Alternate stream.

What's going on?

Oh John, I'm so sorry.

I know how hard you work on putting such a great podcast together.

So I'm about to throw this other computer out.

So I'm gonna tell I'm gonna take a pistol to it after this and put a bunch of bullets in it like Elvis did his TV.

It's all good, my friend's good to see you.

Yes, proper caffeine eating and the morning run.

That's the way it always is.

So, Uh, you got yours, I've got wine.

I've never been a coffee person, but we did.

You go a couple of things I wanted to get into with you this morning.

First and foremost, Uh, there's this thing I don't know if folks have heard of it called the World Cup, and it's common man, Houston's gonna be very, very busy.

What's what's the vibes when the announcement came on Friday about matches and all the matches that are going to be there.

What's what's the vibe been like there in Houston?

Yeah?

I get I get the sense that it's become a little bit more real to people.

You know, now you have storylines, things you can talk about teams.

We know the Dutch, the Germans, we know Portugal's coming here, we get two shots at Christiano Ronaldo.

People are excited about that.

We have two million soccer fans here and they come from all over the world.

I think they're all very in tune to it.

But Houston's turned into a massive city.

I mean there's probably seven and I'm just taking a stab here, but seven and a half to eight million people here, and in the last couple of years.

I mean you can sense, as somebody that's lived here, how many more people are here, just based on traffic and getting around and everything.

So I would say the real soccer people understand it.

There's a lot of people involved with it that aren't really soccer people that I'm wondering if they really know what's about to come here in the tsunami of people from around the world.

So I you know, I think the level of awareness.

Honestly, I was very disappointed with it prior to the draw, and I didn't see a lot being done to create and bring the entire city and community into it.

So that's my take.

But I think now there's a lot more ratcheting up of excitement.

So then you know, and this is a conversation that you and I have had in the past, specifically about Dynamo and making that kind of an impact and drawing folks to hell in a shell to see it on a regular basis.

And you're seeing the same kinds of things now when the world's going to be knocking on your doorstep.

I mean, how other if you had unlimited budget.

If I give you an unlimited budget, I sit there and I hand you the JP money bags, you know, the the Ebenezer Duck, Scrooge Ducks, Scrooge McDuck or whoever he was.

If I hand you that big bag with the S on it, how would you fix the problem and get folks into these matches, especially starting the World Cup and then also with the Dynamo with the twenty six season.

I'm around the corner.

Oh that's a big question.

We would need a lot of time.

But I just think, you know, the sports has gotten so commercial now.

I think a lot of people that are making decisions are the quote unquote intellectuals and data people.

And you know, soccer is a sport that you know, it's as much about you know, striking a ball and putting it on somebody's chest from twenty yards away than it is on all the monetization of it, in the commercialization.

But look, I'm not naive.

I know this is not going to stop, right, They're already talking about a sixty fourteen World Cup.

I just think that there's a lot of people in positions that could just acquire the skill of weaving everybody into it.

I mean, every time we hear about the World Cup in Houston, they say the same thing.

It's the same speech every time, and there's no soccer people up there.

Really, you know, there should be little kids standing there representing the youth community.

You weave in some of your old time veterans from the from the soccer community, you give them a pat on the back, you do things above and beyond.

And look, I'm not I'm not running the thing, and I understand there's incredible stuff going on, but when you are out in public, you have a way of weaving everybody into the thing.

You know, the dynamo on another you know, that's a whole nother kettle of fish right there.

They're just they're not relevant here.

I'm sorry to say, but it's you know, I'm not going to sit here and lie to people.

I'm not going to lie to them on my radio show.

They're not relevant.

There's not enough that I see from a front office and a leadership and an inspiration standpoint.

I mean, they had a press conference recently with with the owner Ted Siegel and Tim Howard, and I mean I listened to this and I said, this is downright disrespect full to Houston and we deserve better.

We deserve better.

Why do you think we have?

How can you be this irrelevant as an MLS team when you know your city's hosting the World Cup.

Isn't anybody shamed in a healthy manner?

You know?

The media coverage isn't there for MLS and NWSL, so there's a lot to go.

But we're constantly told, you know, how well we're doing, and I'm like, well, okay, is the bar then?

