D.C. United moving Chris Durkin?, USL extends training moratorium, and more: Freedom Kicks for 4/17/2020

I’m told it’s Friday, so you’re stuck with me for today’s Freedom Kicks. Not a lot has changed: soccer is still on hold, everyone has a podcast or has started streaming on Twitch, or a podcast about how they are streaming themselves listening to podcasts on Twitch.

But some things have changed, and that’s what we’re gonna catch up on!

Report: D.C. United, Sint-Truiden reach deal on Chris Durkin transfer | Black and Red United
Pablo Maurer broke the details of Chris Durkin’s apparently impending move to Sint-Truiden, which we tried to add some context to here.

Speaking of podcasting, Julian Gressel? He’s podcasting!

I also thought it was really cool of the Washington Spirit to use their team podcast to bring on an experienced epidemiologist and talk about the coronavirus crisis while still involving a player (midfielder Jaye Boissiere, whose time at Stanford set her up well to participate here):

USL Extends Training Moratorium | USLChampionship.com
Been expecting MLS to do the same for two days now. Maybe it’ll be a Friday news dump? Either way, totally not a surprise, because having thousands of people watch a game in person is completely unsafe right now.

The 2020 NWSL season can be whatever we want it to be | All for XI
A conversation between me and Steph Yang from AfXI turned into this set of proposals for how to deal with this NWSL season. Isolated tournament in LA? NWSL Decathlon featuring a dog show? We need to get weird if we’re going to have seasons in 2020.

U.S. Soccer closing the Development Academy doesn’t have to be a bad thing | SB Nation
Have you been reading up on all the (sometimes heated) discussion of US Soccer’s Development Academy suddenly going under and wondering what to make of it? Here’s an exploration on what went into the choice, and what might come next.

Puppets, Prosthetics, and Bubblegum: How They Did The Chest Chomp Scene in ‘The Thing’ | Film School Rejects
One of the wildest practical effects in cinema involved dental wax, Jell-O, and remote controlled faces. If you’re at work or don’t enjoy horror movie gore, maybe don’t open this one, but if you want to know how you can make a classic without using CGI, read up.

Alright folks, that’s what I’ve got for you. I just finished a quasi-binge (I’m against full-on binging shows, but knocking out a couple a day is fine) of Castlevania on Netflix, which was mostly fun. What are you getting into right now? Books, movies, shows, crafts, whatever. Let me know in the comments.