I'm not sure I've ever seen Jackson Ragen play, and he probably wouldn't have been on my radar as someone to pay close attention to if I had. (I just checked, and it turns out he was suspended the one time I watched the Sounders in person recently.) So I was a little surprised to see he was on the 3 man shortlist for MLS Defender of the Year. I guess I'll be looking more closely now.
Ragen was the #1 guy I said I wanted to see last January camp, but he got injured early on. It was very untimely. Otherwise he might be in the mix. On paper, he fits every style & cb combo due to his size, mobility, instincts, intensity & distribution. Hopefully seeing him on the list helps provide Poch a cue for his return this time around. Ragen & the Sounders play tonight actually. This is the 1st day I'm actually interested in the playoff matches. Prior they've been very foreign-centric.
I don’t mind a January Camp call up, and while I hope to be wrong, I don’t think he moves the needle for us.
He plays in MLS for a pretty popular team? Not exactly an obscure name that no one around here has seen play...
As someone that *does* watch the Sounders a lot, he doesn't move the needle (yet) for our CB pool. He can still improve but I feel that he's actually regressed a bit from last year which is ironic since he's up for defender of the year. I personally think Yeimar is still better on our team, but we do have the best defense in the league and he can pass pretty well. He's also scored on a few set pieces which might lift him up in the eyes of some. Houston should be a good test, especially with us not having Vargas (red card last match) so we're having to either play a pretty out of shape Joao Paulo or possibly Atencio in his spot in midfield in front of the backline
That's an interesting take. (not being sarcastic). I do, however, have a few issues with it. The first, obvious issue is that difference between EPL and Serie A is 1.7, but I have difficulty getting a feel for how big of a difference that really is. Man City is the top ranked team in the world, so gets a 100 from OPTA, all other teams rankings are based on that score. The next highest (in the world) is Real Madrid at 97.4 (a difference of 2.6), the next English team (Arsenal) comes in at 95.7. If a difference of 1.7 puts EPL in a league of it's own than does Man City actually belong in EPL? (By the way, if EPL's score is calculated without Cit's included, the average drops all the way down to 87.1 (just below Ligue 1), so you can see how much that one score matters. Perhaps, they should have said that Man City is in a league of it's own and then the top 5 becomes the 2nd 5? But is Man City really in a league of it's own? Liverpool has 22 pts to Man City's 23. (I know the season is still fairly young) Is the top league Man City and Liverpool? But Liverpool's rank is 96.4 to Man City's 100...we're back to that difference of 1.7 separating tiers. Aside from the above, my biggest problem with it is at least threefold: (in no particular order) 1. The difference in size of the league. One reason for the importance is that the effect of any one team's score has a bigger impact in a smaller league.Take the Danish Superligaen and Dutch Eredivisie, for example. The Eredivisie has 18 teams, while the Superligaen has 12. Their averages are almost identical but the Eredisie has more teams at 80 or above (6) while the Superligaen has 4. 2. I assume that the power ranking for the league is a simple average of the teams (I didn't read their methodology so I apologize if I am wrong here. I think a simple average (arithmetic mean) is insufficient. The median would be slightly better imo, but that really is insufficient as well...more information about the distribution within the league would also be helpful. Take the same two leagues, for instance... Eredivisie far outclasses the Superligaen at the top with PSV, Feyenoord and Ajax all ranked above the top Danish team and the upper half (9 teams) has an average power ranking of 82.2, while the power ranking for the SL is 80.9. It's reversed for the bottom half with the bottom 1/2 in the Netherlands ranking at 72.4 while Denmark has 73.7. What does it mean? I'm not sure but it does give a somewhat clearer picture of what each league has to offer. A league like the Eredisie is very unbalanced, to the point where removing the top team or the top two teams (combined with the fact that, with 18 teams, it is a somewhat smaller league) makes a very large difference. Removing PSV lowers the league power ranking to 76.5 which is the same as Czech first league and removing feyenoord lowers the score to 75.7 which is below the Credit Suisse Super League (currently the 20th ranked league). 3. Finally, the third thing is recently promoted teams (and/or relegated teams for 2nd division leagues). All team change from season to season, so there is uncertainty for all teams but those that have been promoted or relegated change more. The rankings, as I understand it, are basically a moving average. This means that there will be a discrepancy for all teams, but especially for the recently promoted/relegated teams that will be much more pronounced at the beginning of the season. As the season progresses, the ratings should become more accurate. Overall, I think that the rankings are interesting and there are a lot than can be taken from them but while the numbers themselves are "objective", the conclusions based on those numbers aren't completely objective. The conclusions are always going to be based upon subjective ideas on what makes one league "better" or "stronger" than another. When I think of what it means to be the "strongest" league, I ask myself "If I were to pick a random team from that league, how strong would I be able to expect it to be?" I wouldn't consider EPL to be stronger than Eredivisie because Man City is better than PSV, but because if you take a random team from EPL it would likely beat a random team from Eredivisie. Based upon the rankings, PSV would be favored against any of the bottom 3/4 of the EPL table but lowly Southampton at 79.5 would be favored against 2/3 of the Netherlander table. Furthermore, the EPL has 5 teams that would be favored over ANY team from the Netherlands and 14 teams that would be favored against all but 2.
