Yeah plus he's scored more for the nats than Magee during this last cycle... Anything he gives us this season will be a bonus. Who was actually counting on him to contribute after all? He'll have a chance to integrate slowly when LD leaves for national team duty.
I'm probably alone in not being overly enthusiastic on Rogers this year. He has great speed and foot skills, but he couldn't hit the back of the net if his life depended on it (just look at his blown opportunity just seconds into the MLS Cup.) And as a defender he's not fit to shine AJ Delagarza's shoes. His giveaway at the top of the box close to the end of the match very nearly cost us the Cup (compare that to AJ's heroics saving us from two near certain goals). I certainly feel much more positive about him than I did a year ago, but as to all the talk about him being the best fullback in the league, he's not even the best fullback on our team.
no but he has improved immensely and is easily our best option at LB. I think he will only get better and better since defending is mostly about experience. Hopefully he learns to keep it simple and just storm down he pitch and put crosses in.
I think Robbie is benefiting from the fact that we mostly had pretty low expectations for him, particularly playing an unfamiliar position. No one should be surprised that he didn't pot a few goals; that pretty much has been his history in the league. What I did see was a willingness to learn and improve and some athletic ability that coaches can work with. Comparing him to AJ is not fair to him as AJ was (in my view) the most valuable player on the team. But he doesn't stack up badly against the average MLS left back, and that's with relatively few games under his belt in that role.
imo, AJ is the single smartest defender in the entire league. Poor kid, if he had the physical gifts of Omar I think he would have been easily the USA's starting CB. Although his sharpness probably comes from making up for his size...
RR did a damned good job in the position and his whoscored ratings are better than any left back in the league. He was consistently dangerous and was rarely bested by any opponent. In the Cup the midfielder was forced to switch sides because Robbie had him blanketed. Granted he had a dangerous giveaway but our dp defender actually cost the team a goal. He also was a big contributor to the possession game and shape of this team and was a big part in bringing the Cup home.
He certainly has the speed to excel and his effort getting back is very good. I agree that with some experience, he will be one of the top fullbacks in the league.
I'm impressed by how often RR can beat his man and get to the endline. His ability to beat guys on the dribble is excellent. His final ball is still dire. I remember right after Gyasi's goal we had NE on the ropes. Rogers got free in front of goal and passed a shot toward the keeper. Minutes later, he gets to the endline and shoots the ball Ronaldo-hard across the goal mouth. Nothing new, but I'd like his final ball to be a bit better by now.
I can't claim any great expertise, but it seems to me that the dire final ball has been the RR story for a number of years. While I can see him improving positionally as he learns the ropes and gets more minutes as a left back, my guess is that the dire final ball is one of those "what you see is what you get" situations. Once in a blue moon there will be a great cross or shot, but those are like lightning strike - near-random events. He can make a contribution as a defender and become an important cog in the machine, but I think we will need to look at other positions to provide that final ball.
RR is a speed monster and like MP9 says he's really good at beating players and getting to the endline, something Dunivant could never provide. OTOH his passing/crossing in the final third has sucked for many years now (we won't even get into his "shot."). The question is can his passing in the final third improve after being mediocre for all of these years? I've told this story on these boards before but when it happened it was an eye opener for me so I'll repeat it. I was coaching a Durham-Chapel Hill select team of 13-14 year olds and we were doing a drill where they took the ball to the endline and crossed it into the box. When we started the drill is was just downright embarrassing. Like I mentioned this was a select team, not a rec team, and had a lot of talented soccer players many of whom went on to Division I or lower division professional success later. But their crosses were going all over the place --behind the goal, into the side netting, or 15 yards over or behind the teammate I had running into the box to receive the cross. Or they mishit the ball and scuffed it completely. The ball went everywhere except where it should have gone. Sort of like RR's crosses now that I think of it. Except our miss rate was 100%. Literally. Not one of the crosses came close to connecting with the guy in the box. After 15 minutes of this demoralizing exercise I was baffled. So I sat down with the kids and asked them what they were aiming at. They said "the box" - we are trying to hit the ball into the box. But it wasn't working. Then something occurred to me. I was a pool player at the time and there was a saying in pool "aim small, miss small." It meant that when shooting a ball into the pocket don't just aim at the pocket - it's too big of a target. It's actually about twice as wide as a pool ball, on recreational pool tables at least, and aiming at such a broad target doesn't focus the mind enough. Instead you should aim the ball at a particular spot at the back of the pocket. Your target needs to shrink from a vague 3" gap to a very specific 1/16th inch spot at the back of the pocket. You won't always hit that exact spot, but as the saying goes, when you miss the spot usually you will "miss small" and make the ball anyway. So I decided to try the technique with the centering drill. I started the routine again and this time I told then I wanted them to dribble to the end line and center the ball as before but this time to not aim for the box, or their teammate in the box, nor even at his head. I wanted them to pick a particular a spot in the middle of their teammates forehead and aim for that specific spot. They were asked to mentally picture hitting that exact spot on his forehead every time they centered the ball. Well I wouldn't be telling this story if it didn't work. And wow did it work. These same kids were now getting the ball in the box probably 90% of the time and getting it close enough to their teammate for him to get a shot off maybe 2/3rds of the time. They were 14 yo, they weren't going to do it perfect every time! So we went from a 0% success rate to maybe a 60-70% success rate just by changing the way they viewed their task. Small change in process, amazing improvement in execution. All of this brings me back to - I wonder what RR is thinking about when he centers the ball?
