Here are just a few opinionated tids and bits prior to a busy week of Senior Legion Baseball’s final regular season stretch, Silver Knights, and, of course, the NHGA State Amateur Golf championship:

First, let’s take a look back at the recent stunning loss by the International Soccer Club of Nashua Eagles in the United Premier Soccer League’s semifinals at Rivier’s Merrill Field.

In case you missed it, the Eagles had a franchise best 7-2-2 regular season, and a bye into the semis with home field advantage. But they were knocked out by a 3-6-2 (regular season) Ole FC team out of Connecticut. How?

Well, here’s the deal. Ole FC managed to win a prelim and quarterfinal, but was not exactly the same team that struggled during the regular season after beating Nashua in the season opener. Its general manager, Rodrigo Cruz, has successfully operated three UPSL teams to titles in his career, and made sure his current team would have some new blood before the playoffs.

“It was a different team,” Eagles coach Eusebio Marote said. “Their manager (Cruz) has won the UPSL in regions for three teams. He’s an experienced guy, and he probably called in some reinforcements. They’re a good organized team. Credit to them.”

At the same time, credit to Marote and Eagles GM Jeremy Zelanes, because they, too, had some players join them midway through the season, including Samuel Latona, who scored their only goal in their 2-1 semis loss. They have players coming to them to seek to play, instead of the other way around. The franchise, including owner/president Jarod Barbosa, plus Zelanes made the decision to go with a younger team. They hired Marote, who is one of the top coaches regionally and even nationally at the junior college level at Northern Essex in Haverhill, Mass., with that move in mind. It worked to the tune of two straight semifinal appearances, and the second one at home. Another step. Now the next step is to win a semi and perhaps a New England Conference title.

As they are finding, easier said then done, but this is a team/franchise in the area certainly worth following.

—- Can the Silver Knights make a push for the playoffs? Going into this past week, they needed a winning streak, a push. The season is now six weeks old, and once again they had to recover from a bad start. This is a better team than the ones that missed the playoffs in 2021 and 2023, especially offensively. The problem has been mainly middle relief. The key in any FCBL game – pretty much a theme throughout baseball – are the final three or four innings.

But here’s the thing, and we’ll keep making this point over and over: Let’s cool it league-wide on the incoming freshmen numbers. Yes, some of them are successful – Nashua has had plenty, including this year with hitter Owen Carey. But there’s too many. We’re not saying teams shouldn’t have them, but seven or eight is waaaay too many. Please, please, please, FCBL owners, in the off-season sit down, discuss it and cap it, say, at four allowed per team. True, you’re not going to have the experienced lineups of the NECBL like you did in the pandemic summer of 2020 when the FCBL was the only league operating in the region. But the acceptance of some of these players at times is pushing quality in the other direction. If you were at last Saturday night’s game, you know what we mean.

—- Yes, Celtics CEO Wyc Grousbeck said the team ownership measures its profit in parades, not dollars. Well, if you believed that, then we have some land for a new arena we can sell you. Parades are nice, but a sale involving part or all of $4.7 billion – that’s the value Forbes has placed on the franchise – is way better, don’t you think?

—- Speaking of the FCBL, keep an eye on the future of the Brockton Rox. We’ve questioned that before, especially after ownership also placed an independent Frontiere League team there. At last look they were averaging below 1,000 – 917 fans in 26 dates, and have sent out a mailer with two free tickets. To just break even in independent league baseball, experts say you need close to 2,500-3,000 fans a game.

Now the college league business model is so much better, but it has its limits. The Rox? Because the pro team has dominated Campanelli Stadium, they’ve had just nine home dates – averaging 125 fans per game. It can’t be a good situation, because how much money is ownership prepared to lose?

—- If you have a chance, head up to Concord Country Club this week to check out the best amateur golf you’ll see all summer with the New Hampshire State Am championship. It’s the closest the event will be to the Nashua area for the foreseeable future. That’s because the sites for the next four years are as follows: Rochester Country Club (2025), Cochecho Country Club in Dover (2026), Mt. Washington Resort Golf Club (2027), and then Bretwood Golf Club in Keene (2028). Yikes. Holy Mileage, Batman.

– Sad to see the passing of regional college and high school throwing events coach extraordinaire, Ed Daniels, who was a 1970 Nashua High School grad. Daniels, who was 71, a great guy and true gentleman, has been a track/cross country coach in various positions at Southern New Hampshire University for decades, and also coached in high school (Londonderry the closest). He’ll be sorely missed by the track and field community and everyone he came in contact with.

Tom King can be reached at tking@nashuatelegraph.com, or on X, formerly known as twitter, @Telegraph _TomK.