J. Bradley Picks Rev to Finish 7th

Don't worry, MIB. The man has never, ever been right.

 

He's so deeply never right that he actually predicts that his predictions are wrong, "Ah, who am I kidding? The Rapids are pretty solid and I’m going down for this pick. Absolutely awful job by me."

There's just something deeply pathetic about prognosticator who rips on his own predictions even as he makes them.

 

No, it's charmingly self-effacing and humorously mocks the pre-season ranking ritual. Jeff is an entertaining, if not excellent, soccer journalist. Sorry it didn't go your way Revs.

 

i like how he fails to mention how SJ's defense is in crumbles and their backup keeper broke his ankle. 3rd place finish? switch them and the revs and its more realistic.

 

That bastard! Let's hunt him down and beat the crap out of him...

 

He's says the Revs are going to field the exact same lineup as in the finals.
Did I miss something, or has Joe-Max retired?

 

for some reason bill parcells comes to mind

" you are what you are "

as for joe-max - let's remember that while he is a good player, ronaldo he is not

i know there is a love affair with the guy and what i have seen he is a terrific person

however - is he really a terrific soccer player ?

time will tell.........

 

have you seen him before he left?, have you seen him what he did for the national team?

 

i saw him ride the pine in england

i saw him do the same at the WC

im not saying he sucks, far from it

im just saying lets not stick the saviour label on a guy who hasnt played first team soccer in some time and is from what i recall injury prone

this is not an attack on joe-max the person

 

you know, without Joe-Max, the chances of the US getting into the world cup last year would have been alot slimmer, considering it was his two goals that clinched a spot in the tournament. Joe-Max will bring what this team is lacking, and you'll see that on the field, any true revs fan can agree with that.

 

Do you read before you post ?

LOOK at what I said.

JMM hasn't played first team ball lately

That's not a good thing !!

Too many folks are placing the weight of the world on his shoulders

 

I can't believe I agree with George "the Plumber" but I think he's right about this. JMM will be a valuable addition to the squad and will help take some of the pressure of TNT, but let's not kid ourselves into thinking he is the one piece we were missing. As for his two goals vs Jamaica to qualify I give him full credit for the first but the PK was nothing special, and I fully expect whoever steps up to take one for us to bury it 9 times out of 10.



As for JB's predictions...

Bradley's rankings are as follows:

1. LA
2. Clb
3. Dal
4. SJ
5. Chi
6. KC
7. Revs
8. Metro
9. Col
10. DCU

The top three look right to me and he makes good cases for all of them. SJ is way too high and should probably be flipped with Colorado. Chi is too high and should move below KC and probably us, but we fall in that middle group. We were a below .500 team that got hot at the right time and due to the flukes of last years playoff system got to ride a home field advantage to the final. We could do the same thing this year. But on the other hand our attack is fairly one dimensional and we could come up on the wrong side of a lot of 2-1 or 1-0 decisions if anything goes wrong with the D or Brown. Actually I think there is so much parity after LA that it doesn't make a lot of sense to try to pick the real order. Much easier to group teams together.

LA - clearly the cream of the crop, and somehow still under the cap.

Dallas, Colorado, maybe KC - the next tier, should compete with LA and be better than most of the Eastern Conference

Columbus, maybe Revs - favorites to win East but could slip just as easily.

Chicago, Metro, DCU - tough to gauge with the turnover, 2 of the 3 will make the playoffs and at least 1 will probably finish ahead of either us or Columbus.

SJ - turnover and injuries coupled with improvements in the rest of the West seem to doom them to the cellar.

 

As I recall, Grant Wahl has made some pretty good picks. He picked KC pretty high the year they won it, for example. Wait and hear what he has to say.

 

JMMUSA8 and georgeplmr - Can we agree that we are glad that JMM is on the team, and are also glad that, unlike in years past, JMM doesn't have to do it all by himself?

If I were writing Bradley's article, I would say that it's hard to imagine that the Revs will become champions without both TNT and JMM having a great year; if neither one is successful, we're going to be slogging it out in the lower middle of the pack, just like JB said. Most likely, they will each have good days

He is also right, sort of, that the loss of Nowak (what we expected of Nowak anyway) really hurt. The Revs still need another offensive weapon or two if they are going to scare people.

