BASAs: My ballot and comments

First, I'd like to thank all the people who voted and those who read the results over the past two weeks. Also, it was nice not to have to think up stuff to write about for a while. Anyway, 12 ballots this year, and I expect to see more next year. This is what's cool, starting something soccer related in this country. When soccer is huge, you can say you were a part of this from the beginning. I'm putting a link to the "BASAs Recap" on the left side of the page, along with other particularly good posts. It's a best of section, like I've seen certain blogs do (The Sneeze, for example). I was going to have a YA edition of the BASAs, but I think that's impossible because few of us get to see them play enough to really judge it. I could do a World Cup edition though... Here's my ballot: 10/24-Goalkeeper of the Year 1 Reis 2 Onstad 3 Cannon Reis was the consensus halfway through the year, and I thought Onstad didn't do enough to displace him. Cannon was still very good, just not spectacular like last year. 10/25-Coach of the Year 1 Kinnear 2 Nowak 3 Nicol My reasoning in putting Nowak second was the way his teamed played beautiful, smooth possession soccer (at times). Plus, he seemed to be able to plug random unheard of guys into the lineup and get results, replacing Stewart, Nelsen, and Eskandarian easily. Nicol's team was supposed to be good. 10/26-Rookie of the Year 1 Parkhurst 2 Rolfe 3 Boswell I was never impressed by Sealy. He didn't score a goal after I wrote that. Guzan sucked for most of the year, no chance I was going to vote for him. Boswell scored some own goals, but played well for much of the year on a good defensive team. He deserved to be in the top three. 10/27-Defender of the Year 1 Califf 2 Parkhurst 3 Conrad I really didn't want to name more than one Earthquake. They really started playing better once Califf went into the linup. I looked at Conrad, T.Marshall, and Vanney as choices for the third spot. They all missed a bunch of time, and it turns out Conrad is the guy whose absence meant the most in terms of goals per game, so I picked him. 10/28-Young Player of the Year 1 Parkhurst 2 Dempsey 3 Clark Parkhurst had a great season, and deserves this. Dempsey started great, but faded. 10/31-Midfielder of the Year 1 DeRosario 2 Joseph 3 C.Gomez Nothing to explain here. 11/01-Old Player of the Year 1 Djorkaeff 2 Onstad 3 Chung I thought about Jones instead of Chung, but I think I made the right choice. 11/02-Forward of the Year 1 Twellman 2 Donovan 3 Moreno Donovan had a great year, and he meant a lot to the Galaxy. Moreno scored a ton of goals on penalties. He still played great though, but I almost put Josh Wolff in the third spot. Almost. He had a very good year. 11/03-Best XI 1 Reis 2 Califf 3 Parkhurst 4 Conrad 5 DeRosario 6 Joseph 7 C.Gomez 8 Guevara 9 Djorkaeff 10 Twellman 11 Donovan I thought Guevara and Djorkaeff both were outstanding at times, and seemed to step it up when the team needed a lift. Dempsey and O'Brien, meanwhile, faded down the stretch. 11/04-Player of the Year 1 DeRosario 2 Twellman 3 Joseph 4 C.Gomez 5 Donovan DeRo created goals, scored goals, and was the driving force behind the best team in the league.