Ben Olsen

Discussion in 'Houston Dynamo' started by quiznatodd_bidness, Oct 29, 2022.

  1. ElNaranja

    ElNaranja Member+

    Houston Dynamo
    United States
    Jul 16, 2017
    Been around long enough to know this won't work.
     
  2. quiznatodd_bidness

    Houston Dynamo
    United States
    Apr 14, 2020
    Why? What defines as “working” to you?
     
  3. juvechelsea

    juvechelsea Member+

    Feb 15, 2006
    are we judging the two lead jobs by differing timescales? the GM is on rebuild leniency but the HC is on win now ruthless?

    particularly if you leave most of the DPs/core intact, this is idiotic. i thought last winter was marginal to compete. last summer was a joke. this so far is a joke. they act like it's a resourced organizational effort, make some tough core decisions, spend some resources, and then i will think it's fair to judge olsen like we expect playoffs. i wouldn't have "expected" that even this year. i just thought nagamura did such a bad job he was incompetent, and that correctly run this should have been in contention.

    you have to give the coach something to work with. and if they aren't then you need a miracle worker of a degree higher than olsen. olsen's history says you hand him talent he competes, you hand him junk he returns junk.
     
  4. quiznatodd_bidness

    Houston Dynamo
    United States
    Apr 14, 2020
    No the leniency is the same Onstad is expected to win now too. Especially seeing how people are reacting to the Achua and GK signings. Sort of mentioned it in the other thread. I’m pretty sure Onstad has said he’s getting fired of the next season doesn’t go well.
     
    Westside Cosmo repped this.
  5. juvechelsea

    juvechelsea Member+

    Feb 15, 2006
    re how glenn and eddie are being treated, i could see this bunch of beancounters hemming, hawing, and playing for time on wishing them well, while we wait and see what apple will look like. maybe they will still be involved somehow to some extent and we don't have to spend any effort or money recognizing them.

    just comes across to me as cheap and thoughtless. why couldn't we thank them after the last game, maybe even do some ceremony, marking the life and end of that tv relationship. cause even if they are doing the apple work or radio, that's not working for houston, or it's a new format with lesser visibility. literally. and i say that despite being critical of them often. solid professional job for most of a decade. you have this long of tenure you honor that regardless what i think.
     
  6. juvechelsea

    juvechelsea Member+

    Feb 15, 2006
    #81 juvechelsea, Nov 24, 2022
    Last edited: Nov 24, 2022
    you're conflating fan response with organizational response. the fans were generally calling for both heads to roll even when they would keep jordan fire the coach. i don't think the fans saw this any different, they think the personnel is junk too. it's the team that's giving the GMs passes. for all my hot air i can't hire or fire. they do that. they are being lenient with a poor personnel department. and kind of acting like they are operating on more than one internal timescale.

    i was ok with nagamura going because i thought he didn't even live up to what he was handed. which can be reconciled with either playing to win or rebuilding. we're working on it but within those confines he still sucked too bad to be kept. but if this is win now for the coach then it's sign now for pat. otherwise it's a semantics accountability dodge.

    part of the reason i say this is i see personnel as more important than tactics. personnel sets the range within which you will compete. coaching and playing the games then decides where within that range you fall. i am ok with canning these coaches because i feel like we finish near bottom of our range of possibilities for the rosters. it's not a well coached bad team. but i think the roster matters even more. that sets the possibilities and ceiling. i could tell during winter 2016 that 2017 could be something. the roster tells you that before they show up. i haven't felt that since, and didn't feel that for about 3 years before 2017 either.

    my select team operated on load em up principles and when i put together an indoor team in between college seasons we had like a future MLS pick, a juco all american, some d1 and d3 guys. won games by scores like 15-3. the problem was keeping people motivated to show up for games as the time to go back to college soccer neared, or keeping friends happy who started in college but couldn't start for an indoor men's league team. to me you set out to create a roster to blow people out of the water. even for HFA or indoor. i don't understand this f*ck around try to squeak through bullsh*t. what team doesn't set out to find elis and manotas types. even on a budget.

    i don't get this at all. i think that's why i harp on this feeling too much like a business 1st, 2nd, and 3rd concerns.
     
