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Bear With Us, Episode 7: We're back!
63 Plays4 years ago
It has been about 15 months since we last recorded an episode of Bear With Us. Don't worry, we're now all fully vaccinated and feeling good.
Will catches us up on what he's been up to all this time, what he thinks of the Sounders' new formation and how he feels his teammates have come together during this trying time.
Of course, we also found some time to offer some advice.
Musics: "Bumped into Bigfoot" - Bedford; "Cutthroat" - prod. by Syndrome
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Transcript
Will Bruin's Podcast Comeback
00:00:00
Speaker
Will Bruin runs again! And can this be the start of such a brand? Will Bruin does his score goals! Will Bruin gets the level up!
00:00:17
Speaker
Welcome back to another episode along like it's been a year and a half in the making. Bear with us with well, Will Bruin. How are you doing, Will? I'm good. You know, it's been I can't remember the last time we had an episode. So it's nice. It's nice to be back on here with you. I know. Emily was telling us that she thinks the last time we recorded was we were getting ready to do Yacht Con 2020 and we were at hails.
00:00:46
Speaker
Homecoming, Yacht-Con Homecoming. Now we have our own version of Homecoming this year. Right, exactly. Long dog season. Yeah, no, it's been a long time, like probably 15 months, at least in the making, 16 months in the making, something like that. So, Will, I'm very excited to be bringing us back out of this.
Stadiums, Fans, and the Pandemic
00:01:06
Speaker
What have you been up to for the last year and a half? Just, you know, hibernating. Just hidden away inside, staying safe.
00:01:15
Speaker
You know, it's crazy like you say it's been 15, 16 months. It seems like so long at the same time. It like really doesn't seem that right. I don't know if I'm crazy for saying that, but well, you've been traveling all this time. Yeah, we have, you know, just on a lot of planes and, you know, just kidding. But yeah, it's been it's been a long time. Glad. Hopefully we're seeing the light at the end of the tunnel so we can be able to be getting out there and seeing the fans at the stadium. So, you know, it's nice to be doing it again. All right. So without getting too cheesy,
00:01:45
Speaker
Well, the first time you go out onto the like so you guys have had fans in the stands at all all season It's a smaller than normal crowd But the first time you went out there and you actually heard real fans cheering that had to be pretty cool, right? Yeah No, it was awesome. You know
00:02:00
Speaker
You don't really you take it for granted pre pandemic. You take you take a full stadium for granted. You're like, oh, fans, this is great, great atmosphere. And then all of a sudden one season, they're just all gone and you're playing in front of empty stadium and it just feels like training games. You know, the intensity is just not quite the same. And then then you start getting a small percentage of fans in there. Intensity ticks up. Intensity ticks up. And then, you know, hopefully down the road we'll have full stadiums. But now it's been great, except I will say you can hear more specific fans, whether that's home or on the road, you know. So it's good and bad.
00:02:30
Speaker
So what was it was that like in in so in Portland? Were you actually able to hear the heckles? Uh a little bit, but not too much I kind of blocked it out But you know I'm just saying in in general you can hear more specific things that you wouldn't really hear with a bigger crowd Will really isn't getting the ball on the ball as much as I would I did here
00:02:50
Speaker
I did hear when I took that big hit and flipped around at the LA FC game the other night I was walking off getting ready to come in heard somebody go. Well, you're a goal scorer score goal It's like yeah, I'm trying, you know, I'm trying to score a goal But I don't think yeah, but I don't think he like meant it right that bad I think it was more like get back out there fine But that's what I'm talking about when I say you hear more specific things I kind of just chuckled in my head I was like he's got a good point, you know, I do need to score some goals
00:03:15
Speaker
So, that's a good transition. You've been playing pretty well, I want to say. You've had two assists. You've been a playmaker.
Playmaking and Family Time
00:03:29
Speaker
You had not taken a single shot up until this last game.
00:03:32
Speaker
No, I was actually talking to Christian Saturday before the game at training. I was like, no matter what, I don't care how the game goes. I'm getting some shots off. I'm done with this. I need to get back in front of goal, get some looks at goal, and then we'll go from there. The goals will start coming.
00:03:47
Speaker
And so your first shot, which I'm, I don't know, it sounds like maybe you don't consider it your first shot, but your first shot ends up being a header that you had a good look at, but you took a lot of punishment to get that one. So right when I jump, so I'm going to go, I'm going near posts and ball doesn't come in. So then I fade back to back post right when I jump, I just feel blessing dive into my heels and I start to flip backwards. So I'm like, this header is not going to be good. And then just don't kill yourself on the fall. So landed straight on the tailbone, but
00:04:17
Speaker
To answer your question, I do not consider header shots. I consider, I mean, me specifically, technically, I guess you say it's a shot on goal to stat, even though it wasn't on goal. But I'm just talking about getting looks at goal with my feet, get some shots and stuff.
00:04:32
Speaker
And how are you feeling? You were you were limping a little bit when you came in here. Yeah, I don't know if that's just two kids or if that's just getting flipped now. I'm just getting that. Yeah, I took a tail bones pretty sore, landed pretty hard. It's a big body going down from from a pretty good distance. So, you know, it'll be all right, though. Well, so since this is not a entirely soccer focused podcast, I want to ask you now have two children. One of them is
00:05:01
Speaker
Absolute monster and the other one is like two years old. Yeah One of them is a monster you are correct and the other is too and just never stops talking, right? There's a lot of stuff going on at our house Liam is
00:05:17
Speaker
He was two on March 17th. What is it's May so he's a little over hmm to two months But now that he's starting to put senses together. There's times. I'm like dude. Just stop talking I just want a little bit of silence. He's just like Tractor set up tractors play tractors. Oh, all right, bud. We'll go do it and then yeah exactly and then Cohen he's just a big a big old baby and
00:05:42
Speaker
But you know, it's kind of a blob. What? He's a big kid. He is a big boy. I think he's he was bigger. We thought Liam was big and Cohen was a little bigger. They both have like 98th percentile of head circumference. So hopefully, hopefully that's full of brains. Yes.
