Category Archives: TIMBERS!

Everything Comes to an End, Part 2

Here’s the 2014 fan appreciation event. (Post here.)

L to R it’s ticket partner, player I can’t remember, Ben Zemanski, me, Jorge Villafana, Michael Nanchez, and Darlington Nagbe. I’m too lazy to check spelling of everyone’s names.

Here’s the 2016 fan appreciation event. Fan-girling all over again seeing pictures with these players.

These were our seats for the championship match. Please note besides giant pole we can’t even see the entire field.

So what happened? Some of the shine had worn off just in terms of life in general but we still loved the matches.

But then, in 2021 we had a championship match in our stadium.

I can’t tell you how many thing had to line up for that to happen – and this was my dream come true.

And the very first thing that happened is our season ticket went away and we had to fight for tickets with all the fair weather fans and ticket scalpers and other randos.

I will never be over it.

Fallout from the pandemic poured gasoline on the situation.

For various reasons our work schedule was modified so we started at 7am which made weeknight matches a chore.

The season ticket prices have gradually increased as you would expect. But it’s escalated and adds up to 25% over the last 2 years. Meanwhile the secondary market is bleargh so if you try to sell your tickets you even can’t get what you paid for them. Which also means you can grab a cheap ticket the day of match — why invest in a whole season?

This probably sounds cheesy but it used to feel like we were a part of something. There was a local TV show with features about the players. One of them had a food cart. I once saw a few players walk up the Timbers Army line on their way into the match. We got to go to the end of the year player banquet. We had a friendly section usher. (Miss you, Louisa!)

The fan group had a falling out with the organization (more below) so that’s all haphazard. The chants lost some of their vigor. There are more eff-you chants. Most of the matches are on Apple TV which I do not have. They offer a free pass with your season tickets: for 1 household. Sure $100 a season for all the matches is great but I don’t watch all the matches and I don’t want to pay $100 more on top of what I already pay for TV and season tickets.

Cumulatively, so many off-putting bits.

I hate the ticket apps — tech bros scraping money and data off us. Remember actual tickets? We used to get a book of them at the beginning of the season.

Then there were the scandals and these were really the nails in the coffin. We probably would have dropped last year but the report on the women’s team came in after we paid.

I don’t want to write all the gory details. In short, the women’s team scandal had to do with improprieties between the coaches and players that were covered up. There’s a Guardian article here.

With the men’s team there was a DV cover-up that wasn’t reported plus additional fall out from there. Oregonian has a timeline of all the scandals here.

We have found that our enthusiasm has dwindled to almost nothing and while it’s hard to give up those kick ass seats plus something that had brought a lot of joy. Everything ends sometime.

Leaving on a good note. Another amazing event: PTFC for Peace. The Timbers and Thorns joined up and played each other in a charity game to raise money for Ukraine. Another event that far exceeded my expectations.

(The Timbers tagged posts are epic. I could write 10 posts with great Timbers memories.)

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Everything Comes to an End, Part I

2010. Year before MLS. Remember how the stadium looked?

For the first time since 2010, I am not a Timbers season ticket holder.

A friend of ticket partner said, “What happened? You guys were obsessed.”

We were.

Team launch in the pouring rain at an airline hanger at the airport. Link to Post. It was a fashion show with the players debuting the team jerseys.

Opening day was my Christmas. Our big rivalry match with Seattle was my other Christmas. I didn’t mind rain. I didn’t mind heat. We went to the second team matches. For awhile they were called Timbers Reserves but now they are called T2. We went to pre-season matches. We went to friendly matches. We went to U.S. Open Cup matches. We were loyal even when they were terrible..

We had a plane painted with our logo and I went to the airport just to see it roll in.

We went to fan appreciation days.

I loved this team so hard.

First home MLS match in 2011.

I had this event built up in my mind and it was one of the rare occasions where the event exceeded all my expectations. (We won.)

Ticket partner and I flew to Vancouver BC (2011) for the day, to watch a rivalry match. It was awesome. We left on the same flight as the team. They came into the boarding area where we were waiting for our flight. We talked about it for years.

In 2014 we hosted the all star between MLS and Bayern Munich — right after Germany won the World Cup and Bayern had a bunch of World Champions on the team.

Another event that exceeded all my expectations. We had the match on our DVR until we had to turn it in. I re-watched it twice.

You can still watch the match on YouTube. That Valeri to Donavan pass in the 69th minute. Swoon!

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PTFC For Peace

I have always wanted to see a soccer match with our men’s and women’s teams play together.