  7. ElNaranja

    ElNaranja Member+

    Houston Dynamo
    United States
    Jul 16, 2017
    To answer the latter first, my definition of "working" right now is qualifying for the playoffs in 23. With the cap room and flexibility we have, that should be doable and what we hold this organization to as a sign of real growth. That's on the macro, on the field, level. If you want me to get into micro standards, I'll be happy to go there.

    For your former, I don't think this will work because Ben has a terrible track record as a coach. As a player he was fantastic and would have slotted in nicely for our Dynamo. As a coach he hasn't done much and the only reason he was given leniency with DC is because he's so beloved there (rightfully so). Any other coach would've been dumped long before he left.

    I'll be honest, I havent watched much MLS during the pandemic because of my job. I've been part of the response from Day 1. Things have likely changed in subtle ways and it is entirely possible that his philosophy can work these days. I'm skeptical that Benny Ball can work any better than it did then. Or that we'll have the players to pull that off.

    It's another in a long line of coaches with little, no, or bad, experience. Unimaginative and I can't believe he is the end result of an extensive coach search. I worry this is Pat listening to his heart and not his head.

    Off the field how is this supposed to inspire confidence in fans who have little or none in the FO? What contacts in scouting or other selling points does Benny bring to the table? It certainly isn't his charisma. He's a nice guy from all reports (off the field anyway...on I remember him being a trash talker and nightmare). What kind of ideas does he have to continue improving our youth system? What track record does he bring in that area?

    Anyway, I look at Benny and respect the hell out of him. But I don't see him winning any trophies except for spoons and miracle USOC runs. One we have and one we've somehow dodged despite our best efforts.
     
  8. juvechelsea

    juvechelsea Member+

    Feb 15, 2006
    #83 juvechelsea, Nov 26, 2022
    Last edited: Nov 26, 2022
    olsen's young player job isn't to develop the kids, it's to evaluate the ones put in front of them and play the worthy ones. we don't play the ones we have. both sides of the bridge aren't well built. one way out of this is let olsen have his pick of the HGP/HD2/raines types on the roster. maybe they then better fir the coaching concept, maybe they play. i do think gold star work would be the HC is familiar enough from watching HD2 and the older end of the academy he doesn't have to defer to the GM. klinsi as USMNT coach could tell you USL and college kids to try. (eg jordan morris) he shouldn't be literally coaching the youth too but occasionally scouting and familiarity might be a good idea. we need fresh blood.

    to me if the HC doesn't play the GM's reservists that suggests he doesn't like the ones he was handed. the "hand in glove" problem with our HC/GM not seeming on a page. the quick fix is pat lets olsen pick some of his young guys himself. but then you get into my sense this is a dysfunctional empire building exercise within the sports side. pat has the power to pick. pat picks a lot of sh*t. if we're gonna overempower the GM he better be a lot better than this.
     
  9. quiznatodd_bidness

    Houston Dynamo
    United States
    Apr 14, 2020
    Sort of similar point to player development, people like to praise Bundy on his winning at the D2 level this year but his grade as a coach for that level is incomplete. The fact is we’re going to see him he full results of his ability as a reserve team coach when the opening day roster is announced depending on how many D2 players from the previous year are on it. They’re already down 1 with Palomino being released. If you don’t have any contributors, even off the bench, from D2 last year then what was the point of it?
     
  10. juvechelsea

    juvechelsea Member+

    Feb 15, 2006
    i have already said my piece on the contract expirations obsession, better teams offload those players and their cap. smart GM, will power, and money.

    doing what they did with parker as long as they are doesn't help. a year is a trade off. it might take a year to get this good anyway. 2 years, how do you expect to rebuild paying for other team's players for TWO YEARS. that defeats the point of the trade. a year, maybe. 2 years is brutal. when do they want to exit the tunnel, ever.

    along similar lines, if you use what roster and cap room we do get to sign artur and tarbell then you aren't helping us win you are just adding to the list of "contracts to expire" before this comes out the other end of the tunnel. the level of quality has to go up, and significantly. this is a lousy STARTING team, and you're farting around with the bench?

    this feels like a team either incompetent or just treading water until a later date. we have a similar roster structure discussion every year, they nibble around the edges rather than be aggressive, they make more bad decisions with the room they have, and on and on ad infinitum. i believe in DPs over anything and they had more freedom on that last year. and i guess i am supposed to have a faith in a supporting player churn this winter which so far is tarbell, artur, achara. i think we might be good in USL next year. wait, what's that you say, we're in MLS? whoops.

    you don't even need scouting or analytics departments to sign players the coach or GM knows from his last job or to seemingly pick loan players out of a hat.
     
