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Seattle
We get to watch Stefan Frei practice his art between the posts every week, and he plays and looks as intense as any keeper in the league. But his outlet from all that intensity is his visual art, which he has dabbled in on and off since his youth, and you may have caught his recent submission to this year's matchday posters.
The New York Red Bulls are coming to town, which means Luis Robles is going to attempt to stop the likes of Pappa, Dempsey, Oba, and Neagle from floating curlers around him or blasting shots past him. Has he spent the week training by throwing and catching slippery fish at Pike Place Market? Maybe.
Fans have gravitated to the Sounders from all kinds of directions, but many were fans of European teams before realizing that we had some respectable soccer to watch here in our own backyard. Check out cougcitysounder's experience as he went full circle, being drawn into the sport by an Arsenal game, becoming a big Sounders fan, and then getting to attend an FA Cup semifinal at Wembley stadium
Major League Soccer
Some food for thought after the recent talk of the relationship between the business side of an MLS team and the side of the organized supporters. Not for sale: A meditation on supporting.
A graphic designer has created a design concept for an Atlanta MLS team, or "Firebirds FC." That's no surprise, but this guy is from Valencia, Spain, and has no connections with Atlanta, he just happens to be a fan of the style of American sports team logo design.
The 2016 MLS All Star Game will be in San Jose's new stadium.
FIFA Fallout
Where to begin? The bombshells continue to drop.
FiveThirtyEight looks at the numbers and wonders how many (and which) countries would need to abandon FIFA in order to break it?
The US Soccer Federation will not be voting for Sepp Blatter, and they think he can be defeated.
Traffic Sports USA President (and NASL chairperson) Aaron Davidson has been banned from all soccer-related activities by FIFA, and unsurprisingly, he's been suspended from his NASL position as well. Oh, Traffic Sports is also the majority owner of the Carolina Railhawks.
Remember Michael Garcia, the guy who led the internal FIFA "investigation" of the World Cup bids for Russia and Qatar, and resigned in outrage after the announced results were not exactly in line with what he put in his report? Yeah, once the Swiss found that original report, they had most of what they needed to make their move.
CONCACAF has created a committee, led by the heads of the US, Mexican and Canadian soccer federations, to investigate the business practices of the organization. They've also placed General Secretary Enrique Sanz on a leave of absence.
The concurrent actions by Swiss and US law enforcement authorities was no accident, but the result of months of careful planning.
Sepp Blatter would like to not be blamed for, well, anything, because how could he watch everyone all of the time to make sure nothing bad is going on?
VISA is the first FIFA sponsor to formally warn the organization that it will be reevaluating its sponsorship at this point.
Meanwhile, the death toll in the construction in preparation for the Qatar World Cup is still horribly stunning.
Video Games
For the first time, in FIFA '16, you can play as 12 women's national squads. Even better, EA took the time to make the players appear, move, and play more like their real-life counterparts.