I agree with this. I also encourage you to note the crosses that literally any EPL fullback puts in this weekend. Spoiler alert...its not gonna be great. It's a low percentage play that not only requires a quality cross, but also the right run from the striker, a good finish from the striker, and failure from the 4 guys trying to stop it.
It seems to me that his defense has actually gotten quite good. I've been surprised at how rarely he gets beaten, and I think his positioning has been very good over the last 2-3 months of the season. On top of that, his combination play in tight spaces, working the ball out of the back, has been very good. He did have one bad give-away in our defensive third in MLS cup, but he has been surprisingly consistent for us. Frankly, I don't put a lot of stock in whoscored and their player ratings and assessments.
@JBZTV is spot on. Walker is about as attacking of a fullback as they come and I can probably count on two hands the number of really good crosses he's delivered since getting a starting job. It's such a low percentage play. Off the top of my head Roberto Carlos, Bale and Cafu are the best I've ever seen crossing a football from the fullback position. With Bale he's a good example of why you don't see many because these days those players don't stay fullbacks for long. With modern tactics a fullback who just whips in crosses 90% of the time isn't good enough anymore. The regularity of the direct wing forward means your fullbacks typically have a lot of space and it's almost a waste for them to be constantly whipping in crosses. Your better fullbacks will use the space, read the movement and look for a more precise pass or a driven ball across the box. That's what Rogers can improve, not really his crossing. When he interchanges with Keane/Donvan and comes inside that puts defenses on the back foot much more than a lame cross. Given that he plays for the Galaxy clubs are already defending in numbers against us anyway and it's much easier to defend. He needs to take that opportunity to get inside the fullback more like he did in the final and almost scored, or at least when takes on players outside to try and beat his marker. He's come on a lot but that's his problem at fullback, he's way too predictable at times. He should look at AJ he's not a natural fullback but he's actually much more dynamic going forward and Rogers has the ability to be more dynamic. ...... Speaking of good crosses, Cafu.
Side note - I'm happy for Rogers and I bought his book last night, but JEEEEZUS. When a celebrity releases a book it makes you almost want to stop following them on twitter. My time line has been inundated by his book tweets.
SoCalYid: I take it Roma doesn't score much given the announcer's reaction. As for the cross itself, I am kind of "well it depends". Obviously it worked for who Roma had in the game at that point in time in front of goal and as such was a sublime touch. However, I don't see it working for Keane or Donovan in the box at all and not when the Galaxy seems to have Gyasi play on the posts (to clear the middle). Perhaps if Gordon is in the game. Actually, I think the crosses that work best for the Galaxy tend to be either low and directed between the 12 and the top of the 18, so that a player running on, (e.g. Hasidic, or Sarvas) has a shot or to the far post.
That's just intense love of the team my man. By the way, get your tweets in. I'll be on my account tomorrow at 4pm EST / 1PM PST answering your questions. Use the hashtag #HeyRobbie pic.twitter.com/TVNEodBPuN— Robbie Rogers (@robbierogers) December 20, 2014