Actual Results!

Sorry for the lack of posting in the lat week or so. I'm a bit of an Olympics junkie and I've been distracted. Other than figure skating if Olympics are on, I'm watching it. Yes, even curling believe it or not. Some rough outings for the American skips, moving them off of last rocks was probably a good move.

Today though the Rapids played their first preseason game. They're down in Casa Grande, AZ and faced the Columbus Crew today. The teams tied at 1 apiece, with Columbus scoring in the 4th minute and Cummings equalizing on a PK in the 19th minute. We used 18 different players with all the subs coming at half:

* = Unsigned trialist

1st Half:

Pickens
Moor - Baudet - Murillo - Valentino
Smith - Labrocca - LaBauex* - Thompson
Cummings - Hodges*

2nd Half:

Ceus
Kimura - Holody - Murillo - Valentino
Thompson - Dalby - LaBauex* - Lorei*
Schunk - Akpan

(BTW, if anyone knows a good widget or something to display lineups in a blog let me know)

As you can see, Valentino is back from Scandinavia. Clark, Larentowicz, and Mastroeni are the big names that didn't play today. Casey is at National Team camp. I'm guessing with a game tomorrow against LA and a game on Friday against FSL Clark and Larentowicz, coming off of injuries, were given a break today. The other interesting names that doesn't appear are Palguta and new signing Danny Earls. Palguta is competing for the open center and left back spots, while Earls is competing for the left back spot. It will be interesting to see who gets time tomorrow on the back line. Its very early but based on these lineups I think that Moor is beating out Kimura for the right back slot. Kimura's a favorite of mine so I'm a little disappointed by that, maybe Kosuke moves into a super sub role this season.