Our 2023 season, as the roster stands, best 11: Salloi, Pulido, JFR Walter, Kinda, Uri. Logan N, Voldemort, Isi (or ford), Pierre Pulskamp There are clear problems in this best 11,a nd of course it does not in any way apply to 2022, which is only about a third gone. Given the investiment in money and time and DP slots, we have to assume Pulido and kinda will return at full strength. They may not, though, and that would screw us, a lot. At 6, Uri, clearly, can not be counted upon. I've thought he's been fine when he's played, but despite being the de facto starter and only player at that position, he has been limited to 151 minutes, playing in three games. So, even when he's needed and available, he's give less than half the game time on offer. He's got three starts, and been subbed off three times. And he's only been available for a third of the games. Counting on him playing much is idiotic. We need a new, starting quality, 6. Salloi or Tzonis, I am not sure how to go here. Pierre has to play this season to see if he works for next. There is no reason to wait until Zusi breaks into pieces. Pulskamp needs games, as well. Even if that means one of three or so, we need to see he can handle starting, though we have a baseline from last season. What I believe we need for 2023 not to be a disaster is that, beginning quite soon, our SKC starting 11 has to look like: Salloi, Vujnovic, JFR Tzonis, Walter, A NEW Starting quality Dmid Logan N, Voldemort, Isi (or ford), Pierre Pulskamp This is not a winning MLS side. It may be a wooden spoon contender, but there is zero upside to finishing 10th instead of last. We need data on our players for the future, and we have to start collecting it soon
This HAS to be the way we approach the rest of the season. If we don't start finding out what we've got with some of the younger guys and give them a little time to play through mistakes then that transforms this from a bad rebuilding year to a disaster. If Peter stubbornly keeps trotting out the senior citizens I'm sure we'd win a couple more points than if he starts rotating in the youth but to what end goal? We're not going to win any meaningful hardware this year so the goal needs to pivot from winning games to learning about our players and maybe even (gasp) thinking about changing our play style to fit the players we have instead of the ones we wish we had. If Peter doesn't do this then it will likely mean instead of having one bad year we'll have two or more because we haven't dug the well this year for water we need to drink in the next.
We deal with this, approach a season for which PV will get a pass because he lost two DPs and (through his poor timing of a good move) a starting Dmid. We don't, and we're Miami or Cinci, and maybe we figure a way out in two years but maybe its four.
There was a time after 2011 when SKC didn’t fear any team coming in to CMP and really the expectation was that they could pull out a win every time. But, its a sad day when fans just don’t want the team to be embarrassed by a lop sided loss and finish last in the league.
Completely agree with this and what kcfooty said. At this point, anything other than trying to build for the future would be folly. It's just obvious. It sucks and I'm sure PV does not appreciate that reality, but such as it is. If Espinoza and Zusi finish the year with more minutes than able-bodied players ten+ years younger, then it's not moving the team forward to 2023 and beyond. If not a pivot to full youth movement, then it has to be judged as a failed plan by PV and stacked up with recently missing the playoffs and the team consistently falling apart at the end of seasons. It can't be a free pass for PV forever.
League like this, every team is gonna have this kind of season now and again. I'm not enjoying it but I understand it. Obviously though I'll echo the others in here. The question is what SKC will do about it, and when. Playing the youth is part of it. The next couple of transfer windows are huge too. Some teams can dig themselves out of a hole just by refreshing the squad. I'm hoping that can be us, in part because I still think the team made four or five really excellent signings this last off-season.
"Every now and again"....2019 SKC finished second to last in the West with 38 pts. That's exactly 2 seasons between years where SKC contended (2019) or will contend (present day) for the wooden spoon. And one of those seasons was COVID 2020. Too many fans "understanding" this ineptness is why there's no pressure on PV, and there never will be.
If you cut out or dismiss all seasons of success or even just above average results, then yeah the bad ones look pretty overwhelming. I'm no Vermes apologist of course.
I can no longer give a pass to Vermes due to injuries. If we can talk about players that are "injury prone" I see no reason why a team could not also be "injury prone". I have long wondered about how beneficial the whole "sporting fit" thing was given how often SKC would seem to fade in intensity as the season wore on. Injuries are part of the game and any coach worth their salt in my opinion has Plans B, C, etc. to deal with that. I am one who has grown to hate the "if only X was healthy" laments. Does Liverpool collapse if Salah catches a cold? As for the vaunted recovery tech, while I have no doubt is helpful, I don't think it is the miracle it was spoken as of when I took the tour. As for the Uri return, which I think you are also referring to, that always felt like "lets get the band back together", which never works, except in stories. Vermes has hit a ceiling, hit it years ago if you ask me, so now how many more years do we give him to break through?
