EJ watch

dcheather · Feb 20, 2012

http://seattletimes.nwsource.com/html/s ... ers20.html?

BRADENTON, Fla. — Eddie Johnson, recently acquired by the Seattle Sounders FC, showed his veteran talent in scoring the first goal and leading his new team to a 5-0 exhibition victory over Florida Gulf Coast University on Sunday.

Seattle, 3-0-2 in the exhibition season, scored three times in the first 30 minutes with Christian Sivebeak and David Estrada following Johnson's score.

Johnson, in the 11th minute, controlled a ball from Zach Scott at midfield and, with his back to the goal, spun his defender and brought the ball to the goal box.

Once inside the box, Johnson cut to the middle with a step over and lofted the ball to the top corner of the net with his left foot.

"He's a quality player," Seattle coach Sigi Schmid said of Johnson, a former member of the U.S. national team.
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Yes, he does Sigi...if he can only keep his head on straight.

Clevelandmo · Feb 20, 2012

The Sounders will put Johnson and Montero together atop their 4-4-2 formation.

“My expectation is that Johnson and Montero can become a forward pairing that we will be able to put down on a weekly basis,” Seattle coach Sigi Schmid told reporters. “It is a pairing that is going to give us a lot of joy by scoring a lot of goals.

"Good players catch on very quickly. It didn't take Mauro Rosales long. It didn't take Fredy Montero ... it's not going to take Eddie Johnson long."

Seattle officials hope Johnson, 27, will reclaim the magic he showed in scoring 41 goals in 127 games for FC Dallas and Sporting Kansas City in seven seasons before moving to Europe in '08. There, he scored a mere seven goals in 80 games for Fulham, Cardiff City, Aris and Preston North End.

Read more: http://aol.sportingnews.com/soccer/stor ... z1mvs9dOWY
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Judging from Sigi's comments, he obviously supports and believes in EJ. My prediction is that will make all the difference and EJ will be successful in Seattle. But I hear what you're saying all the same Heather; Einsteins definition of insanity and all.

HatterDon · Feb 20, 2012

If EJ is ever to recover his confidence and form, Sigi is the man to lead him there.

And I thought that was AA's definition of insanity.

MisterF · Feb 20, 2012

I think it'll be a great fit for him and wish him the best of luck. Unless of course he's playing Columbus.

dcheather · Feb 21, 2012

EJ's story about the Puebla debacle

http://seattletimes.nwsource.com/html/s ... cation=rss

Beasley asked if Johnson had any interest in joining him down in Mexico and Johnson wavered at first, according to what he said in a radio interview with 950 KJR-AM. Johnson, who dealt with some unpaid wages while playing in Greece, needed a little convincing and Beasley provided it. Wages were paid on time, he said; the city was nice, he assured.

Johnson eventually agreed but didn't have an agent, so he worked out a deal through a someone Beasley knew. Johnson said his name of that representative was Luis Garcia (Ed note: the spelling might be different).

The contract arrived and it met Johnson's liking. He had the folks at IMG take a look at the legal details, then he signed and flew off to Puebla thinking the deal was on its way to completion.

Sounds simple enough, but it wasn't.

"There were a lots of events going on under the table that I didn't know anything about, that I wasn't told," Johnson said, indicating some poor communication with Garcia.

Johnson trained with the team four times over three days at the end of December. Puebla was in preseason at the time and, according to Johnson, coach Juan Carlos Osorio (formerly of the Chicago Fire and New York Red Bulls) and the team seemed happy with him.

The owner wasn't in town for those three days to finalize the signing, but Johnson was assured it would get done.

The team got a couple days off for New Year's and Johnson returned to Florida.

Jan. 2 came and he was ready to head back to Puebla, but at the airport he got a call from Beasley, Johnson told KJR. Beasley had already arrived in Mexico and saw reports in the newspaper that the deal had been called off.

So Johnson called Garcia to ask what had happened. Unsure of his future, Johnson didn't want to fly down without any guarantees.

Garcia confirmed the deal wasn't going to go through.

So what happened?

Johnson said it was due to a difference of opinion within the Puebla technical staff, where the technical director wanted to sign a Mexican forward and Osorio wanted Johnson. The dispute was great enough to kill the deal. That's when, according to Johnson, team officials fabricated that he was out of shape to explain why the signing fell through.

"The club said I didn't pass my physical; I never took a physical," said Johnson. "Then they said that I was unfit, but I trained in every training session and I did well, and the coach was happy with the way I trained.

"In the end, you live and you learn. It was a learning experience for me. Where I was in my career at the time, trying to get my career back on track, it didn't look good for me. But that's the truth in a nutshell. ... Those people out there that know the truth, know the truth."

Ultimately, Johnson laments not having his own agent at the time and said he never should've trained without a finalized deal in place. Despite the drama, Johnson told KJR he "couldn't happier right now". He's looking forward to being in an environment where he can develop under coach Sigi Schmid and play in front of 40,000 soccer-crazed fans every week in Seattle.

"I'm glad everyone knows the truth of the story because it's been bothering me for a while and at a time in my career where I had been dealing with a lot of things," he told Mike Gastineau and Elise Woodward. "I had a lot of uncertainty where I'd be playing and I've been desperate to get on the field."
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Clevelandmo · Feb 21, 2012

Thanks for posting Heahter. I guess those agents really do provide something. I had started thinking the only way EJ could be deemed unfit, given that natural speed is his standout attribute, was if the Mexico deal came up quickly and he had been resting for the holidays, thinking he didnt need to be fit until the MLS season. However, prior to the Puebla deal being announced I know he was at IMG training because it was reported during the Academy Showcase in December. This explanation makes a lot more sense.

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