You know less than half Field Stadium is the bar?

Not being relevant in the media.

So it's tough being the one guy that wants to be critical.

I'm not doing it because i want to be someone that's an irritant.

I'm doing it because I've been here since nineteen eighty four and I just know Houston deserves better.

But They're going to be big crowds for the World Cup, that's for sure.

Yeah.

And you know when we have these conversations, you know, I I enjoy our give and take when it comes to presenting the issues of the day.

And I think that you and I and both sides of it here, whether it's you in ninety seven five and us here in the Morning Show and the rest of SDH, we believe in rising tide lifts all boats, and we want to we want to grow the game and make sure that the game is heading in the right direction, especially when you have these large events like a World Cup coming and you sit there and you point at it and.

Go, look, you've got an amazing amount of stories coming in.

I mean because I.

Looked at the I looked at the grid that you've got.

You've got Germany and curas Ou obviously Germany.

You know that's a that's a shiny object.

We know about that.

I mean, curas out.

With what Dick Advocatt has done, it's an amazing story.

That kind of a thing is is is unreal.

You mentioned a CR forty and his abs, which you know are tremendous, and they'll be tremendous until he's like seventy eight years old.

I mean, you've got orchigal come and that's gonna be Obviously that's an easy draw, but for an easy storyline.

But who's going to be playing Portugal coming through the the Intercontinental Galactic Playoff?

If it's New Caledonia that makes their way through for whatever reason ranked one sixty nine in the world.

If the if the planet's aligned and it's them, that is a slam dunk feature for somebody to help grow the game.

With the Netherlands coming in and.

That that fatal four way that that is going to figure out that group.

I mean Ukraine, Ukraine, which is a story and of itself, Sweden, Poland and Albania which is another great story.

Uzbekistan as a minnow is a great story.

Cabo Verd.

We've been hitting Caabo vered hard.

I mean we had Pico Lopez on on draft day.

Stephen Morera with the crew is there.

Saudi Arabia is always injury.

So there's a lot of stories that you can grab onto that are.

Coming into you.

I'm getting I'm getting goosebumps talking about this because I'm not fired up, but I mean it's it's great storylines that people can hang onto even if you don't, even if you're not a sickle like us, that you can grasp onto here to help grow the game.

Yeah, no question, that's what comes with the expansion to forty eight teams.

Right, You're getting these incredible moments for these smaller countries, and you know, like Cape Verde.

I mean, I'm sure there's a lot of people that had to go to a map and find out that Cape Verde is off of Senegal and it's basically a volcanic island, you know.

So I think those storylines are great.

I think it's the yin and yang of competition though and meritocracy.

I do think we have to be well not we, because I'm not making the decision.

This is simply my opinion.

But you know, the World Cup with these great stories, we have to remember there's seventy two first round games, group games seventy two that's more than the entire last World Cup.

So let's be honest here, we're trying to make this a participatory event.

It helps monetize it, right because the more games.

Yes, there are great stories, no question about it, but you know, it's it's all about expansion, commerciality and getting bigger, bigger, bigger, bigger, and involving more and more and more, and there's pros and cons to that.

I think I do worry that one day the World Cup a couple cycles from now might not be as sacred and as unique as it has been, right, I mean, you can go back and pick out indelible moments in your mind from the World Cup, when you when you first learned of it, how it affected you, Which was your World Cup that kicked off, you know, your excitement and energy and passion around it.

You know.

I'm sitting here.

We have an event with the nineteen eighty six World Cup film next Monday, and I'm sitting here thinking, I never forget that side volley that Manoel Negrete hid in Azteca Stadium, you know, and he scissors it and his shoulders dip and he's flung himself in the air, and just to see that crowd in that reaction, and then in my case, I can go, well, a couple of years later, I'd played against him when he was on unanm pumas you know, and he was like a five foot five little guy, and when the ball came to his feet.

It was incredible, right, So you know, I just think the World Cup is special and I just hope it doesn't lose its sacredness, you know.

I mean that was twenty four teams in the nineteen eighty six World Cup.

Now we're up to forty eight.