00:06:02
Speaker
My wife said that Cohen got my forehead because it's more of like the crow magnum stick out forehead. I was like, that's the first thing you notice. So yeah, exactly. Now, now they're both good. It's been spending a lot of time with them. Yeah, exactly. So this last year, I don't know how do you do you feel like that's been a positive, especially as a new dad?
00:06:24
Speaker
You know, not a lot of people get to have that much time with their with their newborn kid. Yeah, it's been a lot of time, a lot of time. So, you know, when we started traveling again for real games, I was like, you know, oh, sorry, guys, I got to go. But I'm not, you know, terribly angry about a hotel room and some silence one night. But now it's been good. You know, I think it's been good, especially with having to so close an age to be able to help and be home a lot. And I'm sure Caitlin appreciates it. And it's been it's been good.
00:06:52
Speaker
What's been the attitude around the team? Do you feel like this last year has been a good experience? How would you describe it? Like this year right now or last year? Well, I mean, just collectively. They all roll together right now. I guess the question is, how has the pandemic changed the way players interact? Or has it?
00:07:16
Speaker
Um, it definitely has. I mean, we're just now getting back to the fist bumps and things like that that you just kind of like
00:07:23
Speaker
I mean, we're still in the pandemic, but there's everybody's vaccinated on theme and stuff. So that's good. So you can relax a little bit. We have where we were in like our own little bubble. So we were allowed to take our masks off and stuff. So so that's that's good. But, you know, I used to pretty much give everybody high fives and stuff in the morning and all that now. It's just more like a fist bump, like you said. But I mean, I think people are slowly getting back to normalcy of interacting. So that's good. What?
00:07:51
Speaker
When everyone finally got vaccinated,
Pandemic's Impact on Soccer Dynamics
00:07:53
Speaker
was there a sense of relief that you could have something like normal locker room interactions? Because I would imagine that's where the biggest difference is. Yeah. I mean, I wouldn't say there's like relief. I think there was more like skepticism. Like, can we go back to doing this? What was life like before masks and Purell and hand washing and everything? So I think it's been a little slow getting back to that. But, you know, it's it's coming back. It's like riding a bike.
00:08:21
Speaker
Sure. So one of the things I've been kind of, I thought was very interesting and.
00:08:27
Speaker
I've been kind of like very into is this idea that the sounders have been able to get everyone in the organization essentially vaccinated, like players, staff. And it was a relatively easy process, but we're seeing that. And it seems like when you say it like that, it's like, well, of course. Right. But yet we look around other organizations and it's not that way. It's like there's not this.
00:08:52
Speaker
mass buy-in and did was there anything that you think the sounders were doing that kind of sold this idea like you also and I should say even before it's not just the vaccinations it's you know you guys had a few players get sick but almost all of them got sick uh when they're on international duty or they you know like they were isolated cases so you haven't had an outbreak anything like an outbreak within the team what is it like how is the how have the sounders been messaging it how do you think they've gotten buy-in because it's not like
00:09:22
Speaker
they could be policing what everyone was doing at home. No, that's yeah. And that's tough. I think we've got a good locker room of guys that understand the risks. Like, you know, people know that if you go do something that is going to put people at risk, you bring into the locker room, they could bring it home to their families. And it's just something that, you know, we got a good group that understands that. I also want to
00:09:40
Speaker
give Chris Cornish a big shout out because, you know, he had a lot on his plate with dealing with all this quarantine rules and everything. And he did a great job of, you know, when there was a case like getting it under control and getting people isolated and and whatever. So he did. I'm sure he's really looking forward to getting back to normal. So he doesn't have to worry about protocols so much, but.
00:10:00
Speaker
You know, I think it's just the guys understanding that, you know, everything you do, every action you make has, you know, it could have a reaction that a bad one or a good one. So I think guys err on the side of caution and that was good. So you didn't I don't want to put any teams on blast or anything like that. But did you get a when you would travel, did you get a sense that other teams were taking a different approach than the Sounders were?
00:10:26
Speaker
Not necessarily. I think we had the mindset like, hey, we can't control what everybody else does, but we can control our bubble. So let's just make sure we take care of ourselves and look out for one another because it's like our little family. So, you know, we can't control what other teams are doing in their bubble and how their players are interacting and stuff. We just control and our little bubble. And I think that, you know, I think that went a long way with us.
00:10:49
Speaker
Does it do you think there were some positive repercussions? Like, do you think has this effectively like brought players like. Trusting your teammates is a pretty big aspect of a team, right? Yeah, for sure. And I think it kind of just, you know, reinforce the trust that, you know, our team has in each other. I think we got a good locker room, like I like I've said plenty of time so far. And I think I me personally, I never really doubted that anybody would, you know, risk anything. So I think that's just the mindset everybody had.
Team Strategy and Success
00:11:18
Speaker
Nice, well, okay, so moving into this season, you guys are off to a 5-0-1 start, tied the best start in franchise history, which came all the way back in 2019. Yeah, did you finally get your stats right? I finally got my stats right. Making sure. A day later. A day later, and I gotta say, I originally had it right, and then Alex texted me and said, hey, I thought the same thing, but it turns out this was the case.
