I found this very interesting article on Loran Vrielink, who is a tactics consultant for professional footballers (since 2016). He uses video analysis to work remotely one-on-one with players, providing the kind of tactical education that most coaches don't do.
https://www.americansocceranalysis.com/home/2021/7/10/where-goals-come-from Regardless of philosophy, style, principles, and game model, a club’s on-field strategy should focus on maximizing goals scored and minimizing goals conceded. Goals win points, points are how clubs reach their objectives, and clubs that reach their objectives win fans and make money. The “Where Goals Come From” project is about how to create goals (or prevent them). By breaking soccer down to basics, we aim to provide clubs a clear roadmap to success. Key points: A club needs a common language to talk about the strategy and principles the team will use to score and prevent goals. That’s what the “where goals come from” framework aims to provide. The framework can also provide context to expected goals (xG) and other types of probability models in soccer. A detailed understanding of how a club plans to maximize its goal differential can help people in a variety of roles understand how their decisions fit into the strategy.
I have issues with this kind of glorification of the "progressive pass". The problem is that it doesn't account for the fact that a "progressive pass" is inherently higher risk and leads to loss of possession more frequently, at which point the other team has more time to score, by progressive pass or otherwise. I just skimmed the article but I didn't see an analysis of progressive pass goals vs. all goals for and against, against PPG. I see progressive pass for and against vs. PPG, but the teams that score more goals are going to have more progressive pass goals for and less progressive pass goals against because they're scoring more goals in general and letting in less goals in general. Just at quick glance I don't see a strong correlation between (% progressive pass goals / all goals) to PPG. For example, Vancouver had a higher % progressive pass goals than Supporter's Shield winner Philly. That of course could be an outlier, but it didn't look all that convincing at first glance. Stahre was a coach who really liked to play more direct. He turned his nose up at "passes sideways and backwards". And that year Magnus was springing "progressive passes" left and right, with a shockingly low success rate. And we were terrible that year.
https://www.mlssoccer.com/post/2021...uitment-set-be-overhauled-analytics-innovator Vancouver hires a specialized analyst.
https://www.americansocceranalysis....e-from-tactical-progressive-passing-movements Part 2 of the series “Where Goals Come From”.
Reading that article makes me want to hurl. This is what OUR team should be doing, but instead, we suck. Go Quakesfans!! - Mark
I think an underrated "perk" has to be the added entertainment feature of watching airplanes landing and taking-off from the airport runway strip in the event that the actual on-field action is less thrilling.
https://www.americansocceranalysis....e-goals-come-from-the-five-progressive-passes Part 3 of the series "Where Goals Come From".
Hey look, you can take a MOOC on sports performance analytics from U of Michigan’s Stefan Szymanski, co-author of Soccernomics We launched a sports analytics "specialization" last year -https://t.co/GioytWy5mR - if you can successfully complete all the assignments I'd say that's equivalent to getting a "A" on 2-3 upper level ug courses at Umich. This is a coding course, so easier to assess than most.— Stefan Szymanski (@sszy) March 14, 2022
Szymanski is a complete dumb***... he said in 2015 that MLS is a pyramid scheme and that the league is likely to collapse and die sooner rather than later. All because he's from the UK and doesn't understand how American sports league franchise expansion fees work (he thinks expansion fees are "profit" for the league, not compensation to the existing owners for dilution of their ownership stake)... How is it possible for a sports author and professor at a prestigious school like U of Michigan to not grasp such a basic concept? Who knows, that's why I said he's a complete dumb***... Soccernomics: So what is the MLS business model? 23, 04, 15 by Stefan Szymanski MLS starts to sound like a pyramid scheme. You can fund a loss-making enterprise from the entrance fees of new buyers for a while, but without making money, the only reason for doing this would be glory, not profits. Americans constantly tell me that owners of sport franchises in the US will insist on making money. If that really is the case, then I predict that MLS will collapse, and probably sooner rather than later. 'Soccernomics' author says MLS' collapse is imminent. His argument is awful. There's a lot of missing information in Stefan Szymanski's calculations.
I read all of that Szymanski 2015 article you pointed to, plus a long time ago I read Soccernomics. Szymanski was largely focused on Premier League teams, so maybe back in 2015 he didn’t understand how tax advantageous a major league team can be to US billionaires with lots of gains to offset. But regardless, I think his 2015 article is pitch perfect. The major attraction for MLS owners is still funding the league with franchise fees and the appreciation of their assets in a closed system. That’s why the pyramid is still going strong.
