The Official Simon Dawkins thread

In many different countries across the world, he could gain his citizenship quickly and perform for the national team. IE Portuguese players playing for Angola or Brazilians playing for Portugal or Argentines playing for Italy. Too bad the USA can not extend such opportunites/possibilities to some of the MLS foreign lot. I'm sure many would relish a chance to play for the USMNT.

 

Re: The Official Simon Dawkins thread

Another consideration is playing time. It's obvious that Dawkins is a starter in MLS, but would he be getting those kind of game minutes in English lower divisions? Maybe, maybe not. He's assured of it here. When you consider his most recent health problems, it's may even be more critical for him, in terms of playing time, that he is here. Here, he was treated, rehabbed and is getting game fit as quickly as possible to get back into the starting 11. Had he been in England, if he was a starter and this had happened, the process would likely have been different because his spot might have been filled by another eager, young player. If I am not mistaken, this was an ailment that would have afflicted him regardless of where he was. The only real difference in England would have been that the team would not have been in the middle of a season, assuming it would have occurred at the same time.

 

Good article on Tottenham's global partnerships and their impact on the club.

http://www.cartilagefreecaptain.com/2011/6/30/2249852/tottenham-hotspur-team-partnerships-sandro-internacional-simon-dawkins-san-jose-earthquakes

 

LoL. Little do they know........

 

Bitchin Camaro. I still want a DP or two.

 

I'm not sure why but I have a funny feeling that the Spurs will call him back when the trasfer window ends/begins in September. For sure in January.

 

I believe we have him until the end of our season.

 

I guess thats better than nothing.

 

Hope the Quakes keep him for a few yrs. I think it may help to stabilize the team.
Hope Doyle doesn't screw this up.

 

At this point, it's up to JD. If he makes a reasonable offer, I'd imagine Harry could be persuaded to let us keep him. He is still far from robust -- I mean he's only played in 19 of 30 matches this year (I'm including friendlies and Open Cup), so I tend to doubt that the Spurs would likely consider him ready for the punishing EPL schedule...

 

IMO, at this point in time Dawkins has two chances of cracking Spurs top 25, slim and none. Talent-wise he just doesn't have what it takes to play for a top level Premier League team. If he was to return to Spurs it would most likely lead to a loan or sell to a lower division team.

 

"it's up to JD." Worse words may never have been typed.

I hope that we do keep Simon, but I also hope that JD doesn't get to make that call. I want a new GM making that decision.

That said, Dawkins has had a lot more impact for our team for a lot less money than Geovanni.

I don't see Spurs wanting him back. Didn't they sign him just before loaning him to us? And he's clearly a bit on the fragile side. Not to mention which, he's probably not good enough for the EPL.

Now if we could just get a full season of healthy play from him ...

GOOOOOO QUAAAAAAAKES!!!!!!!
Fire Frank and JD!!

- Mark

 

..and therein lies the rub.

It seems that some players are just more susceptible to being injured, and tend to fall into one of three buckets: 1) players who never seem to get injured, 2) players who occasionally get injured and miss say a handful of games a year, and then there are 3) players who get injured fairly frequently.

Guys like Donovan (has he ever been injured?) and DeRo seem to never get injured somehow. Those guys are 1's. Then there are guys who occasionally get injured, like say Jason Hernandez. Then there are guys who seem to get injured a lot. I would say Dawkins is a 3, and unfortunately Ike Opara seems to be one also, at least so far in his young career. Sealy is a 3. Eduardo was like a 10. He seemed to get injured lacing up his boots.

I think the Quakes should consider injury-proneness when they build out their roster. It could potentially give them a bit of a competitive advantage. That said, Dawkins is good enough that I would be glad to see him return. But seems like he's been a 3 his whole career. Maybe he can work with someone to reduce his injury proneness. If he can stay healthy, play a full season and put up some very good numbers, I would think that would get Tottenham's attention.

 

Our whole freaking team needs to work on fitness.

My short, and realistic recipe for a team turnaround.

1. New GM and new Coach. (Not open to discussion on this.)
2. Permanent fitness coach.
3. Keep roster turnover to a minimum.
4. Continue to draft well.
5. Add some scouts and find bargain players in overlooked countries. (Or, places where we can just afford to sign players.)

This means that Lew and John would have to spend some cash to buy out Doyle and Yallop's contracts, but the experience would mean that they don't sign coaches to more than two year contracts in the future. A fitness coach would cost the team more money, but it would save us on medical costs and improve our on-field performance. I think this one pays for itself. Scouts would cost more, but maybe you just hire some guys already in place. We need better relationships with agents and scouts that are already in the business.