00:11:44
Speaker
And then he texted me back again and said, actually, I was wrong. We were both right the first time. And you want to guess whose fault it was? Garth's Garth got on Wikipedia and read the read it wrong because Wikipedia is all screwed up because you had to cancel a game in 2019 because of the rapids. Oh, that's right. Because we play that game. We get one point. We host them. Let's go. Right. You know, let's just.
00:12:11
Speaker
Now you got me bitter. Exactly. Garth's to blame for all the Twitter confusion. Garth is absolutely- No, no, no, no. You take responsibility for your actions that you put on Twitter, you put it out there, so therefore, raise your hand and say, my fault.
00:12:28
Speaker
Okay, my fault. I didn't trust. I didn't trust. There we go. There we go. Alex knew what he was doing. Trust your gut. Exactly. Exactly. Notice Alex didn't tweet at me. He sent me a text message. Trust your gut. Exactly. So you guys are off to a five oh and one start. And what's amazing about this start is that it's basically come without. Nico has played 30 minutes. You know, he you played 30 minutes in one game. Yeah.
00:12:54
Speaker
You lose Steph Fry. You've had, you know, you, you, you have the replacement essentially for Nico, Josh attention ends up only playing two games. He's, he's been out injured and you guys just keep rolling through from the inside. How was this team felt? Like did it, did it feel like when you took the field in the season opener, we were like, this week, this is, this is something special we got going here. Um, you know,
00:13:18
Speaker
I think the system that we're playing has been great. And I think, you know, the way that we've taken it on, the way the coaching staff has shown us and made sure that everybody's understood their responsibilities in each role has been awesome. And I think we have the players that fit this role perfectly. Like, for example, Nuhu is the left side and center back. I don't think anybody's getting around him ever. Ever. You know, this guy is like the best athlete I've ever seen.
00:13:42
Speaker
And so I think we just have the right personnel for this system. And it's been showing. We haven't let up a goal from the run of play all season. And that's really, really impressive. So I think we're scoring goals, too. So I think it's been everything's clicking. And the thing we got to be careful of, we can't get too high. We can't be like, oh, man, we're off to a great start. We're flying high. We can't be beaten. And then when you start thinking like that, that's when you start falling.
00:14:10
Speaker
I just think we're taking it game by game and we know that it's a new formation. There's still things we can improve on. The first half of the LAFC game wasn't great. We weren't playing out of pressure that well, but we talked about it at halftime. We made a few adjustments and the second half was much better. I think this team being able to adjust on the fly and take each game as it is and how the game's flowing and adjust to it is something that's been really good so far.
00:14:37
Speaker
So the, the first half's have been, I want to say all across the board, underwhelming, but you guys seem to have consistently stepped it up in the second half. Is that something that is there actual adjustments that are happening at halftime or is this, you know, yesterday, Brad Smith suggested it might actually be a fitness issue that you guys are just in better shape than a lot of these teams. And so you wear teams down a little bit, which was particularly funny last night since you guys were on three days rest and LAFC was on a full week's rest. Yeah. I think teams.
00:15:07
Speaker
Don't know teams give us their best at the beginning and it's hard for them to you know Sustain that for 90 minutes if they're just gonna try to defend against us We're gonna break them down over the course of a game, you know, so I Think LA FC did a good job in the first half of pressing us high, but it really never turned to much they had maybe a few chances that we that we were able to recover on and cut out but you know, I think I
00:15:31
Speaker
We were having a feel-out period in the first half, and then once we get to halftime, we talk about things that are working, things that aren't working, things that we can do better, things we can exploit. And I think we've been actually executing on those points coming out of halftime in the second half of games. And it's been credit to the team for figuring out what we need to do to be successful for that second half and then actually executing.
00:15:50
Speaker
Yeah, and I would think that playing to zero on the defensive side helps a lot. Just a little bit, yeah. Just a little bit. Just a little bit. Like in the worst case scenario, you guys have been going into halftime tied zero zero. I would imagine that that's, you know, oh, that's, you take it for granted, but the,
00:16:07
Speaker
I can't remember who I was talking to about it, but our back line is so athletic just across the whole back line. And so good on the ball. Playing out of the back is just, you know, it's probably one of the best back lines I've been a part of. And, you know, it's showing right now.
00:16:23
Speaker
So one of the things that I wanted to go back to, and I've had this kind of memory of this incident, which I think I've been able to zero in on what happened, but back in 2018, you guys used a three-back formation against Toronto FC on the road. You won that game, you won, you scored in that game on one of the great goals that people remember, because Magnus Wolf-Ikram had this amazing move. Yeah, that pass from Midfield or whatever, yeah. Yeah, that was...
00:16:49
Speaker
You know, I think back then, maybe sometimes we would throw out three slash five at the back on the road and kind of just like you see teams do it and you're like, all right, let's try to hold on for a tie or see if we can get a counterattacking goal.
00:17:02
Speaker
You know, there's been games that I've been part of that where it's been really tough. I've won that comes to mind. I don't remember what year it was, but we went to Philadelphia. We played five at the back and it was just like you take a beating for the whole game and you just try to hold on for dear life. You know, and this system is completely different than those random games where you throw. You say it's going to be a three at the back, but it's a five at the back when you do it one time on the road cross country trip.
