Deadline Day

While we love you to post everything and anything tangentially related to soccer in links, we’ll be keeping track of all the rumors and talking about them over in our MLS Deadline Day 2017 thread.

Seattle

If you want to eat at a ballpark it might not be too safe, but you should take the risk anyway. Eating at Safeco, though, is the safest proposition in MLB.

Sounders Academy is following up a great performance at the Youdan Tournament with two players named to the US U15s for the CONCACAF Championships.

MLS

Soccer in the US is growing, specifically the support and desire for more soccer. As it grows, so does MLS.

Growing the league involves spending, it’s a pretty cut and dry formula. Breaking the salary cap rules might be what it takes to do it.

LAFC may have missed out on Wesley Sneijder but they got a better player, Carlos Vela. The Mexican international will join the club in January, one will wonder what drew him to LAFC that didn’t for fellow Mexican nationals, Andres Guardado and Chicharito.

Across the city, Gyasi Zardes is one of the big pieces to debate on LAG’s malfunctioning roster. Is Zardes good? Is he not? Just what is he, besides poor with a first touch.

Will Parchman believes five MLS sides are uniquely dependent on their superstars. I’ll give you a hint: three are in the East, and one of the players’ name rhymes with the dilla in quesadilla.

If Nashville gets their way there will be another Sigi involved in MLS (technically it’ll be Zygi, but let’s not get caught up in details). The Tennessee expansion bid has added Minnesota Vikings ownership, the Wilf family, to their ownership group.

The transfers kept on coming, with Minnesota United trading allocation monies (both kinds) for Ethan Finlay. This comes on top of the Crew signing Pedro Santos, a winger from Braga.

USA

Alabama is a state known for football, and not the kind with a round ball where you actually use your feet, but the USL officially awarded Birmingham a team and hope to spread the “other football” into the state.

Out in California the NASL announced a new side, California United FC. Unlike other “United” teams, they really mean it. They promise they mean it.

Former MLS defender Bobby Warshaw just finished his memoir. It gives you a peek at the private side of the footballer’s life as he tried to find a squad.

World

As the Premier League is about to kickoff we are reminded that the UK is a much smaller landmass than the US is and that most of us know nothing about its geography. NBC has a handy map of where all the teams are located.

Jose Mourinho’s pursuit of Gareth Bale went from “race to the airport” to it’s over in about a day largely because Real Madrid played him against the Red Devils.

If you thought Paris Saint-Germain cared about the potential financial fair play violations with signing Neymar, think again. The Parisian side is after Alexis Sanchez as well and is willing to pay around £80m.