Puerto Rico

The Islanders had a very inconsistent season in 2007. There seemed to be a lot of promise coming into the season after a successful 2006, but they performed poorly to start the season. Colin Clarke was brought in as the new head coach and the Islander began to look like a good team. But then they petered out towards the end of the season and finished sixth. Along with being inconsistent in form and behind the bench, the roster underwent continual change throughout the season as 29 players appeared in USL play.

Coming into this season there's been a wholesale change in goal, not entirely surprising given their mediocre defensive record. Bill Gaudette and Justin Myers will be stationed in place of Josh Saunders and Michael Behonick. Gaudette played for Columbus between 2005 and 2007 where he made several starts. Justin Myers was with Chivas USA last season. Its unclear whether this is an upgrade or not.

Jay Needham and Marco Velez lead the returning defensive players. Lars Lyssand and Mauricio Segovia are the two players that might be considered regulars last season who won't be returning. Its unclear who will be taking their places though several players who played at least some time in the backline will be returning. Danial Ojeda also looks to have been promoted from the Islanders B team to add some depth. Starting with Needham and Velez and adding a little more consistency in the lineup this season should help the team improve somewhat, but how much?

The midfield doesn't see any significant losses, but does feature a few additions. Edson Elcock from KC and Sandy Gbandi and Scott Jones from Dallas join Petter Villegas, Edwin Miranda and Noah Delgado. There are still several other players hanging around that appeared in midfield last season as well. Overall, the group has more depth and more competition, so probably will show at least modest improvement.

At forward, unless you count Edson Elcock as much up top as in midfield, there haven't been any changes of note. Fabrice Noel, Alberto Zapata and Alberto Delgado will probably all factor here, but in a running theme, how much better will the same guys be over last season?

Stability looks to be the primary factor in the Islanders hopes for this season with the possible exception of some fresh faces in net unless further signings are to be made. Yes, this should be a positive step from last season, but I don't think it can make that much difference. Puerto Rico is probably looking at another upper mid-table season, is that good enough for them?

Portland

The Timbers looked like they had a good chance at winning the league most of last season but were overtaken by Seattle at the end and lost to Atlanta in the semi-finals. Too bad, a Seattle vs. Portland finale would have been huge. A year removed from that success, a few players have been raided by the likes of LA, Columbus and Rochester. How will the replacements stack up?

Josh Wicks decided to take the chance that he could beat out Steve Cronin for the Galaxy's starting job and James Jordan from Houston steps in to fill the void. Or maybe Ray Burse, on loan from Dallas will do the job. In the end, as long as one can clearly win the job it shouldn't make much of a difference from last season.

Whoever wins the job will have primarily the same back line as the one the helped Portland to the fewest goals allowed in the league last season. Cameron Knowles, who played every regular season minute for the Timbers, Justin and Scot Thompson are all back this season, but now they have Tim Karalexis in from Charleston in place of Leonard Griffin. Scott Bolkan, a rookie, appears to be the only cover at the moment, but there's plenty of midfielders to fill in as needed I guess.

Luke Kreamalmeyer departs from the midfield, but Arsene Oka comes in from New England to pick up the slack. Andrew Gregor is still around as is Tom Potl and an assorted cast of others who can fill in as needed. Miguel Guante and Vardan Adzemian come in from the amateur ranks as the wild cards.

Along with Wicks, Bryan Jordan made the leap to the Galaxy. Who knows he might even get a shot to play given how no one seems to be able to finish off Beckham's service. In his place are Chris Brown, most recently of Real Salt Lake and Takayuki Suzuki who played for Japan in the 2002 World Cup and comes via Yokohama. My guess is that Brown and Suzukhi will be starting over the returning Chris Bagley, who only managed one goal in 23 appearances.

So what do we have, serviceable replacements in the leagues best defense from a season ago, who at least have a shot at duplicating the success of a year ago, perhaps a little less speed on the flank with Kreamalmeyer gone and more fire power up top. If Jordan/Burse and Karalexis are up to the task and the new forwards take some pressure off of Gregor and the rest of the midfield to score the goals, Portland could be better. Barring injury they shouldn't fall too far down the table this season anyway.

Puerto Rico @ Portland

Hmm... despite the Thursday date, the Timbers Army should be ready to go. I'm sure the PGE Turf Monster is ready to swallow a few players alive. Oh, and Puerto Rico is traditionally a poor road team. Just a hunch but...

My Prediction: 0-2 Portland

Week in review:

Charleston @ Miami -

In a positive sign for the Blues, 3500+ turned out for the opener. Let's hope they saw enough to keep coming back. The teams put on a reasonable enough show to entertain them. Two players scored on their debut. Miami debutant, Alex Afonso, looped a header in over Dusty Hudock on a cross that the Battery defense probably should have dealt with. Meanwhile, Mike Richardson was busy terrorizing the Blues down the left flank for most of the first half and early part of the second. So it was something of a surprise when Dominic Cianciarulo scored his first ever goal for the Battery on a play that started on the right side. Sean Fraser put Miami back on top inside of ten minutes from the end of time, but Cianciarulo knocked in a second, again on a play from the right side, to even things up in stoppage time. Not a bad way to start your career for the kid from Furman.

On the down side, the announcer for the broadcast was horrible, but often in a so bad it's funny kind of way. For instance, early in the first half he took a phone call on air from the guy who was supposed to be in the booth with him. He kept speaking as though he realized what he was saying was going out over the air, but he didn't turn off his mike. Needless to say his booth buddy never showed. It actually got worse from there as he became completely incensed at the referee for no discernible reason in the second half. He became so irate that he called the ref out over the PA system. Really. And then had a hissy fit swearing and screaming at someone in the background with the USL Live mike still open. Apparently, the anonymous screamee questioned why he was so worked up. Ah, USL Live, I almost missed you during my winter of competently called footie on FSC, Gol, etc. Heck, even ESPN seems a reasonable alternative.

Final: 2-2

My Prediction: 1-1

Montreal @ Vancouver -

And yet, USL Live was just getting started on screwing things up. The entire match in Vancouver was relegated to tape delay for unknown reasons. I haven't had a chance to go back and review it, so here's the brief synopsis. Eduardo Sebrango scored in the first half on the 'Caps only shot on goal of the entire match. Montreal managed to get six on frame, but we held off of the score sheet. The end. On the bright side, Vancouver did get a sell out.

Final: 0-1 Vancouver

My Prediction: 2-1 Montreal

For the season, I'm 1-1 with no exact scores and no correct margins of victory. Whoo!