  11. quiznatodd_bidness

    Houston Dynamo
    United States
    Apr 14, 2020
    I agree with a lot of what you’re saying but for this part I think we have to be reasonable about expectations. Of course Olsen isn’t going to do more than 50ish points and 1 & done in the playoffs but who is a bottom of the table team getting that can? Right now the perception of this job is that you can’t do anything here and the table shows that. It’s silly to think about trophies when games 28-34 of the season haven’t mattered since 2017. The ideal scenario for Olsen is he makes a couple of 1 & done playoff appearances and we dump him for someone better. And if it doesn’t work out this season he’ll be gone even faster.
     
  12. ElNaranja

    ElNaranja Member+

    Houston Dynamo
    United States
    Jul 16, 2017
    I didn't mean to imply he'd get a trophy with us. Just that he lacks a history of winning which goes a long way toward rebuilding a team. Knowing what it takes to win a trophy can be valuable in molding a roster for the next 5 years.

    I've stated before and stand by our expectations have to be one and done playoffs next year. What in Ben's past makes you think he can do that? What makes you think he knows, as a coach, how to even accomplish that? Sure, as a player he knows what it takes. But coaching is a different animal and his lack of success has me skeptical.

    I do agree with you that were using him to get to par and (hopefully) upgrading to get us from there to the Cup and/or Shield. I just don't see him being able to get us, and keep us, at par.
     
    Dynamo_Forever repped this.
  13. juvechelsea

    juvechelsea Member+

    Feb 15, 2006
    the mythmaking per usual continues. in his best season, 2012, DC lost to us in the east final, on our way to being runnerup. so this is a guy who at his best lost to a coach we thought was past it by 2014. if we are hiring people for winning way back then surely dom is available again, jesus.

    2012 he had dero, pontius, kitchen, salhi, wolff, and maicon santos with hamid in net. he couldn't beat us when we had no offense. in 10-11 they were trash and they went back to trash in 13.finishing dead last with a pitiful 16 pts. we never got that bad. the final half of his career they wouldn't make it past 1 round, if they made it, which was about half the time.

    the basic flaw in the "but he made it" logic is he had enough absolute crap seasons to suggest he is not a miracle worker. he will do what the roster provides. if he has espindola they are decent. if not, sorry. we are starting out with the roster providing modest stuff to work with. unlike say mastro, smith, heath, he doesn't have a history of turning junk into a routine bubble team, which is more like what you're thinking of.

    our affection for coaches from SKC, chivas USA, DC, that feels like 2010-2015. the idea of olsen as a winner dates back that far. it's 2022. who is a winner now.
     
  14. quiznatodd_bidness

    Houston Dynamo
    United States
    Apr 14, 2020
    Y’all can clown me all you want but a 50 point, 1 & done playoff season doesn’t sound “terrible”. The fact is the Dynamo are one of the absolute worst teams in MLS. They are losers. I don’t want to hear about stuff that happened 10-16 years ago. It’s ancient history. I care about where we are now which is a team that makes the playoffs 1 time in 9 seasons. That’s the Dynamo culture. So forgive me when I see a guy who just makes the playoffs come in and I get a sliver of hope that we might win a handful of more games than last season. And even if he doesn’t work out (which is still more than likely) so what, the Dynamo will just be the same losers they’ve always been and new faces will come in to be bottom of the table.
     
  15. quiznatodd_bidness

    Houston Dynamo
    United States
    Apr 14, 2020
    And just so we’re clear, yes I want the Dynamo to be competing for trophies and championships. Every fan does. But the truth is this organization has shown no ability to be competent on the men’s side, and hell the women’s team probably had a fluke year. They’re so far behind a league where everyone plays under a salary cap it’s incredible. You can make this a sign as how far this team has fallen, go for it. I’m done using stuff that happened 10+ years ago as a barometer of what we should expect as fans. This is the MLS’ Cleveland Browns. A relic of a bygone era that is allergic to any kind of success. Anyway, I feel the success Olsen has had will give the team at best a coin flip chance of game 34 actually having significance. Then again that’s probably what I said about Onstad and Herrera and probably what I’ll say about the next group of losers come in to try to do something with this trash heap.
     
