Did you get yours?

The meager allotment of 1,300 tickets given to the Timbers Army for the 2018 MLS Cup sold out in 4 minutes. That’s less than the amount that showed up for the Cup in Columbus of 2015, and far less than the FIFA standard of 5% for traveling supporters. Mercedes Benz Stadium holds upwards of 70k people, so we should have gotten 3,600 tickets. Atlanta is fairly new to this, but MLS should have schooled them in advance. It has been reported that ATLUFC started selling Cup tickets before they had clinched. When the original allocation of 900 tickets was announced (before clinching) The Timbers Army/107ist joined forces with Kansas City Cauldron, Terminus Legion, and Empire Supporters Club to released a joint statement in protest. 107ist appeared to be spearheading this effort, and reaction from many fans (especially in Atlanta) was that we were counting our chickens before they hatched, and we wouldn’t be able to fill the seats if we got them, and tough luck if you don’t live in Atlanta.  Well, we told you so. Let’s hope MLS forces the owners to adhere to FIFA standards. It might be too late for this cup, but they need to take care of it for future years.

Local Atlanta man interviewed on driving in the rain.

Mr Nagbe labeled as “Driver.” on the news, somehow not being interviewed or recognized by anyone at Atlanta’s WSB Tv as a professional soccer player. Surely Darlington had to be cracking up on the inside about the dangers of driving in all this rain man! It’s crazy!

Tip of the hat to Colin Smith

Continue reading “Local Atlanta man interviewed on driving in the rain.”

Wellington Phoenix till I Die

Ah yes, a trip down memory lane to that time when we had such great hopes, but 1 Taylor on the roster turned out to be 2 too many. The Taylors weren’t conventional brothers, but they were in the Brotherhood of the Own Goal. This is a panel excerpt from a David Squires cartoon in the Guardian extolling the joys of the Australian A League. 

Hoops are back?

UPDATED: Another MP tweet in the full post.

Merritt Paulson may have given us a spoiler on what the 2019 kits will look like when he replied to a fan-designed kit in a tweet. “…we jumped through hoops to design the 2019 kit.”  Confused?  Hoops in the context of soccer jerseys refer to horizontal bars or stripes.  T2 kits from 2016-17 had hoops, as did 2002-2003 Timbers. It’s getting impossible to find old Timbers jerseys online, as there is no definitive record, and with Timbers and Timbers 2 both existing in USL at different times, well Google isn’t very helpful.

I’m picturing Merritt hunched over his phone, trying to decide whether to submit his reply, agonizing over ruining the surprise. That’s what I’m picturing, but it’s a safe bet to assume he didn’t do that though. Of course, it could be just a common phrase with no hidden inference. 

Continue reading “Hoops are back?”

MP – Man of the People. Anthony Precourt? Not So Much.

Merritt Paulson riding one of those electric scooters en route to Providence Park before the match against Columbus. That same match, Columbus Crew owner and pariah of supporter’s culture Anthony Precourt was spotted stalking the concourses of Providence park. 

[Photo: Katelin Renee] 

Continue reading “MP – Man of the People. Anthony Precourt? Not So Much.”

The Steve Clark Experience.

 

A lot of the Timbers fans were scratching their heads when we signed Steve Clark. You also have to wonder what was going through Steve’s head when he found out. It had to be a strange situation, being the guy whose (celebrated) legacy in Portland was giving up a goal to Diego Valeri 27 seconds into our 2015 MLS Cup victory. Sure, he was a backup, backup keeper, and what were the odds that he was going to see playing time? Then Jeff Attinella gets subbed off due to injury at an away game vs New England.  After only a few minutes in the game he makes a great save, but coughs up a goal on the rebound.  That had to be his worst nightmare, but to his credit, he played well the rest of the game, and the general (informed) consensus is that the was not at fault for that goal. 

All of the sudden he has to make his home debut in front of the Timber’s Army. That’s a lot of pressure for any new keeper, let alone someone with Clark’s history. 

Continue reading “The Steve Clark Experience.”