 

Sure I am glad that we have someone who can score goals on the team

However I won't agree that because JMM is here the cup is ours

We still are 'TO THE RIGHT SIDE, MARCH !' in our offensive setup

We caught lightening in a bottle last year. I hope it strikes twice

 

Who picked the Revs to win the East last year?

I did, that's who.

In ESPN Mag, you can look it up.

Of course, it was based on big seasons from Diallo and Chacon and the "much-improved Andy Williams."

So, if you follow me...

Oh, and sorry about the Joe-Max omission. Pretty bad after I predicted him to score 10-plus two weeks ago! Guess I should have taken my eyes off the Yankees-Tigers exhibition game while I was writing.

 

hehe... good one Jeff. I do not agree with some of your picks though. I don't see how you can place Chicago and SJ that far up in the standings. I do Agree with most of your picks though. Don't worry about the guys on this board. Most of them are so jaded because we are revs fans and thats what Revs fans live to do... Be Jaded.


1. Columbus
2. LA
3. Dallas
4. KC
5. NE
6. DC
7. Colo
8. SJ
9. Muts
10.Chi

 

And I have one more Question. Can we pick up Andy Williams or has he already signed somewhere else in the league, US, or over-seas? And would we have room for Chronopolus?

 

You got me. All the more reason to hunt you down and beat the crap out of you.

 

I think 7th is just about right for the Revs...that would mean there are 3 teams worse than you....DC, NY/NJ and Chicago. But SJ should be 6th, as the only difference between them and you is that LD is a shade better than JMM.

 

i don't think JMM or TnT will nearly as much impact on the success of the revs, and where they fall on the table as the success of the defense. if the revs can hold teams consistenly, look for winning season. they got hot when they stopped fishing the ball out of thier own net.

if they hold teams, they can always score 1 at home, or draw on the road.

if the offense is scoring, but they let in 2 or 3, then it is going to be a long season.

defense wins championships.

so how about a ranking strictly looking at defenseive strength, depth and conistency...

 

Funny how guys like Marc Connolly are all over DCU, thinking they are the second coming of the early United teams, crossed with Hudson's Geordie magic of the 2001 Fusion, and Bradley picks them D-A-I-D daid last. It just goes to show how much parity and uncertainty there is, and how even the "experts" have such a wide difference of opinion.

A lot of folks who didn't follow the Revs will look at the overall record and conclude that A) it was a mediocre team with a .500 record overall, B) Twellman had a great year, but no way will he repeat that, and C) the Revs got hot at the right time.

There may be varying degrees of truth to all of that, but those who didn't follow the team are missing that it was really three phases the team went through last year: Phase 1, Clavijo, Diallo, Chacon, etc. in the 3-5-2 get off to a slow start. Things aren't working so they shake things up to get to Phase 2. Nicol takes over, tries to integrate the 3 new players into the team, not to mention re-shuffling other areas such as a diminished role for Rooney, and bringing in Kante and Griffiths. It takes a while to sort things out, but they finally do in Phase 3. The team manages to jell just in the nick of time to salvage the season, and you know how that all went.

So to take the whole '02 season to make judgements on how the '03 sesaon will go is a faulty premise. The team that will start the '03 campaign is the same one that finished out the '02 season in Phase 3, with the addition of Joe-Max Moore. The Revs have sorted out a lot of the problems they have typically suffered from in the past. This year it is a matter of tweaking and upgrading where you can, rather than trying to integrate 5 new starters like past years. And those of you who are saying JMM is not the saviour, he doesn't have to be. The team was OK without him, and will be better with him. This isn't 1998.

Will Twellman get 25 goals again? That would be tough, but I think that he and Moore will get a lot more than Twellman and Harris did last year. Slice it any way you want, while Joe-Max may not be the player he was 4 years ago, he is still a huge plus.

So I would have to say that the Revs will do OK, and finish in the top half of the league. Beyond that, who knows, but these are my predictions:

1. Los Angeles
2. Dallas
3. New England
4. Colorado
5. Columbus
6. DC United
7. Kansas City
8. Mutts
9. Chicago
10. San Jose

Tom