It’s not like you’re gonna melt.

I’m sure some people will whine about it raining (again) on the MLS Combine despite the fact that it was scheduled (again) in LA where we all know it never, ever rains. Here’s what I have to say to those people: you’re all a bunch of wimps. Wimps, that’s right. Wimps. In comparison to the Biblically proportioned cold and miserable rains at last year’s combine the rains at this year’s combine have been little more than a heavy mist. Sure it was a mist that fell in the form of medium sized rain-drops, but it was nothing to get worked up about. In fact, it sped up play and made for a more interesting game.

There were some covered stands over in the official coaches and media bleachers, and most of the MLS coaching staffs began the day the shelter there. They were cowards. But the Kansas City and New England coaches were among the brave and the wet who began the day around the field. Some of the LA staff braved the weather too. DC United began the day under cover, but abandoned the shelter during the second half of the first game. Peter Nowak took up his usual position brooding on the team bench. The Chivas staff eventually joined me and my associate atop the forbidden bleachers on the opposite side of the field. Of course, they had the keys to the broadcast booth and took shelter in there. How do you say wimp in Spanish?

I expressed some concerns yesterday about the overall quality of the player pool at this year’s combine. I am quite happy to report that the quality of play was much improved today, particularly in the first game. There’s some hope yet!

The first game between the Reds and Light Blues (LBs) reminded me of some of the better combine games I’ve seen in the past. It had a modicum of organization, players seemed vaguely familiar with one another, and some guys really stood out. But generally those guys weren’t playing for the LBs.

Flor will be credited for converting the PK and little else (and I say it’s 50/50 that he dove to win that PK). The less said about Gruenbaum’s day in goal the better. Suffice it to say aspects of his game remind me of the worst tendencies of Nick Rimando.

Marvell Wynne was one of the few bright spots on the LBs. There was one play that shows why he’ll be the first player drafted this year. Wynne chased down an attacking player running into the box, tackled him cleanly, bounced up out of the tackle in one continuous and fluid motion and then won the ball for a second time to clear it up field. It was the defensive play of the day. The whole thing must have taken a second and half.

The Reds were the far superior team. Jed Zayner made some timely clearances, and Kei Kamara showed a real talent for finding open space. Dax McCarty demonstrated a quality touch, sure passing and decent vision. He also took a pretty decent free kick. Willie Sims wasn’t as impressive today though. The wet conditions demanded a simple game; he tried to be too fancy. Kyle Veris looked confident in central defense until he got a yellow card. Then he gave up that PK. (Well, I think the guy might have dove.) Ryan Johnson looks like a promising player. He put in some nice crosses and his physical play might serve him well in MLS. Jeff Carroll is probably the top defensive midfielder at the combine. Donatelli passes a good ball, and he got a goal by virtue of some truly lousy LB defense. Danny Kramer got the equalizer in the waning minutes. Other than that I didn’t notice him.

The Reds had their low points too. Ambersley looked truly bad at times. At one point Ryan Johnson made a beautiful run into the open and there would have been nothing between him and the goal if only Ambersley, who had all the time in the world to look around, had bothered to look to his left and pass Johnson the ball. And the question “How many shots has this guy blown now?” appears in my notes next to Ambersley’s number. (The words “big, lumbering galoot” appear next to Christopher Joyce’s name.)

But the player I’ve liked the most on the Reds (indeed the player I’ve liked the most at the combine) is Justin Moose. I’m pretty well sold on this guy. On the other hand, I do remember Adolfo Gregorio’s absolutely dominating combine a couple years ago. His career hasn’t exactly taken off since then. Moose’s combine hasn’t been nearly as good as Gregorio’s was. Still, as far as wing prospects go he’s my top pick. He’s a real quality player with a good soccer mind. He has a good awareness of the game, and he always seems to know where he’s going with the ball. He’s also quite fast, and he passes well under pressure. If you’re looking for a wing player he’s your guy. He was also the victim of some bizarre reffing when he dove in for a tackle, failed to contact either the ball or the man (indeed, he never came within a foot of either of them) and he still got a yellow card for his actions. It was a horrendous call.