Finally! My dream came true.

This match was a fundraiser for children in Ukraine. It was on a Wednesday night and I went back and forth about attending and decided not to.

Except when we were at the match on Saturday I changed my mind and planned to only go to the first half and then hop the bus home.

When Bob heard I planned to attend he wanted to go too so he met me downtown. I’m glad I didn’t leave early.

Tickets were free but a suggested $10 donation. Attendance was over 16,000. Lots of kids. I would say the women’s team fans outnumbered the men’s team fans. During the match they announced they’d raised over $400K but later I saw it was over $500k.

The ref was from Ukraine — first time in history I saw a ref get a standing ovation at the park. hehe.

The players looked like they were having so much fun. They were competitive but also goofing off. They rotated players about every 15 minutes to get everyone in there. (60 minute match). At the end all the players were on the field. Everyone wanted to score — no one helped the goalkeeper.

It was a really fun event. So happy we went.

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We Lost

Before the match when I was filled with joy.

I have had this post partially written since way back in December when it happened.

We went to our first preseason match last weekend and the new season starts tonight so it was time to finish it up.

My team made it to the championship and about 10 major things had to fall our way for us to get the match at home.

And we did.

This has been my dream to see my team play a championship match in my home stadium.

These are our seats. I don’t know what this setting is on my phone but it looks magical so I’m using it.

But the club doesn’t run the championship match, the league does and the first thing the league does is scrape a whole bunch of seats off the top for all their corporate cronies.

There weren’t even enough seats left for all the season ticket holders.

Twelve years of loyalty, good years and bad, rain or sizzle, US Open Cup, pre-season, friendlies — showing up for the team.

And we had to sit there in front of the computer clicking refresh to try to get tickets.

I will never be over this.

This was our view. Like it?

The only thing available, when we finally got through, were general admission. We both balked and then decided we’d rather be there in shitty seats than not at all.

We couldn’t even see the entire field. You can’t see in the photo but we could see a video screen. So, yay.

And even worse I spent the whole match looking across the field at my seats.

We made the best of it. We always wanted to see a match sitting in the Army section, so crossed that off our list. And at least we didn’t get rained on.

The seats we had were so bad, they aren’t usually even available.

It’s hard to say if I would feel differently if we’d won. I’m not sure. I think I might be less salty, but still salty.

I wouldn’t want to go through that again. What is the point of doing all this if getting to see a championship game is out of reach unless you can pay $1000 a seat or you’re special friends with crony?

I was happy to be back at the park. I hugged my seat.

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The Never Ending Tooth Disaster

Uh oh, that guy fell down. Opponents who don’t like Diego Chara are going to be thrilled to find out we have two Charas now.

I wish I had some good news about my tooth.

Overall, the dentist doesn’t think it’s long for this world but since I wasn’t up for shelling out huge bucks for an implant right now, we prepped for a crown. And the crown prep included some minor oral surgery on my gum. The site is still sore.

Meanwhile, I’ve been back and forth to the orthodontist to take wires and brackets on and off. More of the same next week when the crown comes in.

I’m kinda bummed about being constantly afraid of my mouth and constant low grade discomfort and relying on soft food and visiting the gamut of dental practitioners as my part time job.

Hopefully all will go smoothly with the crown and I can get this behind me.

Coach doing media at the half

These photos can mean only one thing: Timbers season starts again soon.

This is the preseason tournament so I saw a match last weekend and a match last night. It was fun to be back at the stadium and seeing some of the new players.

Preseason substitutions. I love seeing all the guys on the field like this.

I know it’s just preseason but I didn’t see anything that made me overly optimistic. I predict that we play just enough great games to keep our hopes up but enough stinkers to keep us at our usual spot in the middle of the table.

Opening match next weekend.

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Cooking Along

Yesterday was my favorite day of the year: First home match of the season. It was a typical first match, raining and cold which is why I failed to take very many photos. I might brush off my pocket camera and bring it to a match. I think it takes better photos than the phone.

Here is the rhodie update: it’s completely dead. I asked the landscaper about taking it out and he pushed the trunk and it broke off at the spot where the shrub met the dirt. It’s gone and we now have nothing in front of our house. I expect to remedy that but first I need to do some household due diligence/maintenance/pain in the butt stuff –long story.

Everything in life: TBD.

This is the view from my bus stop. That high rise in progress used to be a gas station.