The dmid i was talking about was Mauri. I don't think it was a mistake to move him on, I do think the timing was a mistake. He was a starting level signing ($660,000 a year) and we moved him on without a replacement plan in place. Uri is fine, when he can play, which during the last several seasons hasn't been very often. He can't be more than depth at this stage of his career. he's fine as depth. As for Vermes getting a pass, I wasn't saying that I give him one, but that he will get one, from many corners. Look at the SKC conference finishes in recent years 3rd, 1st, 11th, 1st. Objectively, that's pretty decent. If it's a ceiling, it's a high one. I admit, I rate regular season over playoffs because I'd rather watch a season full of good times than just a month at the end of the thing. Now, we can discount 2020, I suppose, but even so, SKC remains one of the most successful clubs in MLS regular seasons over the past five, even 10, years, and Vermes has been in charge for this success. he will get a pass on a collapse year, and going without 2 of 3 DPs is a decent excuse. As for Sporting fit, I'm not sure that's anything more than sturm and myth. Every club is fit. It's been a while since we had pro teams swilling beer and munching brats and showing up for games hungover.
Also, is there any reason why we couldn't try Isi out at Dmid. Ilie was okay the other way. Isi is pretty well suited to the role, isn't he? He has the range, and the defensive chops, quite a bit of speed considering what we're used to, and the sense of when and where to move the ball. He passes well and plugs lanes well. So why am I wildly wrong?
I was thinking I wish we'd trot out this lineup for a few games to see if it worked out with a few guys (tzone, vujnovic, and duke on the field at the same time mainly). Salloi - Vujnovic - JFR Hernandez - Tzionis - Walter Ndembe - Voloder - Isi/Ford - Duke (probably have to be hernandez and walter double pivot) The obvious problem was going to be the 6 spot. So maybe your idea of trying out Isi would work if we swap him out with Hernandez or Walter. Salloi - Vujnovic - JFR tzone(10) - isi(6) - Walter(8) Ndembe - Voloder - Ford - Duke I feel like this puts our best available players on the field at the same time (tzone has to start...he's been the most dynamic player on the field this season) and we can see if we have anything with Vujnovic at the 9 and Duke at right back. This would require Peter to actually give this lineup a chance AND let some guys play through mistakes. Neither of which have much of a chance of happening because these guys aren't in favor.
I think this is our best available option. I think we owe it to our prospects for 2023 to give this lineup a good run, 5-6-7 games, just to see. I also agree, it won't happen. But would be nice to at least see Duke out there until we know if he can claim the position full time.
Maybe, if we just get all our karmic energies aligned, we can shift the universe and make it happen! Man would I love to see that lineup for a few games at least.
I could not be in more agreement with you on this, the playoffs are just bonus games to me. However 2012 is the closest that a Vermes led team has gotten to the supporters shield when they were just 3 points off the pace. And he has only been to MLS cup once as coach. Given his performance during the regular season I have expected better results in the playoffs. This is true both as technical director and head coach. But I wonder how much of the success of SKC is due to his ability to find talent and then they perform well on the field and how much is a result of his ability to coach a team of pro soccer players.
IMO, SKC will have more problems going forward because of our approach. PV wants to play Barca 2011 football, but almost no one can do that without a Barca 2011 roster. Even BMunch and Man City sometimes struggled with it. People don't copy that approach very often because it's impossible without spectacujlar players. Trying to pull this off a champagne approach with a beer level roster means you end up creating the kind of problems we've always seen in our beloved club. it's going to be increasingly noticeable because MLS is getting better players who are more and more able to make us pay for those problems. We need a CB who can play the ball like Pique. The closest we can afford is Fontas. But Pique can also run and defend, the version we can afford cannot. If he could, we would not be able to afford him. It's a tradeoff we make at a lot of positions, and the net result is that while we're often kind of dominant in terms of possession, we''re also often the less dangerous side. Barca, of course, didn't have that problem, you know, because while we have JFR and Salloi and Shelton, they had Messi and Sanchez and Villa (and later neymar and Suarez, etc). Without injuries and with everyone playing well, we can just about pull it off, and look really good doing that. But if we're injured or slightly off, at even one or two positions, it's going to cost us.
An almost 34 year old defensive midfielder? This screams PV (or Beckham more likely). Sergio Busquets has been approached by MLS clubs but he already turned down proposals last summer - could be an option for June 2023. 🇪🇸🇺🇸 #MLSBusquets’ prepared to stay at Barça next season as Xavi considers him an important part of the project.— Fabrizio Romano (@FabrizioRomano) May 3, 2022
Let's see: Barcelona, check. Aging, check Slow, check Imperial with ball, check Defensive liability, check. Wait, are we describing Fontas? It really does scream PV
Only 3 clubs made the worst in first half and worst in second half lists. Ha, let's all mock Vancouver and Miami! Wait, who was the third? Dang.
SKC absolutely needs to prioritize and maybe even spend big on a d-mid. Please god don't let that be Busquets.
Any MLS sporting director that is considering Busquets should be fired. A slow, old, tici-taka passer playing in a league with lots of top end athletes and (at best) 80% passing completion averages, he would be awful.
Just relax guys… you could put a gun to Busquets head and he still wouldn’t come to Kansas City. The guys that came this year are probably still pissed at their manager for making their deal with SKC.
totally agree. Just for kicks, I looked at his transfermarket value. He's worth a tenth now of what he was six years ago. He's worth, today, $9 million (maybe that was in euro?). I would have loved to have busquets back in the day, when he was worth $90 million. But that day is not this day. Also, Busquets was a dream of a Dmid, and his skillset would be wasted on this squad. It's like hooking Secretariat up to a plow.