Adi-os

Remember those first couple of weeks he was on the team? It seemed like subbing him in was an automatic goal or two. He’s had some highs and lows since then. The last couple of years here have been a little spotty. For some it was hard to reconcile his public plea (through his agent) to be traded shortly after signing a contract extension. Last year he was briefly in the mix for Golden Boot in the beginning of the season but would exit with a nagging injury that ultimately forced him to miss the rest of the season. If you had a nickel for every time Caleb Porter said that Adi would be back to play in 2017, you could probably play a video game or two. The highs were there though, and you can relive all the goals at the Oregonian. When he wasn’t scoring he provided plenty of other highlights in his holdup play, dishing off to others. Grabbing the chainsaw after his brace against Seattle and his gam winning goal on his final match have definitely secured his legacy in Portland. I can’t think of a better way to leave on a high note. Strange how an obviously talented player with impressive stats can lose value to team because he doesn’t fit the way a team plays. The mechanics of managing an MLS squad are hard to comprehend.  And now he’s off to FC Cincinnati, who might even loan him out to Montreal. Timbers.com has a nice video tribute to Adi, who seems like he really appreciated his time here in Portland. So long, Adi. Thanks for all that you did for PTFC.

Continue reading “Adi-os”

LAFC: Los Angeles, Formerly Chivas

LAFC front office has banned the pictured tifo from being brought into this weekend’s Timber’s match. In case you don’t get it, Chivas USA was a Los Angeles (well, Carson) based MLS team that folded in 2014. We picked up Jorge Villafana from those guys! The Chivas mascot is a goat.

Usually, although not always, a tifo or 2 stick will be banned due to offensive language.  LAFC currently sits in 2nd place in the west, and 4th in the Suporter’s Shield race, yet their fragile self esteem can’t handle this.

[Photo : Aaron Emch]

Porter to Orlando FC?

I didn’t even get to properly address the bombshell of Caleb Porter resigning because it happened while the site was down for months. There has been speculation on whether he was asked to resign after our disastrous performance in the playoffs vs. Houston last year. Coincidentally, I finally got around to watching that game on the DVR for the first time. I make a habit of watching the broadcast of games that I attend. It’s an entirely different perspective. For one, a lot of the calls that we fervently boo when they don’t go our way, well sometimes they seem to be correct. That last match in Portland played out pretty much how I remembered. It was a bitter disappointment, but we bossed Houston around for the most part, and they got lucky on that last goal.

Continue reading “Porter to Orlando FC?”

View from the $50 million not-so-cheap seats

Do you want to see what the Portland Timbers stadium addition will look like in 3D and get an idea of the view from the new seats?  Check it out on Seats3d.com. It may only be an approximation, but it beats waiting until 2020. Hopefully the seats will actually be painted to spell out SCUSA like they do in the renders. It’s a shame they don’t let you see what it looks like from the Mac Club! Archived views after the jump.

– Thanks to Jonathan Farrow for the tip.

Continue reading “View from the $50 million not-so-cheap seats”

Zelda record holder is a Timbers fan

It’s been a long time since there was a post of any substance, so I’m going to ease into it with a post lacking almost any real Timbers content. Brad Bourque was watching a video documenting a year long battle between a couple of guys trying to finish the game The Legend of Zelda in world record time and spotted a Timbers flag in the background. It turns out the gamer known as LackAttack24 is a Timbers supporter. The “documentary” video was published in 2017, but the Timbers flag footage dates back to 2015, which was a great year for Timbers supporters… Since then, LackAttack24 has beaten his own record several times.

Continue reading “Zelda record holder is a Timbers fan”

PTSC Rocky Martin Memorial Tournament

Yes, it’s true. There have essentially been no new updates since the recovery from the server crash, with the exception of the 2018 standings graph. Sooooo much has happened. I’m still trying to figure out the future of this site, and involved in a lot of other things like for example this upcoming Subbuteo table soccer tournament.

Portland Table Soccer Club

One of the things that happened since this site went down, there is now a thriving Subbuteo table soccer club in Portland. Check us out on Facebook, or come by one of our bi-onthly Monday night events at the Portland Game Store.  We’re listed on their (online) calendar as Subbuteo – Table Soccer. In fact, if you’re reading this on  the day the postwar published (3-19-18) we’re playing tonight. No experience necessary.  Expect a lot more Subbuteo-based content on this site, as soon as I get some time to work on a new theme. 

We’re back!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!


Just 3 days before the 2018 season and PTFZine is online again! So much has happened that I wasn’t able to post about since the site went down in October… but it’s finally online again!

