Post-match: San Jose Earthquakes - Colorado Rapids (Saturday, 5/7) postgame thread [R]

Feels like Cade Cowell hype train from MLS when they tweet this and he’s not the goal scorer.

A second-half winner and three points for @SJEarthquakes. 🎉 pic.twitter.com/SmPl98VTC9

— Major League Soccer (@MLS) May 8, 2022

 

Thanks for making the trip, the Quakes ought to appreciate fans like you.
We sat in the moat area pre-game (and on those cracked near-collapse metal chairs!) and really froze in those high winds. The stadium is like a wind tunnel, it is hard for me to understand why it doesn’t seem to affect the players on the pitch.

BTW, a fellow fan in the moat came over to us and said that last game, the Quakes had come looking for us after the chair collapse incident. So someone did make an effort to investigate that day…

 

Not surprised to hear attendance is low. I’m sure hundreds of people watched on tv though.

The rapids invented spending all allocation money on MLS players. This strategy continues with their recent Zardis acquisition. They also sold many of the players that won them the west. They wrote the current blueprint on how to be the best of the worst and Fisher no doubt is studying every move they make.

Now it seems the student has surpassed the teacher (at least until we go to Colorado and play in altitude).

It’s a good thing the quakes have center backs who can score because nobody else can. Remember when Espinoza got a hat trick? Talk about a blind squirrel finding a nut.

 

MLS site says attendance was 14,077.

Anyone have any insight on how many actual season ticket holders there are this season?

My understanding is that if a STH doesn't show up for a game they are still included in the total attendance numbers regardless if they show up or not.

I'm guessing the front office/marketing department views that type of info (#of season ticket holders) top secret and works hard to not let that number get leaked to the public.

Thought that in the early days of Avaya they were capping the number of season tickets sold each season to around 10,000 to 12,000 but can't remember for sure.

 

We're season ticket holders, so it's a fully day event for me. Normally we're down for a 3-hour tailgate.

I know not everyone likes to count these, but technically Espinoza had the assist from the corner on Nathan's goal. He's got 4 goals and 4 assists in 10 games. Point taken though. Our creative players looked lively, but they did not look sharp in front of goal and have some decision making issues.

 

1. Worth highlighting that this was a shutout! 23 goals against in the prior 9 games (2.56 GAA). I don't care if Rapids weren't looking strong on the attack. That hasn't stopped SJ from giving up 2+ goals in the past this year.

2. I didn't find this game nearly as boring as the games the last few seasons where the ball was passed back to JT (or god help us Vega) over and over again if the perfect pass forward didn't exist. Only once the game was lost did the team start taking chances. Yes, there was a lot of passing here, but they looked to go forward first.

3. That potential handball was a non-issue for me. VAR got it right in not recommending a review. It's not in the highlights, but all the replays I saw last night had it hit the shoulder/upper arm. Remember that the cut off these days is basically the sleeve and it looked clearly in that range.

 

CO is not a bad team at all. Last year they won the west primarily by being stingy on defense - tied for second in least GA. I think that was in evidence last night - tough to break down. I think they had their starting back line from last year in there last night. They did lose some players but added a U22 Brazilian and Zardes, who scored 54 goals in MLS the last 4 years. Oddly enough, goals scored by an MLS domestic player count the same as those scored by an intl player.

Sometimes a pretty good team doesn't look great because their opponent plays them tough. They're a top 5 team in the west since 2020. If they are "best of the worst" I would take that over a bottom 4 team. But maybe that's just me!

 

Espinoza's been playing pretty well since his hat trick. I think it gave him a confidence boost. He's been fine. One of the things I think we're missing is guys joining the attack late. If it's Cade and Espinoza on the wing, just Jebo in the box against 2 or 3 defenders, prospects are very slim. But if Jackson or Monteiro or Lopez or Marie join in we can get better numbers and improve our prospects.

Also, once we again we generated at least one great chance on the high press (the one where I think Jebo pressed hard and Cade ran in and intercepted).

