...and we have such slow-boat defenders. There's very little speed on this team, and none of it is on defense. Schnegg is the closest to a fast defender that we have, and he is not very.
Troy is just so hopelessly inept. Seems like a great guy though. I hope they’re kind whenever they get around to firing him. I cannot wait to cancel my season tickets later this summer.
Only 16 teams since 2014 have a worse GD than we currently do. Of course we are several of those 16 teams from years past. [297 total teams]
I don't see how you can pin this entire lost season on Coach Lesense with that roster. This is the same coach that made game plans to win at the Red Bulls and at Cincinnatti with that threadbare roster. I think his performance has been above average given the roster available. If you want to move on from him, I get it. Just give him some credit. He isn't a bad coach at all.
Every year, we moan about how we just want this team to do SOMETHING. Find an identity and stick with it. Now that they've finally done that, people want them to drop the identity because the results aren't there. It's stupid. Give Lesesne a roster that isn't the worst in the league, bar none, and let's see what he can do.
I’m sorry but give me a break with that. Nothing about those two results was sustainable. In the New York game you had 2 insane individual efforts by Peglow to snag a halftime lead. Red Bull, a team which has no interest in possession, had twice as much of the ball as we did. They had more xG in each have and subsequently the game on the whole. We hung on to win. Cincinnati was almost the same unsustainable script. We got two goals off of set plays early on and spent the entire second half defending as if we were up a goal and down a man in the last 5 minutes of a World Cup final. Just because we rarely have success doesn’t mean we should hang on that. Those are the outliers. They are prototypical smash and grab results. Any time a team doesn’t beat us right now they view it as a terrible game. DCU has tons of problems but the ones on the field are a direct result of the ineptitude of the coach. Full stop.
But we don’t have an identity. What always gets trotted out is that we’re some high energy, high pressing team. Except we’re not that at all. The team is built around an immobile center forward who is asked to play almost zero defense. Its wingers are asked to cover more ground than almost anyone in the league, but aren’t athletic profile fits for that role. Our backline is slow. None of those are elements for a high pressing team. Without even getting into the insane tactical responsibilities of the attacking midfielders, the tactics that the team demonstrates week in and week out rarely ever execute the stated principles of the coach. This is a team that spends excessive time in its own half, including against some of its worst opponents. The first half of the game in Toronto was an abomination. We didn’t have a shot until stoppage time and that was a Schnegg prayer with a 0.01 xG. Chicago absolutely manhandled us. RSL did the same. NE had us on the ropes until Pirani snatched a draw with a banger. Those are all teams in the same echelon as we are. There is no excuse for how badly our roster has regressed and underperformed. Stroud, Pirani, Herrera, Bartlett, Murrell, Enow, and Peltola have all regressed significantly in year two of being under Lesesne. Troy’s system is the worst in MLS even if it had the perfect players in every role. It is tactically mystifying. And everyone knows any coach worth his salt is going to adjust the tactics to suit the roster they have. Troy just watches our goalie kick the ball out for throw-ins ten times a game while trying to find a triple-teamed Benteke on a goal kick. All we need to know about Troy is that he had 6 month audition to be permanent head coach for RBNY, they said thanks but no thanks, and then promptly went on to win the eastern conference and play in MLS Cup the season after dropping him.
Our roster is more than comparable to Chicago and San Jose, the worst two MLS sides a year ago, both of which hired quality MLS coaches in the offseason. In our last two games against them we’ve been obliterated by a combined score of 13-2.
Your previous post was thoughtful and well-reasoned, even if I disagreed with it. But I don't think this one is. San Jose has two recent league MVP candidates, three total DPs and some other interesting pieces too. For their part, Chicago has one of the league's best young talents and a Golden Boot candidate; they have two total DPs and they're keeping one slot open for the expected DeBruyne signing this summer. DC has one good player, who's been injured for much of the year, two interesting wingers, and absolutely nothing else. The only real competition they have for worst roster in the league is Montreal. (Toronto probably has the most poorly constructed roster but that's because they just can't get rid of the third most expensive player in the league.) Could a better coach do something with a team that has no available DPs, and shitty talent all across the field? It's not impossible, but I very, very strongly doubt it. But tearing down the foundation yet again would do more harm than good.
But they could cut Ally Mackay loose and I wouldn't lose any sleep. Every single one of us looked at this roster at the end of last season and said, "If they lose Benteke, they're a lock for the Spoon in 2025." It's inexcusable to have done fück all to change that. Indeed, it's very hard to argue that DC's roster is better top-to-bottom in 2025 than it was in 2024.
I’ll just say it like this. Troy isn’t the guy and we’re just wasting time the longer we spend with him. How far we’ve fallen that we’re excusing 1-6, 1-7, a 1-4 in Orlando that was even more painful to watch than those games with a bigger margin. 0-2 at Toronto where the first half was worse than any of those other performances. Benteke, last year’s Golden Boot winner and an MVP candidate, played all 90 in three of those four matches. The one out of those he missed, Chicago was missing their star striker and a plethora of other players (as were we - it was equal footing). To cite improved statistics and performance of players on other teams without credit to their upgraded coaching and structure is misguided. Christian Espinoza so far in MLS play has the same number of goals as all of last season in half the games and is on track for equaling his assist tally. His rating has jumped from 7.3 to 7.8. Cuypers in Chicago has already equaled his goal tally from last year and is one assist away from the same after 16 games compared to 31 a year ago. Brian Gutierrez is on the exact same trend but 12 matches played instead of 32. Gutman has double the goal tally and 4 assists (compared to zero a year ago). These coaches also have helped bring better talent into their team. SJ added Arango and Jones from within MLS and they are their 2nd and 3rd highest rated players. Do we not think that Pirani, Peglow, Stroud, etc. would be performing better in a team with improved tactics, structure, and less extended doghouse sessions from the manager? Would the team not be scoring more goals with players far more talented than Jacob Murrell on the field instead of watching him from the bench? I agree with y’all on the following: 1. Our ownership sucks 2. It’s hard to feel good about McKay since a lot of this roster is his, although reports say he didn’t want Lesesne either 3. Will changing the coach help? Most likely not, given the two items above. But it’s just so bad from Troy. And it blows my mind that we’re getting ready to have him at the helm when we sign a DP this summer, still have a trophy to play for, etc.