Speaking of Moose, here’s a bit of rumor and innuendo. As I said above, during the second half DC United left the shelter and moved down to the field. Nowak took his position on the bench. Someone (I’m not totally sure who it was because he had a hat on and he had his back to me; it’s possible it was Kasper but it didn’t really look like him) took a position opposite Nowak along the wing nearest to me. Tommy Soehn also took position on the near side but at the other end of the field from the unidentified guy. So DC United had the whole near sideline covered. It really seemed they were watching someone. The only two players on that side of the field worth looking at were Moose and Carroll. Of those two the only guy playing on both ends of the field was Moose. However, just to throw a wrench into that whole theory, before the game ended Simpson took up position along the remaining sideline on the far side. When he did DC United had one person covering each quadrant of the field. So it’s also quite possible they weren’t really looking at anyone in specific. Read the tea leaves as you like.

The game should have ended 2-0 for the Reds because the Reds are easily the best team at the combine. But, in fact, the game was drawn at 2 all. Red gifted LB one own-goal when Dzubay punched a cross into his own net, and the ref gifted them the other.

The only other thing I can report from the first game is that Preki, who’s looking quite dapper in his Chivas Blues, was talking in a very animated fashion about someone from the first game. I didn’t hear much, but he was certainly interested in the player and particularly liked his “positive thinking” whenever he got on the ball.

The second game was not nearly as good as the first, and I don’t have as much to say about it. I wasn’t very impressed with Oduro’s play for the Dark Blues (DBs). Soccer is a simple game and as I get older I prefer players who play it simply. Oduro doesn’t play it simply enough for my tastes. And it didn’t help his case when, in front of an open net with the keeper on the ground, he choked and put his shot wide.

My associate was head over heals for Altidore, though. I agree he’ll likely be a very good player, and he got what was thus far probably the best goal of the combine (a wonderful, simple and composed goal – the kind most American players fail to convert) but I’m not sure he’ll be a force in MLS anytime soon. He’d be a very good investment for the future though. Sturgis and Wagner were also both much improved today.

Drew Helm from the Greens is my second favorite wing player at the combine. He moved to forward in the second half though. Like Moose he’s extremely fast and smart on the ball. When playing up top he has a knack for making great runs into space. But I’m left wondering whether he can finish. I don’t think he took a shot all day today.

I do not believe the Mehdi Ballouchy hype. Yes, he’s a very skilled player. He’s also a very slow player. I understand why people like him. But he’s the kind of guy who looks spectacular in college and then can’t make the leap to the faster and more physical play in MLS. So I’ve got my doubts about him.

Ianni and Noreiga (not Noriega as listed by MLS) worked well together in the Green central defense. Like Ianni, Noreiga (who, as I said yesterday, I was asked to keep an eye on) is very solid. I don’t think he’d get picked in the first round, but a second or third round pick would not surprise me. The biggest problem for Ianni and Noreiga was communication and organization. At one point the two of them collided together while going for the same ball. Neither one saw the other.

There were three goals in the second half: Altadore’s, a Spicer header off a Paladini corner, and another embarrassing own-goal (credit Dello-Russo).

Look for another report on Sunday night.

So I’m posting this a little later than I thought I would. Tough cookies.

What I said yesterday about the combine being a great event, warts and all? Well, there are a lot more warts this year than there were the last couple years. The combine used to be a really laid back affair where everyone - coaches, fans, MLS and US Soccer executives, the friends and family of the participants, and on occasion Bruce Arena and his belly – would gather around the field to watch the boys play. And when I say around the field I mean right on the sideline.

All that has apparently changed very much for the worse. There is perhaps no worse place at Home Depot Center to watch a soccer game than the track stadium. For one thing it’s got a track. That’d be alright if they still let you stand next to the field, but I’ll be damned if they didn’t do their darndest to dissuade people from standing there. I had more than one argument with the Home Depot Henchmen about being “too close” to the field during the first half of the first game. I wasn’t the only one. Eventually I think Henchmen realized people were going to congregate wherever the hell they pleased. The phrase “herding cats” comes to mind.

It wasn’t just the fans. The coaches and their entourages by and large also refused to sit in the “official” area on the bleachers behind the benches. I don’t blame them. Those bleachers are far from the field and because they’ve set up shelters over the team benches the view was obstructed. The “official” seating area for media and coaches was virtually abandoned after the first half of play.

A few teams stayed there, but most dispersed around the stadium. Some set up chairs along the sideline. Colorado, New England and Chivas went to the opposite side of the field to the ostensibly “off-limits” bleachers. Peter Nowak, with a very annoyed look on his face, marched down from the “official” bleachers during the first game and plopped himself down on the team bench for a close-up and unobstructed view of the field. Of course, Peter Nowak always looks annoyed with something.

