The Aztexan

We have some noticeable improvement to show off this week: paint! And with boards over the doors and windows, perhaps there's more work going on inside, too. You may also notice that Spring is springing in the trees in the background.

(Click to see the Flickr set.)

Labels: stadium

If you look closely — if you really study this week's picture, and compare it to last week's — you'll see absolutely no difference whatsoever. They must just be working on the inside now, that's all!

(Click to see the Flickr set.)

Labels: stadium

Another week closer to opening day, another picture of the future Aztex locker rooms. Definitely a roof on that thing now!

(Click to see the Flickr set.)

Labels: stadium

I'm a day late, but here's another sunny picture of the House Park construction site. Correct me if I'm wrong, but I think I see a roof!

(Click to see the Flickr set.)

We also had news about House Park this week, via Phil Rawlins' interview on KOOP's Futbol en Vivo (get the MP3 from ChanticosArmy.com or subscribe to the weekly show's podcast in iTunes): all regular season Aztex games will be played at House Park, from the very first! (The March 14 exhibition against the Dynamo will still be at Nelson Field.)

Phil didn't elaborate on whether construction is guaranteed to be done by the start of the season, or if there is some backup plan that will let them play there regardless. Either way, this is great news. It's widely agreed that House Park will be a better home to the Aztex, and the less mid-season moving around there is, the easier and more effective marketing can be.

Labels: stadium

A bright, sunny day at the House Park construction site, but not a lot of visible change to the new locker rooms:

(Click to see the Flickr set.)

Labels: stadium

More wet and cold weather is coming, which is never good news for construction projects. I grabbed this picture before the sleet started today. A little progress is visible since last week (note the rafter-looking poles sticking out):

(Click to see the Flickr set.)

Labels: stadium

We learned last week that construction of the new fieldhouse/locker rooms at House Park would not be finished before the beginning of the season. The Aztex are restricted from playing at a stadium without adequate facilities for the teams and referees, so the first few games will be back at Nelson.

In the meantime, I'll keep snapping weekly pictures of progress at House Park. I'm a day late this week, and the weather didn't cooperate too well, either. But here's what it looks like today:

(Click to see the Flickr set.)

Labels: stadium

A few other folks have taken pictures of the construction of the new fieldhouse (i.e., locker rooms) at House Park. But I work only a few blocks from there, and drive right past it every day. So I'm going to do my darnedest to get regular, weekly pictures to follow it's progress. Who knows, maybe they'll finish it next Tuesday, and this will be the shortest series of construction pictures ever; we'll see.

Here's a nice blueprint elevation view of the new structure, swiped from the Grassroots Austin Stadium Supporters (GRASS) site.



But as of today, this is what it looks like so far, in bricks and mortar:


Update, Jan. 28: According to Aztex owner Phil Rawlins on AM 1300 The Zone this morning, the fieldhouse won't be finished in time for the start of the season. So pre-season games, as well as the first few regular season games will be back at good ol' Nelson Field. And unfortunately, this won't be the shortest series of construction pictures ever, after all.

Labels: stadium

It's been long rumored, practically guaranteed in previous statements, but now it's officially official: the Austin Aztex will play at AISD's House Park in 2010. The downtown stadium is technically located at 1301 Shoal Creek Blvd, though most think of it as being on Lamar Blvd (Google Map).

Yes, it will still be artificial turf. Yes, it will still have gridiron lines painted on it. Yes, it will still be on public high school grounds, so there will be no beer sales.

But here's why House Park will be a better home to our Austin Aztex:

• No track — not having that wide gulf of a track between the pitch and the stands, brings the fans a good 10 yards closer to the action. Click on this picture to see how much closer the stands are to the field.
  
  Aztexan exclusive: Comparison of House Park to Nelson Field; click the picture to switch views. (Sadly, neither field looks quite like that anymore; they're both now artificial turf with American football lines.)
  Images: Google Maps


• Smaller capacity — owner Phil Rawlins explains this benefit well in the Statesman article:
  

  The 10,000-capacity [Nelson Field] stadium often swallowed the 3,000-4,000 fans usually in attendance at an Aztex game.
  
