Mexico vs. USMNT 2015 CONCACAF Cup Photo MEGA-POST!!

I am happy and very lucky to say that I photographed the Mexican national football team for the second time this year. This match, however, was more important than a friendly as Mexico faced off against their CONCACAF rival USMNT. At stake was the berth to represent CONCACAF at the FIFA Confederations Cup to be held in Russia 2017.

The weekend began with a visit to the Rose Bowl in Pasadena for pre-match day training photos and the press conference on Friday, Oct. 9th. Kickoff was at 6:30pm the following day at the same venue in front of a sold-out crowd of just under 94, 000 fans (75% Mex, 25% USA), many of which arrived nearly five hours earlier for the tailgate parties.

The atmosphere from both sets of fans was incredible and electrifying thanks to both teams providing an entertaining 120 minutes of football. In the end, Mexico sealed the victory at 3 – 2 thanks to a golazo from Paul Aguilar with two minutes left before penalties.

Complete photo album of pre-match day training & press conference for Mexico.

Complete photo album of CONCACAF Cup match day featuring USMNT (2) vs. Mexico (3).

A selection of photos from both albums is below. Enjoy!

Mexico’s pre-match day training and press conference at the Rose Bowl:

Inaugural CONCACAF Cup match between Mexico and USMNT for CONCACAF’s spot at the Confederations Cup in Russia 2017:

El Chapo Guzman Escapes Maximum Security Prison Yet Again

Photos From Mexico vs. Ecuador International Friendly Match

The national teams of Mexico and Ecuador met at the Los Angeles Memorial Coliseum on Saturday March 28th for an international friendly match. Mexico won the game 1 – 0 thanks to a goal by Javier “Chicharito” Hernandez, his 39th for the national team which moved him past Cuauhtemoc Blanco as Mexico’s second leading goal-scorer.

It goes without saying I attended and got some great photos in the process. The full album of photos is on my flickr. Below are some of my favorites from the event.

Spot me with my camera behind the goal

Bellas Artes, Zocalo and the Paseo de la Reforma

These are the last set of photos from my trip to Mexico. I spent the last two days of my trip at the Palacio de Bellas Artes, the Zocalo (Main Square), and the Paseo de la Reforma. There are more photos HERE.

From Mexico City To Teotihuacán

I skipped the last day of the Vive Latino festival for good reason: to take a trip to the city of Teotihuacán de Arista. The city is home to the Pre-Hispanic City of Teotihuacán, an ancient, Pre-Colombian city important to the Mayans and Aztecs such as the Nahua, Otomi, and Totonac people of southern Mexico (the exact information is still debated by scholars).

The ancient city includes many large and important structures such as the Avenue of the Dead (Calzada de los Muertos), the Pyramid of the Sun (Piramide del Sol), Pyramid of the Moon (Piramide de la Luna), and many others.

Unfortunately, my trip was cut short by a sudden and powerful thunderstorm that occurred the moment I step foot on the summit of the Pyramid of the Sun.

Below are some photos of my journey from Mexico City to Teotihuacán. The full set can be found HERE.

Tlatelolco & the Plaza De Las Tres Culturas (The Square of Three Cultures)

The Plaza De Las Tres Culturas in the Mexico City neighborhood of Tlatelolco is one of the most important historical sites in the country. The site is known by that name because it is home to the three cultures of Mexico: Indigenous, Spanish, and Mestizo (Native & European descent). There’s a large stone slab that marks the area as the “painful birthplace” of Mestizos and, thus, the birthplace of modern Mexico.

It’s also the site of Tlatelolco Massacre of 1968. Thousands of students convened at the plaza on October 2nd of that year to continue their protests against the policies of president Gustavo Diaz Ordaz and the PRI. Military snipers fired at their own servicemen in order to provoke their attack on the protestors. The exact death toll is still unknown but numbers vary between 30 to over 300.

I spent a few hours at the site shooting photos. Click here for the full set and a few of my favorites below:

The Politics of Identity and the Chavez/De La Hoya Fight

Back in February, I spoke with artist Ernesto Yerena for an interview that appeared in Remezcla.

One interesting tidbit that I was unable to include in the article was a portion about the boxing match between Julio Cesar Chavez and Oscar de la Hoya in 1996. Yerena talks about how the fight exposed him to the complexities of identity among Mexicans on both sides of the US/Mexico border, which he lived near in El Centro, CA.