Compared to previous years this combine has been poorly organized and fan-unfriendly. The overwhelming sense this morning was that fans were not particularly welcome there. The seating restrictions were overbearing and unnecessary (really, this is MLS, lighten up already), the atmosphere had none of the intimacy of previous years, and they made precious little effort to provide basic services for the die-hard MLS fans who showed up.

By “basic services” I mean rosters with numbers. In years past MLS has posted the entire combine booklet with pictures, bios and a numbered roster on MLSNet. They’ve also routinely made combine roster sheets available when you walked in the gate to the field. This year they provided absolutely nothing until the first game was three-fourths of the way over. It was a very frustrating experience and as far as I’m concerned it was completely bush-league for MLS not to have the rosters available when you walked in the gate. Even last year’s combine, which was played in torrential rain, seemed better organized than this one. If this had been my first combine experience I’d likely never go back.

(As I’m writing this MLS has yet to post anything online. I have taken the liberty of posting the roster sheet with number assignments at BigSoccer. If you need one here’s the link.)

I can’t say much about the first game because for most of it I lacked a proper roster. I was also walking around the field quite a bit trying to figure out the best vantage point. (It turns out the off-limits bleachers are the best.) And if that weren’t difficulty enough there was a thick haze over the field for much of the first half. Sometimes it was hard to make out the numbers through the glare.

As usual, I refuse to use the names Adidas gave to the teams. I’m going by colors instead.

The first game was between the Light Blues (the LBs) and the Greens. Marvell Wynne was on the LBs and I made it a point to hunker down in the corner to watch him. He did some nice stuff and he did some pretty pedestrian stuff. All in all he played like a guy who knew the combine didn’t matter too much for him. I meant to watch for Jeff Curtin, also on the LBs, but somehow I never took notice of him. Maybe that’s good. Maybe that’s bad. I understand that Jeff Rowland scored the first LB goal, but in the haze I really didn’t see who it was that put it in. Of the three goals today that goal was the best. Competition for that distinction wasn’t hard because the other two goals were pure garbage.

The imaginative and skilled Mehdi Ballouchy was one of the only interesting players on the Greens today. When I finally got hold of a roster I identified Anthony Noriega for whom I’d been told to keep an eye out. He was a calm, controlled, and big (6-4) presence in central defense.

Even by quite low combine standards, the quality of play in the first game was pretty disappointing. The second game was only marginally better. Nathan Sturgis had a decent game for the Dark Blues (DBs). Blake Wagner was horrible. The DB offense had its moments in the second half, but in the first half they were largely shut down by the Red midfield. Josmer Altidore, who looks bigger than his listed 5-10, 175lbs, was the best of that lot.

Overall, however, I thought the Reds played the best game of the day. Willie Sims stood out in the first half. Jeff Carroll looks like a very promising, if slightly built, defensive midfield prospect. He was largely responsible for suffocating the DB offense in the first half. But the player of the day, for my money, was Justin Moose. His goal was pure garbage (and I hope he thanked Bertz and Wahl on the DB defense for the gift), but the rest of his play was – well – it was just different from most everything else on the field. When he was on the field he had a certain degree of control over the game. And it wasn’t just showboating. He was intelligent about what he was doing. He’s also quite fast and composed on the ball, and his initiative, more often than not, paid off in a cross, a chance or a shot. In short, he stood out and was certainly one of the more interesting players out there. Wake Forest has been producing some excellent MLS prospects in recent years (just look at New England’s draft picks last year). Justin Moose seems to be following in their footsteps.

But I’ve gotta be honest here. This is now my third combine. So I know these aren’t the best games. But the combine games two years ago were far, far better than this year’s games. And even the games played in horrific conditions last year seemed to offer more interest and quality than the games I saw on Friday. Is it the players? Maybe they’re not as good as in the past. Is it the coaches? It did seem like the combine players were more organizationally lost than usual. A bit more coaching from the usually very lax combine “coaches” might help diminish the confusion. Whatever the reason, it was hard to come away today with any strong impressions other than “not much out there this time.” So I have my doubts about the depth of this draft.

I hope I’m wrong, but given what I saw today it’s hard to believe this draft will have much immediate impact on starting elevens across the league. There may be a number of long term projects, but only a handful of players today looked like they’d contribute much anytime soon.

Hopefully this combine will follow a different pattern than the ones I’ve previously attended. In the past the best games were on the first day. Then it all went downhill as players decided they’d done enough or decided they’d blown whatever chance they had. We’ll see in the morning if the games get any better.