For the first time in ages I am trying a new recipe. I am making beef broth from some bones I had in the freezer leftover from a fancy dinner a couple months ago. It smells AMAZING. I keep finding an excuse to go in the kitchen and give it a stir. But the real recipe is onion soup. I’m doing a Cooks Illustrated method of cooking the onions in the Dutch oven in the oven. We’re in about 70 minutes so far. That smells good, too.

I had my most productive writing weekend in months and months. I am plodding more quickly. But now my brain is mush and I’m still trying to tie up loose ends.

Looks like this counter works again and I like it better because seeing that percentage thing go up gives me a feeling of accomplishment.

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Things Moving Ahead Slower Than Planned

Should it be “more slowly than planned”?

I am elbow deep in revisions and way too slow. I’ll tell everyone to only read the first 5 chapters.

Everything else is falling apart. We’re having a dinner casserole topped with panko and shredded cheese for about the tenth week in a row. My husband doesn’t complain but my waistband does. I have about 200 loose ends I’m trying to tie up. That’s a lie. I have 200 loose ends that I am watching flap in the wind and laughing at because they will flap until they go away or until April.

We started Timbers on Friday and I am too lazy to even get the photos off the camera. These are from last year – obviously because that guy is wearing shorts and open-toed shoes.

It was about 45 degrees and a cold steady rain when we arrived. I wore my heavy coat that soaked more rain than repelled so I sat in a damp coat for 3 hours. Honestly, not complaining. I was so overflowing with joy to be back at the park and watching my beloved team. Especially watching them win 5-1. This is only the second time in the last 4 years that we’ve won a game in March.

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The Post You’ve Been Waiting For (Final)

Timbers Fan Appreciation Night

Here I am with Vytas who also complimented my earrings and gets a million gold stars. He just joined our team this summer and his full name has about 16 syllables and twice that many vowels. He’s from Lithuania and completely charming. When he arrived he’d never been to the US and every time they did an interview with him he was happily counting off all the things he’d done for the first time since he’d arrived. He is one of my new favorites. The other guy is Wade Hamilton who is the “c” goalkeeper.

Here I am with Zarek Valentin, Darren Mattocks, Fanendo Adi (swoon swoon!) and Taylor Peay. I love all these guys. I wrote Season of Us before Zarek was even on our team. But he used to have a surfer hair thing going and the first time I saw him I said: Zach!

And that concludes my coverage of fan appreciation night.

I had to get yet another crown — the tooth kind. I had the prep two weeks ago and ate half the temporary in less than 24 hours. So for the past two weeks every time I inhaled with my mouth open you had to scrape me off the ceiling because that tooth nubbin was sensitive. I got my tooth installed today and the dentist asked why I didn’t come back to get another one. If I’m going to break them that fast, it didn’t seem worth it. I love my new tooth and eating and drinking hot and cold things without screaming.

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The Post You All Have Been Waiting For (Part 1)

TIMBERS FAN APPRECIATION NIGHT

Here I am with Diego Valeri (Insert that emoji with the smiley face and heart eyes — can you do that in WP?) and Steven Taylor.

Here I am with Jack Jewsbury and Ben Zemanski who is only half smiling because I’ve had my photo taken with him before.

Here I am a JACK sandwich with Jack Barmby and Jack McInerney (more swooning).

There are tons more photos to come in the next couple of days so as they say in college when you’re in a sorority: get excited for the next few posts.

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Timbers Away, Kansas City Version

This is part 3 in our series of Timbers away adventures. When we were in KC someone asked if we were going to all the away games. I thought that was a crazy question but they met someone at the match who was doing that very thing. We try to do one away game a year. We’re limited on when we can go so it depends on how the schedule lines up. We’re still hoping to go to Chicago, New York and Toronto.

If any MLS fans or Timbers fans find this and are wondering about away matches, we had a great time in Philadelphia and Montreal and highly recommend.

We were told that the Timbers Army were invited to tailgate with the KC Cauldron but it was raining so that plan was scrapped and instead we were invited to hangout in their special clubhouse at the stadium. The stadium is in Kansas and is way the hell out there. You need a car to get out there. Bob found a bus that ran once an hour. I didn’t want to take a bus that runs once an hour.

The stadium is super nice. The KC fans were 99% super nice. We lost the match but we had a fantastic time.

After the match we walked over to Nebraska Furniture Mart which is gigantic (according to the website 450,000 sq ft) and has a See’s Candy inside. We just wanted to see what it was like. There’s a big outlet mall out there, too, and we walked around there. Then we had barbecue and custard and got a ride back to the hotel. That concludes the Timbers part of our trip.

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