Listen to the audio below:

Not Dead; Just Busy

I’ve been in Mexico since last Saturday, March 22nd, and have enjoyed every second of it. I’ll be here until April 2nd when I’ll fly out of Mexico City and into Phoenix, AZ for the Mexico/USA game.

Below is a photo from a neighborhood in Tonalá near Guadalajara, Jalisco. I spent three days there before moving on to Mexico City with the main purpose of covering the Vive Latino festival.

More updates soon.

The rise of El Tri-Levisa and the war for Mexico’s football federation

This story originally appeared on Voxxi.

As the Mexican national team took out its World Cup qualifying frustrations on low-ranked New Zealand last week, Sports Illustrated journalist Grant Wahl took to Twitter to describe the months-long drama as “the best telenovela ever.” He may be more correct than he realizes if sports journalist Miguel Pazcabrales is right.

Pazcabrales has outlined in his column Los Demonios Del Deporte what he believes is the return of Televisa’s hand in controlling the Federacion Mexicana de Futbol Asociacion (FMF).

Much like the return of the Partido Revolucionario Institutional (PRI) to power, the conglomerate is the ousted hand of power that has returned to rock the cradle.

“I no longer believe that it’s a coincidence,” exclaims Pazcabrales, “that every time the World Cup draws near, Mexico is always at risk of not qualifying.”

He cites as evidence El Tri’s rescue at the hands of Javier Aguirre from the failures of Sven Gorak-Eriksson and Enrique Meza and the intervention of Manuel Lapuente in the run-up to the World Cup ‘98.

The current managerial crisis that has seen four managers take over El Tri in a little over a month is an exaggerated, almost cartoon-like version of Televisa’s past attempts at creating drama on a national scale with football as its main protagonist.

Through shrewd, opportunistic maneuvers, the largest multimedia company in Mexico (and second largest in Latin America) has worked behind the scenes to “rescue” the federation and the national team on various occasions, purposefully creating a real-life soap opera surrounding the country’s pastime in order to advance their profits by controlling broadcasting rights and bombarding Tri fans with merchandise, advertisements, and more.

The current version of this manufactured crisis begins in 2011 with the appointment of Jose Manuel de la Torre.

Two successful years as coach came to an end in 2013 after a dismal record in the CONCACAF qualifiers and the Confederations Cup.

Luis Fernando Tena took over for one game and Victor Manuel Vucetich lasted two games before being forced out by the FMF (the circumstances of which are incredibly suspicious) in favor of current coach Miguel Herrera.

Herrera, his coaching staff, and his squad of Club America players were loaned to the FMF by its owners to secure Mexico’s place in the World Cup. Unfortunately, this telenovela has more groan-inducing twists than every film by M. Night Shyamalan combined.

Plot twist #1: Televisa owns Club America.

Plot twist #2: FMF president Justino Compean is a former employee of Televisa with stints as head of Club Necaxa and, the cradle of Mexico’s soccer universe, the Estadio Azteca. He was promoted to the biggest seat in the FMF thanks to the collusion of Televisa and its competitor TV Azteca in a bid to protect their mutual interests in football revenue.

Plot twist #3: Billionaire Carlos Slim, owner of TelMex and America Movil, has made numerous maneuvers into Televisa’s territory. He recently purchased Estudiantes Tecos as well as shares in C.F. Pachuca and Club Leon. This gives him extra clout in the FMF (league owners have a vote/say in the FMF’s operations) and the broadcast rights for their games, drawing the ire of Televisa and TV Azteca who were the league’s broadcasting duopoly for many years.

Plot twist #4: Jorge Vergara is the owner of Chivas de Guadalajara, Club America’s fiercest rival. It was long-rumored that Slim was interested in purchasing Chivas plus a few of his other properties. Vergara’s revolving door record with his club’s coaches mirrors the current situation with the FMF.

Plot twist #5: De La Torre coached Chivas (2005 – 2007) before his stint with El Tri.

Plot twist #6: Vergara was Herrera’s most vocal supporter as Vucetich’s replacement.

Mexico’s greatest footballer Hugo Sanchez said it best in a recent column for El Universal where he spoke out against the owners and higher-ups of the FMF for treating his beloved sport as nothing more than a toy for them to make money off of.

“The saddest part of this story…is that people are oblivious,” he said, “and they continue being manipulated and conditioned into believing that the players and the coaches are to blame for this crisis we have befallen. They are absolutely mistaken.”

Unfortunately for Sanchez and Tri fans everywhere, only Televisa knows how this telenovela will end.