SoccerWise - MLS Edition: Midweek Reaction

Episode Date: September 19, 2024

A double portion of MLS action this week so Tom & David are back in the lab to break it all down. With watchability darlings Galaxy & Timbers facing off you knew it was going to be a good match day but who had the biggest win? Who made the biggest jump in the playoffs? And much more to dig into. 5:30 MLS Roster Rule Chat 12:14 Timbers Goalscoring Celebration 20:04 Evander MVP Conversation 24:29 LA Galaxy Question Marks 29:13 Philly Union Turnaround 32:06 NYCFC Struggles 38:40 Orlando’s 3 Game Winning Streak 41:55 Miami’s Race For History 52:14 New England’s Season Circling The Drain 56:08 Sebastian Driussi Hanging Out At Home 58:30 Alan Velasco’s Goal Scoring Return 1:00:35 Weekend’s Top Matches To WatchSoccerwise Live 2pm ET Every Tuesday/Wednesday/Thursday on Youtube/Twitch/Twitter

What's up everybody? Welcome back to SoccerWise. David Goss, Tom Bogert here. Tom, did you want me to warn you that I was going to play the intro song? Did you want me to give you a warning that we were going to start? I don't know how long we're doing this fake cold open thing where you just are going by hitting live on different things at the same time and then it's either dead space on YouTube or Twitter or the podcast recording or something. No, I thought we were just still talking. Tom, we're always just talking. I was told you were going to be sitting and hanging out and playing FIFA the whole show, so I didn't even realize

we were really calling it a show. I'm a big professional, so I'm doing this. But for those wondering that oh fifa doesn't come out until tomorrow well technically it doesn't come out until next friday but if you get a different version of the game you can start playing tomorrow well there's an internet glitch that if you set your xbox location to new zealand you can play it now because it's tomorrow in new zealand because they're time travelers i've resisted that for so long because i was like all right right, I don't need to do this.

But now, like in adulthood, when free time's at a premium, I was like, you know what? I don't have much to do tonight. I would really like to play FIFA. I asked one of my friends, is the New Zealand thing still a thing? He goes, hell yeah, it is. And so I can play FIFA. Probably wouldn't have just said that out loud.

Do you think that I'm going to get charged with something? This is like a no-no. I don't know that that i'm gonna get charged with something this is like a no i don't know that you're gonna get charged but i do think that you gotta think an organization like ea has like fixers and people around the world that could sort of if if ea sports is listening to this sponsor us dm me yeah constant opportunities yeah we're uh we're in, we are happy to play the game. However you'd like us to play and get us involved. But Tom, thanks for being a professional.

I appreciate it. It was a big professional night for both of us. It was a Wednesday night of MLS action, which meant that I went to sleep with five minutes to go in the final Western conference games because Portland's ahead for two LAFC are not going to score. Austin are not going to score. Seattle's up 2-1 on San Jose. You know what? The eyes are shutting. I'm done. I'm out. Little did I know when I woke up, it turned out Seattle was like, you thought we have one more mistake in us to let San Jose back in this game. So congratulations to Seattle for faking me out.

They accomplished exactly what they wanted to do. Is that your Seattle mug? Yeah, I was gonna take a picture of this when I was pouring the coffee and send it to our good pal, producer Anders of Extra Time on Apple TV, the big Seattle Sounders fan that he is and say, hey, man, I got you know, I you know, I turned off the game in the 87th minute. They were beating San Jose. They obviously won, right? Like celebration mug just to see if I could cause a meltdown. And I decided I wasn't going to do that. I think that's really kind of you, and I think that's really mature of you, Tom.

Good karma. Good karma. We're back to zero for the New Zealand thing and now me not being mean to Anders. Just the absence of being mean is kindness. It's kindness when it comes from Tom in New Jersey. Tom's River, New Jersey. Is that not where you're from? It's not close.

Damn it. That's like 25 minutes. That's not that far. Let's not do a performance. In my head, it's like, I know we're speaking to a national audience here. Nobody knows. But that was a team that I played plenty growing up.

So my initial like, no, no, no, no, no. That's not me. Stiff arm that way. One of my close friends now that lives near me. Playing against him since we were both seven. And like, just don't hear it. Okay. Well, if you were from there, you'd be Tom from Tom's River.

Which I'm sure no one has thought of that. And I'm sure there's no Toms there as well. All right, we're going to run through our midweek of MLS action, Topsy-Turvy. We've got our segments that we like to hit every single time we come out of a match day, and then we've got another weekend of MLS action coming up. So hot and heavy here.

That's why we are here on SoccerWise. It never stops. It never stops, and we never stop, and we are here for all of it. So the Discord was on fire last night, just sitting on the couch watching games. And what's fun about it is you have so many fans from so many different parts of the world. And so there's emotion from everyone and then neutral memes from everyone else. It's a really fun place to sit and watch games. So if you want to be a part of it, join our Patreon, subscribe,

and then you get access to our Discord. We are sending out t-shirts to all of our original MVP founders that we have. I believe yours, ours are in the mail as well. Oh, I thought we were going to skip. No, so we are going to be sporting them. We do not have extras to sell. We are working on the store right now. So you can buy them if you are not a subscriber, but get into the Patreon and that's how you get early access to things like that, as well as to our depth charts, which are clean and tight right now,

because we got our second release of the year from Major League Soccer officially of the roster designation. So if you haven't looked at these, you can go look at them. If not, we are putting all of them into our depth charts, which have depth charts for every team, as well as roster designations for the players and salary cap tables, which shows you the length of contracts, how much players are making, how much they take up. There are some cool things in there that MLS is putting out. Kudos to the people in MLS PR who are working on this. This is the type of thing that real leagues have so that real leagues can be covered. It is really nice to see Major League Soccer start to enter that sphere. We'd like to see a little more from NWSL, but I get it. And we are getting there. We didn't get the salary releases with that. That's done by the

MLS Players Association, which is separate. So those will be updated in the depth charts when the next release comes out. But that'll happen before decision day. I don't know if it's like imminent or like a month from now, but like that will happen over the next month. Like this is the time of year that MLSPA releases the data. And for the most part, most of what we have in there is accurate because it's only players who have signed new contracts or new players who have arrived in the summer that will be affected by that. And like a small thing, a lot of these new contracts, like you do it now, like it starts next season for the most part, just because of the way that the salary cap for every team, all of the dollars are budgeted. Plus, like it's prorated and that if you sign like instead of it being like if if let's say the the 600 000 like is your new salary you're only getting half of that for half of the season so

players like they'll they'll just all right we'll do it for the full year starting next year so um yeah for the most part everything is pretty correct on that and we'll see what some of the new signs i missed this over the course of me moving um and so i noticed that today yeah i noticed it today while i was looking through things i think it's cool but i'm curious what other people think uh teddy cudi pietro signed a new contract with uh dc united as a u22 initiative player yes which allows the teams to pay them an increased level yep um we have seen a couple of these the iowa canola one i think was the first one tfc did it blew up in their face obviously along with the galaxy around the forefront of this uh with

julian alvarez good ever alvarez yes but it allowed them to keep those players like they sold out for alvarez for money like they could have gotten more before that but like this is um a way that i that i would like to see the U22 initiative be used as a confluence of bringing in new talent, but also paying your best homegrown players to keep them there a few more years. That's how Kate Cowell, because the earlier and earlier these deals are signed, these players are getting to their second contract, 18-19,

which is awesome, but then makes it difficult if they're excelling to give them a pay raise, to give them the correct pay raise that is fair and makes it worthwhile for them to stay in MLS rather than force their way out immediately. And you look at Cade Cowan, I know that he's not the beacon of player development in this league just because of it.

