My biggest curiosity for this year is how we will play when Acosta is not in the game. We didn't figure out how to adjust last year and we were usually disjointed and uninspiring. He runs a ton on tiny little legs that get kicked a bunch so he'll have to come out of games early and he'll likely have to miss a few games due to kicks either to him or when he does it to retaliate and yellows build up. I have to admit, I'm a bit nervous.
I suspect we'll be about the same as LeToux can spell Acosta. He doesn't have the speed, but he's plenty able. Given how little we are paying for him, he's going to be a great luxury this year (that will probably interrupt the development of Buescher unfortunately).
I'm not sure I've ever noticed LeToux playing that type of position in his many years in the league, but man what a difference for the defenders between those two Just in height if nothing else.
My biggest concern for this year is team defense. Kemp's defending has never been his strength, and now we have De Leon learning a new position on the opposite flank. Then you have Franklin trying to learn a new position at center back. Set piece defending is going to be a big challenge without Boswell. And then you have Sarvas as the last line of defense in front of the backline. The guy is old and it was already obvious last year that he was a split second late to a lot of plays, resulting in a lot of cards. Hamid and Birnbaum will need career years to offset some of these obvious problems. And we'll need to continue scoring lots of goals like we did at the end of last season and during preseason. If we ever hit a rough stretch where the goals aren't going in, I think this team will struggle big time. I just don't think they're built to grind out many 1-0 and 0-0 results.
I'm worried about both when he's out and when he's in because of the five positions in the spine of the team we have two good players: Acosta and Birnbaum. (Two good players playing in a position they have played in anyway) Sarvas is a year older and wasn't always solid, Jeffrey and Vincent are journeymen with little technical ability. Worried that Franklin will take a long time to adjust CB positioning and marking. More optimistic about the attack for the first time in a long time. Hopefully we can get the ball to them. Also optimistic a year or 2 down the road but maybe we'll get lucky and Buscher and Harkes will solidly contribute this year. If they do, then we'll be in decent shape. Overall I feel like the middle of the field continues to be a weak spot and will keep us around the 4-6 spot with an early playoff exit again. If Levien is for real and we get cash to spend in the summer. A big time DM would be my 1st choice by a long way.
I agree ... That upgrade over Sarvas is a drum I've been beating since before last season. I wish we would have gone after someone like David Guzman who I think will be terrific in Portland. But my shopping list at this point also includes a center back. If Boswell was not the answer and if we refuse to give Opare a shot at the starting lineup, we should have dropped at least one of them and find a different solution in the market. I am very worried with Franklin back there. What I saw of preseason didn't really comfort me.
If Levien was for real when he's talking about this summer he would have picked the VERY low hanging fruit right now and bought out Chris Rolfe's contract. That would have given us a couple of hundred thousand in salary budget to help bolster the roster. But apparently he wasn't even willing to spend that money. So when he talks about signing high dollar DPs, um, yeah, right. My only caveat to this comment is if somehow "doing the right thing for Chris" meant keeping him on the roster - if that some how gave him access to doctors or rehab or something that he wouldn't have had otherwise, OK, then I take it all back and kudos to you DCU for doing a player right. But somehow I'm pretty sure this was just Levien being a cheapskate... As for the big time defensive DP, I have at times thought the same thing. If you got the right guy, someone who didn't just fit the spot skill wise but was a real natural leader (I'm thinking Ryan Nelson type), it could really turn this team into something. The flip side to this though is Chris Durkin. I think that's his spot and everyone in the know seems to rave about him and he seems a little further along already then expected (went from we'll let him be with the U17s all year to now we want him around here all the time) so do you get the DP in the one spot where you've got maybe a real breakout star
When he was paired with another forward he almost always played in the withdrawn position. Not too far off of what we have with Acosta.
Well if Acosta can't go tomorrow, there are plenty of interesting options to take his place, unlike last year.
If Acosta can't play, I'd like to see Neagle get the nod. I know he's not a perfect like for like sub, but honestly none of the other options are either. I think being the team's leading scorer last year should earn you that much.
One think I saw too much of last year that I don't want to see again is Marcelo/Jeffrey being bypassed by attackers coming down Route 1, forcing them to chase and make tackles from behind - which led to many a direct kick from dangerous spots on the pitch - often just outside the box.
Okay, I was nervous at minute 4 (when I got inside) ... and terrified for most of the rest of the minutes. Missed him bigly. Ugh, that was not good going forward.
I saw Steve Birnbaum hanging out with his gf at Paradise Springs Winery (Clifton) yesterday....so yay for me.
I dunno, Thor Lee may have been let go too soon, I mean could he have really been that terrible if they kept Peay?
Ben Olsen says Luciano Acosta remains day to day with ankle injury, questionable for NYCFC trip this weekend #dcu #mls— Steven Goff (@SoccerInsider) March 8, 2017
Acosta will help, but the team's top goal scorer from 2016 is a 20 minute bench warmer who probably won't replicate those results. The second highest goal scorer is cold as hell and third and fourth highest goal scorers from 2016 aren't on the team anymore. More than half of Acosta's 11 assists were to players not on the team anymore. It's going to be interesting to see who steps up, and does so with the consistency of an Adi/BWP/Espindola (when he was good) because I can't see it being Mullins. The team seems very vulnerable to injury. Acosta, Sam or Nyarko go out and we will sputter more dramatically than other team's in MLS. On defense we can't really lose Birmbaum or Hamid at this point. It's a bit unsettling that we basically need everyone accounted for to be at a rank 5-10 team level.
I wonder if we'll see the beginning of the end with Sam, Franklin and Nyarko. And certainly with Sarvas and I guess Boswell too. This team has really fallen in love with the 30ish year old MLS veteran under Olsen. The result is almost always the same. We tend to get one great season out of them. Sometimes maybe two. But never three. It's a trend that goes back to De Ro, EJ, Espindola, Saborio, Rolfe, Russell, Thorrington, Saragosa, Parke and so on ... This makes it hard to really get the team to have a peak year because just as you're ready to take that next step, there's inevitable holes that open up on the team. It's a constant one step forward and one step back. If you look at this entire Olsen/Kasper era, it's hard to see an overarching vision and identity. It's always as if the strategy is to bring random players in and have competition for minutes. And over time hopefully the cream rises to the top and we ride that wave. But the good times are never sustainable. De Ro wins MVP one year, and the next year it's over. Espindola, Rolfe and Silva work some great chemistry for one year, and the next year it's done. The fact that we can't sustain a system, or chemistry suggests that those few bright spots are just luck. Basically throwing crap at the wall to see what sticks. What if that Acosta/Sam/Nyarko/Mullins chemistry late last year was just another brief stretch of luck?