Yeah, and you don't want to get it to no offense the NCAA basketball tournament where you're like sixty eight and sixty nine and team seventy is complaining about things and you're looking at some you're looking at some one sixteens that aren't really worth it, and you're pushing to that point right now where yeah, you've seen it in the Women's World Cup when they expanded the field for the first time and you were in blowout city and it wasn't looking good, but you got you can grow the game this way.

It's a dangerous.

But I think on the women's side that was a good thing because you had to nudge people forward into taking the women's game seriously.

And I mean, I think that's the greatest thing the ninety nine team did and all the great pioneers of the women's game out of the US, is that they showed the rest of the world that competing in women's sports was a beautiful thing, right, I mean, you and I, everybody has seen the quality of women's soccer.

Just go through the roof, whether it's the college game, the professional game, it's incredible.

I understood the need for expansion, then I understand it now it's monetization.

Let's be honest.

But listen, not all fans are like you and me either.

Okay, yes, a lot of the European fans are.

But in the United States, fans are different.

They may just want to go for Ronaldo.

They may want to go just to say they went.

They may want to go.

You know, they're watching clips of goals, but they're not necessarily watching full games.

The expansion of it may be good in a way to track to a lot of people.

I guess the hope will be that the sport will gain some new unique fans, and I don't think there's any question that will happen.

Yeah, And we were sitting there and we were looking at the grid about what's coming on in Atlanta, And we're sitting there going, okay.

Feature here, feature here, feature here, food, food, food.

All that.

I mean, we're already looking at the grid and we're trying to figure out, Okay, how do we fit all this stuff in.

When you look at the United States, I know that there were tiki torches and pitchforks and the whole thing.

Early on, Pochettina was like, you know, just be cool, fam we got this.

Now that we're out of that cycle and we're now heading into twenty six, I think there's a couple of other matches before you get into the tournament.

What did you think of Pacha's approach focusing on I guess like thirteen through thirty and understanding that one through eleven.

You know, we got one through eleven.

Let me work on the other guys and we'll figure out these other spaces.

Well, I agree with you there.

Everybody's quick to judge in the world we live in now, and I think there's also people, you know, fire in flaming arrows because they got numbers they want to reach on podcasts and things like that.

I looked at it and I said, no, you have to.

You got to give the man time.

Number One, be thankful we have an unbiased manager in here, right, somebody that's unbiased coming in and he's not going to be influenced other than the way he sees things.

Him and his staff.

Yes, they had to turnaround the culture.

You could see he's preaching team, team, team, team, team, team.

Nobody steps outside of that container.

Play for the shirt, play for the shirt.

That's pretty argentine, right.

I mean, if there's ever a country that's passionate about playing for their jersey, they're as good as any, right, So why don't we be quiet and maybe follow the leader a little bit?

It seems like that's happening.

I think the Gold Cup in the absence of Christian polistic even though that was a big topic in the meat, the absence of others allowed others to grow, and he ran with some guys like Max Arfsten, Matt Freeze.

You know, there's other examples there of players that got a lot of run in playing time that in the beginning people were like, oh, why are these guys getting Well, Now they're bona fide guys that are going to make the roster, likely going to play for sure.

And now you got you've broadened out the depth.

And there's nothing better than watching a US national team put a beatdown on Uruguay five to one while guys like Anthony Robinson Christian Polisic, Tyler Adams, Chris Richards are all on the outside watching that.

Okay, that is what you call health, healthiness for a squad.

So I think I think he's doing an exceptional job.

He's going to be judged ultimately on how well they do in the World Cup.

But where we are, POSI the head of a lot of really good friendlies before the World Cup.

I'm optimistic.

How optimistic are you?

I'll go ahead and.

Bite host nation team spirit, camaraderie, players playing in top leagues in the world, guys scoring goals consistently right now following balligan at Monaco, Christian Polisic two against Toreno Ricardo Peppi for PSV in the Champions League.

Why aren't you optimistic?

And I?

Peter Vermis was on one of my shows recently and he said a really good thing.

He said, you know, we got to stop the negative stuff and get behind this team and be quote unquote the twelfth Man.

I don't know if Texas A and M was the first to do that, but I have a feeling there's a lot of people who use it.

But I think some miraculous, amazing things can happen if national pride kicks in and you see American players competing in a World Cup, and you never know how how many inches you can grow and where you can take it.