 

I would have guessed less than 12,000 in attendance last night. Who knows how they figure it. At one time I heard it was tickets "distributed", which includes any freebies they give away, and a convenient way to pump your attendance figures. If we had great season ticket numbers they would be bragging about it, since they are not, I suspect the numbers are rather moribund.
When the stadium opened they said they capped season tickets at 12,000.
Sounders get a nearly 69,000 seat sellout for a Wednesday night game, we can't manage 15,000 in San Jose on a Saturday evening for Mexican Heritage Night. How pathetic.

 

If I'm not mistaken (haven't watched the replay, yet), the only reason that play happened was due to a really bad call. Marie(?) got pulled down by one of their guys, but, got called for the foul.

I told someone that I'd be really pissed if Colorado scores on this free kick.

 

It looked noticably down from previous home games. Crossing the street at Newhall there's usually a good crowd of 20-30 people, but we were the only ones! I think the cool weather might have had something to do with it, sad to say. We're that wimpy! There's also the "bathroom meter". No line for the men's bathroom. It was full-ish but no line.

 

This! So much this!
We essentially had 3 #8's out there last night. Replace Gregus with Judson, or even Remedi for now, and it starts to look a little better. I like Monteiro, but he does come off as more of an 8. However I'm fine with keeping him in the 10 spot and letting him get more settled in. His high pressure is very valuable.

 

I thought I saw a graphic that listed only Judson and Chofis out for injuries. Does that mean Fuentes is over his personal problems?

 

Agreed. Of that group Marie did do some good overlapping with Espinoza, and was creative in the first half, but then seemed to tire in the second. In addition to guys joining in on the attack late I'd like to see competent shots from outside of the box. Gregus had one in the second half that was too central but really well struck! I had sort of forgotten how much we have been missing that. Becoming more versatile in these two ways would really help. Though we are playing better, we are also currently too predictable.

 

Glad we got the three points at home. We're addressing the defensive issues in the midfield, but still a work in progress...Colorado had some very good looks and opportunities, but squandered them. I totally agree with others about our midfield, as I've said from the beginning. I don't like the dynamic at all underneath our forwards from Montiero or Gregus...I particularly think Montiero is ghastly poor fit. Imo, he had a pretty poor game overall, a ton of bad turnovers and incredibly slow play from the creator ACM role. He will make a handful of nice passes...but too few over 90 minutes. Cade made some good runs, but his finishing is rusty...really poor...essentially at least three breakaways without getting a shot off.

I'm old school, we were incredibly lucky to get a homer call on the ball that hit Nathan's upper arm...not shoulder at all...and he dipped his body to try to block the shot...on a shot towards an open goal...stone cold PK if we're in Colorado...or anywhere else on the planet...but I'll gladly take it.

Marie is playing better upfield...sublime pass to Cade. He looks good overlapping and cutting into the middle. He made some very proactive decisive runs that caused problems. Our attack looked much better when Lopez and Marie joined the attack...we needed that...to get us over the top...our regular attack is generally not that threatening...needs a lot of work.

This would never happened due to the fact that we just brought in Montiero and Gregus...but we would get more out of Jackson at ACM, with Remedi as the 8 and Judson as the 6...

Or take it a step further...I wouldn't mind seeing Espinoza at ACM under Cade with Jebo on the left and Benji on the right....Jackson as the 8 with Judson at the 6...I'd roll with that any day.

I still think we need to jettison at least one mid maybe two.

Maybe the attack will come around...I'd like to see us try some different options though.

 

Fun stats to keep an eye on with the Quakes media team... only 3 points below the playoff line and ahead of CCL chaos Seattle in the table!

 

Colorado's attack is potent even if they weren't last night. I think not having Jack Price in the midfield pretty drastically changed things for them. And I'm sure missing Rubio didn't help. Looked like they had Zardes (no slouch even if I've never thought much of him) and Kaye (another very good player) up front even if the lineup shows him in the midfield (he was very far forward very often). I haven't watch them closely enough to know but Kaye is usually a midfielder, so pulling both Price and Kaye out of the midfield would certainly change things for them.