00:17:27
Speaker
You try to tell the team it's an attacking formation, but you're just taking it for 90 minutes. But this formation, this is a very attacking formation that we're in. And it also has the support of a back five. But the reason why this is so good for us is because we don't play as a back five. It's purely a back three. And the wing backs are just cruising up and down the wings. We're best when they stay high and wide. And, you know, they've the wing backs all have more goals than me.
00:17:54
Speaker
Brad Smith, all of a sudden, I think he had one goal in his entire professional career. Now he's scoring goals for fun. Yeah, exactly. I don't even think I've seen him score three goals in training. There was a preseason game actually against San Diego, I want to say.
00:18:12
Speaker
and i was making a i was making a comment about how i've never seen a player who looks better in possession and worse when it's time to shoot than brad smith and basically ever since that moment he's done nothing but look really dangerous honestly like
00:18:29
Speaker
Just the last few weeks, I think he's improved. He's looked so much more comfortable in front of goal. I mean, he's he's been a left back his whole career. What are you expecting to be in front of goal and start scoring immediately? It's going to take time. It's going to take repetitions and practice. And he's already taken that on so quickly. Like he's getting headers. I made that near post run last night and I was thinking, Alex missed me. Oh, God, Brad better be right there. And he's right there and he scores. You know what I mean? So it's just like
00:18:55
Speaker
These are things where he's getting the more comfortable he gets, the more confidence goes, the more he's going to get in spots to score. That was about as smooth of a finish. I know Andy just kept it running to the corner. I was like, all right. I was like, all right. Yeah. So I'm curious, though, about the kind of the tactical journey that Brian and the rest of the coaching staff has really taken.
00:19:19
Speaker
I think one of your frustrations back in 2018 was you played this three at the back formation, but you didn't, it sounded like you guys didn't really train in it and you just kind of threw it out there as a way to get a result and somehow they took all the wrong lessons from that result and they didn't, they didn't like take, there was nothing tactical that came from it other than like
00:19:38
Speaker
We put five at the back. We get a win. Yeah. And and now, like you said, it's a it's it's much more of a system. There's a system. Yeah, it seems like for sure. Even when you play, you know, whether it be three, four, three or a three, four, one, two or a three, four, two, one or whatever it might be, there's this same
00:20:00
Speaker
Mentality that you come into there's a way of playing that's not about the formation. It's about like the system Yeah, that's exactly because we had a whole preseason to work on this this year. I think when you
00:20:11
Speaker
When you do it, like maybe we did in the past where you're like, all right, this weekend, we're going to play this way. We got a week to work on it. You can't really learn. You can't. So you can't learn a system at all in a week, you know, right? So it was I think it was awesome that they decided we're doing this from the beginning of preseason and we're committing to it. And, you know, I give Schmetz all a bunch of credit for doing that because, you know, it's hard to do, you know, something a formation that's worked for his whole career. The team has been great in it. And to be like, well, now I think we can be even better in this formation based on the personnel we have. So
00:20:40
Speaker
credit to him for doing it and sticking to it and I'm sure you know we haven't gone through any growing pains yet but I'm sure we will in the future and you know it's been it's been great.
00:20:51
Speaker
So your role in this formation, I think has been really interesting. You have, you know, I'm sure you like being on the field versus most. Yeah, exactly. Exactly. That's, that's my favorite. Right. Being on the field is your, your primary objective, but the, the role that you've played up until last night where last night you seem like you were a little bit higher up the field, but up until then you'd been almost playing as a midfielder. You'd been kind of like a, a facilitator. You didn't. Yeah.
00:21:16
Speaker
You know, doing a lot of holdup play, but mostly in passing lane and runner, having runners come off of you and whatnot. What's been your mindset going into this season and how have you, like, has it been tough to not be in positions to put a lot of shots on goal? Um, you know,
00:21:35
Speaker
I really do feel like I've been more of a withdrawn forward this year because Raoul is a pure number nine. He stays high in the box is where he comes alive and he's a goal scorer. Sometimes I like to stay there too, but we can't both occupy the same spot. I'm comfortable dropping in and getting on the ball and just trying to get involved in the game.
00:21:56
Speaker
you know, I feel better when I do that, but then at the same time, I'm further away from goal and I'm not getting in the spots to finish plays off, but I'm still helping facilitate the, you know, the attacking pattern. So, you know, that's been an adjustment for me. And then last night I got my first few shots off because I told you that was going to be my
00:22:15
Speaker
I was talking to Christian the day before the game. I was like, no matter what happens, I'm shooting. I'm taking some shots. Enough of this. I'm getting in, you know, in the attacking third and just having a go. So hopefully that's the first domino that starts getting the goals coming. So, you know, I enjoy it. I enjoy playing and being a facilitator. Facilitator? I think that's right. Facilitator, yeah. Just sounded weird.
00:22:39
Speaker
because you're not used to I know about yourself that way yeah exactly I'm like this is what what's going on here right um no but it's been it's been good I enjoy it so that I thought the the funniest moment to me at least that looked the most that way was you were on a little bit of a breakaway you were on the on the right wing you had row kind of at the top of the top of the penalty box
00:23:03
Speaker
You wouldn't let it rip. Yeah. Oh, yeah. Wait. Oh, this was the first half one. Yeah, exactly. So the way I looked at this one was I think it was Christian that played it into the channel. Yes. And I think it was Maria that was coming at me from an angle. So I'm thinking if I if I take a touch here or something, he's going to just come in hard and I'm going to try to either cut him or he's going to get a corner out of it. So I was like, you know, why don't I just try to hit it hard for post? I hit it hard, but not for post. It just went directly over, you know, and.