And let's not forget a lot of these guys have experienced from the last World Cup that was a very young American team that went through that outplayed England in a zero zero draw on midfield.

I remember that distinctively, So I think there's a lot of ingredients here that says you could do something special.

Yeah, as long as I don't see Matt Turner starting to do the.

Well goalkeeper goalkeeping position, even though it seems like it's Matt Freeze's to lose, it's a whole different thing.

I guess when you're going to walk out there in a World Cup.

I never have, but it certainly looks to be a little bit more pressure filled.

Yeah, no doubt.

Was there anybody in this in this cycle of trying to figure out what the roster was going to look like that was some that came out of lane eight for you that ended up, you know, winning the race or anything.

Was there any.

Surprises that were call ups that you're sitting there going like, I like that idea and then they proved that they proved everybody right with that call up.

Was there anybody like that for you?

Well?

I think Arsten was one in the beginning that you know, people were maybe scratching their heads a little bit.

He can play ei their outside back position.

You could see when he first got into the national team he was making some mistakes.

But you know, what do you expect, right Like, if you're going to stick and believe in somebody, you have to give them the opportunity.

It can't be a one and done necessarily, So I think he was one.

I think the Gold Cup was very good for Tilman because no Christian Polisic was around.

There weren't other leaders.

He kind of stepped up a little bit more Tilman.

I'm wondering what's gonna happen with Alex Zendejas, who always plays very well for Club America.

I want to see if he's going to ultimately make the roster.

I like, I think the other thing that propelled this whole situation was moving to a three back you know, three center backs.

If you're not happy with two, sometimes you go with three, right, and you've got the wide players to do it.

If it's technically Anthony Robinson and desk and you have Arfston as maybe a backup.

I mean, who knows, We're just playing around here with the lineup.

But I do think they're good options.

And I think that was a really a good move by Pouschatina to go to a three back system.

And if he wants Tim Reim on the field for certain games, you put him in between two athletic guys, or maybe you play him on the left.

That might be a little bit more risky, but I think he's got options there.

Yep.

Catching up with our buddy Glenn Davis soccer matters at ninety seven to five in Houston, and he's been he's sporting a T shirt by.

The way, Oh yeah, yeah, shame promotion.

Nothing wrong with that, brother.

When you're the lone ranger, you have to do your you know this very well.

You look great in that studio, but there's a lot of work that goes behind getting the word out about your show and obviously producing it and putting it on the air.

I mean, I've had a radio show for over twenty years on you know, a major station.

I'm on at six o'clock at night now on Tuesdays and Wednesdays and then the show gets podcasted.

But what people don't know is I've had to buy my airtime for twenty years, so that means I have to write a check every month to the station, and then I better go out and sell it.

And there's been time periods where selling soccer was easier than others.

You know, it'll probably be easier now with the World Cup coming right and over half a million people coming here.

But I think people forget that.

You know, it's kind of creating your own job.

But I got into it because because I was calling MLS in the early years and I'd fly home on a Sunday and I'm like, man, there's no soccer talk.

I mean, we got to do something.

Got to do something.

So I went to public radio, got a show on there, soccer fit the mission statement, and then took it to mainstream radio and the rest is twenty two year history.

Yeah.

Well, I mean you you're just getting started, brother, come on now.

I hope.

So I'm not sure everybody looked at it like.

That, but you know, yeah, I mean, look, i mean it's we knew going in.

This is season eight of our network, and we knew going in that when we did the morning show, it started out as an hour, and then we figured we were going to go too.

We just didn't know we were going to go too after.

Eight months and then you get to two hours, and then there's time where you're still leaving stuff on the table, and so traditionally for me in the morning, it's two hours, ten, two point fifteen.

You know, it.

Turns into this stream of consciousness loggeria kind of thing.

It's like you're missing news and hearing this, and we go from we go from that to doing the Monday Night Show where we're talking Europe, and Jason and Jarrett, Nick and I and Maddie.

We're all over the place doing all these kinds of things, doing the twos games, hitting high school hard.

It's just it's amazing to see all the different avenues that you can grab on to and sit there and try to grow the game.

And I mean, it's safe to say from my perspective anyway, you're you're one of the You're one of the guys that was the first one onto the track.

