News: Revs trade Feilhaber to Kansas City for Allocation + Draft Picks

See the irony that a lot of people miss in Benny disappointment is if you have high expectations for someone you must think they are pretty good at what they do, or at least capable of meeting those expectations. If I thought he sucked, I wouldn't care. I had high expectations for Benny and he failed to meet them here. If he succeeds at SKC, great; it will shed light the cause of failure was the coach or inferior level of the other players and not Benny himself. Or, he won't succeed and people will provide excuses why. He is in probably the best situation to succeed in MLS, playing for Vermes so I can't imagine him not being successful.

 

Yeah, I was. Given 2 other teams passed on him I just was skeptical he would perform well for the revs and lo and behold after 2 seasons he is out the door.

I agree with that writer, the truly great players don't need the 'right' situation, they can make any situation right. Thats what I would expect from a guy with Feilhaber's talent, experience and salary. Benny can't do that or he would have found a way to succeed here regardless of the talent around him, hence why I was critical of the move to pick him up. He may have been the selection available on a silver platter but just like Philly and Chivas knew, he wasn't going to justify the salary in MLS.

All I care about is the revs being successful on the field. He is no longer a rev so good luck to him elsewhere. Time to move on.

 

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Well let's be honest here, you've ripped Benny from pillar-to-post here on a number of occasions. I'm just pointing out that I think, as well as others, that he wasn't as bad as you keep telling us he was.

 

I can't argue with you that he didn't quite live up to expectations. But I honestly don't think he deserves the scorn of being this "uncaring" or "underperforming" player, because the team he played on was literally utter shit. I know a lot of people (including you), have waxed on about how great players raise the level of those around them. To me, I think that is largely an overused saying, especially in soccer. The influence a great player can have on a team is largely dependent on the quality of the players around them. Name a single "great" player in the league, or any league for that matter, that is surrounded by crap, and lifts his team into a winning status. You can't. Benny was surrounded by utter shit for the two years he was here. I've already explained tactically why I think he was ineffective on this team, and that it had far more to do with the horrendous back line, so I'm not going to go into a long diatribe about that again. But I honestly think Benny was not nearly as bad as a lot of people, especially you suggest.

Was it his time to go, though? Probably. If I were him I would have asked out of this shambolic team anyways.

 

You watch, he will do very well on a well conceived team. We have seen over and over how people leave and are suddenly effective when carefully plugged into controlled spots where they can achieve: Seth Sinovic, James Riley, Jenny Mansally, Daniel Hernandez, Adam Christman. Benny is way better than the ones I mentioned, so he should make a big splash. And, he'll burn us in a game too.

No, our parts are assembled ham-handedly. We are a Frankenstein assemblage of random parts.

 

Is that Kenny's wife?

(Sorry couldn't resist)

 

Maybe he is now a she?

 

I guess I'm used to watching Steven Gerrard will Liverpool to so many victories the last decade, so it's probably unfair to place that type of expectation on anyone else.

To give you a MLS example, for a short stretch Perovic was a player of that quality when he was here. In the middle of 2010, literally no one was scoring goals besides him and that team was arguably worse than either 2011 or 2012. Sure, it's a small sample but big picture, I'm thinking of guys like that who will rise to the occasion and have the intangibles to put the team on their back and will it to victory when the going gets tough. What I'm talking about isn't coachable, it's what's inside the player. You usually see it in their performance, no matter where they go, the team wins.

Maybe it's a harsh analysis of Benny, but I'm never going to lower my expectations or make up excuses about the external environment for the most talented players.

 

I think what bothers me most about Feilhaber departing, from a Revs team perspective, is I don't really have confidence in Toja as "the guy" in central midfield. I understand it was a small sample size and he hadn't played in a long time prior to signing, but he didn't really show a ton and for him to struggle to get in shape for 2 whole months was worrying.

The only other options are Nguyen (who IMO is more effective on the left side given his tendency to dribble rather than pass), Rowe (who might not be ready for that move fulltime at the pro level), and Caldwell (even moreso). Basically, I'm hoping the Walter Martinez signing is for real and is Bilello's deal he hopes to get done before January.

