If multiple people are waxing poetic about the days of Dominic Oduro screwing up everything he touched, I demand that BigSoccer bring back the neg rep button.
Hey at least Oduro sucked with flare! Bruin sucks in a workmanlike manner! If you're gonna suck, you can at least entertain the fans with your suckitude!! In other words...Bruin even sucks at sucking!!
This reminds me of something I have been meaning to ask - Keeping in mind that I started following the Dynamo around the end of 2008 or beginning of 2009 - Was Brian Ching ever that good of a forward according to what many of you think of Bruin? Many of you talk about him as a Legend -which in all fairness I also think he is . Now Will Bruin puts up similar #'s to Brian Ching's during his Dynamo Tenure. Here are some stats not counting Ching's last year on the Dynamo and not counting Bruin this year since it wouldn't be fair. So Ching's 7 years to Bruins 3 so far. Bruin 2011 (rookie): 5 Goals 1 Assists Bruin 2012: 12 Goals 4 Assists Bruin 2013: 8 Goals 7 Assists Total: 25 Goals 12 Assists Brian Ching 2006 - 2012 (7 years) Goals: 56 Goals 21 Assists Bruin is already above Ching's average in a Dynamo jersey and if MLS quality forwards have taught us anything (Wondo - Mcgee - Saborio) they tend to get better with age. Bruin is 24 years old he will be 25 this year around playoff time and I don't think his numbers are really that bad. I think what really makes us a little upset is that he has chances to score and his "potential" is there and he should have even more goals. I say give him a bit more time then we will see what he really can do - Also keep in mind $135k is not a lot of money for your starting striker - There are so many MLS Forwards getting paid more money while doing less matter of fact we have one on this team.
The major issue with comparing stats like that is alot of what makes Ching a legend doesn't show up on the stat sheet.
I threw that Tidbit in there yes but I am not saying Bruin is legendary because of that. I am simply stating if we judged Brian Ching then by the same standards we are judging Bruin right now was he that good of a forward? Bruin will have his chance to show us more he is still growing and is cheap.
Ching had an impact on games whether he scored or not. He controlled the ball well, kept the ball alive on goal kicks and punts by using his head to knock the ball forward and he distributed very well with both his feet and his head. He was also someone that defenses HAD to be aware of at all times. He was not Lionel Messi, but his on field contributions were far greater than Bruins.
Brian Ching was an all-around player. He was also hurt a lot which did hold his totals down some. Go watch the 2006 & 2007 playoff highlights to show you what Ching could do.
Bruin 5 I agree the pairing just might not work. Here are the numbers: Bruin, 14 shots, 3 goals. 1 assist, 539 minutes Barnes, 22 shots, 0 goals, 1 assist, 527 minutes Not the biggest Bruin fan out there, but how come Giles is cut so much slack?
I've said it before and I will say it again. The problem isn't Bruin. He scores at an ok rate for an MLS caliber forward. It's his partner.
Brian Ching was a clutch player who scored key goals at critical times. Many of those clutch goals came from his head. Bruin is a more durable player who does not have much aerial presence. Bruin's a smart player and passes the ball well and creates opportunities for himself via good movement. However, he has not improved any other part of his game especially the aerial part. Commonly in close games when the team is desperate for a score we have an opponent packed in and we have to dump crosses in. This was when Brian shined back then and where Bruin struggles now. Yes Barnes needs some criticism too but he fills a different role that is harder than staying central all the time like Bruin gets to. Ngwenya, Kei did this stretching work well and resented not getting more credit for it as the paired hold up striker got the most glory like Ching or Jaqua. Barnes and Bruin need to both get some results now or the pairing needs to be discontinued.
two MLS finals, four conference finals, and more than several semifinals that Bruin did not play particularly well or score. Barnes was very poor in the game against KC last year. We need clutch players. Examples? Aurelian Colin, Rimando, Keane, Donovan, Gonzales, Dempsey or Rico, Hall, Davis from the Dynamo. Boniek will get back there and I think Warren will develop into the next Rico.