The handball seemed suspect, but I think if the payers were in a wall with the hands at their side (as Nathan's was) and the ball hit the same place, I don't think any ref would call that a handball. But it wouldn't have surprised me to see it called.

 

I spent all last season saying that we should play Jackson, Remedi, and Judson together in midfield (the JuRY midfield). We did it twice and won both times and the 2nd time Jackson said yeah we do really well with me, Remedi, and Judson in midfield. JazzyJ is right! OK maybe not the last part but the first part. I’m not convinced we wouldn’t be better off with it *this year* as well as you say.

That said you do need depth so we probably needed one more starter quality CM but not 2, if they’re both 8-ish. I’m not as down on Monteiro though because his work rate is very high, he’s reasonably quick, and he hits a nice creative pass now and then. You can’t have a CM with a half-assed work rate - it will kill you. That’s why I prefer that Chofis play wide forward and not in midfield.

 

I was finally able to attend the first home game of the season and take in the action from the nose bleeds.

Defensively we are pretty sound in terms of positioning and aggression which has lead to us no longer being caught up during counters. Nathan and Lopez are very stout in one-on-one defensive actions while Calvo is "inconsistent". However, I was really trying to focus on Marie and he is your typical modern-day full back who is much better suited as a wing-back due to his offensive prowess and defensive struggles. Most of the Rapids offensive attacks that resulted in chances came via our right flank in which Marie was either out of position forcing Nathan and Gregus to scramble to fill the gaps or he was just easily dribbled past by the opponent. Having said that, he has been a very pleasant revelation as he has been a very good attacking threat who is always in position as an option and actually has forced Espinoza to combine with him which has been a big issue while he was playing with TT last few seasons.

Cowell at this point is just frustrating to watch. He makes great runs to make himself available for long passes or has much improved positioning where his body feints have resulted in him able to shake off his direct defender for through balls on goal but his final third decisions are always way off. He should have scored a hat-trick or at least assisted on three goals last night if he just managed to read the game better and make the correct decisions but, instead, he bungled every single opportunity. I found myself actually screaming at Cavelo to sub him off after a play in which Gregus intercepted the ball at the midfield line and and ran with it down the middle towards the goal with Jebo to his right and Cowell to his left. Then, for whatever reason, Cowell decided to make a diagonal run towards Jebo's side where there were already two defenders waiting while the RB that was covering him stayed put and waited for Gregus thus leaving him with no options. He is young so this will have to be chalked off to that but his awareness and decision making needs major work.

 

This is just anecdotal, but 4-5 years ago when Stahre was coach, we gave up 2 of our 4 seats. I met the STH who took those 2 seats, but after that I’ve only seen him one more time. The rest of the time, those seats have been unoccupied except for maybe 2 games per season, usually by people who don’t look like they could afford to pay for the seats. So it seems he doesn’t sell them. Also, the 4 rows in front of us tend to be vacant about 30% of the time. The first row belongs to Fisher, but I don’t know about rows 2-3. Row 4 is fans who show up 70% of the time — typically not at mid-week games.

I guess that means that there are a lot of people in Silicon Valley who can easily expense $3,000 for a seat that goes unused because no one wants to watch the Quakes.

 

I was wearing 5 layers by the end of the game, including a sweatshirt and jacket, up in section 106. During the game I noticed the poor ballgirls were in shorts and T-shirts on the sidelines!

 

I was in shorts and t-shirts, too!

 

In 106, I had my heavy jacket gloves hat scarf blanket as per usual. But there was only a little wind, compared to the 20-30 mph winds I experienced in the moat pre-game. I always feel sorry for people who buy tickets in the moat. Such a terrible experience except for being close to play. And you can’t see the whole field.

Really, the absolute worst design of any soccer stadium in the world, I would bet. Maybe we should run a contest and see who are the competitors for bad fan experience (not playing field and surface).