00:23:32
Speaker
Sometimes, you know, when you're on the box, you gotta be greedy. I don't think I'm greedy enough sometimes. Absolutely. That's something I gotta start doing. I was actually, like, a part of me was very, I was like, good to see you. Good for you. Yeah, good for you. Take that rip. You deserve that shot. Exactly. You've done a lot of the dirty work. Yeah. You deserve to make that run.
00:23:49
Speaker
And there was a couple other ones where I saw you making a run. And I want to say it was Brad, maybe, that was coming up the left wing and he he shot it instead of like dishing it off. And I'm thinking, if I'm Will and I make a 90 yard run, I want that. I want at least the attempt to play the ball. Yeah. Yeah. You know, but I'm not somebody if they're taking a shot, go for it. I'm never somebody that's going to scream at you unless I have a tap in. But, you know,
00:24:16
Speaker
Brad's got more goals than me. I can't say much to him right now, you know? It's unbelievable. Crazy. And it is funny, the more success begets success, where it's like, you know, how awkward he looked in front of goal and now how...
00:24:31
Speaker
Comfortable yeah exactly honestly I would Kind of say this about me too like I think previously before this year like when I would drop into the pockets I would kind of feel like rushed
Unbeaten Streak and Game Focus
00:24:42
Speaker
on the ball and try to get it off my foot quick I feel like now I have more patience on the ball. I look up more I'm just a little more relaxed on it as opposed to trying to get off my foot and get in the box Which you know it's a good thing
00:24:55
Speaker
Yeah, no, I mean, a lot of seems to be a lot of good things going on with the Saunders right now. We got to keep them going. Got to absolutely got to keep them going. You guys have two more games until the Gold Cup break, essentially. Yeah. What's the attitude going into these two games? Let's let's get into the break undefeated still. Let's get six more points out of these two games and then, you know, have those two weeks off, regroup, kind of refresh, refocus, because, you know,
00:25:23
Speaker
you wouldn't think so you think when you're playing well you're winning win-win easy easy easy but you have to keep you know plan better every game because every team's coming out for the more the more you win the more teams want to beat you they want to be the first team to take points off they want to be the first team to give you your first loss so it gets harder and harder so i think uh... these two games atlanta on sunday's going to be very hard and then austin you know i think they've looked really good as a expansion team this year so far uh... so they're going to be too tough games and then i think we
00:25:52
Speaker
Get six points out of those two games go into the break and regroup and refresh like I said Has there been a lot of because I at least to me you look at these first six as Kind of a collective group because it's all western conference teams. They were kind of close together Yeah, and then these last two games seem to be almost like a separate challenge
00:26:11
Speaker
Yeah, no. Is that kind of how it's been internally, too? I mean, I don't think people thought about that much, but I see I definitely see what you're saying there because, you know, you're like, oh, now you're playing a Eastern Conference team. So, you know, it's not a six point game, but at the end of the day, it's every game for us three points. So we want to maximize our points on the year. So.
00:26:33
Speaker
You know, I see the point of like, oh, we got rivalry games and, you know, West Coast Western Conference opponents and stuff. But, you know, every game is opportunity for three points. Absolutely. All right. Well, that's probably a good place to take a break. We're going to come back. Do we have some, I think, some advice? Nice. Yeah, they're an advice that might be a little wiser after these 15, 16 months. Yeah, exactly. Exactly. But we'll come back. You're listening to bear with us. Cool.
00:27:06
Speaker
Welcome back to bear with us. The will broom podcast. We're here. I should say we're here at masonry and we're drinking some fast fashion brew beer. I don't know. Fast fashion brewing. Right. Right. Not brew. They don't go away with that. But it's good. And we're having some some decent, some good food. Really good. You want me to talk about decent. It's great food. Some nice meatballs, some spicy meatballs. So we'll.
00:27:35
Speaker
We have a game that Emily came up with, and I think it's a very clever game. I don't know how with the... I don't know where she came up with this idea, but it's great. Who knows how I think of it. Yeah. The game is called 1921 or 2021. And basically what you want to do is we found a bunch of advice, pieces of advice, like people writing into advice columns. Okay.
00:27:56
Speaker
And we want you to guess whether or not this prompt came from 1921 or 2021. Does that make sense? Yes. And then we're going to ask you for your advice. OK, sure. All right. So, Emily, do you want you want me to read these or you want to read? Absolutely. OK, so my sister sells for a multi level marketing company for a few years now and is inviting us to events again.
00:28:21
Speaker
I don't want to attend for many reasons, including that I think these companies take advantage of people. How do I get out of it? And should I share my opinion about this path or should I keep it to myself? So, you know, the first part I picked up on was they're inviting inviting us to events again. Yeah. So that makes me think that's a question from now coming out of a pandemic. Yes. You are correct. OK. You're thinking is one points already.
00:28:48
Speaker
And then after that, I kind of stopped listening. So what was the rest of the question? What do you like? How do you what's the right way to like, should you go? Should you not? And she doesn't want to go. She doesn't want to go. Does she say something about why she doesn't want to go or does she just keep to herself and say, like, come with an excuse? Like, what's the way to handle this?
00:29:08
Speaker
Do you have MLM marketers in the centers? I would say, I would come up with an excuse. That's just me personally. If I didn't want to go, I think I'm too nice to be like, I just don't want to go. Is Herbalife coming to you guys? No, no, no, no. Everything goes through Caulfield in winter. They take care of it all. And Kelly, so it's all good. I tell them, honestly, I tell them, I'm like, I don't want to go. And then they take care of it. So I'm sure if you wanted a real good answer, you'd have to ask them.