  16. juvechelsea

    juvechelsea Member+

    Feb 15, 2006
    the 50 point season thing is rubbish.

    first, you cannot predict points with any meaningfulness. you can guess how you compare, which is more akin to table position. i think this group here is better than that group there. i think overall this bunch would be about the 4th best team this season compared to all the "over theres."

    are you f*cking kidding me you think you can predict points that way? this is one reason i freak out about our sh*t coaches blowing leads. it's clearly a bandwidth, a sizeable range, not a predictable number. i think our dynamo could have been anywhere from 7th to last. you look up the table points that's a 10 point spread. that's all the wins become ties, ties become losses. or vice versa. you get those, RSL. you don't, SJ. SJ had more goals than teams up to about 5th place. they couldn't stop anyone. that over a season is a dozen points. if you have a coach and GM who can stop that bleeding, it ends up top of a range. if you just bleed, bottom of it. we for years have not priortized defense, and not been very offensive either. routine bottom of range.

    worse, i think part of the problem right now is one response to what i say is to backpat yourself with the delusion that since in theory this already could be as good as RSL, it's a potential 50 point team already. what are several actual recent seasons saying about that delusion? we say similar rubbish. we get back bottom 2. as if to prove that you can believe it's a 50 pointer but reality is something else.

    second, in my experience -- and even watching the dynamo -- you need to aim much higher than you would be happy to finish, if you want it to work. this works with my range analysis -- the range moves up. but more to the point about every year for a decade has seen us start hot then come back to the pack. if you aim to barely make it you probably spend all your shells shooting short. i think you have a disastrous idea. the 2017 4th seed was loaded and started high and fell to 4th. recent teams have gotten as high as 7th before dropping to last or next to. this suggests a fairly obvious point if you're trying to finish at least 7th. ie it needs to be a team that for a period might even be well up the table.

    you're out of desperation suggesting our spy jumping from building to building aim for getting to the next building hanging off the edge by their fingernails. this makes no sense. you hope you land yards onto the building and act accordingly. if you have to climb off the precipice you f*cked up but you made it. no one aims for that.

    last point, you're trusting pat to do this against all experience and common sense.
     
  17. juvechelsea

    juvechelsea Member+

    Feb 15, 2006
    you're also not considering player sales, injuries, or other predictable changes and body blows a team has to take. you thought 2020 would be decent and then they sold both the forwards. you swap HH in and he actually sucks. the guy who plays _______ blows out a knee.

    ironically history has shown a lot of good dynamo years were salvaged in the summer which would be completely unpredictable to some sort of preseason points guess. some of the better teams were tie-namo trash in may hovering around the line. but what they did was let the table tell them what they had, then kick it up notches from there. i think half the problem may in fact be that around may lately we typically have been near the line, and we tend to respond meekly and perhaps entitled -- "50 point team" -- instead of aggressively like let me make sure.
     
  18. quiznatodd_bidness

    Houston Dynamo
    United States
    Apr 14, 2020
    Where did I predict 50 points? It only comes up because A) it seems to be a magic number to get in playoffs and B) it’s a number that the Dynamo plain don’t hit. They’re lucky to get 40 points on an average season. And by “average season” I don’t consider anything prior to 2014 counting towards that. And I get the idea they should aim higher, of course they should. The issue is the idea of winning a trophy (other than an Open Cup you can luck into) for this club is like trying to hit a dart bullseye shooting from a 15ft hole. The best case scenario for this year is just making the playoffs, worst case is last place. Reality is still closer to the latter. If they don’t make the playoffs this year I see them reverting fully back to the Brener era strategy of regarding spending as soon as they can move HH out. Of course even then nothing really changes as it’s still the same loser club with or without money.
     