  House Park seats 6,500, which could create a better atmosphere at games.
  
  "If we're averaging 3,000-4,000, we can use both sides of the stands and have a great atmosphere," Rawlins said.

• Lower ticket prices — seating will be general admission, and tickets will be $15 for adults and $12 for children 12 and under (kids under 5 are free). Sure, they could have done this at Nelson, but it will be another good boost to next year's attendance. It also shows responsiveness to fan feedback that the prices this year were on the steep side ($22 or $18 for adults).


• It's downtown — House is more centrally located to the heart of Austin, with the city skyline visible right from the stands. Several watering holes, such as The Tavern, are within walking distance of the stadium. It's also more accessible to more transit options, not to mention tens of thousands of UT students.


• It pleases Chantico — the patron Aztec goddess of Austin supporters is known, after all, as "she who dwells in the house".

There have been well-founded concerns about the parking situation at House, which is summed up more or less as "there is none". However, the Austin Community College (ACC) just opened a brand new 7-story parking garage practically next door to House. According to the ACC website, the garage will be open to the public on Friday nights for high school football games at House. I've heard from the Aztex that they are talking to ACC about a similar arrangement for their games.

With the results we've been seeing from our Red & White this season, we've already started looking to next year. The announcement that House will be our new home makes the outlook for 2010 even more appealing.

Labels: stadium

• Lamar Hunt U.S. Open Cup Pairings announced — USOpenCup.com
  

  All 32 lower division teams will enter the tournament in the first round and have been grouped geographically into eight groups of four teams. The first-round match ups were drawn randomly within the four-team groups, although match ups between teams in the same division were avoided when possible.
  
  The two winners from each group will face off in the second round on June 16, with the winners then advancing to the third round to face the eight qualified Major League Soccer teams. The quarterfinals will be played July 7, the semifinals will be played July 21 or 22, and the final will be played on Sept. 2.

  The Aztex's first game is against PDL side Mississippi Brilla on June 9, here in Austin. According to the full bracket, the winner of that game will go on to player the winner of the El Paso Patriots (PDL) vs. Arizona Sahuaros (USASA).


• GRASS: Grassroots Austin Stadium Supporters — AustinStadium.org
  

  GRASS is a new grassroots organization dedicated to the idea of bringing a multipurpose music and sport stadium to the City of Austin. The group was founded by a group of soccer and music fans who believe that Austin needs a centrally located place to enjoy outdoor concerts and sports.

  Hopefully this is the beginning of something great for Austin!


• Call For Photos — Aztexan.net
  
  I'd really like to have a photo to use with each match report blog post, like on this one. But my camera is kind of crummy, and it's one more thing I'd rather not worry about at the game.
  
  So this is an open call to anyone and everyone: send me game pictures. The details:
  
  • I usually write the postgame post the next day, so the sooner I get a picture after the final whistle, the better.
  • just email your picture(s) to the email address in the sidebar over there
  • I am not going to start or maintain any kind of photo gallery. I just want one — and only one — picture to accompany each match report. (You're welcome to send as many pictures as you like, I'm just saying I'll only ever use one per game.)
  • I'll attribute and/or link your picture however you want
  
  Thanks!


• Minor League Sports Games — DadLabs.com
  
  Some interesting promotion of the Aztex from this video blogging site, DadLabs.com. This guy, "Daddy Clay", is pointing out the fun to be had on the cheap at minor league sports. His main example: the Austin Aztex. Though he tweaks the experience a little bit — calling the Aztex mascot Sgt. Pepper "an anorexic apple", for example — and he includes a caveat for the ESPN crowd ("I get it, being a soccer fan is kind of a tough sell for a lot of American guys"), it's still ultimately a good plug for the games. And it's pretty funny, too. Here's the video.
  
  

Labels: media, stadium, U.S. Open Cup

I went down to get a first-hand look at our new stadium today. And I took my camera: here's my 36-picture Nelson Field photo set on Flickr.