TLDR: Web host had massive hard drive failure. Everything was lost. Now, several months later, they managed to recover the files, and I’ve managed to reinstate them. There might be some weirdness here and there that I haven’t discovered yet, and if there is, I will be fixing that in the coming week.

The full Story: My web host had a catastrophic RAID failure, and had no off-site backups. Apparently, that’s my job. They must have have done something wrong however, because after they tried to fleece their customers for a forensic hard drive recovery service and didn’t get enough takers, the eventually decided to pay for it themselves and only charge their users $20 a site to retrieve what they could. Fortunately, everything appears to have been recovered for this domain.

One of these figures is a larger than life legend

 

One of these figures is a larger than life legend, and the other is Paul Bunyan! Timber Jim outside Providence Park showing off his Paul Bunyan sticker benefiting the Kenton neighborhoods restoration efforts for the beloved Paul Bunyan statue. Get yours at Green Zebra grocery in the Kenton neighborhood. Check out that ring! Then check out the Timber-themed patch that the sticker was based on.

He always beat me at Subbuteo…

My curiosity about Subbuteo finally reached tipping point after seeing Subbuteo article on MLSsoccer.com. Not being from the U.K., I didn’t grow up with it as a kid. In fact the first time I ever became aware of it was as a teenager, listening to My Perfect Cousin, by the Undertones.

Even at the age of ten
Smart boy Kevin was a smart boy then
He always beat me at Subbuteo
’cause he flicked the kick
And I didn’t know

Seeing the custom painted Sporting Kansas City Subbuteo teams on the MLS web made me pul the trigger. SKC is my lest favorite team outside of the Sounders, but those figures looked sharp. I figured it would be easy to find in the U.S., being owned by Hasbro these days, but it isn’t distributed here. I tried local game shops, but had to go to Amazon to find it. In my search I went to Ebay as well, seeing all the different teams available got me thinking. On a whim, I entered “Portland Timbers Subbuteo” and it actually returned a result, but first, lets’ get to the Subbuteo review.

Multiple updates made since the original post!

Continue reading “He always beat me at Subbuteo…”

Timber Jim IPA

Somehow I missed this Hopworks release of Timber Jim IPA that benefits Meals on Wheels People. Jim does not stop doing things for other people. I had shaken his hand a couple times at matches did not really meet him as person until he found out about a patch I made modeled after the Paul Bunyan statue in Kenton. He wanted to use the image for stickers as a fundraiser for restoration efforts. (More on that to follow) It was wonderful to meet him in a non-Timbers context. He is gung-ho about everything he does. Jim’s mother used to drive for Meals on Wheels up until she started needing their services. Watch him talk about it on KPTV. Despite Widmer’s official relationship with he Timbers, this is at least the second collaboration by Hopworks with a Timbers figure.

[Images via @hopworksbeer]

Now Tracking Points Per Game

There are some minor additions to the Season Tracker seen at the top of every page.  Points Per Game (PPG) have been added to individual games (visible on rollover) as well as the current PPG in the legend under the individual match boxes.  On the Standings chart, PPG has been added as well as the individual match result and the opposing team. As a bonus, the data is pulled from the match results the Season Tracker uses. This means the chart is updated the fly as I update a match, and I don’t have to monkey with the embedded javascript in the post. Can you say Data Integrity? Tim will appreciate this.

 

 

MLS Season Tracker Plugin for WordPress

I made a WordPress plugin to help visualize match results and double as schedule that would allow me to easily see who and when we were playing. If you operate a WordPress-based site you can use it to track the Portland Timbers, or some other, inferior MLS team. Rolling over one of those squares will give you the match date, and if the match is finished, goals, and other results. A running tabulation of the season is kept at the bottom, and you can sort by home or away, conference, and games played, and more.

