Dude the players were the ones who mentally collapsed game after game after game. And unfortunately the roster wasn't deep enough to just remove the offenders and put other guys in ...even though that was tried on occasion.
If his mothers name is Mary the Akron connection makes sense with Porter. Bezbatchenko might be from Westerville but appears to be perhaps a aunt ? what was interesting to me was a lot of his family lived in Akron. Seems like Porter wasn’t the only Akron connection. Including whoever this Mary is who was involved with the university.
Someone in Bez family named Mary one of many from Akron. Commented on Columbus Crew fb post about Perry Kitchen. i found it interesting he had a lot of family members from Akron . This Mary lady is a Akron alum. Just wondering on the connection with Porter.
I have this dude on ignore and the threads are all swiss cheese and I don't get why we allow someone to come and spam the boards without a yellow card.
The man has a thing for threes. Three letters in his name. Three years missing the playoffs. Signing players whose age starts with three. Giving said players three year contracts when literally no one gives a 30+ year old three year deals.
You have to think that if this team stumbles again in 2023, Bez might be on the way out. It’s tough to shitcan both the President and Head Coach in the same off season. So I understand the logic of jettisoning Porter and keeping Bez. But come on, if we fail again to make the playoffs, that would be four out of five years. That’s bad. Historically bad. Couple that with his failure as head of both the soccer and business sides of the organization, his role in the botched rebrand, and that his job’s been downsized to really just the soccer stuff, and 2023 sure as hell looks like a make or break year for him in Columbus.
Here’s my big question: what is the goal this season? Until we fill out the roster, and hear what Bez and Nancy have to say this preseason, it’s hard to say. We lost our most productive winger last year, a starting caliber central midfielder, and our starting left back, and we added a soon to be 32 year old striker they may or may not have something left in the tank off the bench. The only way I can see this team being better is if Nancy is just that good of a coach. Because based on essentially the same (and older) roster, I’m not sure it’s enough. Now, if Bez and Nancy come out and say we want to contend for cups and be a top 4 team in the east (like last year) I’m gonna hold them to that. And if we have LZ and Cucho, we better be trying to win. Otherwise, what are we doing? Is this a rebuild? If they say we wanna make playoffs and have a transition year, then I’m ok with that too.
The goal every year has to be to make the playoffs, at least. How bad would the team have to be for that not to be the goal?
Agreed. If Bez isn't on the hot seat, he probably should be. Regarding the playoffs: Here's when we didn't make the playoffs: 2000, 2003, 2005, 2006, 2007, 2012, 2013, 2016, 2019, 2021, 2022. Noteable: The 1996 season saw us make the playoffs on the last day. The 2010 MLS season saw eight teams make the playoffs. Only two were from the Eastern Conference. One of them was us. The 2012 season saw us miss the playoffs by one season.
He's not acting with much urgency so it looks like he thinks the new coach will get a year to settle in and see who fits his system and who doesn't. Maybe we'll be more active in the summer window but there are some obvious holes the team hasn't done much to fix to this point.
I always look at new coaches in pro sports with a 3 year view. The first year is the start of the project. They assess what they have, find what can work, add pieces to fit. Playoffs would be great, but not expected. The second year they tinker, cut away what didn't work, bring in some new blood to round out the team. This is the year that playoffs would be expected. Then in the 3rd year you make minor changes and hopefully have a real contender on your hands where playoffs are all but guaranteed while the eyes are firmly on the Shield and MLS. I struggle to see how that blueprint can work for Nancy. The age of the core group is the main problem as he can't exactly count on 3 years of Mensah, Nagbe, Molino, Zelarayán, etc. Next issue is the very large cap expenditure on defenders/GK/CDM. I fear that very much of the next 2 years will be trying to hang on by a thread with the guys that failed to make the playoffs the last 2 years. We will get a very real presentation of whether Nancy is a better than Porter because so much of the core group will remain unchanged from Porter's tenure.