  19. juvechelsea

    juvechelsea Member+

    Feb 15, 2006
    #94 juvechelsea, Dec 1, 2022
    Last edited: Dec 1, 2022
    you're still missing my point. you can eyeball that my team is the xth best team in the league on talent or stats. that is a function of getting in the right players, subject to injuries, sales, etc. or incoming god forbid. you cannot predict either the moving target line or whether we have "50 points' worth of players." that comes down to 34 whistle to whistles and if you blow as few as 100 minutes of 10 of them a 50 point qualifier is a 30-40 point travesty.

    to the extent people are instead arguing "50 point coach," there are coaches who routinely make it and then ones who make it half the time. ben is the latter. ben's history at the end was either not make it or go out first round. personally i thought his overall history showed he roller coastered depending on the talent. this team starts out junk. what we have added so far is more marginal junk. you then don't need a coach who makes it when he gets the roster, you need one who makes it regardless. there are such coaches. they are not the guy who if you rebuild his team he gets 16 points.

    my personal experience is that most sports involve some degree of game day or season frustrations. one time we made it through 10 games of EDDOA undefeated and unscored upon. so there is a such thing as perfection and i hold myself to chasing it, though that youth team had a pile of future college and pro players and coaches. but generally life works something more like you want regionals you get state. you want state you get league or district and partway through the playoffs. if you want a track PR you better have seconds/tenths on your old mark in practice. in my new sport i finally broke my PR when i was practicing 10% above it. if you want this to compete at 50 points you need to go out and probably put together what you think on paper is the 3rd or 4th best team in the conference. since even that is hard to predict precisely, just go out and sign a bunch of studs. you do that and we'll be talking what seed and not whether or how bad.

    last point, and this is a running beef i have with US soccer that we are witnessing a tactical shift on****, but y'all do realize there are other teams out there, right? the repeated story of recent years is austin or dallas is 1-2 points better than us this year then dozens the next. the league does not freeze while we sign tarbell and artur and other incremental ideas. they go sign their own good players. you either keep up with that or not. they try to get good, we try to get mediocre. they move, we don't. IMO that has to do with it's not just a moving target on points, but a moving (upward) target on team quality. MLS is constantly improving. if you aren't improving faster than it is, you're roadkill. y'all's "squeak in" hopes consistently underestimate the standard of play the following year by the rest of the league.

    there are only 2 teams in our conference who make this mistake consistently -- SJ and us. the rest can generally figure out what a playoff team looks like 40% of the time at least.








    ****essentially, spending 4 years preparing to play a way that neither worked during the cycle nor is appropriate to the teams you draw in group play at the world cup. i give them some credit for their last minute klinsi 2014 tactical overhaul. most teams don't waste years of work. they gauge where the sort of teams they expect to play are going and create tactics accordingly. i think we planned to mirror teams following a fad now several years stale. then we get to a tournament where even holland is playing a 352 and either whacking longballs or crosses. the dynamo should consider the same thing with their stale and unsuccessful "innovations." where is the league going. do we want to mimic that fashion or use tactics to thwart it. the biggest mistake is to hold onto ideas that the fashion has already adapted to stop.

    i personally don't think a coach who at the peak of talent and his powers couldn't beat kinnear ever had the secret sauce, and nothing about the past half-decade says he's even close. i see this "50 point" nonsense as a grotesque lowering of expectations. it's repackaging basic "hope" as some sort of hiring strategy. "maybe next year." "maybe next coach."

    i don't think he got hired to get 50. i think he got hired for nodding his head along with pat's dictates who has no clue how to get 50. maybe he thinks he does but that's two different things.
     
  20. quiznatodd_bidness

    Houston Dynamo
    United States
    Apr 14, 2020
    You may see the lowering of expectations as grotesque but I think it’s realistic. I look at this team as what it is in modern terms. A team, like the Quakes you mentioned, that is wholly incapable of putting together a decent team. Nothing before 2014 is relevant to my expectations anymore. I consider making the playoffs an achievement because it’s not something the Houston Dynamo are capable of doing. I think you’re right about Pat. He thinks he’s the smartest guy in the room and is the only one with solutions. I suppose it’s what happens when you hire someone from a bygone era of the teams history and kiss his feet upon his arrival. Hindsight is 20/20 of course.
     