He stagnated for a little bit, but he got to work through that. He still got the money that came from that contract, still got the transfer to Chivas, and now he's doing better with Chivas. So player development is not linear, and any chance that a young player has to get a nice little pay raise you 22 so you're a fan of this right because i i wonder if there are fans out there who will say the flip side which is like shows a lack of ambition to not bring in a new player from outside the club yeah i i understand where that argument is going but like uh julian al was, I think, the better one for the examples that I could have used.

He was a really good right back in MLS. Julian Araujo, by the way. Julian Alvarez? Jesus Christ. Yeah, Julian Araujo. He was very good. And I don't know if they would have been able to keep him much longer or what would have happened if they weren't able to do that. Or I know we're talking about strategy and business and salary, taking a step back, doing the right thing. This player is vastly outperforming his contract.

We have a way to pay him that won't screw up the rest of our roster. Do it and keep the player happy and show everybody that we want to do the right things at this club. For me, I think it'd be lacking ambition if you did three homegrown players. Interesting, right. Two for two. But I'd rather re-sign a known commodity, somebody that I brought through, somebody that has proven themselves in MLS, than go to Uruguay and spend $4 million on a player who might not work out.

And this scenario with Kudipietro, he is 22. So it's going to work out really nice in that it's a two, three-year deal. Like, he's going to be in his prime on a deal that doesn't hit the cap fully. He is also probably not a player that you're looking at a big number to sell. So he's probably, when you assess your academy and say, like, these are, Matai Akinbone should be sold, right? The rumors are already there to a point where, like, when you assess your academy, you say to yourself, okay, this is a player we're going to make money on. And then this is a player that we want to be part of our core. You go back 10 years.

This is the type of mechanism that a Seattle would have used for Jordan Morris. And Christian Roldan obviously was drafted. But nowadays, he probably would be an academy player. For those types of players to be a part of your core and then be able to build out the spots around them. So I agree with you. It's obviously case by case. I think this is a really nice use of it. Shout out to Kuti Pietro because he's been really good.

And shout out to DC United for trying to fix some of this because they are a mess in the way that they have handled their academy and their view in the market. And it's one of the big soccer markets. It has gotten better. Like the fact that Christian Fletcher signed with them at all shows that it's gotten better i think they handled griffin yeah actually pretty well like it's what's been best for his career which wasn't being at dc united but like that's part of it obviously kevin paredes they handled pretty well so there's better examples now over the last few years of this going forward my only quibble with the griffin yeah stuff is the behind the scenes

story of that was not this heartwarming. There was a lot of pushing just to get him to Westerloof, somewhere where he was going to play, and there was an agreement, and then somebody else came in and said, no, no, no, we're not good with that deal. So it was a very convoluted negotiation for a player who wasn't playing for DC United who ended up leaving for for i don't know if it was free if it was close like the

whole point of that deal was to get a selling percentage and like it did not need to be that complicated love those sell-on previous regime though yeah previous regime love those sell-on percentages uh and we continue on so if you like what we're talking about right now if you're interested about it jump into the. You can chat with us. I'm going to start tweaking our mailbag. Instead of having it come out every Monday with our weekend recap, I think we're going to restructure our shows. And we're going to do a Monday weekend recap that I'm going to get to you earlier that's a little bit cleaner and more concise. And then a longer mailbag episode that can come out on Fridays.

And we might start to sprinkle in some interviews with that but if it's a question like that hits something that interests both of us we'll do it on this show as well that you can only send us through discord or you can chat with us in there and we can talk about all these things as things go along it's been really really fun there as well as those zap charts which you can get which I

will be using very often throughout this show let's dig into our midweek recap we start every time with our best match. Tom, I previewed it on Tuesday by saying the top two teams in our watchability rankings are facing off the L.A. Galaxy against the Portland Timbers. And they delivered. Let's go. Defending, optional. Attacking, elite.

Top tier number tens on their game. you add in a chance third yell at the referee a couple times a good atmosphere a good crowd and this thing delivered uh portland timber is a 4-2 win after the goals this is from the mls comms uh twitter handle after the goals from evander which was two of them yesterday felipe moore and jonathan rodriguez the group of timbers teammates is the first trio in MLS history to each score at least 14 goals for one club in a singular regular season. And they are in eighth in the Western Conference. That's your watchability right there.

That was incredible. I'm glad that you brought up the atmosphere as well because because this is a Wednesday night game in September, right? Like, shout out to the Portland Timbers fans. Like, that place felt like it was a big game and they made it feel like a big game. So I was really glad about that. Thank you to the teams for putting out strong 11s, because as the lineups were rolling in for the 730 and then the 815 game, there was a whole lot of rotation. I was like a little bit worried. I was like, oh,, I was really looking forward to Houston, Vancouver and LA, Portland. What if they're going to go full rotation? They didn't. This was a super fun

game. It was a pretty clear letdown spot for the LA Galaxy after their huge win against LAFC on the weekend. So this was a good time for Portland to get them home. I want to start with Portland, then we'll get to LA Galaxy next. But this was everything that is right about this team.

This is the most optimistic view of this team. Evander's playing at an MVP level. He's one of the best players in the league right now. Jonathan Rodriguez has been phenomenal for this team. Felipe Moura has been healthy and very good. And Santi Moreno is like low-key, like what, their fourth attacker? Now it's crazy, right? Like this was everything that this team could be,

and I think that they will be going towards the playoffs. I don't know how dangerous that makes them because of the defensive deficiencies, but this is a very good team. Think of that first goal. Jonathan, it was a headed clearance by Maxime Crippo, sweeper keeper all the way off the line. A wild headed clearance. Like, a center back moment where he, he like was 45 yards off his line,

tracking a ball that's like slowly looping towards him. Yep. Had disaster written all over it. And then so Rodriguez brings down the ball, plays it, sprays it wide to Evander. And if you watch that highlight, like I was kind of tracking Rodriguez on that rather than following the ball

because I was curious, is he going to go to the back post? Evander can hit him wherever he goes. The run will dictate what the pass is. And he kind of faded out and then made a really hard run between the centerbacks and timed it perfectly in an incredible ball by Evander. And a beautiful, like that goal in and of itself, that's not a lot of combos in this league can do that goal.