Looking for bargain players should be axiomatic for any MLS club, our especially.

GOOOOO QUAAAAAAKES!!!!!
Fire Frank and JD!!

- Mark

 

Just a theory, but I think there's more to injury proneness than just fitness, though that's a factor. I think there's a predisposition factor, based on how a guy plays, body type, what kinds of risks he takes, and sort of an instinctive ability to "fall right". I think there's a bit of an art to it the last one. Some have it and some don't.

I don't think Simon has the "fall right" thing, but maybe more significantly his body type seems to be problematic - lots of problems with his legs, including that weird injury he had earlier in the year where his calf muscles basically started to grow too large for the surrounding tissue. But maybe he can mitigate at least the physical stuff with the right kind of training program.

 

Sure. Also, the frequency with which you play against the likes of Dema Kovalenko or Cam Weaver can be a factor.

I don't think that fitness alone will be a huge factor for any given player. However, we worked hard on fitness at the start of the 2010 season and had comparatively few injuries. This season, we did not work much on fitness and we've had a ton of injuries. I think that good fitness is a huge help when you look at the whole team, as opposed to any given individual.

Also, Dawkins was a known injury risk when we signed him. This is standard procedure for JD. He signs risky players all too often. We should be scouting durable players, but then our scouting blows.

But, back to the JD and Frank signing risky players issue. They have done this since the rebirth. In '08 we signed Hucks, when we knew that he was an injury risk. RO'B too. And PJP. And ALM. And many more. Signing rookies, or guys from USL, or the Caribbean can be a good strategy, but when it's your only strategy it increases the risk of these signings. So in '09 we signed Weaver and Campos, and we needed for one of them to deliver. We should have signed one or the other, or even both Weaver and Campos, but we should have signed a proven target forward from Central America, or Eastern Europe (there are some big tall, strong target types in Eastern Europe and Scandinavia). We don't have to sign guys from the EPL and Bundesliga, though it would be nice. We need to sign guys who more of a sure fire bet to perform than high risk guys.

And that's all on JD and Frank.

GOOOOOO QUAAAAAAKES!!!!!!
Fire Frank and JD!!

- Mark

 

There are lots of different types of fitness. A player can be endurance fit and yet not strong nor metabolically well. Most of our players have decent soccer specific fitness, but they don't seem fit. In fact I find it a bit of joke that they talk about nutrition and a healthy life style in schools since most of them don't seem to understand that.
That said, Dawkins is fouled unmercifully and unlike a player such as DeRo or Donovan, he gets zippo protection from refs. With these refs, I don't see why any players except thugs want to play here.

 

Renteria's is the best

 

Last one by the Houston player is good, too (being objective that is, but I don't want to be objective.)

 

Dawkins had a good goal, but this week goes to Renteria.

As for Dawkins fitness, I think the term "injury prone" is a very overused term in modern soccer. A player with a history of injury is not necessarily injury prone. Trend is not destiny. For some players, they are so large and clumsy or play such a risky game that they are probably injury prone. However, for most players, a lay person almost certainly lacks the information and the training to identify the real indications of injury risk. The doctors in places like Milanello and other clubs actually study these things and try to determine what the risk factors are for different injuries and try to determine how to spot them in their players. Milan's doctors discovered some effective methodology for identifying knee-injury risk in their players and Milan keep it a closely guarded secret to maintain a competitive advantage. Clearly if the medical staff at other clubs have trouble figuring out what Milan's doctors keep so secret, then it may be a good indication that most of us are talking directly out of our posteriors when we call a player injury prone in anything but the past tense.

Maybe Dawkins is injury prone, and maybe he's just been unlucky. It is common for players to have periodic injuries throughout their careers. Some randomly suffer from more or less injuries than what the average player would, but even if they suffer from a lot of injuries, it may be a completely random outcome, rather than being predetermined by some unspecified "injury-prone"-ness.

Considering that he is a class above any other quake when it comes to composure in possession and skillful dribbling, and that he is a good passer, who makes good runs and has good finishing skills, I don't want the quakes to lose him. If quakes are going to play a good possession game, they need players like Dawkins who can hold off challenges and maintain possession in tight spaces. Besides, he is also young, so as a player going forward, he has real value in the future as well as the present. If he can play for the quakes on a reasonable salary, then I really want to keep him, at least until we can find a players with the kind of quality and composure on the ball that Dawkins has shown.