Pretty good so far. Can't wait to see the next two episodes. But I have a couple bones to pick.... The documentary makes it seem like Wahl's tweet happened, the STC rally happened, and then the home game against Toronto happened. That Toronto game happened over a month after the Wahl tweet. It completely ignored the shootout win against ATL and then 4-1 win at home against NYCFC on Halloween. It also ignored the fact that STC was able to take over College Gameday when they were in Columbus. That game against NYCFC was one of my favorite games I've ever been to. The crowd was only announced at 14k due to the fact that there were only a couple days for people to actually buy tickets, in was in the middle of the week on Halloween night, and people were split on whether or not to attend games and give Precourt their money. Even so, the atmosphere was electric. I distinctly remember the entire stadium chanting "Save the Crew" in the immediate buildup to the first goal. Most of the stadium stood for the entire game and every 10 minutes or so a new "Save the Crew" chant would break out and around the entire stadium. I believe the "C-R-E-W...F**k you Precourt We are the Crew" also got it start during this game, with Precourt actually there in person making it all the better. NYCFC was stacked that year. That finished 2nd in the league to Toronto (one of the best teams in the history of the league) but we destroyed them that night. Afful capped it off by cutting through their entire defense to roll in our 4th goal of the night in the last minute of the game. It was glorious. Some of the most epic Crew pictures ever came out of this game. It's a sin that this this game didn't even get a mention, let alone a full five minutes dedicated to it. They also failed to mentioned the fact that Save the Crew completely took over College Gameday when they were in Columbus for the OSU-Penn St. game on October 28th. This got non-MLS fans talking about the situation and really boosted the morale of Crew fans. I get that you can't possibly fit everything into a documentary and keep it at a reasonable length, but these are two of the most iconic moments in the early stages of Save the Crew and definitely should have been covered in the documentary.
Agreed. The GameDay stuff was huge. There were all sorts of positive shoutouts on Twitter from non-soccer people. One big boost there was the terrible weather, undoubtedly causing a lot of fans to stay away, giving even higher visibility to the STC cause. At times, it seemed like "MLS GameDay." The Halloween game was mentioned, but it wasn't mentioned that it *was* Trick or Treat night. There were definitely a few unmentioned factors going into the reasons why people were stuck outside. The photo of the guy with the Browns hat...do we know who that is and does he have lotto numbers? The crazy thing about that game? Trust Fund's kid were there and had to be told by him that the "F U" part was about their dad. Once all parts are released, hopefully it gets released as one unified movie.
I know they talked extensively about that Toronto match. They talked about how thousands of fans, myself included, were stuck in line outside of the stadium at kickoff. They also talked about the "Respect Your Roots" tifo. But they made it seem like that was the first game to take place after the news broke, when in reality it was the fourth game (second home game) to take place. But if they did mention that NYCFC match I must have missed it. It couldn't have been anything more than just a one sentence acknowledgement at most.
Yeah...they could have touched on the away game. I went to the viewing party at whatever Hilliard-area bar that was (some Lifestyles Communities place, IIRC) and there was a big STC-related banner there for us all to sign. But I suppose it's one of those "edited for time" things. I wonder how much was edited out. Maybe we get a longer cut later on?
What away game? I'm talking about the home game against NYCFC. It 1,000% should have had a couple minutes dedicated to it.
As I recall, wasn't that game a playoff game, and the Afful goal made the difference in the final aggregate?
Yes. As I mentioned, we beat ATL in the wildcard round via a shootout, which created this epic moment: After beating ATL, we played NYCFC in the next round. NYCFC were pretty stacked, so the 4-1 win on Halloween night was quite surprising. We held on for dear life in the second leg when we had to play on the postage stamp at Yankee Stadium. We lost 2-0 but won 4-3 on the aggregate. Then we played Toronto, arguably the best team in the history of MLS, in the conference final. We tied 0-0 in the first leg at home (which was covered quite a bit in the COPA90 video) and then lost 1-0 in the away leg thanks to a Jozy Altidore goal. Toronto would go on to beat Seattle 2-0 to win the MLS Cup. It was a crazy playoff run, partly fueled (in my opinion) by the unique energy created by the fanbase via the STC movement. Granted we finished the season on a crazy hot streak, going unbeaten in the final 10 games, but the stadium was a special place to be that night against NYCFC. I truly don't think we would have won that game without that insane atmosphere.
Pretty good so far....I couldnt listen to certain parts because it still makes me so angry hearing pre-shits voice. They could cover those other things in the next few episodes.
Yea, hearing him speak on that teleconference the day after the news broke was nauseating. They could, but it wouldn’t make much sense assuming they are telling the story in chronological order. It appears that that is the plan.
This games was the lowest of lows in my fandom. Traveled to the game (didn’t take the bus thankfully) just in case it was the last game we ever played - it was that season but of course we know the rest. At the time though, we very much didn’t know. Even after we conceded a goal, we still only needed 1 to win on away goals and we definitely had chances.
I remember that for the Toronto game their were no Cops doing traffic control so it took longer to enter the Stadium to park. The Security check point, did they shut some gates down or understaff the gates?
Wasn't that the game where everyone entering the grounds had to be patted down and there were only two guys doing the pat downs, one at each gate?
I was there with my son for that game. He repurposed his Pikachu Halloween costume to be "Save The Crew Pikachu." IIRC, coming from the north, traffic getting off at the Hudson St. exit was backed up onto I71. The 17th St. exit was a little better. My son and I went directly into the stadium and the lines for security were already long while most people were still tailgating. I want to say they only had 1 or 2 security stations open at each gate.
I think you mean Morse. Maize parallels I-71. I do not recall having much of an issue, personally, as we usually go down early. I seem to recall a warning to do so, actually. Something about "increased security". Which was probably the right thing to do, all things considered (lots of anger at the time). The fail was, intentional or otherwise, not having enough security.
Increasing security as a result of potential security threats would result in a larger and more robust security presence, not less. That night there was less.
You guys are all such credulous dupes. I heard directly from Chris "Kneepads" Bils that the reason entry was so slow was that a bunch of STC goons blocked the gates, backing up the crowd half a mile into the parking lot in order to make Fratboy look bad.
Not automatically. There can be an increase in how thorough the check is without increasing staffing. Which means it takes longer, which is what occurred. Not defending the situation, but I do think folks were warned. Edit: I tried looking for that game email from 2017, but did not see it.
There wasn't an increase in thoroughness, as far as I can remember. I recall walking past one person with a handheld metal detector and then stopping at a second person to get the ticket scanned. It was no more thorough than previous games. They simply had less lines operating and there was a crowd of 21k trying to get in.
This is from an email: "MAPFRE Stadium looks forward to hosting the Audi 2017 MLS Cup Playoffs Eastern Conference Championship tonight. As always, we are in constant collaboration with law enforcement and Major League Soccer on security protocol. MAPFRE Stadium continues to value the safety and enhanced safety of all guests as its highest priority. As part of our commitment to provide the safest environment possible, out of an abundance of caution, enhanced security procedures including pat-down screenings will be in place for the match."