Another long Fall/Winter off for AFC fans and the FO. That match was hard to watch, with AFC players constantly hacking LAG, complaining to the ref about every call, and starting fist fights. Josh Wolff went ballistic at the end, knowing that prec*urt must be axing him soon. The team plays the victim role, just like their fans. A team born out of greed and deceit, is undoubtably one of the worst clubs in MLS history. Does prec*urt have the courage, and money, to axe Wolff, bring in a proven manager, and re-build the roster? I doubt it.
He was signed through 2025 so he's not going to go hungry although I can't believe Fatso had him anywhere near the top of the pay scale Oddly, he's the one person in that organization that I don't detest. So it's no real cause for great mockery when he gets the can. Oh sure, he was a fool to agree to work for Precourt but MLS head jobs aren't easy to come by and that goes double for guys with zero HC experience. He'll end up someplace as an assistant. maybe with Gregggggg in Chicago if the rumors are true. Anyway, that leaves Brad Stuver as still the only person in that outfit who I'd be happy to see with the Crew. Great person, terrific keeper who single handedly kept ATX at least a bit competitive despite playing. ehind a crap.defense.
Part of me thinks that what they did in year 2 set unrealistic expectations for the fanbase, and he's a victim of his own success. But when an MLS team misses the playoffs in back to back seasons, it's hard to say it's unfair that someone gets fired. I honestly haven't paid enough attention to them to say if he's to blame or the front office is to blame, and I don't really care enough to find out.
I don't think so. People can be outright delusional when it comes to calls that go against their own team. This forum is proof of that.
We're the ones who came up with the whole "We're so massive that 2005-level Thierry Henry is too chicken to play for us" joke.
Seeing our new USMNT coach wearing that putrid verde shirt, and everything it stands for, makes me want to vomit. What he witnessed from AFC, and Josh Wolff as the match was ending, should have been eye opening for sure....
I mean it was just a guy who lives in his mom's basement and not Poch,but still vomit inducing either way.I mean it's not even funny!
He was too chicken. In addition to having to play in front of the megaphone every game, he would have to practice against St. Duncan, Chad, and Ezra/Leitch every day. On game days, he would have to go up against Dema, Heaps, the Human Tampon Michael Bradley, and others known more for dirty play than their finesse. Henry was too scared.
IMHO. Austin was fed this line that their city was soooooo superior to Columbus, and that their fans were spending so much more than other teams, and their sponsors were donating so much more than other sponsors, that their on-field product should be much better with all the financial advantages they had. But their city is ranked 25/29 in population. Their stadium is 18th in size clustered with the smallest 12 stadiums in the 18-20k in size. Their roster salary is in the top half but grouped the mid-spenders who are in the 15-18 million range (ie not the top 4, or bottom 7.) In every essence of the word, they are a small market team. Small market teams need to have several breaks go their way to compete with the Miami, New York, and LA's of the world. Columbus has it (but for how long) with Nancy, Cucho, Nagbe, Facilities, and the rest. Austin doesn't, and being entitled to have it doesn't help their situation.
Missing the playoffs 3 times in 4 years is pretty damning for any coach. At the time of his firing, Wolff was one of the five most-tenured coaches in the league. I think the only reason he got 2024 is because he’s one of AP’s boys and Precourt is too much of a coward to do anything until forced.
Leaving aside the corrupt manner in which the city got a team, Austin was/is a very strong market for MLS to be in. Not the biggest metro area, as you point out. But growing rapidly, and without much in the way of competition from other pro sports. As with everything associated with him, Precourt is Austin’s main weakness. I won’t pretend to be an expert on all things Austin, but his failure to get the stadium built in a prime location will, I’m sure, be a net drag on the club’s finances if they don’t start fielding a competitive club in the near future. But mostly, he’s just not shown a willingness to spend what it takes to be competitive, or that he really understands how to run a pro soccer club (how the hell does Andy Loughnane still have a job?). Being an owner has always seemed as though it’s been a hobby, lifestyle choice for him. The best thing Precourt could do for MLS fans in Austin would be to sell the team and pocket what would be a sizable return on his marginal investments.
Garber & Co. were determined to move the Crew to Austin because of two simple-minded ideas: First, the ridiculous "largest city without a major league team" fallacy, which pretended to mean that it was practically a civil rights violation for them not to have one. But the obvious flaw is that there is ALWAYS a "largest city without a major league team". It's like, make a list of cities and then tick them off. Today it's, I dunno. Birmingham, Alabama or something. We practically owe them a team. Once they get one you cross them off and go to the next until every place this side of Biloxi Mississippi has a major team. It simple is not a logical argument. Second, sports marketing types are in love with their own brilliance, and they looked around and said "Hey, MLS sure does attract a lot of Millennials" and then looked around for a crowd of Millennials and found Austin. They got big old boners over the Land of Man Buns and held some meetings to try and figure out how to put a team there, which then dovetailed nicely with their contempt for Columbus as a flyover country soybean field and figured they could kill two hipsters with one murder. So then all they had to do was locate some midwit investor. Enter Tony Precourt. You could have just stopped there. The problem is that he's not a businessman, he's a punk who never earned a damn thing. Money is just something you manipulate, and other people's money is the best. Daddy gave him a big pile to play with, but he really hit the jackpot not because of his skill or vision but because he was the only guy who would return Don Garber's phone calls. Don is the person who made him a billionaire. Precourt bought an asset for $65 million, Don then swapped him what amounted to an expansion team worth around $400 million and now, without doing anything much is now estimated to be worth $800 million. All because Don was desperate to toss Columbus overboard and pander to a town full of very flakey consumers.
Not sure if you knew this but a soccer match is actually two games in one. The battle on the pitch and another battle in the stands. Sell outs put us in rare air amongst the MLS elite. Some teams focus on the attendance and couldn’t care less about fielding a competitive team. See the green men of central Texas.
Not so sure that the green men's focus on attendance is working anymore..... Because the seats are bought & paid for - they don’t care if the stadium is empty if people already paid for their seats.They’re also making money hand over fist via retail sales as the only game in town.They want Austin FC to make money for them & sadly it’s still working. https://t.co/CT0iLaAoXc— . (@imanilfc) September 29, 2024
Ah, the old “they don’t care if people who bought tickets actually show up” line from some random twitter account. Right. I’m sure all of the vendors and sponsors who rely on people actually being in the stadium don’t care, either. And that those people who decided it was a better use of their time to burn the cash they’d spent on those tickets, rather than put themselves through the misery of going to the stadium to watch another shitty loss, will happily line up next season for the privilege of handing over yet more of their hard-earned income to Precourt just so they have the opportunity to skip going to games in 2025, too.