Others have said it, but the big difference from my standpoint is what the player contributes when he is not scoring. Ching contributed plenty. Even in the last couple of years you could see the impact he had when he came on as a sub. He held the ball up well, he got teammates involved, his passing was clever, etc. With Bruin, if he is not scoring then he is pretty useless. He can't hold the ball up, his passing is generally poor, he can't run with the ball at his feet, he ranks among the worst defenders on set pieces on the team. Ching was quality. Bruin is an average poaching forward at best. I see nothing with Bruin that leads me to believe he will ever be anything more than that. In that sense, he is an okay #2 forward or as an option off the bench. As the #1 forward, though, not so much.
Because Barnes offers a lot even when he isn't scoring, unlike Bruin. Problem with Barnes is he has been playing more like a midfielder than a forward as of late. Sense I get is he is short of confidence at the moment as a forward so is reverting to what he feels most comfortable with. In a perfect world, the Dynamo go get a forward who can play alone up top in a single striker system. Drop Barnes into a CAM spot and go either 4-3-2-1 or 4-2-3-1.
After all that I have witnessed in Houston pro soccer over the decades. I have arrived at this same conclusion Bill. I live a much happier life nowadays I must confess. Or perhaps it is me viewing things different now. Now that my oldest son, a U.S. Marine, could be headed for Poland/Ukraine and a possible world of death and destruction depending on the fuking Russians. So football results in the league table just don't mean what they used to for me when he was 12 and us geared up in wildcatter naranja being berserk followers of all things Dynamo football.
Didn't he have the lowest scoring percentage per chance among starting MLS forwards last year? Or some similarly bad comparative statistic? I disagree that he is an "OK MLS forward."
He had what Opta terms as the highest number of quality scoring opportunities in the league. Because he blew most of them, he had by far the highest percentage of blown quality scoring opportunities in the league. His overall goal scoring efficiency ratio was pretty poor last year but it was good in 2012. 2011 was roughly the same as 2013, but he wasn't a full-time starter in 2011 so I suppose you have to take that with a grain of salt. It is still early in the season so I'm not entirely comfortable judging yet whether he is the guy of 2012 or the guy of 2013, anymore so than I was comfortable with saying "he's back" after the first two matches. Still, given this is a contract year you would kind of expect to see a better overall performance; especially as bad as he was last season.
Then please name another starting striker making $130k that has more goals and assists than he does. Is he our savior and solution? No. Do we need and deserve better? Yes. Quality costs a lot of money however. Bruin will keep growing he reminds me too much of Wondolowski who actually didn't start peaking until after 26 years old - remember he scored 3 goals only the first year after leaving the Dynamo.
Our missing piece is a DP striker. This has been documented for three seasons now by many analysts, and pundits.
Exactly - We want/need steak we have Chicken wings - Why are we expecting our Chicken wing to taste like Steak?
And because Bruin and the Dynamo have tried to pass him off as steak. Last season he was talking about scoring 25 goals. This season the Dynamo PR machine went into full preseason drive about how much he has learned, ready to be a leader on the team, going to rebound with a huge year, etc. I agree he is an average forward, and frankly in MLS an annual goal return of 8-12 is still pretty good. You don't see many players getting above 15 goals a season. That is starting to change, but for the time being 8-12 per season is nothing to sneeze at. Just that a better forward put in the same spot as Bruin last season would have had 15-20 goals.
I think it's more like we want our chicken wing to grow into a full chicken (very huge tasty chicken) and feed all of our hunger for goals!!! Yep, that's it!!
Doesn't have to be a DP just have to cast a wider net...... Remember I kept ranting and raving about a guy named Vicente Sanchez. 4 goals in 280 minutes for Colorado. For $130,000 less than Vicente a year (and $100,000 less than Barnes) there's 'El Cubo' Torres with 6 goals. Both Sanchez and El Cubo with their ball control, technical ability would make great strike partners for Bruin. Why aren't we getting sniffs at these players? We will always get the SPL/EPL type player/forward (Dalglish, Ade, Driver, Barnes, Tony Caig, guy that chose Portland instead)? How about Emanuel Villa? (He played at Derby)