  21. quiznatodd_bidness

    Houston Dynamo
    United States
    Apr 14, 2020


    Some sort of meet the coach event. Kinda weirdly setup. Tweeted by the Dynamo Youth Soccer page. Email address is for Douglas Sitton - Account Executive - Group Sales Specialist, so I guess the goal is to get more youth teams out to games. One of the pictures in the graphics is the East Club but I’m guessing that’s something just thrown in as a sign of an improvement and not part of what they’re selling here. Also the tweet shows the style of how e-mail addresses are set up with the Dynamo incase any of y’all want to try to send a message.
     
  22. juvechelsea

    juvechelsea Member+

    Feb 15, 2006
    https://www.houstondynamofc.com/news/dynamo-hire-ben-bartlett-as-director-of-methodology?

    point 1, are we doubling or tripling down on the proactive 433 concept at this point. what is the table telling you.

    point 2, i noticed a chunk of the announcement: "He shares our values in playing a proactive, physically-demanding, and youthful style of play – and we are excited to work with him to develop our club’s soccer identity in the coming seasons."

    my theory was that they would spend some money, bring in some names, and put on a veteran leaning show, while actually putting effort into development. i think it's debatable if they really mean to be doing the supposed "50 point" thing or if they just want a respectable product while their attention is elsewhere, and playoffs would be gravy.

    subpoint 1, kids are not going to come here to sit and apprentice behind your placeholders.
    subpoint 2, players who do sign here are not going to endlessly wait at HD2 or on the bench, you will be on a clock before they ask for a trade, mutual tear up, or transfer.
    subpoint 3, kids are not going to sign in abundance with a repeated loser blowing hot air about its winner future. they will respond to a team showing positive signs.
    subpoint 4, if you internally see the concept as physically demanding and youthful why have i been watching old farts absorb so many minutes.
    subpoint 5, if you internally see the concept as physically demanding and youthful why do we even sign O-30s, marquee players or filler.

    i see the disconnect as supporting my theory these present years are just a show and not even a sincere attempt to compete. a team that sincerely sees themselves as competitive but youthful and hardworking promotes raines and signs a bunch of U23s and U20s. you begin executing your youthful concept. you do it this way the veterans will suck and be unable to execute your ideas. the kids in turn will ask to leave, eg gitau. "you keep talking youth then go sign fafa HH quintero artur etc., when would i ever play."

    i have broadly raised commitment to a side of the ball. offense, defense. i would add to that commitment to a side of the program. you cannot run a "youth movement" that when it comes to game day plays O-30s. it may make sense to some cynical soul in the front office as a way to do a "holding action" until the cavalry arrives. but the reality is when the astros wanted to go young, they just cleared the runway for the kids and fielded minimum salary players other than altuve. there is then no mixed message. there is then no barrier to your claimed goal. you do exactly what you say you are doing.

    you don't try and simultaneously barely make the playoffs with the old wing while you teach up the kids. you cannot serve both masters. the old wing cannot win enough to compete. they suck cap money and roster slots from the kids. they suck playing time from the kids.

    the upside on going youth movement is if you need 2 wings you can sign 6 and see who works out. as it is we have the veterans already, but not good enough, and so we have maybe 2 shots to fix a position, and if pat misses both targets, that's it. neither effective youth scouting nor fixing the veteran team. i thus think this would make it easier for pat. sign a bunch of veterans and don't bother with kids. or. sign a bunch of kids and don't worry about veterans and success this year. ok, pat, can you find any truffles at all. you're on, go.
     
  23. juvechelsea

    juvechelsea Member+

    Feb 15, 2006
    #98 juvechelsea, Dec 2, 2022
    Last edited: Dec 2, 2022
    re doubling down on the proactive 433, if you're watching the current world cup, i have seen very few teams try it and the one who did - USA v. Wales -- blew their lead second half. they held their leads in a 442 (england) and 532 (iran) but those are not proactive. if you watch enough world cup the 433 is passe. i feel like this team is stuck back at about 2015. it's 2022. i see a lot of 352, 3412, anything but our "backwards innovation." the table is screaming our ideas are stupid. even kids will wilt playing high press 433 in the summer heat, and we're not even trying to focus on kids first team.

