Wednesday, April 11, 2007

The Plot - it thickens

Ok, maybe there's no plot per se, but I'm still confused. I just got off the phone with Daniel Jankowski, the Chicago Fire press officer. He was returning my call about Thiago, answering whether or not the league had forced him to comply with the new regulations that don't allow first names on the back of jerseys.

"Thiago is wearing Thiago," Jankowski confirmed. "He was "grandfathered" under the rules that allowed him to use his first name before these new regulations were implemented, according to our equipment manager."

Of course, Thiago joined the league in 2005 - the same year Herculez Gomez reentered the league, and both wore their first names on their jerseys that season.

I'd thought that Thiago was getting the "Brazilian exception" given DC United's Fred, (though Thiago wasn't mentioned as one of the "two exceptions" in the league email denying Herculez the right to use his first name).

Now, according to the Fire, it's not because Thiago is Brazilian, it's because he's used his first name on his jersey since 2005. Except that's exactly what Herculez has done as well.

Something stinks. The league doesn't even have agreement on this issue among the teams.

6 comments:

Anonymous said...

Inconsistency by MLS? I am shocked.;)

Unknown said...

FIRE DON GARBER!!!!!!!!!!

Anonymous said...

Wonder how Crystal and Thiffault (whose role/position within MLS you didn't clarify in your article, btw) will address Mr. Radosavljević when they meet him the next time.

A.C. said...

Apparently Jeff Thiffault is the Senior Coordinator of Games Operations for Major League Soccer.

I'm not sure what that title means, but apparently it means he can tell Herculez no, Fred and Cobi yes, and ignore what Sinisa and Thiago are doing.

Anonymous said...

all this attention being paid to the names on the jersies seems silly to me. And then to have a double standard in place is rediculous.

Travis said...

A league in need of fans cannot be doing something like this. In fact, they should be encouraging it. The more soccer players that can be popular enough to known by a single name the better.

It seems at times that the MLS believes they are running an "American" league. It's not, it is an international league played in the US.

MLB understood this and allowed Ichiro to go by the single name. The NFL doesn't have this problem, and the NBA may just be entering it (as more South Americans enter the league, I'm sure it will happen. There already is Nene).