 

Point is he without him, it would've been 4 wins.

 

But even still, Gerrard has been surrounded by: Xabi Alonso, Fernando Torres, Jamie Carragher, Sami Hyppia, Mascherano, Milan Baros, Djibril Cisse, Lucas, Reina, Sissoko, Arbeloa etc...They had quality up and down some of those squads.

But the team really didn't get much better with Perovic. Maybe marginally by the end of that year after they had added Stolica, Joseph was healthy, Osei before he went crazy...then they went on a decent run of form. And sure, Perovic was the best player during that stretch...but the team still sucked. He couldn't lift that god awful team to any new heights just as Benny couldn't do these past two seasons.

I totally see where you are coming from, and someone with that much talent should be looked at with higher expectations than other players, but they still shouldn't be scapegoated. Benny wasn't the problem. The crappy squad was.

 

and without Benny, I'm sure this team would have had less points than they had this year, too

 

Well, they did bring back Dorman and bring in Cisse to sit a bit deeper. So, it's not just about Toja. I think he will see an expanded role wider than central actually. I also think Rowe will see more time centrally. I am still a believer in Rowe. I think he will have what it takes to be a solid contributor in the middle of this team even as early as this year.

 

You should google "kitten eater." Bob Kraft's name doesn't come up, but a Canadian politician does. True story: In an election a few years ago he called his opponent "An evil reptilian kitten-eater from another planet." I didn't realize Bob Kraft was elligible to run for office in Ontario.

 

Bob Kraft paid Google to alter search results. It's known that he is the most devious kitten killer in the world.

 

Clearly - and I acknowledged that, rather than spun it.

My point was that when you hire a coach to turn around a losing team with few resources, it doesn't make sense to judge too much on the first year, since often all that can be accomplished is laying down a foundation for the future.

I saw a number of positive things that leaves me more hopeful than the last few years.

But, there are clearly still some major question marks about Heaps and his staff, about whether he can start producing better results (i.e., points). I think we'll get a good sense by June/July.

 

I agree, but within the context of what he wrote, he wasn't wrong.

I think things have gotten slightly better. There was a lot to turn around and change, as you said, so it is still hard to know what the actual direction is. And I don't necessarily say that as an indictment on Heaps, as some others have tried. I know you and I have different opinions on the possession of this team and of the back line, but I think in context of where this team was, it is certainly in a better position now than it was when he first took over. Will it be good enough or positive enough to keep moving forward? That is the real question that will only be answered next season.

Yeah I agree with that. There is still a certain amount of roster turnover that is happening with this team. So, I think it is reasonable to expect that they could drop points early on next year as they build team chemistry. I just hope that excuse isn't relied upon to heavily, or deep into the season.

 

This is it. Players like Gerrard aren't always "game changers" per se, they're force multipliers on their respective teams. If the surrounding cast is not of sufficient quality (exhibit A: NE Revolution 2010-2012), the force multiplier is less effective. I don't think that this takes Benny off the hook for his performance, but it is a mitigating factor.

 

Ha ha ha both yoo guy velly, fuh-neeeee.

 

I dunno, conditioning aside, Toja showed me a level of pedigree that you don't see every day. To me he seemed like a keeper and a player who just needs to adjust to MLS. I am expecting bigger things from him.

 

After watching every Revs goal from 2012, I did notice that there were at least a few goals that were scored off rebounds of shots from Benny. So those are goals he contributed to, even though he didn't get credit on the scorers sheet.

 

You guys went to MLS Cup four times. Your team has not "sucked on and off the field for pretty much it's entire existence." The Red Bulls (among others) would love to have your track record on the field.

Granted, the last couple years have been bad. But for awhile there, you guys were the envy of most of the league, with Twellman, Dempsey, Reis, Ralston, Noonan, Joseph, etc.

 

This is New England, where if you don't win silver, you are out of the sports conversation.