What’s Going on? Team Is Quiet, the Boss Is Relaxed

Forward Juli Veee says his teammates are quiet this year. Bob Bell, managing general partner of the Sockers, is relaxed. The team will receive championship rings on opening night.

What is going on in Sockersville?

This isn’t the way the controversial, argumentative and financially struggling Sockers captured five consecutive indoor championships, including winning three straight games in last year’s dramatic come-from-behind victory against the Minnesota Strikers.

“We don’t argue that much anymore,” Veee said. “I think that’s a problem. Everybody is quiet. It’s too quiet. Maybe it’s just the calm before the storm.”

Spoken like the true veteran Veee is.

Just wait until the offense bogs down and the team drops three in a row. Or wait until San Diego plays a close game against a team of what the Sockers call “dogs.” Remember the playoff series against St. Louis last year?

Actually, Juli, your teammates are not quite as laid-back as you might think as the Sockers prepare for their season opener against Minnesota Saturday night at the San Diego Sports Arena.

“When you win, it disguises some of your deficiencies,” said Socker midfielder Brian Quinn, the most valuable player in last year’s championship series. “Even when you win, you try to bring in two or three hungry players. Sometimes you do need changes.”

Not around here, Brian.

The Sockers enter the 1985-86 Major Indoor Soccer League season with just one new player. He is defender Carlos Melian, a relative unknown who played for six years in the Uruguayan First Division, and is having visa problems.

Midfielders Branko Segota, Jean Willrich, Hugo Perez, Quinn, Jacques Ladouceur, Cha Cha Namdar Raffaele Ruotolo and even veteran Kaz Deyna are back. So are forwards Ade Coker and Veee.

On defense, Melian is joined by returnees Fernando Clavijo, Wadd Hirmez, George Katakalidis, Brian Schmetzer, Gary Collier and Crow. Defender Guy Newman, who has played in only three games since the 1984 playoffs because of a knee injury will not be on the roster. He will be the player/coach of the reserve team.

Goalkeepers Jim Gorsek and Zoltan Toth return to form one of the top duos in the league.

“Since the season ended, the thing I’ve worked most on is trying to keep the team together from last year,” Bell said.

He extended the contracts of many players who were entering their option year. And along with team vice president Randy Bernstein, Bell has finally enabled the front office to match the team’s effectiveness on the field.

“This is the first time in nine years I feel like I’m involved in a professional business rather than just trying to survive,” Bell said. “When you don’t have to work under crisis management, you can be more creative.

“In terms of a business becoming successful, I really believe we have turned the corner.”

The Sockers will appear on Prime Ticket cable television 16 times and they have sold out their advertising time for all 52 radio broadcasts on KLZZ (600) and on XEXX (1420), which will broadcast all 26 home games in Spanish. On the English broadcasts, Randy Hahn also will conduct a half hour sports call-in show from the Sports Arena after Socker home games.

They have hired a full-time public relations man in Glenn Goldberg, doubled their team sponsorship, sold out advertising in their first yearbook and poured money into upgrading their offices and team presentations.

“I’m kind of starting to see it the way I hoped it would be,” Bell said. “This is the most relaxed I’ve been.”

Added Bernstein: “Now we have gone out and presented our product professionally. Any time a business can associate with a five-time champion, people jump on it.”

For the first time in their history, the players will receive championship rings on the opening night of a season. In the past, just getting rings has taken a monumental amount of complaining on the part of the players.

“The players have such a good feeling about the front office this year,” Quinn said.

Don’t tell that to Veee. He’ll have a fit.

“We’re being put on a pedestal by the front office like we never have before,” Quinn said. “The players love that.”

The front office has done its part. Now it’s up to the team to try to maintain its incredible winning streak.

A streak which came very close to ending last season.

“Last season, a lot of it was Lady Luck,” Socker Coach Ron Newman said. “I didn’t think we could do it five years in a row. Why is it any more difficult to win it six times than five times? But then again, if the ball doesn’t hit Kevin’s leg in that sixth game . . .”

Trailing three games to two at a sold-out Met Center, the Sockers had a tenuous one goal lead in the final quarter when Crow averted a tying goal with a leg save in front of the net.

The Sockers held on to win that game and captured “One for the Thumb” with a 5-3 victory at home in the seventh game.

“I think our players believe we’re hanging on to a thread,” Newman said. “The thread could quite easily stop any moment. There is nervous anticipation.”