This Portland Timbers team, this was a phenomenal performance. of itself like that's not a lot of combos in this league can do that goal like this portland timbers team this this was a phenomenal performance um a game that you really want to have if you're them again for all the reasons of at home midweek galaxy coming off this huge huge win over the weekend against arrival so they should be in a letdown spot and portland timbers took advantage and it was just again i can't say enough good things about the portland timbers and that attacking quartet evander had this and it's been a weird few weeks, right? Evander kept himself out of training, apparently wanted to transfer, apparently didn't want to transfer, but his team slash management wanted him to transfer. It's been a weird couple weeks. him on all the goals he scored where it was like so easy that he was annoyed that he scored them

and like turned around and walked back to midfield there was this like vibe of him looking at the galaxy being like you made me do this to you and like there i'm not saying he's unhappy because he's done this in the past and there are other times where he scores and he's like super excited and he has celebrations and all of that um but there was just like there was so many chances in this game for both teams that every time portland scored except the first one which was the breakthrough and it was as you talked through it it was like not the easiest moment it was this like finally we put that one away i can't believe we haven't put one away already. Finally, we scored that.

And Evander, he's, you know, I talked about him last year saying like, this guy has a ton of stuff to his game. The first thing that pops out is his size and strength. And like, as a 10, it's hard in Major League Soccer to hang in the game. It's hard to show all the skill things you have because you're going to get physically dominated. He doesn't do that. He physically dominates. Then he's got touch. He's got vision. It's hard to show all the skill things you have because you're going to get physically dominated. He doesn't do that. He physically dominates. Then he's got touch.

He's got vision. There's just those little moments, stuff we started to see from Moran Chuck this week of like, oh, there's a four-yard pass. I'll just clip it because it makes it easier for me to lift this ball, and it's effortless for me, so it doesn't really matter. Or I'll just make sure my entire body's facing right so that every time I cut the ball back to the left,

no one knows it's happening and no one sees it coming. There was a few moments where you see like opening up the hips and you're like, I know exactly what's about to happen. And it's not what happens. He was on point. He was on fire. And as you said,

this is all the good stuff with Portland. Like this is what they're capable of. This is what they do, but they get up to zero and then they don't see it out confidently or comfortably and they have to keep scoring. To their credit, they at least understand that to this point. They don't try and sit in and win the game. They bring on Anthony. They bring on more attacking pieces. They bring on Eric Williamson and they continue to push and they get the fourth goal to make it 4-2. And it secures probably their spot in the postseason with the gap right now between the last playoff line in the West going down. But they're going to have to go on the road. They're going to have to win some gritty games. I don't know that they're capable of it. At this point of the season, you can't see a situation where it's like's like oh they can flip the switch and go in to a tight defensive block and they can see out a one zero or a zero

zero you know to get to penalty kicks on the road in the round of whatever with 87 games and series and the nlcs whatever you want to call it going forward so yeah so one thing that i love that's like an overarching theme of this game, this was, like, this felt like international soccer in the best way, and it felt like all fives. And I don't mean that to be dismissive to Vanny and Devil, but just, like, how end-to-end it was, how many turnovers there were,

kind of, in, like, the middle third, and how disjointed both teams looked, and, to my favorite part, how much both teams immediately let's go forward. Like, let's take advantage of this. That's a scramble defense. Let's take advantage. We don't need to put our foot on the ball

and go left and right and slide ways and take our time. That was just vibes. It was like, you know, like all the memes on Twitter of like, oh, game's gone, mate. Game's gone. Where's the game gone? Game's gone, mate. This is the opposite of that.

Game's back. Game's back. I was looking to find like one of those videos of like, oh, game's back. But I don't think that those exist yet. Hopefully the game will be back soon. But that was exactly what I like. Perfect.

Just chef kiss. I don't I don't have a great point of analysis. I just wanted to point that out and have that on the record because it made me very happy. I want to I want to give you a shout out because you put out a piece that gives me sport talking through some underlying numbers and like what's going on in the league. And what's super surprising about it is it's a lot of like top xg overperforming underperforming i just read out that fact of like portland's the first team with three players to score 14 goal they are not anywhere none of them are on this list like they are playing exactly who they are which is they create a ton of chances and they give up a ton

of chances and they sit right there it It is like a fascinating team to watch. What was your, what was your favorite part of that story? Or, you know, what was your favorite? I liked it when you wrote it. I thought it was sick when you like,

you wrote it. And then someone was like, and you were like, and then you said, and then you threw it in their face. So we have to talk about a Vander in the MVP racevp race right now he's leading mls in gold combined goal contributions 32 14 goals 18 assists lucho cosa is number two at 29 right now messy and chicho rongo 28 denny bonga 26 and fifth phil neville after the game he said i've i've said

it since probably the first month in the season i think he's the best number 10 in the league people laughed at me people questioned me people thought i was joking not joking now like this this dude my problem with potentially voting him as mvp and again like i'm gonna think deeper about this as we get towards the end of season plus see where everything shifts can you vote player for mvp for the team that's sitting in eighth place in the conference i don't know but it's not his fault that they've conceded 50 goals like he's been incredible so i don't know, but it's not his fault that they've conceded 50 goals. He's been incredible. So I don't know how to parse that away. Where is your head in the MVP race, again, particularly with Evander? So one, last year on Extra Time, I titled Evander the 2024 MLS MVP finalist Evander. So that's where I stand, clearly, because I can't come off it now when he's putting up the stats

and he's getting there if you zagged to phil neville when you say i said this in the first 10 games and people laughed at me that's fine but when coaches and gms and and cso's are like if you ask if you come out and you're like oh my god uh i'm trying to think of someone right now because there's no americans on this team because i was going to do the like when coaches come out and they're like why is so and so not in the national team when they clearly shouldn't be and then six months later they have a point and they're like why is no one listening to me it's like because you lied before if you just if you are the the boy who cried wolf then yeah we don't really care what you say.

Spoilers. Phil Neville is going to say his guy is the best in all the positions at all the times and that his team is the best. And that's what you're going to get week after week. So awesome. He did it with Rodolfo Bizarro and Gazzal Aguain. He did the opposite. He challenged them. He's like, they need to be better.

Well, they did need to be better because they sucked. Again, another obvious case. Sure. Fair. You can point that out. But he's always got his guys backs but like he's pretty honest in these press conferences and like knows how to put like i don't know i think that he's done a very good job this season and i think that he has merit here because like he has been saying this since

the beginning like the difference between this and miami was because like i was on a lot of those press conferences because it was super interesting to me it wasn't Pizarro is going to be one of the best tens. And it was they need to be for us to be good. It was like a careful consideration. He was challenging them. With Evander, it was no, no, no. I've had several interviews and conversations with him. It's like this is one of the best players in the league.

So he has been saying that since day one. And you're right. It's obvious that that's what he's going to say. But I do think that the way that he kind of the the framing of that versus when he was in miami like i think there's a little credit on that and i thought he did a good job in miami i mean the whole thing it's i called it i call miami a fever dream on tuesday we're gonna talk about them in a moment again like just like nothing about that is a real conversation to me because it's so far outside the realm like yeah sorry phil neville i

thought you did a decent job your team made the playoffs the next year your team was going to sign the greatest player of all time whose friends were going to come play maybe for free maybe for a ton of money we're actually not really sure um so like just do that that whole thing was weird so i think that's fair pushback um the whole like can he win in eighth no he can't he can't because there are players who are close to him like if he was double lucho acosta right if everything that he was doing was outside of the realm of what everyone else was doing then yeah fair if you score 40 goals and your team is terrible you're probably going to be able to win an award i don't think that that's the case with this and i don't think it's tough to be

like, oh, well, you should make them better, right? Evander, why are you not doing more against the ball? Why are you not helping your team? There is really only so much he can do. But I think there's a chance that this team could make a playoff run and it doesn't affect your MVP because the voting will have already occurred, but it would affect the way you assess the end of this season and the rest of what happened for this team. So as we do on every show, we bring up a new player, Alan Sockerweiss, and we say, can X player be an MVP? And that is our headline.