One slight difficulty in getting a view of the place was the fence. There's chain link fence around the stands, of course, and everything's chained up, as you'd expect. But the entire rest of the field is surrounded by a green, 8-foot-high, solid metal fence. You simply cannot see anything through it at all. I wondered if it was just for construction, but it looks pretty permanent to me. I'm not kidding when I say that a shorter correspondent would not have been able to get some of these pictures of the field. But, while not pretty, maybe this Green Monster will have a silver lining, if it keeps in all the home field noise of the crowd.

As you may be able to tell, I just walked all the way around the stadium — clockwise starting on the west side, if you're looking at the satellite view — snapping away as I went.

One thing you'll notice immediately is that the lovely grass soccer pitch visible in Google Maps' satellite view is no more. We knew that had been replaced in recent years with Field Turf, but you can see it in full color here, down to the bright white throwball lines. The track surrounding the field is all new, too, not that it makes much difference what color the big separator between the pitch and the stands is.

The bottom line, in my opinion, is that it's more or less like Dragon Stadium, where the U-23s played this year. It is, after all, a high school football stadium. Granted that I didn't get a very close look. And, the field surface is new, which is good. But otherwise it doesn't seem either especially great, or especially terrible.

That's the stadium itself. The location is definitely an improvement, being much more central (obviously) than Round Rock High School was last season. Hopefully it will be that much easier for lots of folks to get to. As you can see in the pictures and the satellite view, there's a good deal of parking right around the stadium. I don't know if that's enough parking for a capacity crowd, but it's certainly got House Park beat on that count.

As visible in one picture, there's a Capital Metro bus stop right on the edge of the parking lot. It's for route 300; I don't know whether people will use that for game-day transportation or not.

There's still some scouting to be done to find the best nearby watering hole (Nomad Bar, about a mile and a half away, seems promising). And there's an El Regio stand very close by, too. You haven't had truly excellent chicken until you've had El Regio chicken (available in 2 sizes: half or whole).

For this post, I just wanted to make a quick fact-finding run and see it in person. What I found was about what I expected: a quiet, empty high school football stadium. Not anything awesome, but that's perfectly okay. We all know this isn't the ultimate home of the Austin Aztex. Look no further than the very announcement, in which the possibility of a future at House Park is already hinted at.

And even that, hopefully, isn't where our Aztex will wind up playing forever. Someday we'll have — Chantico willing — our very own stadium, just for our sport and just for our teams. Until then, Nelson Field will be more than fine.

The Aztex have a house; it'll be up to the team and the fans to make it a home!

Labels: stadium, USL-1

I caught the following short (less than a minute) Aztex story on News8Austin last night: Head Coach Adrian Heath talking about the new stadium.


Speaking of Coach Heath, here's a nice story in The Echo, the Liverpool evening paper, on his immigration to Texas: Everton legend Adrian 'Inchy' Heath's big Texan dream.

"The difference [in US soccer] between now and when the likes of Pele, Bobby Moore and George Best came over, is night and day. It was almost like a circus then, with players at the end of their careers, but everything is geared to the future now.

"The potential is world class."

There is clearly potential in Austin, too. Heath is not one for making bold declarations but the team he put together this summer to see what he had to work with captured the imagination of locals... "We’ve got some decent kids here and word is starting to spread."

"We just want to try and build something that we have had at home, and in a few years we’ll have a thriving academy and the players who have passed through will be making a name for themselves.”

Last (and probably least), I was flipping through the latest issue of the free, by-mail Community Impact paper (Northwest Austin edition), and saw this. It was in their section on new area businesses. They seem to think it's a store, but bad press is better than no press, right?

Labels: media, stadium, USL-1

Announced in today's Statesman: Aztex set to play at Nelson Field. They acknowledged not getting the location most fans were hoping for, House Park, but that's still not ruled out in the future.

"We always wanted to play as close to downtown as we could," Rawlins said.

But the stadium closest to downtown, House Park, will be unavailable to the Aztex in 2009 because of ongoing locker room renovations.

Rawlins says a multiyear deal with the Austin school district gives the team an option to move to House Park in 2010, but Nelson Field, adjacent to Reagan High, will be the team's home when it begins play April 18.

