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So you think you can be a professional soccer player?

Keyvan Heydari thought he could too. Almost did. Now some 20 years after he first tried, after he covered six World Cups (starting with Mexico 1986) as a journalist and broadcaster, after he contributed to outlets such as NPR, The Miami Herald/El Nuevo Herald, The Washington Post, L’Equipe, La Gazzetta dello Sport, Paris Match, Univision, ESPN, Gol TV and Telemundo, not to mention a couple of soccer books published in Italy… he wants another shot.

After the jump, Heydari delivers part 3 of his exclusive dispatches from a place where, yes, even a 45-year-old has a chance to live the dream.

Caribben Dream

PART 3
(read parts one and two)

by Keyvan Heydari

No matter how fast you can run, the brain and the ball are even faster.

It’s an important factor to consider, and now that I am facing two-a-day workouts to prepare myself to play pro soccer at 45, my brain has to be my advantage. Not to discount my body. Indeed as a diabetic, my mind must be acutely aware of my body—the everyday diabetic in a lot of ways much treat their body as if a professional athlete.

The body produces insulin, a hormone that aids the transport of blood sugar into cells where it can be used. My pancreas does not produce insulin, so I inject it several times a day. There are other hormones which affect this balance of blood sugars, including adrenaline, which raises heartbeat, blood pressure, and sugar in a fight or flight response. Although most people identify diabetes with high blood sugar, which over an extended period causes your body chemistry to become acidic- a condition called keto-acidosis, the real life-threatening problem is the low blood sugar. The brain runs on sugar,  so if your blood sugar drops, the brain starts cutting back on functions, just as if it was closing departments.

SOCCER IS BRAIN FOOD

So I am doing a balancing act of insulin and food. Sometimes I get it wrong. I believe years of playing 3-4 times a week have kept me relatively healthy and young, and certainly free of the complications many diabetics have. Not to say I haven’t had my issues.

Normal blood sugars are in the range of 70-150 mg/dl. Sometimes mine can go up over 300mg/dl if I don’t keep close control or don’t inject after a meal. But the situation that is really scary is when it goes low. If it drops even slightly under 70mg/dl, I can become incredibly jittery and then disoriented. Imagine drinking five Red Bulls at once or sucking down a 32-ounce coffee. At a certain point, low blood sugar will cause you to break into a cold sweat. It’s largely a guessing game; heads or tails, I can’t tell which way my body will fail.

When the blood sugars are low, one gets short tempered, stubborn and I can talk nonsense. For example, broadcasting for Gol TV a few years ago, I was talking about Roberto Carlos sending sizzling low balls into the box and my broadcast partner, Phil Schoen, gave me a strange look. I took the cue, left the studio and drank some juice. Then I was fine. But I was in a pattern where morning lows caused my brain to shut down basic functions, and the left side of my body was paralyzed, and I couldn’t get out of bed without falling, much less calling the paramedics.  Through a series of events related to this, I lost my job at Gol TV.

Which in a lot of ways brought me to Puerto Rico. You can find most of anything found in U.S stores. But I pack some special foods just in case: figs, Arugula, Italian parmesan cheese, Danactive liquid yogurt—things I eat and feel that keep me running smoothly and clean, even if it’s just due to a placebo effect. I always remember the South Korean World Cup team,  though, whose players fell ill in France 98  because the French diet was fatty and so different from their typical regime.

LANDING IN THE CARIBBEAN

I have never been a morning person, but forced myself through 1-hour training sessions with the ball when I woke. I played games or more put myself through more training every evening. The running was torture. I had to relearn skills with the ball you don’t normally try, much less in pickup games. Profe Bonilla, an old-timer Uruguayan and a physio, recommended no weight training. I deferred to his experience, for he said there was not enough time to reap the benefits in a preseason and the weights would leave me stiff. He also did a test and devised ball exercises to increase reaction time and agility with the ball.