00:29:36
Speaker
So, okay. I am now, I'm curious. So when this, when, when Alex or Matt or whoever else comes to you with a, a promo pitch that you're just not into, do you just straight up tell them that's, I'm not doing it. Yeah. I'm comfortable enough around them where, you know, I just tell them like, I don't want to do that one or.
00:29:56
Speaker
You know, I mean, it's not like I have all these people coming after me saying, hey, we want all these. So usually we need the world. Exactly. So usually I'm like, sure, I'll do it. But if there's something I don't want to do or just like I'm tired from, you know, a long night with the kids or something, I just tell them truthfully like, OK, not today. And they understand. OK, so what's the most absurd ask they've ever. Oh, my gosh.
00:30:19
Speaker
You have these are one that stood out now nothing comes to my mind right now podcast with Jeremiah honestly That's probably the most absurd one. They're making me do this. Yeah as much as I do not want to do it I remember I I twisted your arm a lot I remember going to Alex and Matt and saying you need to get me will yes, it's mandatory It's mandatory. I definitely don't remember you coming to me. I was like we should do a podcast I was like why won't this guy leave me alone, right?
00:30:46
Speaker
or hazy at this point. Exactly. I don't know. A pandemic mushed my brain. Exactly how I remember it. All right. So I'm 10 years old and my dad said that when I saved enough money, I could buy anything I wanted with it. All my life, I have wanted a monkey. I have saved $14. My dad said no because I wouldn't know how to take care of it. Do you know anyone who has a pet monkey? And can you give me some advice? What first of all, what year do you think this is? This sounds like. No, that's a tough one, actually. It's a tough one, I agree.
00:31:16
Speaker
My gut was going to tell me 1921. Is that the year we're doing 21? Yeah. But then I think about coming out of a pandemic and I think about how crazy people are right now. I'm like, that could easily be this year. So my final answer is going to be. Oh, it's tough. I'm going to go 2021.
00:31:36
Speaker
It is actually from the 19. Oh, I knew it like I told you earlier listen to your gut I know and I did you change the year the amount of money that no that is what that $14 in 1921 is a lot of money that and that's what I was just thinking I was also thinking to
00:31:53
Speaker
Like, you always, me growing up, I would get paid for doing chores around the house and stuff, and you know, I don't know if that's, it's still like that these days, like I'm so old. I think the kids still do chores. So I was gonna say, yeah, that was my reason why my gut was like, oh, look at that pizza, that looks delicious. Yeah, I'm not gonna judge anyone for eating on air, by the way. No, no, no. All right, so do you have any advice for this? If the girl wants a monkey, or the children, the child wants a monkey. The lesson is, you know,
00:32:24
Speaker
You're you're heard their dad told them they could get whatever they want their allowance. You know, that's what they want. That's what they want. But as a parent, I would I would I would try to backtrack very quick off a monkey. Yes. You don't want a monkey running around the house. I would say, you know, when you get your own house and you get your own place to live, then you can get your monkey.
00:32:43
Speaker
Absolutely, and that's good advice alright, so how do I hang out with friends again without being weird? I've forgotten how I know I think everybody has it's a tough one This I feel like this is a little a little obvious, but maybe not yeah 20s. I take it back 90 choice there was the oh yeah
00:33:02
Speaker
I did forget. I honestly was just thinking that was a question right now. So I had 20, 21. I forgot about the game now. I was like, it's just a normal question. It's too real. Yeah, I should. I guess I should. We should have set this up in 1921. They were coming out of the Spanish flu. Yeah. Yeah. All right. What do you think? This year, 2021 is my guess is 2020. Yeah. You're trying to throw me off with the whole Spanish flu thing. I know. Good try. But
00:33:30
Speaker
I think everybody feels it, so I don't think it's just the one question. So this is like a monumental thing that we're doing right here. We're all in the same place. We're all vaccinated. I think this is a very safe endeavor. I don't want anyone to be worried about us. That said, what's your social life?
00:33:53
Speaker
Go outside your bubble. Have you had friends over for dinner? I've not been invited. No, actually, yeah, I've had all my friends over for dinner. No, I've had not had any friends over. Also, I'm probably a little different with the two little kids. It makes this, in general, it's just a little different lifestyle. So I guess if there was time to have two.
00:34:12
Speaker
Two little kids it would be during a pandemic because you're at home regardless, so okay not to get too far off topic But I actually had this thought like in April or so I remember thinking why would anyone have a kid right now like this? What a nightmare to have a kid right now? And then like but you're home regardless right and then like a month later I was like what a perfect time to have kids a month later. You're like we're having five Can we get this going yeah
00:34:36
Speaker
Cuz you're right like it was all of a sudden went from being a nightmare time to have little especially newborn Yeah, because like having a five and a eight-year-old not just a randomly picked two ages Yeah is a nightmare at home all the time because they want to go all they want to do is go and play this and
00:34:57
Speaker
But like having like one to two, like zero to two. Yeah. All they want to do is hang out with parents anyway. Oh, yeah. We we started asking Liam our oldest today this morning. We were like, has he had a play date yet? Well, we go to the park now and he like loves going to the park and going on the slide. But we're like, do you want to go to school? Yeah, exactly. Now it's all about tractors these days. OK, so come on. And then so we're like, do you want to go to school one day a week in the fall?