And that's our social clip. So thank you, Tom, for getting there early today. You're welcome. All right. And then let's go to the other side. What did you make of the LA Galaxy's performance? Oh, you're asking me? Well, I think.

I am. Let me offer a mea culpa, which is a new segment you created on the last show where I was challenged saying, you didn't believe in the Galaxy at the beginning of the year. What do you think now? And I said, I won't back down. We're not going anywhere.

I'm sitting right here. And this was the problem, right? This game was indicative of what it is. I won't back down. We're not going anywhere. I'm sitting right here. And this was the problem, right? This game was indicative of what it is. It is now two games in which they've conceded twice in the first 20 minutes of the game, and they have a ton of capability to come back. I thought they were going to tie this game 3-3. The way they played to close out the game, the chances they were creating, I thought Payne still was really good coming back into the team.

I thought they looked dangerous for large segments of that second half. It's why they're competitive. Columbus has proven that in the overarching scheme of big games, they will come back and win. We haven't seen that from the Galaxy. So I am going to question this going into the postseason, no matter what, because of this deficiency and their inability to control the game from the beginning to because it is, it hasn't been proven in big moments and it's hasn't been proven that it's the way to win in major league soccer outside of one team one time. Yeah. Um, this was a really bad Ricky Pooch game. Um, he was kind of all of the bad habits of drifting out of the tactical structure, losing the ball in bad spots and losing the ball in bad spots on like-risk, low-reward passes.

I didn't keep a tracker on how many times he tried to find Mark Delgado in the pocket of a chipped ball between two midfielders who were paying attention and could feel where Mark Delgado was with a defender on his back. So even if you kind of slip it through, then what? He takes a touch backwards and passes it back to a left back? And those are prime transition moments. And because Ricky Pooch is dropping deep,

Delgado is trying to fill the space forward where Ricky Pooch should be. So when Mark Delgado loses the ball, Mark Delgado is the one who's blowing up the transition opportunities. So this was just every bad habit that Ricky Pooch has. They were on display here. There was several moments where, like, he, like, again, all the dropping back, and he would be trying to dictate these one-twos where it wasn't on, and he has this gravity to him.

Again, mostly in a good way. When it's on, it's great, where he's just pinging, he's just running around the field doing one-twos, where it's like, yeah, man, Maeda Yoshida can complete a 10-yard pass. You don't need to go stand next to him. Like, you can just drift the other side, right? And, like, there was a few where, like, Mark Delgado was, like, forcing it back to him or John Nelson was trying to force it back to him

because if they tried to have their own, you know, decision-making and pass somewhere else, he screamed at them. So this was a really bad Ricky Pooch game, and that is what is central to all the questions against the LA Galaxy. And I think this showed, like, why Marco Reus is much more important in this team than I thought he was going to be when they signed him. And my last point here, Greg Vanney in his post-game press conference says,

I think he summed it up the best, so I'm just going to throw it over to him. Greg Vanney, what he was asked is, this was a reality check for this team. I don't know if it's a reality check. I think everybody understands the challenges of this league and competing on the road, and they're a good team. We create our own problems with how we lose the ball and rushing and forcing attacks and

things that don't need to be allowed. We need to allow ourselves time to develop. And he's spot on. Like a lot of those errors were more unforced in the sense that like you didn't need to try that one too at midfield under pressure. You could have kept the ball and then you're giving Portland transition opportunities, which they were gladly taking. And I know Portland gave it back to the galaxy later in the game as well but they were the architects of their own demise here and any anybody that's in your camp

of i don't think they're a serious playoff team a serious contender in the western conference this is the game you point to this is the tape you point to and i don't think that they are this bad but this is the worry that this could show up in a playoff game they could play the portland timbers in round one of the playoffs. Like this could happen. Yeah, true. I think if you're the galaxy, you look out on the rest of the day and you're like, oh,

the reason we would is because everyone, all of these other teams are also struggling, which is my other point in that game. But I completely agree with you. And I think for Greg Vanney, like that's part of the problem. The other part of the problem is individuals. I say this you mentioned maya yoshida shout out he had a moment in the second half where he went up for a set piece and i think he felt like he got fouled and he turns around to jog back and he's just eyeing whoever it was and they finally turn around

he goes don't don't do that again like super calm serial killer level which is what i do and he was just like don't don't try that don't do that again. Like super calm serial killer level, which is what I do. And he was just like, don't. Don't try that. Don't do that again. And I was like, yes. Thank you to Maya Ishida for handling his business on that one. Best match of the game goes there. Biggest win for the playoff push.

I think this one's pretty obvious to me. The Philadelphia Union knocked off NYCFC 5-1 on Wednesday night. The Philadelphia Union scored five goals against a playoff team. Only their second win against a current Eastern Conference playoff team this entire season. They put it in a 5-1. It moved them, I believe, into the postseason, right? I'm reading this correctly. They are currently the ninth-placed team in the Eastern Conference. They sit three points behind Toronto with a game in hand,

and they are tied on points with DC United, but have the tiebreaker over them. Philadelphia, resurgent. I talked about it on Tuesday. No one's going to want to play this team in the playoffs. They are now a playoff team, and I can't even think of a bigger performance. Ty Bariba is hot.

He's feeling good the rest of this philly team feeling good a couple gifts from nycfc but you got to be there to take advantage and philly tried to give a couple gifts right back that nycfc refused to take this um man i think that this says more about nycfc, this is just really, really bad, disastrous from NYCFC. Philly played really well. All credit to them. The frustrating part of this Philly team is this was supposed to be the team that you know what you're getting.

You know what they're really good at. You know what they're bad at. You know what they're trying to do. You know how, you know, the conceits of the game where they'll be at their best or at their worst, right? We are supposed to know all of this. We don't. This team just shows up inconsistently week after week.

They were awesome last night. And then, like, they were awesome in League's Cup. And then before that, it was just weird, inexplicable individual mistakes or collapses at the end of the games. Like, I don't know what to make of this Philadelphia Union team because are they going to replicate this on the weekend? I don't know. They've been so inconsistent.

Their best quality is that everybody below Columbus sucks in the East. That's their best quality. As you say, the nobody wants to play them trope that I hate. That works. Are they better than the Red Bulls, NYCFC,

Toronto? I think so. They could be better than Orlando. Orlando just beat their first playoff team of the season last night. Like, I have no idea what to make of four through 15 or however many teams are on the Eastern Conference right now, other than a couple of the teams all the way at the bottom are really, really bad. And then the teams between them are kind of bad, mostly bad. I don't know. Let's dig into the sort of bad, mostly bad situation. For NYCFC, this is eight matches without a win in a row. This match against Philadelphia was against the teenage goalkeeper with Andre Blake out. And with Jack Elliott suspended, had Nathan Harrell at center back. And then the new Haitian international that they signed to be defensive midfield is still injured. So Leon Flock gets to start in there, which I think is fine. That's like what was on the board for NYC FC playing a home game.

