The Official 2022 San Jose Earthquakes related Blogs/Press thread

we don’t need a DP to be a “Great Man” prior to joining the Quakes. The archetype is Wondo. If there are more great, unappreciated players out there we should do a better job of scouting, signing, and developing them. I know the academies are doing great things in their age brackets, but their positive impact on the first team so far have been negligible, imo. And in the absence of that, we need help now - which means a DP who provides immediate impact. I think that perhaps Nathan is the only addition we’ve made in more years than I care to think who has had that sort of impact on the team.

 

No, CL said JY was a suitable replacement for Nathan at CB. Matias thought okay sure CL, let’s try that. We didn’t have many good options and CL wasn’t able to help much.

 

Yes, generally people don't think of Wondo to be a Great Man like Shakira and hayBale and Insignia because he's not a big name euro transfer guy. The europhiles go nuts over those kinds of guys. But Wondo was a Great Man in his own right. He got the results. It's just that people don't see him that way - just an unassuming and not particularly athletic late round barely a draft pick guy from Chico.

But there are many ways to get it done. If you don't get a needle in-the-haystack like Wondo (and I would argue that Benji might be something along those lines), then you can get say multiple Lesser Great Men™, ~1-1.5 mil DPs that may not be household names but they play their butt off and are successful MLS players. Like Monteiro for instance.

 

When discussing our odds of winning against Chicago you pretty much have to discuss Shaqiri. That's not a Trojan horse that's acknowledging their best player.

We can't stick our heads in the sand and pretend other teams don't have DPs just because the Quakes don't spend much on DPs.

 

He's been gone for months now and still dominates the discussion. I think whenever people feel bad about the Quakes they take a jab at Almeyda and feel better.

 

I thought it was a bit over the top, to say the least. He's a good player but he doesn't turn water into wine. Chicago has some good players, and in fact they didn't score until Shakira left the game against the Quakes, and they had a good run of play right when he left the game, and a bunch of shots.

 

I don’t feel bad about the Quakes. But they’re still in the hole Matias dug.

 

And what did I say about Chcago- I said they suck even with Shaqiri but without him they're hopeless. Shaqiri was the only one who created danger. The late Chicago goal was a defensive mistake.

You're so triggered by DP talk that you can't even comprehend what is being said.

 

I know, as long as you have 5 hour tailgate you're happy

 

You should try it sometime.

 

Probably not this year. I'll wait for Leitch to pick a coach and set him/her up for success.

 

They're not hopeless without him. As I said, they did quite well when he left the game. You can see that after he left the game, Chicago created a bunch of shots, and then eventually the goal, which was not just a "defensive mistake", it was a great play by Gutierrez to split the defenders. Their xG / minute actually went up when after he left the game.

 

I don't need the chart - I watched the game.

The Quakes let their foot off the gas late in the game which allowed Chicago to score a goal. Any club will look good when the other team takes their foot off the gas.

 

It was a great play by Gutierrez and a great pass to spring him. And as I said, right after Shakira left Chicago generated a lot of chances, as you can see in the chart. That wasn't "late in the game". That started right around 62' when Shakira left. Ball don't lie!

 

The reason Chicago sucks is because they can't finish their chances. That's why they still suck even with Shaqiri because he generates dangerous chances but they still can't finish them. Sometimes they go in but it's rare.

When the Quakes took their foot off the gas Chicago was able to score. Even Chicago is able to do that. That's why I can't guarantee a win for the Quakes the way our defense plays - we can always let the other team score even when everything else is going right.

 

If they "can't finish their chances", Shakira or no Shakira, then we look at chance creation with and w/o Shakira, to get a sense for his impact on Chicago's game. And there we see what happened vs. the Quakes. Ball don't lie, sorry.

 

What your chart doesn't tell you is that Shaqiri creates better chances. He's their highest quality player and it's obvious when you watch the game and not just look at the numbers.

 

I saw the game too and saw it differently. The xG ranks chances with an objective methodology, so it's a way to look objectively at the question.

Chicago had roughly .9xG/61 minutes while Shakira was in (.014xG / min), and roughly .8xG / 33 minutes when he went out, for a much superior .024xG / min.

 

Well, you saw the game very differently than me and Danger. Are you sure you weren't watching a Shakira concert instead of the game?

 

Which have as much relevance to a thread titled:
"The Official 2022 San Jose Earthquakes related Blogs/Press thread" as the prior several pages...

 

maybe the title of this thread should be

The Official 2022 San Jose Earthquakes Un-related Blogs/Press thread

 

https://www.mlssoccer.com/video/big...gest-all-star-snubs-our-xi-to-take-on-liga-mx

Skip to 32:40

These guys seem to think 1) we have almost all the pieces needed to compete well (they call out Nathan as the weak link, oddly enough) and 2) LD will be the coach.

 

Shocked that these guys talked so much about the Quakes. I generally take their Quakes stuff with a grain of salt. They don’t watch the team much - they tend to go to worn-out cliches - uh what do we know about the Quakes - let’s see - man-marking, “chaos”, and Wondo. Dweibe never learned to say “Matias”, after 3.5 years. The bald white guy can’t say Kikanovic properly (his pronunciation - Kee-kah-NOH-vich).

Charlie Davis should know, as a former forward, but got Jebo’s game wrong in terms of areas for improvement. The problem isn’t his 1st touch, which has been pretty good, it’s that he tries too hard to work the ball to his left foot. Again he hasn’t really watched him much this year.

Not convinced on the LD thing. They didn’t really address any other candidates. I think they believe it will happen mainly for PR reasons but I don’t think CL is going to make a move just for those kinds of reasons.

One thing they did get right is that the Quakes roster is set up nicely in terms of potential + lack of commitments to bad veteran players.

 

Jazzy, as proven tonight, Jebo has a bad first touch.

 

He doesn't, and one game wouldn't "prove" anything anyway - he's played 119 MLS games. Don't know what you're talking about, honestly, in this game. He makes play after play with back to the goal, with good 1st touch and turn and pass. He one-timed that pass from Espinoza and the shot was fine, but Parker(?) made a great sliding save.