You can see it under the banner at the top of every page. Those are generated by a function called in the theme template. You can also generate it inline with shortcode in a post. [See below]

2016 Timbers Schedule and Results

March 6, 2016: Win
Goals For: 2
Goals Against: 1
GP: 1
PPG: 3
Conference: 3
Supporters Shield: 6
MLS Power Ranking: 1
March 13, 2016: Loss
Goals For: 1
Goals Against: 2
GP: 2
PPG: 1.5
Conference: 6
Supporters Shield: 9
MLS Power Ranking: 2
March 19, 2016: Draw
Goals For: 2
Goals Against: 2
GP: 3
PPG: 1.33
Conference: 8
Supporters Shield: 13
MLS Power Ranking: 3
April 3, 2016: Loss
Goals For: 1
Goals Against: 4
GP: 4
PPG: 1
Conference: 9
Supporters Shield: 16
MLS Power Ranking: 8
April 10, 2016: Draw
Goals For: 1
Goals Against: 1
GP: 5
PPG: 1
Conference: 9
Supporters Shield: 17
MLS Power Ranking: 10
April 13, 2016: Loss
Goals For: 1
Goals Against: 3
GP: 6
PPG: 0.83
Conference: 9
Supporters Shield: 17
MLS Power Ranking: 10
April 16, 2016: Win
Goals For: 3
Goals Against: 1
GP: 7
PPG: 1.14
Conference: 8
Supporters Shield: 14
MLS Power Ranking: 8
April 27, 2016: Draw
Goals For: 1
Goals Against: 1
GP: 8
PPG: 1.13
Conference: 8
Supporters Shield: 13
MLS Power Ranking: 10
May 1, 2016: Win
Goals For: 2
Goals Against: 1
GP: 9
PPG: 1.33
Conference: 7
Supporters Shield: 9
MLS Power Ranking: 9
May 7, 2016: Loss
Goals For: 1
Goals Against: 2
GP: 10
PPG: 1.2
Conference: 8
Supporters Shield: 10
MLS Power Ranking: 8
May 11, 2016: Loss
Goals For: 1
Goals Against: 2
GP: 11
PPG: 1.09
Conference: 9
Supporters Shield: 13
MLS Power Ranking: 8
May 15, 2016: Loss
Goals For: 1
Goals Against: 2
GP: 12
PPG: 1
Conference: 9
Supporters Shield: 15
MLS Power Ranking: 12
May 21, 2016: Win
Goals For: 4
Goals Against: 2
GP: 13
PPG: 1.15
Conference: 8
Supporters Shield: 13
MLS Power Ranking: 11
May 28, 2016: Draw
Goals For: 1
Goals Against: 1
GP: 14
PPG: 1.14
Conference: 8
Supporters Shield: 14
MLS Power Ranking: 11
June 1, 2016: Win
Goals For: 1
Goals Against: 0
GP: 15
PPG: 1.27
Conference: 7
Supporters Shield: 10
MLS Power Ranking: 9
June 18, 2016: Draw
Goals For: 2
Goals Against: 2
GP: 16
PPG: 1.25
Conference: 8
Supporters Shield: 12
MLS Power Ranking: 9
June 26, 2016: Win
Goals For: 3
Goals Against: 2
GP: 17
PPG: 1.35
Conference: 5
Supporters Shield: 8
MLS Power Ranking: 8
July 4, 2016: Draw
Goals For: 0
Goals Against: 0
GP: 18
PPG: 1.33
Conference: 7
Supporters Shield: 10
MLS Power Ranking: 7
July 10, 2016: Draw
Goals For: 0
Goals Against: 0
GP: 19
PPG: 1.32
Conference: 7
Supporters Shield: 10
MLS Power Ranking: 7
July 13, 2016: Draw
Goals For: 1
Goals Against: 1
GP: 20
PPG: 1.3
Conference: 7
Supporters Shield: 11
MLS Power Ranking: 7
July 17, 2016: Win
Goals For: 3
Goals Against: 1
GP: 21
PPG: 1.38
Conference: 6
Supporters Shield: 8
MLS Power Ranking: 6
July 23, 2016: Win
Goals For: 2
Goals Against: 1
GP: 22
PPG: 1.45
Conference: 7
Supporters Shield: 11
MLS Power Ranking: 11
July 31, 2016: Loss
Goals For: 0
Goals Against: 1
GP: 23
PPG: 1.39
Conference: 7
Supporters Shield: 12
MLS Power Ranking: 11
August 7, 2016: Win
Goals For: 3
Goals Against: 0
GP: 24
PPG: 1.46
Conference: 6
Supporters Shield: 10
MLS Power Ranking: 9
August 13, 2016: Loss
Goals For: 0
Goals Against: 2
GP: 25
PPG: 1.4
Conference: 6
Supporters Shield: 11
MLS Power Ranking: 11
August 21, 2016: Loss
Goals For: 1
Goals Against: 3
GP: 26
PPG: 1.35
Conference: 6
Supporters Shield: 11
MLS Power Ranking: 12
August 28, 2016: Win
Goals For: 4
Goals Against: 2
GP: 27
PPG: 1.41
Conference: 6
Supporters Shield: 11
MLS Power Ranking: 10
September 3, 2016: Loss
Goals For: 1
Goals Against: 3
GP: 28
PPG: 1.36
Conference: 6
Supporters Shield: 11
MLS Power Ranking: 11
September 10, 2016: Win
Goals For: 1
Goals Against: 0
GP: 29
PPG: 1.41
Conference: 6
Supporters Shield: 10
MLS Power Ranking: 9
September 17, 2016: Win
Goals For: 2
Goals Against: 1
GP: 30
PPG: 1.47
Conference: 5
Supporters Shield: 9
MLS Power Ranking: 7
September 24, 2016: Loss
Goals For: 1
Goals Against: 3
GP: 31
PPG: 1.42
Conference: 6
Supporters Shield: 10
MLS Power Ranking: 11
October 1, 2016: Loss
Goals For: 0
Goals Against: 1
GP: 32
PPG: 1.38
Conference: 7
Supporters Shield: 13
MLS Power Ranking: 14
October 16, 2016: Win
Goals For: 1
Goals Against: 0
GP: 33
PPG: 1.42
Conference: 7
Supporters Shield: 12
MLS Power Ranking: 10
October 23, 2016: Loss
Goals For: 1
Goals Against: 4
GP: 34
PPG: 1.38
Conference: 7
Supporters Shield: 12
MLS Power Ranking: x
Show All | GP: 34 | PTS: 47 | PPG: 1.38 | GF: 49 | GA: 52 | GD: -3 | WLD: 13-13-8 | H: 13-2-2 | A: 0-11-6 | WC: 10-10-4 | EC: 3-3-4 | WCS: 7 | SS: 12 | MLSPR: x | KEY
Won
Loss
Draw
Above the line
Below the line
Away Game