    i am deeply concerned they are committed to an identity that will not work and the identity thing makes it non-negotiable. it sounded like nagamura got fired as much for going off that reservation as anything else. i don't think that was his mistake. he made plenty but not having the front 3 running around high upfield like chickens, in the heat, with the poor defending HH, coco, and vera was not one of them.

    i might even think they were clever if they were like the world is going 352 and i am going to anticipate that and thwart them with _________. but this is not thinking about a trendy chess move, or its counter move, but perseverating about your opening move the last 2 chess games you already lost. we aren't even fighting a current war, or the last one, we're back 2-3 wars ago.

    maybe it's the US missed 2018 that we don't get this. ironically what i am seeing is the world circling back around to 1990s type soccer. you want to press high and clog the middle. fine. i will not try to combine passes through the wood chipper. i will play over the top or down the wings. hence 352 or 442. 433 crazy holland plays a 352 to get their wings loose.

    the sad point is maybe they think the shrinking attendance will respond to more entertaining soccer. no. the fans don't want more entertaining losses. they want wins. i don't think they care how.
     
  24. juvechelsea

    juvechelsea Member+

    Feb 15, 2006
    #99 juvechelsea, Dec 2, 2022
    Last edited: Dec 2, 2022
    last, i think it was klinsi who pioneered domestically the idea that the whole pyramid be drilled in some style of play. which is first ironic because he changed his style right before the world cup. kind of like berhalter. he had a system. and then he dropped it. personally i'd rather have my coaches more flexible, dropping things that don't work, not beholden to "i told you we were going to do x so x it is" no matter what results or how the teams look.

    but second my concern at the time was the arrogance and empire building aspect of it all. a team should win a while before it pretends it has found the money tree and xeroxes it on down to the U5s. and independent of whether it works is the sense that telling everyone in an organization to assemble their widgets just so is a top down hierarchical exercise that empowers the boss who controls the style of assembly. just like the formation and tactics should maybe make some playoffs before becoming rote gospel, maybe the team should have some degree of success before we annoint pat Dear Leader and let him dictate what every team we have will play like, at pain of being tossed out of pat's pyramid at whatever rung you are, first team, HD2, U-15.

    we haven't done sh*t yet, pat should be one foot on a banana peel not dictator of the whole dynamo pyramid. kinnear earned the right to maybe make his reservists play a 442, that we have a successful team and scheme and your future here should depend on convincing me you play some scripted role in that system. i thought half the point to bundy was showing up how little the prior coach had managed with the same materials. i'd prefer they have that sort of freedom until this gets fixed.
     
  25. juvechelsea

    juvechelsea Member+

    Feb 15, 2006
    to which i would respond the one successful outlier of the past several years -- 2017 -- was basically a massive roster revamp. 4 forwards at the level of perhaps 1 now. alex. a backline of ageing but formerly well resumed backs. that is what it takes. i think you're asking me to lower my idea of what it actually takes in tandem with saying all we need is 50. the one time we dug out of the hole we didn't act like it was an incremental squeak exercise. the history says it doesn't work, that we undershoot it badly every time. to me has a lot to do with if you have a solid supporting cast soccer tends to turn on gathering as many impact players as we can. a lot of our problem is compared to elis manotas quioto deric senderos alex cubo beasley on and on, i think we had about 2 players even in the neighborhood of "impact" last season. and one of them like the system wasn't working for him.

    to put it in EA FIFA video game terms, we keep trying to fix it by signing a 52 to replace a 51. what we need is some 70s or 80s. and typically when we sign the 52 we pay him a half million and not replacement level wages. we talk like we want to fix the roster and the cap and then pay for half a former player for the next 2 years, and sign yet more scrubs at half a million, which means either cap or cap tools burned. and cap freedom even further off at the horizon. we did all that GAM/TAM accumulation to get........artur. artur. not some star. or to pay for parker to play for StL. just awful.

    my deal is i think this 50 point stuff is like JC give up on asking for the 70/80 guys you know playoffs take, and just play along with the incremental bullsh*t and hope. sorry but at the moment what i see being assembled so far might be the worst team in our history. we got rid of some decent older players who needed to go. thus far the adds are USL level. that is net negative. i am going to say that and not "rah rah" how i have to accept what they give me and hope signing a bunch of 52s somehow makes this competitive. it would if we had been relegated.
     

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