The roster is trash, I don't think anyone could argue it. I think its worth considering that the players who have regressed, have regressed for one of 3 reasons - 1 - The got a year older, the coach is bad and they tuned him out 2 - The best player, golden boot winner has been out for a while now 3 - Last year's positive performances were the outliers against these player's mean rather than the other way around. Lets be honest, Enow was a solid contributor on a midtable club in the Israeli PL, not exactly a hotbed of elite talent. Peltola was injured and out of contract when we signed him, its not like anyone else thought he was worth a flier. Murrell is a draft pick, not some guy that pro teams were hot on to have in their academies. St Louis was horrible when they traded Bartlett away, its not like he was setting the league on fire. Same thing with Stroud, who I think also benefitted from having Benteke around, drawing attention. Herrera is dependent upon someone getting on the end of his crosses, with Benteke out, Murrell isn't exactly close to a sufficient replacement. Pirani is who think he is.
When I let my season tickets lapse two years ago (after more than 20+ years), I told the team representative that reached out to me that the team was broken from top to bottom and nothing I saw gave me the impression things were going to change (and I was personally insulted by the 30% increase in my seat prices). Two years later, I don't feel any differently... The ownership is terrible - cash poor or unwilling to spend and they make bad hiring decisions. The business office is a joke - we sold a record number of hot dogs and misspell the names of team legends. Surrounded by young talent in the DMV, the academy and development system is pretty much a train wreck. The General Manager has gone from bad to worse - I mean, Ally actually seems to be worse than Dave Kasper when it comes to judging MLS talent and roster construction. He should be fired immediately lest he be allowed to do more damage during the upcoming transfer window. Herrera is a good signing and Schnegg isn't terrible. Beyond that, I'm not sure I can think of single player he's brought in who seems like a good signing at this point. And the coach seems like a nice guy, but what he's doing ain't working. Could I see him doing better with a better roster. Maybe. Do I think he's an elite young coach who could eventually take us to a championship. I just don't see it, MLS is a league where you can turn your entire club around very quickly with a good coaching hire and 1 or 2 key signings that you can build around. What's happening at DC United right now (and pretty much for the last 15 years) is the opposite of that... Anyways, that's my .02. Back to lurking...
Nearly every single argument on this forum for the last 16 years has been some variant of, "Is this abortion the coach's fault or the GM's fault?"
FTR, I have alwasy laid our poor results at the feet of Levient/Thohir or Levien/Kaplan. I've defended Dave until some point a couple of ys ago, after moving to the new stadium when the revenue that was supposed to fix everything didn't. I've always maintained that we gave Ben short shrift for the results he got from a roster that often one of the least expensive in the league. There were only 2-3 ys out of his 10 where our results on the field fell short of the spend on payroll. The man got us blood from a stone and a healthy chunk of the fan base was still willing to chase him out of town with torches and pitchforks. I blamed owenrship when they hid behind the lack of stadium revenue at RFK while they cried poor/losses while collecting SUM $$$ off the DCU books. I blamed ownership for the entirety of the Lucho debacle. I blamed ownership for alienating Rooney the player. I blamed ownership for our office park training center, an hour from the stadium, from the start. I blamed ownership for Lodada disaster as well as the knock on effects like selling players who should have been kept in lieu of the coach. I blamed ownership for Rooney the coach, which I was never a fan of. I am not yet to the point at which I am ready to throw McKay under the bus, but should I reach that point, it will be 100% on onwership's head.
Ownership is absolutely the root of all of our problems. It’s why we have deficiencies in CSO personnel. It’s why we have to overpay for players. It’s why many players don’t want to come here. It’s why our youth academy is half assed. It’s why we’re stuck hiring rookie MLS coaches who fail and won’t get good gigs elsewhere in the league. It’s why we’re ok sending out effing hot dog sales social posts after getting shutout at home to a rival. It’s why Jim Curtin is unemployed and we can’t (and probably haven’t even tried to) get him aboard. And it’s why I’m done with my season tickets. $99 for MLS season pass next year will save me thousands.
I used to be one of the perennial optimists on here, but I haven't had season tickets since the last year of RFK in 2017. The price just made no sense compared to the results on(and sometimes off) the field. Moved to Denver for work a few years ago picking up the Rapids as a second team and then moved to Richmond a couple years ago. I actually found watching the Rapids more enjoyable for a period despite their moneyball. You expected the penny pinching in that organization and for a period they had more direction(under Fraser) than I've seen in this organzation in a long time. Even now, though not perfect, they seem to stockpiling a lot of solid American talent which is better than the international island of misfit toys we currently have. DCU will always be number one but this ownership really makes it difficult to remain that way. I will never consider resuming until major organizational changes take place. And it doesn't seem like that will be happening anytime soon.
I think it’s more that fans know pressure won’t change the owner. I mean, how long did Snyder have? And even then, as an outsider I think it was more the internal bullshit like the cheerleader scandal or the Jon Gruden stuff.