In the Beginning...

Here I am again, back where I began
Try as I may I can't get away from you
And all of these roads lead me to roam, bring me back home
Here I am again, back where I began
--Where I Began, Caedmon's Call

Inspired by Cardillo at That's On Point, I've decided to remember the path to football fandom that I've traveled over the last decade-plus, and the varying factors that have brought about what is now complete obsession. Since I never played anything but basketball growing up (with the exception of three-par golf and the occasional game of billiards at B's house), soccer took a backseat to pretty much every other sport, kickball and handball included. Evidently, your father attended a match at the Coliseum during the '84 Olympics, but I was completely unaware.
The first time I ever even noticed the sport was my junior year of high school, when two important things happened, both of which (I think) were inspired by the middle brother. He somehow obtained a copy of a computer game entitled "1-0" (or "One-Nil"), which changed my computing life forever. It was a text-based management game allowing the user to manage any club in English football, from the Premiership down to a collection of non-league teams, and encouraging eternal addiction. I don't know that I caught the bug right away, but it didn't take too long before I was guiding Blackburn Rovers to the top of the Prem (and eventually into the Super League) year after year. Granted, they were by default the top team in the league, so winning shouldn't have been all that hard, but to keep a team atop the table for several years running did take a little bit of foresight (to sell all the old players and buy young ones--Ryan Giggs, Alessandro Del Piero, etc.) and skill (or at least I'd like to think so).
One-Nil had a profound impact on all of La Canada, I'd like to think, culminating in one glorious night at LCPC where more than ten of us sat, spread throughout the offices (and illegally using the computers of various church employees), managing our respective squads to championships. I'm not sure, but I think Craig Baldi may have even been involved somehow. This was the night that we also pulled the piano out of hiding to perform a little bit of a late-night concert, forgot to return it to its safer (and dryer) home, and consequently removed the privilege of spending the night at LCPC (theoretically to watch the audio equipment through the life of the Pops concert, and allowing youth to raise money for camps and whatnot) from future generations. Needless to say, small price to pay for world (soccer) domination.
The main benefit of playing this game non-stop (besides an addiction that survives to this day) was gaining a thorough knowledge of teams and players, something I had easily developed for MLB, NBA and NFL teams, but had no means or motivation to do in soccer until that point. I think I can still name the entire starting lineup for Blackburn--actually, let's see:
G Tim Flowers, CB Colin Hendry, CB LB Graeme LeSaux, RB Henning Berg, DM Mike Atkins, CM Tim Sherwood (or DM David Batty), LW Joshua Wilcox, RW Stuart Ripley (those two wingers might actually be switched), CF Mike Newell, and last but certainly not least, Striker Alan Shearer. Ah, Alan Shearer. He's deserving of a post by himself, those he wasn't even accurately named until a few months into his entry into my life. Because the game simply abbreviated first names, we were left to wonder what the A in A.Shearer stood for, and for some reason settled on "Andrew," which lasted until the next of Michael's contributions, World Soccer magazine (I have no idea why he got this) told us otherwise. In addition to learning about English clubs (Man United had Beckham, Neville, Schmeichel, Cantona, Ince and many others; Kasey Keller was in Leicester, Roy Wegerle and Cobi Jones at Coventry, etc.), the Super League allowed us to meet other great clubs from around the world, most notably Barcelona (Romario, et al) and AC Milan (Maldini and Weah). I ended up buying a George Weah poster that summer (and I still have it), so I was sufficiently motivated.
The next release from heavenly Wizard Games was a national team manager centered around the '94 World Cup, and I was obviously quick on board for this one as well, though it didn't captivate quite as much, and with the exception of an LCHS version of the German national team dominating the competition for years (Josh Henderson = Jurgen Klinsmann, Chris Sawicki = Lothar Matthaus) I remained wed to One-Nil. Even future versions of 1-0 didn't quite make the same splash, updated rosters and everything. For some reason, they just never beat the original (much like NHL '94, I must say, though recent encounters with Dave, Tim, Shupe, Suss and the '06 version have caused me to rethink that one just a bit).