Parenting and Socializing Challenges
00:35:22
Speaker
and his response was no stay home with mama dad sissy which is our dog and we call we call Cohen Coco man and he goes and Coco man and play tractors we're like no you're going to school for right there was a trick question yeah you actually didn't have a choice yeah exactly you failed I'm sorry yep now you're gonna school two days a week right exactly so is it is it gonna be are you guys gonna do like a
00:35:46
Speaker
a coop
00:36:04
Speaker
No, she brought that up and I don't think she was too thrilled about something like that. Honestly, no judgment on anyone who does it cool, but I conceptually just don't understand it. If I'm going to send my kid to school, the whole point is to get out of it. For them to go to school, yeah. Getting out of caring for them. Exactly.
00:36:22
Speaker
Like, have somebody watch them for however long they go. This is a trap. This is speaking MLM. I don't want to be teaching eight kids for when they should be gone. Right, exactly. All right. This is the last one we got out of this fun game, which is great, actually. Good job, Emily. This is a great game. Why does he sound surprised? It's what I do. I know. Every time, I'm like, I don't know if it's going to work. Actually, it does.
00:36:49
Speaker
I have a little faith over here the truth always comes out a producer of fun things Yeah, okay, so I have a very dear friend who lives in a distant city who recently wrote to say she would love to visit
00:37:02
Speaker
I saw her briefly several months ago, but she had a five year old child with her who was a holy terror. If I tell her that she is welcome to leave her kid at home, I'm afraid it would end her friendship. But I cannot see myself putting up with that child. What would be the best way to handle this? So again, first of all, 1920s or 1920s is my guess. They got the letter in the mail that I wrote to her. My dearest, I wrote you. Right. Exactly.
00:37:28
Speaker
So what do you do if you want to hang out with your friend? Do you have friends now that have like kids that you're just like, I don't like your child? No, not there yet. I think the whole thing with the whole pandemic and everything is kind of we haven't gotten there yet. I feel like if there wouldn't have been pandemic, we would have been hanging out with more people and stuff and been like, oh, that kid is not very nice or that kid's awesome. You know what I mean? But I'm sure we'll get there. But we're not there yet. Yeah, I.
00:37:54
Speaker
I'm not, I luckily did not have a whole, like I was one of the first people in my friend group to have kids. And so I never had the experience of like hanging out with someone else's kid and being like, dude, your kid sucks. I'm sorry. And so now it's more about like.
00:38:11
Speaker
how convenient you also have a child and we can have our kids keep out of our hair. Which is the best thing about other, and I luckily don't have any friends who I can't stand their kids yet, but I could definitely see how that would be a problem. Yeah, I could definitely see how that'd be a big problem too, but I cannot speak on it from experience, yeah. All right, so who are the dad, who are the dad awards in the sounders? Who are the guys that you think
00:38:40
Speaker
They know what they're doing. Who are you asking for advice? Oh.
00:38:44
Speaker
First one comes to mind is probably Nico. Yeah, he seems like have a pretty yeah I feel like he's a really I feel like he's good dad kids are always around so Yeah, yeah, exactly and then you know Brad he's younger than me, but he's got a three year old and one year old So he's kind of on the same trajectory, but about a half a year ahead of me so ask him what to expect in future weeks and stuff, but Those those two come to mind first, okay?
00:39:12
Speaker
Those are that's a solid. Yeah, I would say those are those are solid. Does anyone have older? All the people that had older kids are out of it. Yeah, I don't think so. Yeah, I think it's like Ramon had older kids. Yep. Yep. Yep. I saw it as a seems like, yes, two kids are like six. Yeah. Yeah. Oh, yeah. Yeah. So yeah. Roll seems like.
00:39:32
Speaker
He actually strikes me as almost like a super dad. Like, he just comes in. He's like the fun dad. Fun. Yeah. It's time to have fun kids. Dad, dad's home. Right, exactly. Come on. Exactly. Well, that was good. You did good on that one. Yeah. All right. Why do you sound surprised? You know, you constantly surprise me, Will. I surprise myself sometimes. We did get a couple other questions from readers, listeners, I guess. That's what we're calling them now.
00:39:59
Speaker
So this one's from Bill Jones T trumpet. He's a I think he's a member of the the sound wave. Okay, cool. Good to see them back. I know that was they were back. This is him right now to stay. Yeah, that was awesome. So I look up and I saw somebody dancing on the screen. I was like, oh, they're back. Okay, that brings me up. It brings a good aside. So when Reed came in, did you happen to see the picture? Oh, I saw the picture. The picture was from the 90s, huh? Yeah.
00:40:26
Speaker
Like it was like he's 16 and they used a picture from like when he was 8. They used 10 year old picture to say, look, we're playing very young kids. In case it wasn't obvious, we're playing children. Let's just use the real headshot and go on. Did anyone give him shit about that? No, no, no.
00:40:47
Speaker
I don't think a lot I think I was one of the only people that really noticed it on the team because I was subbed off at That point and I just like happened to look up. That's not I like I looked up and I like double-checked like who is that?
00:40:58
Speaker
We're playing children. His mom sent in a school photo. Honestly, at that point, I was like, all right, I'm getting kind of old here. Right. Exactly. This he could that picture could literally be my child. Exactly. All right. So as a parent who travels a lot to play music in non covid times, I get a great support. I get great support from my wife and kid. But what steps can I take to make sure I keep their support and not take too much advantage of them?