 

The project started last season. Once I figured the basics of how I wanted it to work, I coded up some CSS, Javascript, and PHP to make it work. It’s pretty easy in a one use situation, where you’ve only got one season and you’re only interested in one specific team. Updating results was a matter of editing a text file with serialized information. It was simple, but not simple enough. I wanted to be able to do the whole thing in the backend of WordPress, make it reusable, and not limit it to one team. I imagined a scenario where someone might want to show two different teams on the same page, or the same team in multiple seasons. Simple enough… sort of. It needed to be flexible enough to easily accommodate expansion teams and teams that switch from one conference to another during different seasons. Figuring out the approach to take was the hardest part. It would have been easiest to create my own tables in the MySQL database, but I considered it a challenge rearrange my thinking and make it work with custom post types, taxonomy, and custom meta boxes.

Installing and activating the plugin automatically creates the teams. It’s up to you to create the matches and sign home and away teams to each match. You can do it manually, or you can upload it in a CSV spreadsheet and do it all at once. I used the MLS calendar subscriptions viewed in the Google Calendar, agenda tab. A copy and paste into a text document and some search and replacing made it a pretty quick affair, and one where I didn’t have to worry about typos on match dates. Now that I’ve got it figured out, I might even consider converting some other teams schedules and making them available for others.

Implementing it in a site can be done with a function call in a template, or shortcode in a WordPress post or widget. Of course, if you fail to specify a team, it defaults to the mighty Portland Timbers. After a game is done, you edit the match with the goals and optional information like Conference and Supporters Shield standings. If you’re logged in as an admin you’ll be able to access edit links directly from the match info rollovers.

On the roadmap, I want to submit it to the WordPress Plugin Repository. There are some minor options I’d like to add, and some tweaks to the UI. Once that’s tackled, I want to work on making the CSS more elegant, but I figure that can wait until the mechanics are more or less complete. Also, the interface is based on rollovers, so I need to make it work on touch devices too, because apparently these new-fangled iPhones and iPads are going to stick around…

I’d love to hear feedback. Until it makes it to the official repository, you can download the code here. No, I’m not on Github.