Now, speaking of LCHS, this would have to be stage three in the development, so I'll jump in with stage two real quickly before getting back there.
Having the World Cup in the U.S. in '94 came about a year too early for me, because I was just barely getting to know what was going on. I did watch the U.S. games (I knew enough to appreciate Wynalda's free kick goal against the Swiss at the Meadowlands), and watched in awe with the rest of America as we made it to the quarterfinals against Romario, Bebeto and the heavily-favored Brazilians on the 4th of July. A bunch of friends spent the day down at the beach (somebody's beach house? I honestly don't remember), and somebody else (Charlie Petit, I believe) had the foresight to bring a portable TV, so I (and my pale skin) spent a couple hours underneath the lifeguard tower (reducing the glare--I used to be smart) watching our boys fight valiantly in a 1-0 (appropriate) defeat. I have a picture in some album of me, Charlie, Ray Lee and Tony Rosa crowded around that little TV. Good times.
So after World Cup came and went (and I realized, much too late, that I should have gone to a game or two), we started school and I met a dude by the name of Josh Henderson (you might remember him from three paragraphs back), who had moved out to LC (along with four or five other, um, "out-of-towners") to play club soccer for the Flyers and high school soccer for La Canada. LC's soccer program was already one of the best in the area, and with this infusion of talent, it became the best in the entire country--just ask USA Today, which ranked Lou Bilo's Spartans No. 1 in the country in both 1994-95 and '95-'96 (I couldn't find the old USA Today polls, but I found a couple of things:
...a StudentSports article listing the historical #1 teams in the country (we were winter, and/or spring it seems)...
...the old champions list from the Dallas Cup, the best club soccer tournament in the country, which included the Flyers victories in U17 '95 and U16 '94...
...and the SoccerTimes article that listed them as the Boys' U-17 national champions in 1995 (holders of the Don Greer cup).
Something like 10 guys from that team played Division I soccer (I'm sure I'll forget somebody, but: Cardis, Sawicki, Dyslin, Paneno, Haupert, Sweeney, Cropley, Henderson, Cuellar, , which is absurd, and the goals for and against numbers from both of those seasons were criminal (like 136-7 and 141-5 or something like that). Without going into too much detail (these teams, like Alan Shearer before them, are worthy of an entire post), having the chance to watch these guys play (and I didn't always get that chance during league, because we'd play at the same place, usually later) made me appreciate "the beautiful game" that much more. Seeing guys I knew just destroy other guys our age, mixing in all kinds of pretty tricks (Gaston was the master of the pointless back heel, an early forerunner to the pre-2006 Cristiano Ronaldo) gave me a higher level of understanding of the sport and how it could be played at its highest level. Josh was worth the price of admission himself, scoring goals at a record rate and rarely staying in for the second half (once he got his hat trick, Louie would sub him out). He's the best I've ever seen among people my own age playing the sport at which they excelled, if that makes sense. Without fail, whenever I think about these guys, I want to remember to ask Lou for a copy of the season highlight tape, something I've never done for some reason. It could be the greatest soccer highlight video ever assembled.
So needless to say, these guys went on to capture the CIF title our senior year (and again the year after), and I was able to watch every playoff game (since we, uh, lost to Franny in the basketball version), including a ridiculous 5-goal, 2-assist effort from Josh in one early-round match. The semi-finals happened to be against league rival San Marino (including defender Nate Decker, who I ended up working with at Abercrombie, and who was a real solid dude, but I'm sure that I was disparaging him on this day), and the finals against future Mexican national teamer (and APU standout) Carlos Ochoa, and Carlito knocked one past Cardis for the losers' lone goal. I could obviously write about these guys all day, but I won't.
There are numerous other stops along the way, but once I left for college, I was sold. UCLA allowed for a similar appreciation of the top level of the sport (traveling to Virginia in '97 to watch my boys upset Indiana--thanks Key--and Virginia--Matty Reis standing on his head--to win the title was awesome), and the fact that several of the guys on the team became good friends didn't hurt either. Work beckons, another day without soccer on our show...