00:41:24
Speaker
so like how do you that's a that's a great you are in a great position to answer this yeah that's when your kids are traveling to watch you play how much of it is like they shouldn't be supporting me and how much of it like it's fun to go watch the soccer game um no that's i think because i like
00:41:41
Speaker
When we always tell Liam, because Cohen doesn't understand yet, but we tell Liam, like, you want to go watch dad to play soccer tonight? He's like, yeah, he loves it. And then Caitlin tells me about it like he watches for the first few minutes and then he just loves to run around the suite like he games over with. Who cares? Whatever. And he's like, I just want to he brings his tractors into the suite and he plays in there. So he cares more about going in there and playing. I can't remember exactly what she told me, but when I got undercut,
00:42:09
Speaker
He said something like, dead, dead, get up, or something like that. Wow. And Caitlin probably made it seem like it was more like, get up, you're fine. When he was far, like, get up, dead, dead. Don't be dead. Yeah, exactly.
00:42:23
Speaker
No, I'm sure it's more just the experience for him. Yeah, I mean, it's it's cool for them to see you once or twice. And then they're probably like, all right, let's move on to the real fun playing. Yeah, of course. Yeah. Yeah. Like, do you do you like? I would imagine you got to be hoping that they have a memory of you as a player, right? Yeah. Yeah, for sure. I think it's been way like way.
00:42:47
Speaker
I guess, cooler and more for me to be like, oh, now because Liam understands, they can know everything and I can look up and like wave to him and stuff. That's like that's pretty cool for me as opposed to when it was, you know, no kids or anything. So yeah, it does give you like a weird like focus. Yeah, it gives you like it gives like a purpose. Yeah, it gives you like a cool sense of like pride and like you're not just like playing for you and your career. It's like you're playing for your family and stuff. So it's cool.
00:43:17
Speaker
Yeah. So, all right. So this is this is one that is from Likit. Likit wasn't able to make it here today. Come on, Likit. He wants to know, how's your butt feeling sore? Is it landed on it pretty hard, you know? Yeah. Say more more tailbone area.
00:43:35
Speaker
Yeah, they did not look comfortable. No, it wasn't fun. Last time I did that, I dislocated my elbow. So I was like, so it was better than that. So I was like, just don't land on my arms. I kind of just threw my arms up. I was like, just take it on the back. So, of course, that was also when the legend of Will Bruin was maybe born.
Injuries and Support for Women's Soccer
00:43:53
Speaker
Yeah. Like the bionic, bionic. Yeah, that's true. Bionic arm. Maybe I'll have a bionic, bionic, like corset. Bionic butt. Bionic butt. There we go.
00:44:06
Speaker
Well, that's that's what we got. That's what we got for you. Well, it's been it's been good. Yeah, it's been fun. Good. And we have some pizza waiting for us. We have some balls waiting for us. Yeah.
00:44:18
Speaker
Yeah, and I got I got to get home to some crying babies, probably eventually. Probably. Yeah, it's been it's been a long time. I would like to think that we won't wait this long again. The last time I talk to you, you're like, this can be the farewell show. I'm not going to let that happen. Well, sorry. And he likes to say it was me that came to him like, oh, we must get this going. Right. No, I won't be. I won't be. OK.
00:44:44
Speaker
I know, you didn't know what you were going to do with yourself. Okay, I do have a suggestion for you, Will, before we close out this thing. So one of the things we've been seeing in the NBA lately, a lot of NBA players wearing WNBA jerseys as a way to promoting it. How do we get MLS players wearing NWSL jerseys, especially with like
00:45:04
Speaker
Rose Lavelle is gonna be coming to the rain. We got, this is gonna be like a star-studded team. What do we do? How do we get this, how do we make this happen? Have Front Office give us some jerseys and we'll wear them, no problem. Easy money. There we go. Oh well, Rain, you hear that? Get this under some jerseys, get them outfitted, and we will make this happen. We're good to go. Yeah. That's easy, that's probably better style than I have regardless. It would actually improve my style again.
00:45:31
Speaker
Yeah, I mean that's a low bar, but yeah, I mean I'm looking at you. I'm like you could use one too.
00:45:38
Speaker
Yeah, I get the influencers there. I know I know I've been getting a lot of influencer packages lately. I'm big time How much do you love that Jimi Hendrix Jersey though? Oh, I love it. Yeah, it's good. It's really good Oh to go off topic again before we get off. No, I know it's your show some I can't I don't know off top my head somebody tweeted at me was like hey He had his Jimi Hendrix Jersey on he's like hey, I just saw your dad at the Charlotte Airport. I'm like
00:46:04
Speaker
What are you talking about? Like, I'm just going to let this one go. It's nobody. Like, my dad's not in Charlotte. And then I talked to my dad yesterday. He's like, I'm in Charlotte at your cousin's wedding. It's like, ah, my dad really was in Charlotte. So shout out to that guy for saying hi. So apparently my dad went up to and was like, go sound her. So he had his Jimi Hendrix jersey on. Yeah. So because I was thinking.
00:46:27
Speaker
go centers my son yeah that's that's something my dad would ever heard of him yeah my dad would be like oh my son's a sounder the guy's probably like yeah I'm sure right movies plays to the academy yeah exactly right it was reed's picture right he shows a picture and as well it's all wrinkled yeah right
00:46:44
Speaker
Well, well, this has been wonderful catching up. And I appreciate you doing this as always. Yeah, no, it's a lot of family. Thank you for once again providing the fun. Always. And Masonry for providing the pies. And we got some pizzas and meatballs to dig into. So yeah, thanks for listening. This is bear with us. And we think there's going to be a next time.
00:47:31
Speaker
Yeah, we'll see. Yeah, we'll see. We'll see. Bye. Bye.