It doesn't specify, but presumably both the USL-1 and PDL teams will play there. The article also has this hint about players moving up from this year's PDL squad:

Rawlins expects up to six members of the Aztex PDL club to be promoted to the USL-1 team. The rest of the roster will be filled in the USL draft of college players and by signing free agents.

Update: Phil Rawlins was also on AM 1300 with the stadium news this morning. I can't find a link directly to their post, but go to AM 1300 The Zone and look for "Soccer in Austin!!", dated "Friday 12-05-2008 8:33am CT"

Labels: stadium, U-23, USL-1

Here's a follow-up to my recent post about where one could get one's soccer fix after the Aztex season finished. While I still miss the games out at Dragon Stadium, it's hard to argue there's not enough soccer to keep a fan busy.

• Stoke City — their season is underway, so there are games every weekend. Unless you have satellite TV, you'll probably watch these matches at a bar. For example: Mother Egan's this Saturday at 1:30PM to see Stoke City v. Aston Villa.


• USL-1 — I have been (casually) following the Carolina Railhawks, as I said I might. As part of this experiment, I paid for a month of video via USLlive.com to catch some of their games. The announcing is uneven but not terrible, the video quality I've seen is also uneven but not terrible. There have also been frustrating technical issues (video not starting, for example, or in one instance, the live stream being switched off "while we archive this video" before the game was even over!). It's pricey for that quality, in my opinion ($10/month or $50/year).
  
  I don't imagine they have zillions of subscribers. It's probably 98% avid fans who want to see their team at away games (e.g., like I'll be next season), so maybe that's just how the cost has to break down, but it's unfortunate. If it were cheaper — more like MLSnet's $20 (which just dropped to $10 after the all-star game) for the whole season — I'd just subscribe and catch the occasional game for fun. As it is, I won't continue past this month.


• Olympic soccer — what can you say about the U.S. men's team? "You lose some, you lose some"? There's been some great soccer to see, though. And the U.S. women's team will get at least silver, which is great, though gold would surely boost next year's WPS launch just a little bit more. We'll find out tomorrow morning! (On Telemundo, USA network or online, if I'm reading NBC's website correctly.)


• FCD — they seem to be coming around, maybe. They've been wheeling and dealing, cutting and signing, including, as you surely know, our own Jamie Watson. Told you Dallas was classier than Houston, didn't I?


• miscellaneous other stuff from previous post — Stoke U18 games, check; no knitting, as predicted; haven't gone to the Mexic-Arte Museum yet (but I have until Sept. 16); no rumors on stadiums yet (there's plenty of time for that); and Juan Toja's move to Liga I Frutti Fresh hasn't gotten another 2 seconds of my time since I mentioned it. Sorry, Juan.


• one major soccer option I completely failed to mention — the University of Texas women's team. Among Aztex fans it seems that mentions of UT result in grumbling about (a) the total preoccupation of the Austin sports media (and fans) with anything and everything burnt orange, or (b) how unlikely it is that the Aztex could ever play at UT's Mike Myers stadium.
  
  What's perhaps forgotten, at least by me (though not by Nick Barbaro at the Chronicle), is that there's already a soccer team that plays there, and a darn good one at that. Ranked 8th in the country, expected to win the Big 12 this year, etc. Here's the 2008 Longhorn Soccer schedule; their first home game is Friday night at 7:00 vs. Samford. I might just go; I'll be the one in the Aztex shirt (I don't have any burnt orange anyway).

Labels: MLS, stadium, Stoke City, supporters, USL-1

Finally, some signs of life from our soon-to-be PDL arch-rivals, the Houston Leones, in the form of two articles from the Houston Chronicle.

The first is a fairly brief blurb covering the basic facts of the new team and the league itself, though it does have a little info on some of the players: Leones ready to roam pitch in Houston

Adhering to league rules, the team is made up of mostly college-age players, many of whom attend local schools, including the University of St. Thomas, Houston, Houston Baptist and San Jacinto College. . .