Get yourself right again. Nick Cushing said before the game, we're just one win away. The next win, it's all going to start rolling. We're playing good soccer. The results are not there. You have now not won a match in eight games.

So they're saving grace right now is that Charlotte's the team behind them. And you just mentioned Charlotte's bad as well. And no one wants to move up the playoff standings. And everyone's tripping over themselves to not get there. Except for Philadelphia. This NYCFC team, though, it has gone wrong in a lot of different ways over the last few years. This one feels different to me. Yeah, so for me, it's the's the next one oh we're playing well dude he's been saying that for since tati cassiano's left i'm sick of hearing we've

played fine we just need another win like dude you are who you are at this point like the grace period is gone uh the nycfc fans were pushing out at the beginning of the season he righted the ship things were going better and now they're like firmly back into coaching out all this stuff. Like, I don't blame him. In that like mid-range in the Eastern Conference, this is from Tom Posting Doss. Licensed to post is how I call him. He sent me his own tweet that is really good.

Since June 1st, there have been a total of 37 games that NYCFC, the Red Bulls, and Charlotte have played. They have combined picked up 41 points slightly better than one point per game for the teams that are allegedly what had been four five six in the east to the point where now orlando is up there orlando remember how bad they were at the beginning of the season they were dead on arrival like this is like it's i don't know how many other ways to talk about, like, again, we could get into tactics. We could get into game saves. We can get into, oh, maybe this, if this, whatever, right?

Like, I feel disingenuous if any conversation goes longer than, yeah, but they're probably bad. Or, like, they're not good enough right now. And, like, it's like that with the Red Bulls, NYCFC, Charlotte, and everybody on there. So, for NYCFC, I think there's a few things going on into the stat you're talking about. I think part of it is they're really young, so it's hard to have consistency and be like, okay, we're up and down. These are the guys we lean on. The other thing is we got a message from someone when we did our underrated best 11 last week

where I think we chose two NYCFC players to put into the team. I think it was Matt Freeze and Alonzo Martinez. I stand by that. And someone said, are they the most underrated team? No, the problem is they don't have star players for those players to lean on. Like the question in the whole underrated convo is like,

you talk about some of these teams and some of these players. And for a lot of the players we put in that the pieces have superstars that they operate in orbit with or they can help who can carry their team that is not the case for this nycfc team so they don't have the star power to carry them through bad performances they don't have veteran experience to carry them through the ups and downs of a weird season and for them it's weirder than normal like they don't have a home stadium really they move around they've got all this bizarre stuff that happens they're the only ones that plays at the time windows and on the schedule they play like all this weird crap that

occurs with them they don't have a ton of experience to carry them through it and then you add in the final piece which is okay they've got a lot of potential talent can you make this system the star patrick vier was able to do that with more talent we saw domey torrent be able to do that but with more talent ronnie um diala was able to do it to the talent we saw Domei Tarrant be able to do that but with more talent Ronnie Dyla was able to do it to the highest extent and make it all the way to MLS Cup or win MLS Cup Nick Cushing has not brought that and I think that's the frustration from fans I don't think it's 100% on him I don't think this is a great roster I don't think there's a ton of vision of like how to build good MLS rosters right now for NYCFC from the CFG side coming all the way down.

And you could say the same for Red Bulls. But I think you have reached a point where you've seen similar talent perform better in MLS for NYCFC in the past. So my pushback on this, so I totally agree on the star power stuff, right? On the experience side, I actually disagree. So like maybe some of the ages are younger but a core and we get so santi rodriguez he's a well-experienced player in this league like that should be maybe not like the system is a star and he's our de facto best attack right he should be i guess a little bit more consistent um so even like i think he should be in this group but even take him out keaton parks james sands tiago martin's burke

recent like that quartet that should be what is driving them. They should never be conceding five goals. They should never be throwing away two nil leads. That's supposed, that should be the one thing, the best thing that this roster does. Matt Freeze, again, like, he doesn't have the experience. He's best goalkeeper in the league this year, man. Like, if not the best, then top three. So, so going out that spine this should never happen and that's my disappointment and that's my frustration with this team is that yeah like some of some of those players are younger but like i think that they have plenty of experience around them like for sure the they don't have like a killer you know somebody who's going to challenge for best 11 in

the attack and that is a big problem but you can still be they should be more successful than they are yeah i think a lot of that's fair i think some of it's a little listen tiago martins is not the guy i'm building an mls roster around i'm not putting him in a convo with the best center backs we've seen in this league he's probably in a convo with a lot of the best center backs this year as we've talked about it's been a little bit of a weak year um matt freeze as well awesome great first year that's great he is not matt turner right now like he has not proven it for two years and he is not at that age level experience fine but you are right the five goal thing shouldn't happen and the eight run eight game stretch should not occur with this team uh from the fans i saw online nycfc they had some wild comments about Cushing being out and all of that stuff.

And I think the heat will be there. And I think the pressure will be there. I don't know that it will matter in the standings. Like, they are two points up on Charlotte. Charlotte are sinking tank right now. Toronto are not any more competitive. And the gap between them and Philadelphia and D.C. is too large to really be covered. So they're probably going to finish here and it will probably come down to how

they perform in the post season and how they perform in the playoffs, which I do believe would line them up against Columbus, which has been a super entertaining and extremely unsuccessful matchup for NYC FC over the course. It's too soon, too soon to be doing the, uh, what would the matchup be?

This is going to change 15 times. Maybe. These kind of. Or if nobody picks up any points. The top three and the middle three of the East kind of feel pretty locked in, in which we should give our flowers here to Orlando. We talked on Tuesday and said, beat a playoff team. Like, beat someone good.

They had back-to-back wins, which is awesome. They had done it against teams that were not going to make the postseason and were not in competitive space they knocked off charlotte at home 2-0 um kundo torres scoring goals creating chances charlotte has a first goal yeah charlotte has a ton of issues right now they are very disconnected as a team they also don't generate as many chances as they should i talked a little bit about the way they're using wide players and stuff on the tuesday show but orlando three straight wins for them shutouts in all three as well which is huge to see for this team that was their strength over the last two years it has faltered a bit as they've had to rotate center backs and try and find some more solid play in front of guy a say They've gotten back there as well, and they've done so, I think,

partially because the attack is more dangerous and it's taken a little bit of pressure off those guys. Yeah, this was, again, so they've got, you know, seven wins in the last nine games or whatever it is. They've been really good since Martino Heda has been used as the number 10 in this group. It's not as simplistic as that, but that's the biggest driving force. Martino Heda was very good in this game.

