Pre-match: San Jose Earthquakes - Colorado Rapids (Saturday, 8/25) pregame thread

THANKS, that was succinct and helped a lot, but I hope that Yallop & team aren't reading that site.

this is hard for me to understand. You mean 13, 24 or 27 points out of the next 9 games?

 

How many break aways has Lenny scored?

 

For the supporter shield, the total number of points by the Quakes + plus the total number of points dropped by KC (the current 2nd place team) must be 27 or more. The Quakes have 9 games left and could earn 3 points per game for a total of 27 points possible. KC also has 9 games left and could drop a total of 27 points Let's take the example of both KC and the Quakes go 3-3-3 for the remainder of the season. The Quakes would earn 12 points (3 wins x 3pts + 3 draws x 1 point). KC would drop 15 points (3 losses x 3 points not earned for each loss + 3 draws x 2 points not earned for each draw). The total number of points earned by the Quakes and dropped by KC would be 27 (12 + 15) and the Quakes would win the Supporter Shield 59pts for the Quakes to 58pts for KC. It is possible that another team would be the 2nd place team, but in that case the Quakes magic number is less than 27.

 

How many breakaways have the Quakes scored as a team? I don't think it's very many. The Quakes will find success against Colorado the way they did when they played them last time and the way they've played pretty much every game so far. Fast action to the wings, a little bit of position rotation to confuse defenders and service into the box. We know Gordon can score as a starter so unless he does something really stupid, then our only real potential issues will be on the defensive end and in substitutions.

 

Those equations are great, but it's not only KC we need to worry about. NY is right there, and RSL, Seattle, LA, DC not far behind. We are talking. Two game swing is all it would take in several cases to get knocked out.

We need to keep winning, period.

 

First and foremost, we need to take care of the home games we have left. 3 points every time. No more of that weak 1-1 sh*t. It would be a massive letdown if we didn't win the Shield.

 

That was my point, for some reason I want to say the last Quake I saw put in break away was Donovan.

 

Pssssst...Huckerby.

 

What about Alvarez in Philadelphia?

 

Okay, thanks.

 

A break away? Just him and the keeper? Starting off closer to midfield than the 18?

 

On breakaway scores, RJ had a few in 2009-10, Quincy had one, Salinas broke in the first game this year but passed to Wondo for the goal. I think Lenny's been in alone on the keeper a few times this year but hasn't scored one yet don't think. It's unlikely to happen with Wondo or Gordon (slow!) but they've been trying with Chavez.

 

No breakaways because now we possess. Any news on line up for Saturday?

 

Really? Before the season, most of us hoped to make the playoffs. Just because the team got off to a great start doesn't mean they were going to be able to close it. While we have better talent and depth, we still haven't been blowing out teams. Other than the 5-0 game against RSL, the other high scoring games were 4-3 (LA) and 5-3 (DC). We have won a lot of tight games with comes backs.

Sure, it would be a disappointment for them to not win the division (not even talking the Shield), but I wouldn't call it massive.

 

BTW -- the man in the middle for this game is Silviu Petrescu.

 

im pleased Bernardez only got one game to be honest, surprised he didnt get more, he probably deserved it too.

This is why im happy we got depth, we lose two guys in the back we can still roll out a starting defense without completely crapping our pants in Corrales-Morrow-Opara-Beita , and replace Lenhart with Gordon without missing a beat. I cant think of any other team in the league that can pull that. We wont have a broken wheel anywhere despite losing 3 players, which is a nice feeling. Opara is honestly plenty adequate as a backup CB, and you gotta love Morrow for the versatility factor.

 

That was my orginal implication... We don't need no sinking breakaways

 

I hope to see this ..
-------------Flash-----Wondo--------
--------------------Dawkins------------------
----Ballouchy ---------------------Chavez----
---------------------Cronin---------------------
Corrales---Morrow----Opara--------Beita
----------------Busch------------------

Subs: Baca(M), Khari(M/F), Ring(M), Zayner(D), Sercan(F), Garza(M),
Bingham

 

It would be a massive disappointment to me because we've been in first for a while and have a favorable schedule to close out the season. If we don't win it we'll have to have a poor end to a great season, and that wouldn't bode well for the playoffs either.

 

The only thing that doesn't bode well for this game is we tend to win against good teams and lose to the crap teams like Portland and Montreal.

 

1) The Quakes record flatters them a bit, 2) several teams have (apparently) improved themselves through significant acquisitions or players returning from injury, etc. while the Quakes have kind of treaded water. So I don't expect a stellar end to the season. Playoffs - meh, they are a crap shoot anyway.

 

We had one of the better offseasons though. We haven't put together a complete performance yet, there have been times we completely dominated, yet tied or narrowly squeeked out a victory. If we have some luck with player availability in the last stretch we still have an advantage over teams that were reassembled mid-season. Confidence can also go a long way.

 

I disagree with this.

The Quakes have the best goal differential in the league by a wide margin.

We also only play one game in our last 9 against a team with a winning record, which means we've previously played the good teams a ton.

One could talk about late goals, but it's no more legitimate to take those away than to take away first half goals.

Can't argue with that.

We play Colorado, Chivas, and Portland each twice. I think we could take 4 points from each.

If we win the Supporter's Shield, the only thing that worries me about the playoffs is the first round, since it involves a road game.
Hopefully the winner of the play-in match will be worn out from the midweek eliminator. Let's all hope the race goes down to the final week so the 4th place team can't rest their starters.

 

I don't really care about the goal differential - it's just another artifact of "record". I look at how the matches flow - the number of chances that the Quakes create vs. the opposition. How many of the last 10 matches have the Quakes dominated?

 

I think you have that backward.

I totally buy into the touchy-feely stuff over stats for one game, but not for an entire season. Supposedly Wondo actually has a very mediocre conversion ratio for scoring chances.

Not sure why 10 games became important, but if you look at the games against Portland, Chicago, and Montreal where we got negative results, you could make a very strong case that the results were harsh. Brain farts and miracle strikes.

The Quakes only seem to get outplayed on the road on short rest.

And again, we've done all this during the hard part of the schedule.