The team also boasts developmental players from Mexican teams UANL Tigres (two) and Cruz Azul (four), the latter with whom the Leones have a partnership.

The Leones will be coached by Carlos Ayala, who previously coached Cruz Azul's team in First Division A, Mexico's equivalent of a second division.

The second is a more in-depth piece on the owner, Juan Carlos Hernández: There's nothing amateur about Hernandez's venture. At least there were never any anguished decisions about where they would play, as Hernandez owns Soccer World Center, a 17-acre private soccer park in Richmond (southwest of Houston).

Proof [of Hernandez' seriousness], in the way of a brand-new 4,500-capacity stadium, is as hard as the white-coated concrete it is made of. A simple yet efficient facility consisting of two long bleacher structures along the sidelines that rise some 25-30 feet, a small but cozy press box (complete with A/C), and a no-frills scoreboard, sound system and lighting. The field is getting greener and should be in good shape come May 3, when the Leones host the New Orleans Shell Shockers.

The Leones will be one of only five PDL teams, out of the more than 60 this season, to own their stadium.

Sounds like a nice outfit. I can't wait for the Aztex to start beating them!

Labels: rivals, stadium, U-23

Finally, the answer to one of the biggest remaining questions of the 2008 Aztex season -- "Where will we play?" -- is out.

The answer is (drumroll please...) Round Rock High School's Dragon Stadium, located north of town, near the intersection of I-35 and 620.

I've added Dragon Stadium to the Google Map included with my original stadium speculation post (it's the solid green marker at the top of the map). You'll see that it's farther out from downtown than, say, the big new RRISD stadium complex, but I think it will be much simpler to get to from the south.

Sure, it might be lacking a couple of things that would make it ideal (e.g., real grass, closer in to town, no American football lines) but honestly, what could anyone expect? There is no Easter Bunny, Gwyneth Paltrow is already married to someone else, and the Aztex didn't find a secret soccer-specific stadium between the couch-cushions of downtown Austin. Okay; mourning period over!

In all seriousness, I'm looking forward to seeing this place. With a little over a month until the season begins, I'm sure the team is being put together as quickly as possible. Let the countdown to the home opener begin! (That's Saturday, May 10 vs. the Houston Leones, if I need to remind you).

Labels: stadium, U-23

Aztex owner Phil Rawlins, on his Aztex Chief blog Wednesday, hints that a stadium announcement is coming soon:

Along side our coaching appointments I have been working around the clock on securing a stadium for us. I have now reviewed and met with organizations representing more than 16 stadium alternatives. Many of the options are not available in '08 due to scheduling conflicts, field reconstruction or policy issues but I am determined to find us the very best option. That means a stadium we can call home for the whole season, that has a good location and is the right size for us to create a good atmosphere. We have a couple of great options and I am confident that in the next few days/week we will have good news to share.

Labels: stadium

After my recent post on possible stadiums (and the discussion in the comments), I've learned that grass is on its way out in Austin ISD's stadiums. Two of the three I mapped, Nelson Field and Burger Stadium, have already been converted to artificial turf, and House Park is scheduled to be switched over, though I'm not sure when.

In addition to a project page Google found on the website of "Sports Engineering Technologies, Inc.", an artificial turf company site, there are also mentions of the de-grassification as part of AISD's 2004 Bond project. There are separate pages for Burger, Nelson Field and House Park, but they all share the same bullet point: "Replace natural turf with a synthetic playing surface".

As commenter ERic pointed out, it boils down to AISD -- certainly not the most well-off school district in Austin -- having to support more schools and more teams with the same number of stadiums.

So of these possibilities I'm tracking here, it looks like that leaves UT's Myers Stadium and Veterans Stadium in Del Valle as the only grass options.

Labels: stadium

Last week's Austin American-Statesman article covering the Aztex announcement had an interesting comment from the owner about possible stadiums where the team might play:

Rawlins said he's talking with five organizations about renting a stadium for games, but that the long-range plan is to build a facility, as other teams in the league have done.