That first goal, he assisted Fagundo Torres. That was just a top quality moment from two designated players. And that's kind of the difference in attack for Charlotte right now. That's the difference in attack with NYCFC right now. Orlando had the track record of how well they were last year. They got better as the season went on. Again, it was really disappointing how they started this year because we hoped and thought that they were going to build

that momentum into this year. They tried to bring in Luis Muriel. They had everything with the Duncan McGuire situation, reintegrating him to the team, bringing in Nico Ladero, trying to figure out, all right, how do the pieces all fit? The best part about this team right now is they know who they are. They know where the best pieces fit. There is no more,

hey, can we play Duncan McGuire and Luis Muriel together? Both of them are the bench right now. Like, Ramiro Enrique started. I know Duncan came on at halftime. And I would like to see Duncan front for goal. And Luis Muriel had the assist on Duncan McGuire's goal. They are best friends now. That's the key.

I know. I know. What if we got a Luis Muriel redemption run over the rest of the season? The Dragon Ball Z. Yeah, so, again, like, I was critical or at least pointing out, like, hey, just let's be careful.

Let's look at who they beat, right? Like, they can't dictate what the schedule is right now. Like, over the last four games, they have Columbus, Dallas, Philly, Cincy. Particularly those three Eastern Conference games, it's going to be really important to me because seating is most important. It doesn't matter what the hell me and you say about, whoa, I don't know if they're really good or not.

But, like, on top of seating, I want to see, what do you look like against bona fide playoff teams? And they play Cincy and Columbus, and let's see how it goes. I think that they are closer to that tier than Red Bulls, NYCFC, Charlotte. Before you start celebrating, that's not difficult to separate yourself from those three teams, right?

I'm very curious to see how these last four games go because I'm back in on Orlando and I really like this group, how it's founded right now, how the attack is moving. They have all the pieces, and let's see if they can continue this run against some better teams over the stretch.

Let's stay in the great state of Florida, the freest state, the freedom state, I believe is what it said when I drove in here. We move from central Florida, is where I'm told, Orlando is located, to southeast Florida, which is where I'm told Orlando is located to southeast Florida, which is where I'm told Miami is located. We had a segment that I created called biggest win for the shield race. The segment was eliminated within a week of me creating it because Miami has locked in. It is now going to be our tracker on Miami chasing the record for overall points in an MLS season. So right now, Miami

are on 63 points. That is 10 points behind the New England Revolution, who set the record in 2021. We have played 29 games so far this season for Miami. So they have five games left. They need to pick up 11 points to set the record, 10 points to tie it. And they went in and got a draw against Atlanta United in what was like a ridiculous end-to-end fun 2-2 game between these two teams. I messaged in the Discord pretty early in this game, like 50, 55th minute and was like, the thing that's hard for me is I don't understand how Miami hangs on to some of these points that they had. And at that point it was like, they're going to win this game and they are completely open and exposed. And Atlanta had numbers breaks where they just chose rather than

playing the right pass or taking the space that's there. It was almost robotic motions of like, there's no way this space is here. So I have to hit a blind ball to the far post because that's what I should do in this moment. And there was a ton of that even from maranchuk who was like hitting early through balls after he'd break through pressure and it's like bro no one's defending you just keep driving and keep dribbling but then he had the class moment the goal uh the curler i messaged you and said look like tiago almada uh just a little taller and more Russian on this one. But it's the exact little bit less sun. It's the exact same quality and style of like, there is this small window that I could put this in. No one else can put it there. And the odds of me getting it there are low,

and I'm still going to do it. And I think I'm still learning his style and how he sort of dictates the game and reacts to the game, but that's pure class. And it was an unbelievable moment. Yeah, that was his welcome to MLS moment. That was great. Like, these are the things that you want to see from him more than honestly even picking up a draw here. Like if they lost 2-1 and Maranatouk had that result or whatever, if they lost 3-2, if Miami

came down and scored, that would be more important than the one point to me because everything they're doing moving forward revolves around is he a really good signing or not. And like Tiago Almada as well, Almada played very well against Miami earlier this season. So, Maranchuk is really just picking up where he left off. While we're here, look, you were patting yourself on the back. I hope your arm's okay. You really were going after yourself about the LA Galaxy take now that they lost.

Do you remember when you unironically asked me, would you rather have Alexey Maranchuk or Pepio? Yeah. I think the jury's still out. What do you think now? I think the conversation's still ongoing. Grow up. I'm sorry.

Did Maranchuk not start for the team that just got smoked by Nashville at home and then should have won this should have won this game. By the way, I know you say the points don't matter. They're one point out of the playoffs. If they had won this game three, two, as they should have,

because of the chances they generated, they would be in a playoff spot today. So I'm just putting that out there and saying the jury's still out. We will deliberate. We will talk. Good thing. Pep VL kept all those clean sheets. He's really been holding things together.

He's the only one trying to hold things together in Charlotte. Saba was good in this game as well. You're starting to see the connection and combination. There was a lot of moments where Daniel Rios was like, why are you playing me the ball right now? Like bounce passes with Marunchek where he's like, get this off my foot. And there was late decision making, which I thought was a little bit of a struggle at times for this Atlanta team.

They should have gotten that should have. They had chances to win. It would have been huge for them. They didn't. Miami hangs on to two. Messi and Luis Suarez come off the bench late on. They also are generating chances and creating big opportunities. A couple of balls cleared off the line for both teams.

And so this Miami team now, they are 11 points away with the final five games of the season. So they go to Yankee Stadium on Saturday. Then a week later, they host Charlotte. Then midweek, they go to Columbus. They follow that up with a trip to Toronto that weekend. Then you get the international break and they finished the season at home to the new England revolution on decision day. Do you have 11 points in there?

Yeah, I do. I think you have four wins with the dropping against Columbus, but I thought they were going to win this game against Atlanta. And to your point of the, you know, I don't know how they're hanging on to all these points. Like the other way too,

like they were up 2-1, and Brad Gazan made a really nice save on Messi, and then I believe it was Amador who made a goal-line clearance on Luis Suarez from 6 yards out. He looked like something out of Les Mis, Amador. He looked like he was in an old Civil War video and was struggling through, but he played well. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

So even these are the fine margins. Miami, look, I said this, like, even, like, these are the fine margins. We're, like, again, like, Miami, like, look, I said this about Portland, L.A., in that this felt like just vibes, no tactics most of the game. Dude, this second half of this game was on drugs. This was, I couldn't believe how many times that, like, there was, like, Miami lost the ball, and there's 35 yards between four players in the back, maybe one defensive midfielder.

Atlanta's going through. They play the ball to Edwin Mosquera, who's in acres of space, and then he just dribbles into a defender, and then Miami go, let's counter, and the first pass to try to break and enter into the attack. They lose it, and it's coming back in. I'm like, what in the hell am I watching? Is this FIFA? I got EAFC out of my brain.

I couldn't believe it. I couldn't take my eyes off that game. I didn't want to watch it. I wanted to take my eyes off that game. I didn't even want to watch it. I wanted to watch other games more because I've seen enough of Miami. And Atlanta is what it is at this point. I wanted to really focus on Maranichuk. Other than that,

this team, whatever. Maybe they finish ninth. Maybe they don't. I don't think that's going to be super consequential. I couldn't take my eyes off this game. So if you have Columbus penciled in as a loss, which I think a lot of people will, midweek, at the second best team in the league, all of that, a team that has stood up and played well against you, the question is where the other points might be dropped or where they need to pick them up.