Hmmm.....interesting from Tim Ream. “I’m not a huge fan of academies in England”Tim Ream on what he learned about youth development in 🏴 pic.twitter.com/OzH5A1o7yp— PLAYER / MANAGER (@Player__Manager) October 28, 2024
Ragen is an organizer and a very good passer and he’s learning to turn 6’6” into an attacking threat too and he’s either lefty or so two footed it doesn’t matter. He doesn’t inspire confidence 1v1 in the open field, he’s basically got to make the right choices because he’s not athletic enough to be wrong and recover. He’s usually right and Seattle has Yeimar, basically a Miles Robinson tier 1 v1 CB to be his CB bodyguard and Nouhou. a monster 1v1 defender as his LB. If he plays next to Jedi and with a safety as his CB partner, he would look good for the USMNT. My personal preference is that both CBs be safeties but lots of teams make it work with one passer and one runner.
Yeimar would be a starter for us, & fwiw they're both similarly, well-rated in the metrics the last 2 seasons. You show a flaw in the way you project to the nat'l team that you base your opinion off more the down season, in which he still sports a 7.09 rating on the best d & is a finalist for defender of the yr. Sign me up for a guy who does that in a down yr & checks all the attribute boxes. That, & at least decent performance annually, while showing he can be really good for seasons, is what's important. It's not as if Miles & Besler didn't experience moderate dips in performance. We can't all have Walker Zimmerman's level of consistent intensity for MLS regular season games which mean little.
Not much for standouts thru the 1st set of matches (I've seen). 2-3 I'd highlight: - Tolkin: tough match-up at the champs, shows a ton of character, & skill in their shock win - Ragen: rock solid all-around while helping keep a home clean sheet - Freese: was beaten, but little fault there, & multiple difference-maker saves
Roldan was rock solid as usual, came a nice save from opening the scoring at 5 minutes, hit his shootout PK and generally bossed the midfield even before Houston went down a man.
Rarely watched Colo this year, just the games with LA. Having said that, Oliver Larraz was the one player who impressed me for Colo yday. Went to the fotmob graphic with the scores and it was unusual to see one player, Larraz, with a 8.1 score and teammates 6.9 and below. He hit a howler on the goal. He was active in the midfield in a game where LA had possession when they wanted it (58%) From Wiki On August 6, 2021, Larraz joined USL Championship side San Diego Loyal on loan.[6] On March 15, 2022, the Colorado Rapids announced Larraz had successful surgery to repair an open fracture for his tibia.[7] Because of the injury and subsequent recovery and rehabilitation, Larraz did not play any professional soccer during the MLS and MLS Next Pro 2022 season. Larraz spent the 2023 season with the Rapids 2 team, scoring 8 league goals and providing 8 assists while leading Rapids 2 to the MLS Next Pro Western conference playoff finals. Larraz was selected to the MLS NEXT Pro 2023 Best XI for his efforts. On February 24, 2024, Larraz earned his first start with the Colorado Rapids during their season opener against the Portland Timbers. Larraz quickly established himself in the starting squad under Chris Armas. Who scored says he likes to tackle and dribble, is a strong tackler, and has no weaknesses. Question: Is he a Jan camp guy?
Zack Steffen with his feet. Pochettino, USMNT 🇺🇸 staff, are y’all watching? pic.twitter.com/jkOnnRavqX— Tactical Manager (@ManagerTactical) November 2, 2024
Tolkin was outstanding again, outside his "miss" in the penalty shootout. Thankfully for him it didn't cost NYRB & they down the reigning champs. Back to the Flat Earther from Middle Earth, the guy's just different. A couple plays he makes in ET - deadens a ball running full speed, and traverses the d, then connects on a pass. Another one that could have been FTW; he cuts across the d on the edge of the box, and chips the ball w/ the outside of his boot to his teammate far post who can't get the ball off his foot fast enough. And he was just making smart defensive reads to stop runs in behind and knock it off his man. The other notable guy was Schulte, and he was what he normally is. He's a neutral shot-stopper, who's plus w/ his feet, & not afraid of the moment. Allowed a goal he could have saved, but wasn't a mistake either. Then made a couple saves in the shootout, including reading one and springing low to the ball inside the post (this was described as a weakness). That was the last rd of the regular frame to keep CBus alive. But his overall shot-stopping needs to improve to have the clear leg up on the Turners and Freeses who have that as their selling pt. He is significantly younger.
Miles Robinson won ASA's MLS Defender of the Year and he, Walker and Cole Bassett made their G+ Best XI. They are the only Americans, plus Lucho Acosta. G+ really likes Bassett; I wouldn't mind him getting another look one of these days. Just a versatile player. https://www.americansocceranalysis....rds-ballot-the-most-analytical-ballot-in-town
Look at how high Herrera is in the pecking order. I see he only debuted for Guatemala last year. I wonder why there was zero interest in him. He played youth football for us.
Herrera has a US cap. I can't get their app to work to see the breakdown but in general, Herrera is considered a very good RB in MLS but is heavily weighted to offense and crosses and has some defensive deficiencies. Kind of a like a Brooks Lennon. I expect like a few others, he was scared off by Dest and our supposed RB depth.
Yea, the bigger issue was starting Herrera over Araujo in Olympic qualifying. If anything our coaches gave Herrera too many opportunities.
Herrera is a better attacker than Julian and the big complaints we hear about the RBs is going forward. It was a reasonable call IMO.
I doubt Herrera would ever be a good La Liga RB sold to the EPL for double-digits. Araujo had more usage at the time, let alone long-term. On the list of epic fails by Kreis in that debacle.
Apparently, neither wanted to play for the US. Araujo, in particular, has been vocal that he did not want to represent the US. There is not epic fail, other than ever calling him in. But, I don't think anyone would argue we shouldn't have called him in. In short, we were never an option for him. No worries. We will survive, move on from him. Better yet, move this to another thread.