The team's own stadium, built just for them, will be a dream come true. But that's a long way off, of course. So, where will the Aztex -- the U-23s this year, and both teams next year -- play? There's been a good bit of discussion of this most important of decisions on the BigSoccer forums. I skimmed through those posts again, and came up with the following list of possible Austin-area stadiums the Aztex could play in:

• House Park, Austin ISD


• Myers Stadium, UT


• RRISD Athletic Complex, Round Rock ISD


• Burger Stadium, Austin ISD


• Chaparral Stadium, Eanes ISD


• Connally Stadium, Pflugerville ISD


• Nelson Field, Austin ISD


• Veterans Stadium, Del Valle ISD


• Hawk Stadium, Pflugerville ISD

Then I found and marked them all on a Google Map (if you click that View Larger Map link, you'll see the legend for which tag goes with which stadium; you can also click each tag to see it).


View Larger Map

I figure this is a work in progress, and I don't claim it's complete, or even completely accurate. One handy page pointed out in comments is this list of all the area stadiums on the TexasBob site. Feel free to comment or email me with further information, corrections, etc.

For my part, and with the benefit of more or less complete ignorance, I'm hoping for House Park. I gather that it's narrower than it should be for soccer, and that parking can be a problem. But there's something about it that just seems like it has good character, somehow. Oh, and it's less than a mile from my office. ;-)

Update 1: replaced link to Statesman page with TexasBob; added Hawk Stadium (Pflugerville) to map; added links to TexasBob for all high school stadiums

Labels: stadium

Via a post by 'Liquidator' on the BigSoccer forums, this news on the Aztex site: Meeting With Austin Area Players.


It doesn't sound like the team is going to rely solely on their partnership with Stoke City:

Rawlins gave a presentation with graphics and spelled out the player opportunities that exists with the Aztex alliances. He also stressed plans to forge an alliance with a professional club in Mexico.

There were also good -- no, great -- words about their approach to finding a home pitch for the team. Er, make that, home pitches.

Rawlins also discussed stadium choices, saying that the club is looking for the best match of the team and season with a stadium. He said the U23 season and the Aztex First Division professional season may be played in separate stadiums to accomodate the specific needs of those teams. "We probably don’t want to put the U23 in a 20,000 seat stadium," he said. He explained that the club will be looking for the best stadium match for each season in order to maximize the crowd experience at the events. Rawlins explained that the organization is in contract negotiations that will soon result in an announcement of stadium choice. "Believe me, it will be for the entire season," he added.

As other BigSoccer folks noted, the "20,000 seat stadium" would just about have to be UT's Myers Stadium. The consensus on that forum seems to be that UT has never, would never and will never let anyone but UT teams use their facilities, but we shall see. In any case, I'm happy to see they're looking for a permanent home, at least for the duration of the season.

The team has also gotten a good bit of interest in their open coaching spots, receiving 30 applications for Head Coach, and almost 20 for Assistant. I thought this last bit about the U-23 Head Coach position was pretty interesting:

Rawlins told the local players that the head coach in the U23 season will be the same Head Coach that will direct the First Division season in 2009.

Labels: coaches, players, stadium

Although the USL-1 team won't play until next year, the Aztex U-23 team (formerly the Austin Stampede) has announced their 2008 schedule and availability of season tickets.

The ticket prices for adults are $50 for all 8 home games, vs. $8 per game (that would be $64 for the season, just to help you out with that tricky math ;-).

The other benefit of buying season tickets is that it shows some fan commitment. It's a pledge to support the team, financially at the very least, through their season.

The Aztex U-23 team will play this season against the DFW Tornadoes, Laredo Heat, El Paso Patriots, New Orleans Shell Shockers, Baton Rouge Capitals and Mississippi Brilla. Also of note: our first home game will be against another brand new team, the Houston Leones, who are affiliated with Mexican club Cruz Azul.

Personally, even though I'm really more interested in the USL-1 team next year, I'm ready to buy some season tickets. But there is one big thing holding me back... I don't know where they're going to play!!

I don't think that's been announced yet, and if it has, I sure can't find it.

Labels: stadium, U-23