I'm looking at Saturday. A midweek game, you are going to Yankee Stadium. Like, I don't understand in this scenario even risking Messi, but for sure from the start, I would throw Suarez in that conversation as well. Like, you've already won the shield. I can get pushing for a points record. I think if you're going to do that, you do that at home against Charlotte, and you do that on the road even against Toronto than in this scenario

on one of the worst fields in the league, coming off midweek, coming off his return last week, and at what? He played like the full 90 minutes last week against Philadelphia? It just feels like a step too far for me. Yeah, I understand you think, but they sat. They didn't start in Atlanta. Sergio Busquets didn't make the trip he got his rest like a well-deserved rest he was one of the guys who has been much more consistent

in playing time than i thought he was going to be so well done for him but like all their started their big stars rest like you look at that 11 it was even beyond that um of how much rotation there was so i think that they did that on what's like hey either wednesday or saturday and i think that they said, let's play Saturday. Um, don't know that as a fact, of course we'll see what happens,

but I'd be surprised if Messi didn't start two games in a row. Like again, like we were all pleasantly surprised that he went 90 minutes on the weekend. Like, I think that that shows you that he feels he's, he's ready to be, um,

a regular here, like rather than just putting like the training, like rather than 60 minutes and then, okay, we won't bring you to Atlanta and then we'll build you back up. I think he's good, and I think he'd start. But again, that's no inside information. That's just what my assumption is. Okay, I think from the outside, he wants to play,

and Tata Martino is a madman and is like, everyone should play all the time. Tata will play anyone, anywhere. Tata Thibodeau. Why did he play 90 minutes it was just like not necessary it ended up well he's not exactly he's not exactly covering a ton of that's fair yeah that's a good point it is a an easier load on his body than for other people i think this one's the dangerous one in saying that nycfc as we have said have not won in eight straight games playing at home. Let me add this little fact in here for you, because I wasn't thinking about this.

And so I went and checked. And so the Revs in 2021, they set the points record on the second to last game of the season in a victory over the Colorado Rapids. They finished out the year on decision day against Inter-Miami and lost 1-0 to a Blaze Matuidi, John McCarthy-led Inter-Miami squad. If the points record is set between 74 and 76 points, Lionel Messi and Luis Suarez and Tata Martino can thank John McCarthy for showing up and doing his job for that team. They beat the Rebs 1-0 as Matuidi's goal, McCarthy with the shutout, and that is poetic justice.

Dude, this, again, you joked about fever dream into Miami, like all that, like listen to this 11 that they put out that day as under head coach Phil Neville. John McCarthy, Christian McCoon, Nico Figo, LGP, Lauren Gonzalez-Perez, midfield, or like five midfield, Breck Shea, Blazeman Tweedy, Gregory, poor guy doing all the running here, Indy Vasilev, turns out to be a very good signing, Lewis Morgan, right?

Indy Vasilev, Lewis Morgan, you're starting to put together a roster. Julian Carranza, when he was bad. And Roddy Pizarro. This is a team that can make a playoff run. It is an absurd team. Jay Chapman was on the bench. Kelvin Leardem. This is Drake Callender's bench

for John McCarthy. I'm sorry. That was too good to disregard as I'm just staring at this 11. That's how I want to spend the next 4 hours I just want to look at this 11 and this roster And just let my mind go And the potential is That they are sitting on the verge of that history

On the final game of the season And on the flip side you've got Brandon By Andrew Farrell Matt Polster, Carlos Heal Tommy McNamara They all started that game for the Rebs who have the potential to potentially, with nothing to play for, protect that history.

And that might be on Caleb Porter. That might be Caleb Porter's final job of the year. Defend the Alamo. It's to defend the Alamo and defend that history because this is a Rebs team that's not going to make the postseason. They were up 2-0 at home against CF Montreal last night, and they ended up tying 2-2 and the looks on their faces coming off the field at the end of that game was you could feel like the dead man walking of that may have been

the last chance or the last hurrah and it went through their fingers and you could see them sense that coming off the field in gillette, this was my submission for down bad of the week, New England Revolution. Up 2-0, that game was, oh my goodness, in front of, I don't know, 400 people at Gillette Stadium on a Wednesday night. That was a tough one. Both of these teams were not good. You joked about it on Tuesday that you were excited about what Montreal did

and Kane and Clark and all that, and were like doesn't matter they're just gonna have a completely new 11 and then they did exactly that they were bad in the first half I made it through I think 30 minutes and because I hate myself I put that game on my main screen of course and I was like I'm tapping out I'm gone and then like I'm checking the discord

which I had to like pull my like put your phone down and like pay attention to the screens you have up. Because the chat was so much more fun than watching New England-Montreal. And then all of a sudden it was 2-2. And it's just, like, I got no juice on this, man.

Like, you're up 2-0 at Montreal at home and you can't see that out. Like, Esmir Bauer Terevich was very good. Yeah, scored the second goal. 30-35 minutes I watched. That goal was really good. he was lively every time he's on luca langoni he's looking like a good signing for me carlos hills carlos hill i just don't i don't get it i like that game should have been much more likely to be five nil maybe five one because i don't trust him to give a clean sheet then it would be two two and it's inexplicable. It's inexcusable.

In that article where I did the underlying numbers, the expected goals and stuff, New England are dead last in expected goals. That's a fireball offense. You have Carlos Hill. How are you dead last in expected goals? He alone is worth not being dead

last in expected goals. I don't know how you fix it. I don't know what's going on. The vibes are very bad in New England right now. The fans, again, in our Discord, I was enjoying the nihilism and enjoying all the jokes. That was, I think, my favorite part of the game was the self-deprecating jokes. So the comeback starts with a Tom Pierce free kick

from 35 or so yards out that should be played in as a cross off like sort of the right side of the box, but somewhat central being struck on goal and going in because Iva Chich is off on his right hand side, trying to organize his defenders and organize things. Those are mental mistakes bad teams make. That is a team that's not engaged, that's not locked in. And so you have Caleb Porter coming off the whole, like, the ref screwed us and all this stuff. One, in that, I went on a rant coming off that being like, oh, cool,

so we're just going to call out everyone's mistakes. Awesome. You probably shouldn't concede a goal off a free kick from 35 to 40 yards out in a non-dangerous area. Tom Pierce struck it pretty well, shout out to tom pierce for continuing to be like a left-footed savant every four to five games when lauren quarta lets him play and rotates him back into the lineup but like that is that's that's that is a losing thing to occur for a team that now won't make the postseason in new england let's talk about another down bad of the

week here. Let's go to Sebastian Drusi, who was unavailable for Austin. They went on the road, and they were able to go up 1-0 against LAFC and then not be able to continue it, and they ended up tying 1-1. they are currently the last team out of the playoffs during the game sebastian driussi at home is retweeting fans saying trade seba fire josh i think it's time to move on from driussi and find a decent 10 in the market harrison reese here it's great to see how well we can play without the fraud, Drew. See crying and making dumb trick passes that kill attacking buildup. I don't even understand what he's doing there. Is she like making them look stupid or is he doing that at his own team?

I don't know what goes through the mind. Like I was putting on this maybe it's time to log off for this week. Sebastian Drew, see the easy winner. Yeah, so he retweeted that. He's since un-retweeted them. But my friend, the internet is forever, as you well know. I don't understand the point. When I saw the most recent one, it had Fire Josh in it.

