I Went to My Kids Soccer Game and an English Soccer Game Broke Out

Three adults were arrested after a brawl erupted at an AYSO soccer game between teams of 14-year-olds in San Juan Capistrano on June 24. After the customary end-of-game handshakes, an assistant coach for the Chino Hills Chiefs allegedly picked a fight with a player on the Palmdale Eagles. Players and parents poured onto the field to break things up. One adult chose to swing a metal rod for peaceful emphasis. Sheriff's deputies arrived to a 150-person melee in the middle of the field. Only minor injuries were reported, but a contingent of English hooligans hoping to change that have already snatched up all tickets to the rematch.

Illustration by Bob Aul

BE TRUE TO YOUR SCHOOL Junipero Serra High School, a private Catholic campus set to open next year in San Juan Capistrano, decided to drop its team name on June 25. It turns out that having a bunch of Catholics calling themselves “the Crusaders” offends Muslims, who were targets of the bloody crusades of the Middle Ages. And here we thought the Crusaders were a '70s-era, jazz/soul/funk band. Serra High is now soliciting suggestions for a new team name. How 'bout “the Inquisitors?”

HOLLOW VICTORY Normally Clockwork would be laughing so hard we'd pee ourselves over three conservative Orange Unified School District board members losing their seats. But the challengers' margin of victory in the June 26 recall election was so narrow—and the opposition to them is so resourceful—that you might wanna keep the cork in the champagne bottles a bit longer. Two of the new trustees already face re-election in four short months, and considering the amount of money and support the recalled right-wingers received from GOP Chairman Tom Fuentes, the Newport Beach-based Lincoln Club, county Treasurer John Moorlach, Home Savings and Loan heir Howard Ahmanson Jr. and fundamentalist Christian groups nationwide, expect a bloodbath come November.

AND THE ENVELOPE, PLEASE The Coastline Community College Foundation on June 27 announced its 2001 Visionaries of the Year. They are television broadcaster Ed Arnold, county Supervisor Cynthia Coad, Pacific Bell official Richard Porras and Andersen's Orange County executive Katherine Szem. Among those sponsoring a July 25 luncheon to honor the foursome are Arnold's public-television station KOCE, something called “Friends & Family of Dr. Cynthia P. Coad,” and Pacific Bell. Hey, Andersen's not on the sponsorship list. How the hell did Szem sneak through?

SPENDED ANIMATION We didlaugh so hard we peed ourselves while reading The Orange County Register's editorial page on June 28. One editorial (“Rosy Forecast for Economy in OC”) said Orange County's economy “will benefit from a boom in aeronautic defense spending.” The next one concluded, “Orange County's congressional members should vote for no increase in the Defense budget.”

BALLPARK AND RIDE The Anaheim Angels and Orange County Transportation Authority (OCTA) teamed up to reach out to the Latino community during a June 28 photo-op at Edison Field. Under the large Angels baseball cap that hangs over the stadium's Homeplate Entrance, Angel infielder and avowed Latino Benji Gil presented a team jersey to OCTA chairman Michael Ward. Ward then gave an OCTA bus driver's cap to Gil. The way things are going this season—the Angels were a nearly insurmountable 18 games behind the Seattle Mariners the day of the ceremony—Gil may be coming back to Ward for the rest of the bus-driver uniform, keys to a motor coach and the map to Route 102. Free bus rides from heavily Hispanic neighborhoods to Angel games are part of the double-play marketing effort, which is touted by local buses fully wrapped in a Spanish-language Angels advertisement. Yeah, the Barbara Coe/Harald Martin/immigrant-incarcerating Anaheim Police Department crowd's gonna love that. We just pity the poor saps who get on a bus with “Los Angels” on the side expecting a ride to Pico and Sepulveda.