The 2019 Table :: Magic Numbers, Tragic Numbers & Other Doubtful Digits

If you immediately know the toaster is hot, the team
was toasted a long time ago. (The Riddle of Toast)​

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Alright, fine! You filthy, screeching brats ...

The Toast Thread is back for another season of crap analysis, shoddy calculations, moronic prejudices, childish superstitions, musty inside jokes, and its ever growing pile of shameless toast puns.

So there you go. You jerks got what you wanted. But do I get what I want? Nope. MLS passes over SRFC and for what?! For Cincinnati, a city Dr. Johnny Fever once rightly described as "rock bottom." Well, MLS, if your standards are gonna drop that low, then maybe I don't even want Sacramento to be in your stinking league any longer. Except, I really do. And I also want Matador back on TV.

It's all been downhill since Matador was cancelled. Trump was elected. SRFC got passed over ... more than once. NYC, ORL, MIN, and CIN all joined the league. The USMNT missed the World Cup. LAG and SEA both won MLS Cups.

Of course, the NASL also died. So I guess it hasn't been all bad news since Matador went off the air.

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Things that nobody reads.
Links that nobody clicks.

If any of you read this stuff, you wouldn't ask such stupid questions later. But you don't and you will. If you recognize what's written here, first, that's weird because nobody reads this stuff, and, second, that's because, year after year, I pretty much entirely copy and paste it from previous iterations of this thread.

• Previous editions: 2007, 2008 (lost), 2009, 2010, 2011, 2012, 2013, 2014, 2015, 2016, 2017, and 2018

• Companion threads: DCU 2010, and DCU 2012.

• Parity related notes: "Yoshou’s Blind Squirrel Theory,” Parity, Player Selection & The DCU Front Office, (Dis)Parity and The 2013 MLS Season.

• Background on the Calculated and Actual Despair Numbers: 2010 incarnation, 2011 explanation, 2012 revision.

• Toast: The taxonomy of toast (which runs from untoasted bread to burnt toast) is rigorously scientific, and certainly not some back-of-an-envelope calculation based upon an anecdotal sense of the probable, improbable, and highly improbable. Nor is it purposefully designed to infuriate Crewligans and Orlandorks. That is, however, an accidental, but welcome, attribute. As per the 2015 thread, once toasted, a team may be Lazarused, becoming Lazarakia, which is to say untoasted, only once back in playoff position by PPG. For yet another year, the secret word remains fercockt. Nobody seemed to notice the secret word last year or the year before that. I told you nobody reads this stuff. This does not shock me, but it does disappoint me. Have I mentioned that you're all terrible people? In the grand history of toast, no team once toasted has made the playoffs, though one or two have been temporarily Lazarused. Determinations about toast are made at the end of the playing week as establish by this thread's schedule of games.

• The Way of Toast: The Toast Jesus thread on the religion board exists to discuss the religion of Toasterology, the philosophy of Toasterism, as well as all other matters ethical, epistemological, and metaphysical. Toast technique is, however, off topic.

Also, we are free to make up new rules as we go along, and from time to time when weird shit happens we do just that. That's how we roll on the toast thread. Deal with it. And if you can't deal with it, then kindly go toast yourself!

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The 2019 Toast Festival is brought to you by Mercy Health, the official healthcare provider for expansion dysfunction syndrome.

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For the sin of bumping the 2018 Toast Thread with the intention of pressuring me to begin the 2019 Toast Thread, this year's enemies list is as follows: @AndyMead, @BalanceUT, @Baysider, @Beerking, @bgix, @Bluecat82, @cleazer, @El-ahrairah, @ElNaranja, @EvanJ, @FoxBoro 143, @Green and BLue, @GunnerJacket, @JasonMa, @jaykoz3, @lurak, @nlsanand, @odave, @POdinCowtown, @pr0ner, @PTFC in KCMO, @rslfanboy, @SiberianThunderT, @SierraSpartan, @sitruc, @SoccerMan94043, @TheJoeGreene, and @ThreeApples. Also, your pressure did not work.

No doubt additional enemies will be acquired throughout the remainder of this season. Indeed, more than likely all of you will be enemies of this thread before the season is complete. But especially those defects to decency who support LAG and SEA.

Please remember that all imperfections in this thread, no matter whether technical, factual or grammatical, are the fault of these enemies. If errors are discovered, please curse this thread's enemies, and then kindly notify me of the errors so I might correct them.

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Golly, gee whiz! Look at the pretty tables!


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Notes

In last year's opening post, I said that the more we expand, the harder it will be for bottom of the table teams to survive beyond August, and maybe even July. Especially with the schedule shifting earlier, July is now the month when bottom of the table playoff hopes die. We are opening this thread with five toasted teams, and only one of them is newly popped from the toaster.

Let's begin with the EC. Unlike last year, we have a pretty even PPG gradient throughout the EC table. Except CIN at the bottom, no team is really on an island. NYC, PHI, ATL, NYR, and perhaps even DCU are sitting comfortably, needing only 1.00 PPG or less to squeeze into the playoffs. NER, TFC, and MTL are fighting it out in the middle of the table for the final spot. ORL will need to fight just to get back into fighting shape. As for CIN, they are long gone and well on the way to becoming burnt toast. CLB was the first EC team toasted. I do not weep for the Crewligans. CHI only recently joined the toasty ranks.

As for the WC, LAX is on an island by itself atop the table. I think they could lose every single remaining game and still possibly make the playoffs. A winning percentage of nearly 80% will do that. Not bad for a team that is and will always be CHV's ghost. SEA, MIN, SJE, and LAG have virtually no separation between them, and are all on a glide path to a playoff berth. RSL, POR, and FCD are the mid-table teams vying for the last spot. HOU and SKC are in limbo between contention and toast. Which brings us to VAN and COL. VAN was the first team toasted this year. And COL followed soon after.

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Quick Hits

LAX has been eliminated from WS contention.

Leaving all competition in the dust, LAX is averaging 2.80 PPG at home and 1.85 PPG away.

CIN has been eliminated from SS contention.

Leaving all competition in the dust, CIN is averaging 0.91 PPG at home and 0.50 PPG away.

With a schedule of 11 home games and 1 away game remaining, POR have, by far, the easiest remaining schedule in the league.

The league is averaging pretty much exactly 3 goals per game. This is a bit lower than last year.

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Housekeeping

Same as always: Full updates once a week. Mini-updates as warranted. Some updates (like this one) half-assed. Others (like the next one) full-assed.

 

Fixed below ...



There's always something. There are two portions of my toast spreadsheet. One is a true worksheet, and the other has everything formatted for posting here. I've had this correct on the worksheet for months, but I never noticed it wasn't updated on the posting format until it was pointed out just now.

 

No timeouts in soccer!

All that matters is that I'm sure you're guilty of something.

Silly Crewligan thinks people care about the Crew.

 

Where's the 2020 Toast Thread?

 

Shorter version: I'll tell you when your damn team is toast.