Szymanski may not be a "dumba**" as x called him, but I think he's an incurable europhile as are so, so many soccer fans, and as such, is unable to evaluate MLS fairly as something different than the euro models. For it to be a "pyramid scheme" you'd have to posit that MLS teams have no real value. But the stadiums, the growing audience, the improving quality of play, the big $ transfers of academy guys, etc., all demonstrate simply that it is a growing league, getting more and more successful each year. So piss off Stefan!
Yeah, how can someone be excited about 74k in Carolina one week and believe it’s all a pyramid scheme the next?
You know that does not surprise me at all, actually! So when MLS announces they're opening up four expansion spots, and 12 different potential ownership groups of multi-billionaires apply from 12 different cities, the people who unlike you or Szymanski actually get to see the league's books before they plop down multiple hundreds of millions of dollars in expansion fees (plus stadiums, training facilities, academies, etc.), it's because they're falling for a pyramid scheme? Okay. Even RSL, the least desirable MLS market as the 47th largest metropolitan area in the US, had two big ownership groups interested in buying (and of course the previous owner didn't want to sell, he was forced out by MLS) that ended up combining to do so. All way dumber than you and Szymanski, two people who spend their time posting on the internet. Pretty much no difference from Theranos investors... can't wait for the miniseries about the scam that is MLS! When does the pyramid scheme collapse? When MLS stops being a "closed system"? So that will be "sooner rather than later"? Who exactly is going to force MLS to stop being a closed system soon, can you explain how that will go down? Every major sports league in the US, NFL, NBA, MLB, NHL, WNBA, NWSL, USL, etc. has expansion franchise fees AND is a "closed league".... so are they ALL pyramid schemes that will soon collapse?? That's literally just the American sports league model. No league ISN'T a closed system and it's actually the ones that say they will be an "open league" that end up collapsing (NASL 2011–2017 version) or seem headed in that direction (NISA 2019–), weirdly without ever even actually switching to an open system, it almost just seems like a curse or a desperation move to get in the good graces of the two dozen internet weirdos who are obsessed with crapping on "closed leagues". Sure looks like a league that's about to "collapse... sooner rather than later"! Just heard @stlCITYsc has north of 60,000 season ticket deposits for their @MLS season!!!!!!!! Truly remarkable but not surprising to any of us inside STL!!!! #MLS Their @MLSNEXTPRO opener on March 25th will be sold out as well. Keep it going @BetzKindle 👊🏼💪🏼— Taylor Twellman (@TaylorTwellman) March 17, 2022 Nashville Soccer Club Surpasses 20,000 Season Ticket Member Threshold for GEODIS Park
Guys, remember that a pyramid scheme is where the money put in by the newest investor, who is starting at the bottom, flows to the earlier investors. The income stream may look like revenue to the early investors, but it is really just investment fees flowing uphill. MLS expansion fees are the same deal. And when Garber ratchets up those fees, MLS franchises appear to increase in value. But the fees are super-inflated when you compare them with the price of clubs in other leagues. E.g., how could InterMiami or Houston be worth $700M (I think that was the latest valuation), which could be 1/3 the price of Chelsea? According to that guy who co-founded Zappos, MLS did not provide him an open book of club finances. He said he couldn’t understand the finances at all, the numbers didn’t make sense, and MLS did not reveal the broadcast revenue that was coming from SUM. It will be interesting to see what happens to MLS franchise values once the league stops expanding. I’m sure that’s about when Garber will retire, leaving the $300-400M annual revenue shortfall to the next CEO to solve.
Anyone think this book will be worth reading? It is my solemn duty to inform you that I have written a book. It's about how data (quietly) conquered and then transformed football. But mostly it's about the people who did it. It also contains a joke about Paul the Octopus. Feel free to pre-order it. https://t.co/ESMt63FFDy pic.twitter.com/ZMdRxE2Qph— Rory Smith (@RorySmith) July 21, 2022
Wow, @JazzyJ and @xbhaskarx, this is your chance! (Sorry if I missed mentioning anyone else, those 2 came to the top of my mind.)