it.</i></span><br />
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i><br /></i></span> <span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i><br /></i></span> <span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i>It goes without saying that there is wrong and certain extremities fit that mold, so don't go there and yes you know what I'm talking about.</i></span><br />
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i><br /></i></span> <span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i><br /></i></span> <span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i>Something else I'd like to address that it is on this subject, you probably heard by now the whole what you want and what you need are two completely different things. But here's my perspective on the matter.</i></span><br />
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i><br /></i></span> <span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i><br /></i></span> <span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i>Physically what we need is food, clean water and oxygen, one of which is free, the other two can fluctuate depending on the location, for someone living in the jungle is free, for an executive staying at the penthouse of the Four Seasons expensive (just not to him, if you put it into perspective). The point is while a lot of people die for not having one of these. For the majority of humans, it's fairly available and you both want and need. Anything else that it is tangible, you want not need.</i></span><br />
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i><br /></i></span> <span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i><br /></i></span> <span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i>Now the big part is this, emotionally there is a huge link between what you want and need. Although a lot of people lose sight of this at somepoint, we all want love, irrational crazy yet wonderful love, a soul mate, friendship, soemeone by our side all of that stuff everyone has heard a million times, bound to hear a million more, it's all true, it fulfills you, it makes you a better person, the catch is it leaves you vulnerable, open, exposed, the risk of pain, broken heart is much greater, which drives people away, so many out there are afraid to love for this reason.</i></span><br />
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i><br /></i></span> <span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i><br /></i></span> <span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i>It all boils down to taking a chance, the path to happiness goes through love and there is no way around it and to love, to really love like we were meant to, you must take.a chance, give up power and care.</i></span><br />
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i><br /></i></span> <span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i><br /></i></span> <span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i>People that give that up, may hold the power emotionally, they may control their relationships, successfully avoid the pain and even appear happy on the surface, but don't mistake happiness with joy. A lot of things bring us joy, the same cannot be said about happiness.</i></span><br />
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i><br /></i></span> <span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i><br /></i></span> <span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i>And I end this collection of words keep in mind. Live YOUR life, doing what you want, don't apologize for your taste and there's a great link between what you want and what you need emotionally, and lastly seek Love, forever seek Love.</i></span></div>
Estevāo Maximohttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13198759462983118646noreply@blogger.com3