Grand Opening, Grand Closing

I promised when I tried this last week that I would try to not forget to do it again this week and...I almost did. But I didn't! I'm here. And there's much to talk about.

The shoulder seems fine

I'm not doctor, but Fernando Tatis Jr. doesn't appear to be held back by whatever shoulder injury took him out of the game on Wednesday in Sacramento.

Against the Rockies on Friday, Tatis went 2-4 with a solo HR and a stolen base. Pour yourself a glass of something crisp before pressing play on this one:

Last night, Tatis opened the bottom of the 1st inning in similar fashion, leading off the Padres' portion of the game with yet another tank:

As if that weren't enough, Fernando also closed the door on the Rockies with a game-ending (and maybe game-saving?) catch against the RF wall:

It's still so early in the season, but a .365/.433/1.049 slash line would be his best year by a lot and would probably get him a ton of votes for Most Valuable Player.

It's not supposed to be easy

I've taken to this habit of trying to read coverage from the opposing team after each San Diego FC game. It's become almost standard that each one of these squads refers to it as a "budding rivalry" after coming out of their game against San Diego FC.

San Diego FC is a really good team already. They're well-coached and they're tough as hell and they have a bunch of veteran leaders that aren't about to act like anything but veterans just because they're on an expansion team.

After winning two home contests in a row, San Diego dropped a 3-2 game on the road against the Colorado Rapids which included a penalty kick that could best be described as "bullshit". Not the kick, and not the near-save, but the call itself.

Even the AppleTV broadcasters were quick to point out that, while the rule book was being followed, the call that led to the (eventually successful) penalty kick was "negligible at best" and not really in the spirit of the rule.

Anyway, San Diego played hard and lost a good game against a good team that was playing with a brick wall in goal. I wouldn't call it a "schedule loss", but it's also not really worth getting worked up about.

SDFC (which, if we're being honest, could use a better nickname) is still 3rd in the Western Conference, and still ahead of Colorado. Next week they travel much further, to Charlotte, to take on the team currently sitting 1st in the Eastern Conference.

It's not going to be easy. It's not supposed to be. I think people are starting to get over the idea of this expansion team being anything other than a really good MLS team. Now the real fun, and the real challenge, begins.

A change in the tides?

The Wave had a pretty terrible end to last season and offseason and things aren’t starting much better this year. They lost to Kansas City 2-0 yesterday and currently sit 8th out of 14 teams in the league.

Sick uniforms, though I doubt Jonas Eidevall cares about that at all.

Section News

Social Media Updates! We're now on Instagram! And I forgot to mention last week that we're also on TikTok, but that's mostly because I only have one video there and need time to put some more together. Anyway, subscribe if you're a TikTok person! We are still very much on Bluesky and Twitter.

Technical Challenges! I think I have a lot of the challenges I was struggling with last week figured out. It'll probably take a few more days to actually get everything working, but it looks like it'll all work.

This means that, some time soon, you'll be able to listen to paywalled episodes of the podcast on Apple or Spotify or wherever you normally listen to podcasts and your Section 1904 membership will get your access into a Section 1904 Discord server where we can all hang out and chat.

I don’t imagine any podcasts will be paywalled for the next two weeks, but solving problems before they piss everyone off is my current goal and I feel like it was a good week for that.

Template Change? If you saw some things looking weird on the site this week, no you didn't. I'm still trying to figure out a template that works better for this website than what we have, but I might be resigning myself to just custom-coding it instead of shoe-horning us into something that isn't right.

Logo Stuff! You probably heard Darren mention this on the podcast. The logo above was made by AI when we weren't entirely sure what we were doing here. Now that things are getting real, we're talking to some local artists about making us a new one. If you are a local artist and want to send us something, you know where to find me.

What I'm doing

This seemed to go over well last week, so let's try this again...

What I'm watching

The Pitt's first season is over, unfortunately, which means I'm taking a break from it for a while. When I'm not watching Padres games or the ramp-up to the NBA Playoffs, I've been rewatching season 1 of Severance before diving into the new season. I don't think that show is for everyone but it's definitely for me.

What I'm reading

I had been planning to purchase the eBook version of There's Always This Year: On Basketball and Ascension for a few months now. I was waiting to finish a couple of books I was in the middle of first.

Last week, I finished them both during my vacation in Ojai and then stumbled into a place called Bart's Books.

Bart's Books can probably be considered an "outdoor book store", but the books are shielded from weather (it was actually raining while I was there). There is a section that is indoors, too.

This isn't a sit-around-and-read kind of bookstore. This is a shop-buy-leave kind of bookstore and I love those ones the best.

Anyway, after looking around, I saw a copy of There's Always This Year and decided to pay the extra few bucks to have a physical copy of the book. I've barely started it and it's already as wonderful as everyone says it is.

What I'm listening to

I spent more time than I want to admit watching Green Day close out Coachella last night. I have thoughts and they're negative. Sunday mornings are not a time for negative thoughts, so let's go in a different direction.

Sometimes, I go on long walks with my dog. When I do, it's usually through the trails near my house that traverse through a nearby canyon. It's beautiful and 90% of the walk happens far enough away from the hustle and bustle of the nearby roads that it can feel peaceful under the shade of random trees.

Yesterday, I was walking this trail with music blasting in my headphones and this song came on...

I love this song. Like, as a song, but also because I feel like the goal of the song was "Let's write the best possible song to play as an encore at the end of a concert". If you look at it through the lens of a tired band getting it all out at the end of a 2-hour long show, it makes so much sense and feels more fun.

As a certified content-creator, I love music that is built for a very specific purpose. I haven't looked up if that's what this is, but I like believing that's what it is.

Or maybe you had the be there amongst the trees and the trails, a little buzzed and getting pulled by an exuberant dog, for it to hit you in exactly the right way.

Thank you so much for subscribing to Section 1904. We can‘t wait to keep building this thing for you, and with you.