My opportunity came with the Puerto Rican pro soccer league mid-season break. I could sign with a team and did, the worst of the eight-team pack, Humacao, who also had – in my opinion – the least attractive uniforms. Humacao had one victory in hand, but many of its defeats were 6-0, 7-1 affairs. So I knew a defensive midfielder would have plenty of work to do. When you have those kind of results, as many coaches say, defending starts with the forwards, but I had been told the goalie and the central defenders were a huge problem. At mid-season, Humacao brought in three 20-year olds from Pachuca’s system and a 45-year-old from the U.S.

Puerto Rico is going through a soccer boom. Connected to the rest of the world via satellite TV, the sport has taken hold. City mayors, seeing that the local pro baseball league suspended operations for lack of fan interest and the participation of soccer was growing among the youth, turned many baseball stadiums into soccer fields. The main one is Juan Ramon Loubriel in Bayamæon, home of the Islanders. Hiram Bithorn Stadium, a mecca for Boricua baseball, is now the home of two teams in the PR pro soccer league.

Until my player transfer was official, I needed to stay active, staying fit and getting acquainted with the team. My first training session was with the Carolina Giants. My friend Jorge Viggiano, who runs the biggest soccer club in the Caribbean, called the coach, told him I needed to bolster my fitness and sharpen my touch and he invited me in. Plus, I needed to get used to turf, as 4 of 8 teams on the island play on artificial surfaces.

After doing some interviews at the Islanders training in Bayamon, I got a ride from Andres Cabrero to the other side of town to train with Carolina. I remember that Puerto Ricans have an inherent niceness to them. Imagine getting someone to drive you from Manhattan to Queens after training even if traffic is a nightmare. Cabrero is the playmaker on the PR National team and the best young talent in Puerto Rican soccer, with good vision and moves and we had plenty to talk about.

Cabrero in action:

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Cabrero and I went to the same school in Puerto Rico, and we were trading neighborhood stories and match notes of the WC qualifying matches against David Suazo and Honduras. He is getting little playing time with the Islanders, but Cabrero thinks Colin Clarke is toughening him up for international and USL play.

In the San Juan suburb where my childhood idol Roberto Clemente was born and where he is a patron saint of sports, my professional career began, walking past the statue of the Hall of Fame Pittsburgh Pirate into the locker room. I sat back and took the temperature of the room: listening, learning, figuring out who the leaders and slackers are as they look at you and wonder who you are, understanding the inside jokes they have been repeating over months.

In the Carolina locker room, details were encouraging: towels and training gear for all the players, showers and a trainer to wrap player ankles. The trainer protected a broken toe I got about a month before. Players and coaches will tell you that little details make a big difference. Carolina isn’t a big club, but you could tell they had the support of the city behind them. The US-based players were making about $1000-1500 month, and some of the local were getting meal and gas money.

My first practice. We ran 5 kilometers of sprints and jogs, always with the ball, then stretched, had some shooting practice and then played small sided and one-touch games. There was a combination of local and foreign players. Standouts included Nick Webb, a Pacific Northwest native who had played for the Vancouver Whitecaps of USL before landing in Puerto Rico in midseason. I called a USL game where Webb played; now we were on the field together. Guys I had seen before, like Christian Turizo and his twin brother, Mauricio still have great skill.  One of them played in midfield and the other up front. I still can’t figure out which played where.  The Columbian brothers grew up playing street ball in Barranquilla and New York, something called “bola de trapo” and their skills and smarts showed it.

Even with these talented players, It didn’t even take a whole practice to realize Carolina had a serious problem. The starting goal keeper was hurt and they had neglected to sign a backup. You know the rare occasion when the keeper and his backup are thrown out of a match and a field player has to fill in? Imagine that for a whole month. That’s what happened to Carolina. You can feel when players are not motivated.

It rained the whole evening, but the old-style Astroturf at Roberto Clemente stadium absorbed it all. I was afraid my shooting would be way off target, sending a ridiculously wayward pass or some other sign of being out of rhythm, but I managed alright. I found it comforting that the team captain, an Argentine named Fidel, was also over 40. But the 42-year old was a central defender, and I am a midfielder. Could I last?

Heydari after his first practice

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banner photo of the author with the… coach of Argentina’s national team?