Over the weekend, people in faraway lands gathered for the purpose of kicking a ball around a field, and other people gathered to watch it and later they all got together to look down on me for not liking soccer. But what I do like is a little bit of violence sprinkled into my sports, and that’s where soccer makes brownie points with me. Can you imagine how much greater Air Bud: World Pup would have been if the dog had rabies and went around attacking everyone? Even better, they should have replaced him with White Dog.

Thankfully we have heroes like Luis Suarez and Samuel Eto’o to keep me from completely disregarding soccer. Suarez and his Ajax squad took on PSV Eindhoven on Saturday, and during a brief heated exchange between teams, Suarez bit Eindhoven’s Otman Bakkal on his neck. Actually, it was closer to his clavicle, if you want to get sexy about it.

Also on Saturday, Eto’o’s Inter Milan squad took on Chievo and Samuel became fed up with Bostjan Cesar and pulled a move from Zinedine Zidane’s playbook by headbutting Cesar in the chest. All in all, I’d say it was a pretty productive weekend in soccer violence. After the jump, take a trip down memory lane with some fun moments in soccer fights…

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Most of us remember that women’s soccer video where that aggressive New Mexico player punched and hair-pulled her way into America’s hearts. Now that player, Elizabeth Lambert, is doing her best to quell the uprising indignation emanating from the media, and not just from the sports world.

“I still deeply regret it and will always regret it and will carry it through the rest of my life not to retaliate,” said Lambert, a 20-year-old junior on scholarship.

“I look at it and I’m like, ‘That is not me,’ ” said Lambert, a defender and an all-conference academic player. “I have so much regret. I can’t believe I did that.” –NY Times.

Lambert also insinuated that what people saw was just a retaliation to the dirty play of Brigham young, and since almost no one chastising Lambert has seen the entire game tape, I’m inclined to give her the benefit of the doubt. How many of us have actually seen an entire game of women’s Division I soccer, and would therefore have a baseline to determine what would qualify as “dirty” play? There’s no context to this video; would Lambert’s play have come off as so outrageous if there was?

Don’t get me wrong, it’s nice to see a woman get famous for doing something besides releasing a sex tape or a sh!tty pop album. But there’s no reason to bury someone for pushing the envelope of rough play. Women’s athletics in general could benefit if more players took a similar approach toward pushing those boundaries. Read the rest of this entry »

UPDATE: ESPN is reporting that Lambert has been suspended indefinitely by the school. Totally worth it.

Here comes your women’s soccer post for 2009, courtesy of New Mexico defender Elizabeth Lambert. Lambert played in the Lobos’ WAC Mountain West semifinal against BYU, and took some time out to go Mormon hunting, as seen in this ESPN clip. It looks to me that she’s spending more time fighting for women’s rights than simply gooning it up. Sure, she’s fighting other women, but that’s where the groundswell starts, in my opinion. And I’d by lying if I said I wasn’t a little turned on…BYU won this game, 1-0. No, I didn’t really care either. Read the rest of this entry »

UPDATE: ESPN just reported that Locksley will be suspended for one game and docked eight days of pay. Formal announcement forthcoming.

Let’s face it, most of the coaching innovations have from the non-BCS schools, whether it be the spread offense, blue turf, or even grabbing an assistant coach and punching him in the mouth. They’re crafty that way.

Some of you might remember New Mexico head football coach Mike Locksley (pictured!) after he was targeted with a sexual harassment suit almost before he could even unpack his office as the Lobos’ new head coach. And after starting out 0-4, trouble has found Mr. Locksley again.

With Leather has obtained an unofficial copy of an incident report filed last week with the State of New Mexico by the Albuquerque Police Department, citing that assistant coach “Johnathan Gerald” was punched in the mouth by Locksley last Saturday, the day after the Lobos’ 37-13 loss to Air Force.

Mr. Gerald said that Coach Locksley punched him in the mouth causing a small cut on the inside of his upper lip.

Locksley needs to work on his people skills. His hand speed, however, seems to be terrific. See our copy of the incident report, and Coach Locksley’s statement, after the jump. Read the rest of this entry »