You're you're one of the flag bearers for this whole thing, and we're just trying to sit there and be right there with you as a good steward for the game, regardless of where we're discussing it, whether it's about Atlanta, whether it's about the stuff here in the US or internationally, we're just trying to be good stewards like you've been.

Well, it's all it's all off of passion.

I think that's how it all gets started, especially for my generation.

I agree with you.

It's a tremendous way to grow the sport, shine the light up things that are going on locally.

You know, we have so many kids that grow up here in use soccer in Houston that you know, are coaching, head coach of Notre Dame, head coach of Connecticut.

I mean, the stories are amazing.

I can't even keep track of all of them.

Right.

You know, I'm calling an ACC women's game the other day, and you know one of the top players is a young lady from Houston named Leah Clinke.

Right, I end up on the plane with her parents.

But you know, it really is amazing.

And the other thing is we have history back to the late sixties with professional soccer in the Astros.

Most people don't know this.

They can't tell the stories.

And I just want to make sure that some of the story telling about Houston and it's soccer history and the city, et cetera, is not left to the hands of the people in suits because they don't know it.

They don't know it, and I want Houston to get its due.

So that's kind of maybe where I come in a little bit.

But listen, we also have a lot of fun at this right.

We also have a lot of fun fun with it and that's a beautiful thing.

Yeah, I think you were doing the acc stuff with our friend Casey D.

Right, Casey White.

Oh, yeah, she's exceptional.

She just did the National Championship with FSU.

I enjoy working with her.

Yeah, Casey D comes in on Tuesdays and she's one of our regular pundit type.

She joined us from LaGuardia on Tuesday when she was trying to go from one place.

Literally she's walking through the concourse.

She's got the headphones on everything.

Before you go, one more thing, one of the folks in our twitch pitch wanted to know what you thought about the current situation with it Landy United.

So what do you think about the current situation with it Landy United?

Comic Glenn question Mark.

Well, i'd be excited you're bringing back Tata, right, so I would be excited with the new manager coming back.

I was surprised to see it knows dive for the time period it did.

I've I've been lucky enough to call games in that stadium, and I mean, you know, I walked in there and then comparatively to what I see regularly, you know, there are just certain markets and mls that are off the chains, and that that was an incredible experience.

I don't even think al Marone was playing that night and the place was still packed.

But yeah, I think we're going to keep an eye on it.

But I like the storyline of Tata Martino coming back.

I haven't looked into the roster much and what's going on with the build and everything, but you know, it's like we're bringing the band back together a little bit, right, And I think you've got a manager there that the fan base is going to be pretty confident in seeing return.

Has that been the reaction They're excited to see him coming back.

Yeah, they're excited to see him come back.

Obviously, you know the Miguel Alma run that you have in version two point zero is not the version you had in one point.

Oh, because Father Time is undefeated, much like Mother Nature.

So it's trying to figure out what's best for meggy.

How do you do things defensively?

Do you go three at the back, you know, three center backs and try to have support?

Do you try to be more defensive early just so you get your sea legs with you then have the offense figure itself out.

Those are going to be the questions.

And we got free agency starting this week too, so I mean it'll be really interesting to see how they fill in those pieces, what Tata and the staff want.

Yep.

I think it'll be very interesting.

And you know, it's a World Cup year, you know we're seeing I think every single day there's going to be really interesting things going on in the world of soccer and we get to cover it.

So how lucky are we?

Absolutely true?

Hit the promo for me, sir before you leave.

How can folks consume everything?

Glenn Davis?

Oh, you can hit me up on Twitter and Instagram at Glendevis Soccer YouTube Soccer Matters, and then we stream the show on Tuesdays and Wednesdays.

It's six o'clock Central Time on ESPN ninety seven point five.

Now you realize, of course, you cannot be a stranger now going forward.

Since we have got back with you and we're trying.

To do that, I need to get you on my show too.

Yeah, and look, you know how to grab a hold of me.

Just as long as we can dial it up and knock it out, you know, we'll have fun and we'll crush it.

Yeah, no, no problem, John, wonderful.

I love visiting with you.

Good to see my friend.

Go consume your coffee.

We'll catch up with you soon.