I was like, that's really... And I was like, oh no, it was Drew, he sucks, and Fire and fire like it was more about drucy sucks and that was all the other ones uh very odd to me i have no idea i don't know the motivations there did he think that was better than replying at a guy maybe like is that the thought process i'm just trying to figure it out um eric goodwin goodman the one who i saw screenshot this and tweeted out, who's a producer and sports writer in Austin, followed up by saying a reminder that Trucy told John Arnold, who does a great job and is one of the best, earlier this year how he misses the harsh criticism from fans

that he has experienced in Argentina. So if that was his problem, was fans were being too harsh, then that's a whole other direction he's choosing to go in there. They weren't harsh enough. Don't kink shame him. If that's how he enjoys his life, that's what he needs. And by not making the postseason, he will probably

solidify that for his team and everyone else involved. Let's go to who's back of the week, the bounce back win or bounce back performance. There's a few teams or people you can put in here tom did you have any one that you felt really good about no it's nice to see alan velasco um like not like because we've we've talked about several of the games like i so like i'm gonna go like uh micro view rather

than macro view uh alan velasco being back and scoring that was nice it was awesome so he's played i think twice for 10 minutes off the bench. He played the full 45 in the second half off the bench. He scored the penalty, which they got late on in this game. A bit of a gift. It was fun to watch him, Jesus Ferreira, Pedro Moussa, and Paul Areola be out there on the field. This is a team with no center backs.

Very little cover in central midfield consistently but if that attacking four or five can be what we thought they could be and what they were hoping to build around alan velasco it could be really cool i am saying they are the only team outside the playoffs in the west that have a shot to get in uh and i think dallas is actually going to make a run at this. I don't. I don't. Like, they're five points off. They would have to climb five points. I see

the argument. Logically, it makes sense. Logically, I would loosely agree. Hey, don't rule it out, right? Be optimistic. Sunny outside. You know, it has been two seasons of me looking at Dallas in the preseason saying, this team is ready to take a step.

All these pieces make sense. Okay, last year they weren't very good, but whatever. Like, Peter Moussa, he looked great. He makes a lot of sense with Ferreira and Velasco when he comes back and Ariel and everything else. And then they've been bad on you. And then even with Peter Moussa, they've been better. And then even when it looked like, hey, maybe they're going to pick up

a little bit of momentum, then they're dropping points. I'm not doing it again. I'm just not. They would have to chase Minnesota, who fell 2-1 to Cincinnati after I said nice things about Minnesota. So thank you for that. Minnesota, Yuya Kubo, awesome goal for him as well. Almost had two. Looked really strong in that game.

Yeah, it's going to be tough for Dallas down the stretch. They host LAFC. They host Orlando. They travel to San Jose and Portland, and they host KC. So two teams in there that are not playoff teams, but they're going to have to make up a ton of space. They will have to win one or two of those other games against good teams. It seems somewhat unlikely. As I said, they play against LAFC this weekend coming up in Major League Soccer, full match day on Saturday, one game on Sunday as well. Philadelphia against DC United is that Sunday game. I don't know why, for no reason, maybe so that Eagles fans don't have to watch the Eagles play again. And they just throw it out there every once in a while. I've been doing this

end up in a cell has back to back Monday night games. and I'm like, I don't care. I have no idea why this is happening either way. Some of the big ones for this weekend, I think to circle, we talked to NYC Miami. Columbus hosting Orlando. That's a playoff rematch from last year. That is a good place to test all of what you talked about with Orlando. Are their lines cleaner defensively? Are they able to keep the game in front of them? Are their attacking pieces able to shine in a game in which you have to take advantage of your chances? Because Columbus will score. You will not shut this team out. Columbus able to get a pretty simple 2-0 win over TFC on the road this weekend. So that's one of the ones that stands out to me.

Copa Tejas in there as well. Austin against Houston. Houston didn't get the win against Vancouver. They were really good for 45 minutes to go up 1-0. They were fun. They were dangerous. You know, Griffin Dorsey's flying all over the place. Ponce missed what should have been a goal. He scores the penalty, but that's sort of that line that they're on right now. You need him to perform in those moments.

He misses the big chance. And in the end, they get a one-one draw against a competitive team but it could have been three points for them if he puts it away yeah and i wanted that we haven't talked about this game because it wasn't a ton of fun i was looking forward to that one a lot um and for who's back the week it should have been ryan white new jersey mario gomez back from after his concussion he scores because of course he does all he does is score goals bro so uh that again that was good resiliency from vancouver to fight back um dude houston played just beautiful soccer man again the fact that they are committed to and executing this without

hector herrera the way that they were at the beginning of the season like if there's good soccer aesthetic karma this team would be getting more breaks. I still think that they're very good. I still think that they have room to grow in terms of that execution and putting it all together in points and goals and controlling games even more. But this was a fun matchup. Again, these are two good teams. I would say I feel very safe in saying these are two good teams. Vancouver is another team that I'm looking forward to watching

how they evolve over the rest of the season what is stewart armstrong again due to this team we talked about that tuesday so i'm not going to dive too much further back into it but yeah that was um again portland la and vancouver houston from wednesday were the games i was looking forward to most and again it wasn't wasn't a bad game it just wasn't um you got one one draw on a wednesday ho-hum and again two good teams just playing like a team yeah a little unfortunate not to see armstrong in this last game just because you want to see more of it and you want to see what it looks like and you know they play the galaxy this weekend and this is like a whole different ball game for the galaxy right vancouver

is going to be compact and direct and try and hit in transition. I think that could be really dangerous, but you've got to be efficient with your chances there because you know the Galaxy are going to create theirs. Armstrong playing as a second forward and all of that, that's an interesting option. I can't imagine Brian White's available to start, so there's probably some minutes there to move around. Shout out to Fafa Pico, by the way, because he had the assist.

He's been really good for this Vancouver team with a few injuries where he's filled in yes either as the the nine or the second forward underneath he's played a little wing back for this group as well um he's been a big part of their ability to turn this season around so that Houston Austin game an interesting one for Copa Tejas uh this weekend RSL Portland, I would say the other big one. By the way, Vancouver Galaxy, that's Saturday night, as you could expect. But I'd say RSL Portland, the other big one. I thought that we were going to spend all this time previewing San Jose for St. Louis.

Yeah, we're going to dig in pretty heavily there. Montreal, Chicago. Montreal, Chicago, 730. Pre-game for San Jose, Houston. San Jose, sorry, St. Louis at 1030. There's nothing better to do on a Saturday night on the face of the earth. You really had the exclamation point to just hammer that point home. On that note, I'm just going to let it rip.

I think that's the end of the show. We're going to end on a high. We've got to end there. Tom, it has been fun. It is always a pleasure. Thank you to everyone for listening. Thank you to everyone for listening. Thank you to everyone for being here live as well. We will be back, of course, next week.

The weekend recap, I will come out with Monday morning, and then we will be back on Tuesday to break down all things that happened over the course of the weekend in Major League Soccer. Thank you all for listening, and we'll talk to you again very, very soon.