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  1. #481
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    Quote Originally Posted by Kaz View Post
    That is BS. Other teams were able to avoid injury just fine. The Injury is on the staff for not preparing properly. Over working players not making sure they are healthy. Not having the depth in a position we didn't have nearly enough. Not adjust tactics to win games during the season. Not trying to win early season games. The CCL had an earlier start.

    Red Bulls played just two game fewer than we did. They are top of the table. So the CCL is just an excuse.

    The CCL puts you in a position to have injuries. It couldn't matter less that, in theory, if things went perfectly our way with depth, training and knocks then we COULD have been healthy. But a tournament which starts in February increases the chances of a shit MLS season.

    This is not like teams who gun for CCL in Europe, where if you make the final you have the talent and budget to sustain the job. We are in a salary cap league. Going hard for a tourney to start the year, resting players against league minnows and dropping points was a conscious decision. And we still go hurt.

    So yes, my Bull shit argument is the CCL hurt us.

    I will be actively cheering for our elimination from this tournament in game one.

  2. #482
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    Quote Originally Posted by Kaz View Post
    That is BS. Other teams were able to avoid injury just fine. The Injury is on the staff for not preparing properly. Over working players not making sure they are healthy. Not having the depth in a position we didn't have nearly enough. Not adjust tactics to win games during the season. Not trying to win early season games. The CCL had an earlier start.

    Red Bulls played just two game fewer than we did. They are top of the table. So the CCL is just an excuse.
    Red Bull didn't play the three best teams in Mexico and they were eliminated before the end.

    If TFC did what every other MLS side does, give lip service but don't go all out to win it, they wouldn't have had these injuries too. It's a fact, not opinion, that TFC had several major injuries from this tournament, including Jozy out for most of the season.

    That doesn't mean that management isn't responsible, from Bill Manning came the mandate to win the CCL. I think Bez and Vanney genuinely bought into this goal, it wasn't just because their boss told them to do it.

    My opinion is that CCL is a "poisoned chalice" for any. MLS side. Anyone seriously going for it is going to kill their league chances. Just look at Tigres, even much deeper Mexican sides can get hammered in the following season.

    In my opinion that unless MLS changes their policies to substantially backstop teams that go far in the CCL, the club should stop the insanity of trying to win the CCL and focus on the league. I wouldn't hesitate to call out management on this.

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    So let’s hope these boneheads look at the CCL schedule for next year when it comes out and then they work the MLS schedule around the CCL schedule . They should schedule the MLS games around the whole CCL schedule right up to the finals dates of the CCL, so don’t schedule an MLS game the same week as a CCL game , give the team at least a week break before a CCL game and a week break after a CCL game so that you don’t have to sign players from their U14 TFC academy team and play them in an MLS game for God’s sake!

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    Quote Originally Posted by Oldtimer View Post
    In my opinion that unless MLS changes their policies to substantially backstop teams that go far in the CCL, the club should stop the insanity of trying to win the CCL and focus on the league. I wouldn't hesitate to call out management on this.
    Agreed. If they do chase the CCL this year it’s at their own risk. I won’t be happy to watch a burnt-out, injury plagued squad in league play for 6 months.

    Notwithstanding this, there are still some things to fix on the roster. A CB primarily.

  5. #485
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    Quote Originally Posted by Oldtimer View Post
    Kaz, you've never given up on the Vanney hate, but calling any support for Vanney "a cult" is truly bizarre.

    Let's just think that some people give a little credit to Vanney (and to Bez) for two excellent seasons, including the best season in MLS history. It's not just having star players. Some people don't believe in rotating coaches just because we didn't get a coach from a "big three" league. That doesn't mean we will blindly accept failure for years on end, but maybe just maybe they have earned a pass one year.

    Now if you want something that is truly difficult to understand, it's Robbo not getting fired from the Whitecaps after years of failure. They have unbelievable patience.

    +1. Disappointing season end to be sure, but I don't believe we even need a pass for this season. IMHO, the CONCACAF CL matches early on were the best football this club has ever played. We should all reflect happily with some perspective on the last three years:

    - Two MLS Cup Finals at BMO
    - One MLS Championship
    - One Supporter's Shield
    - Best season in MLS history
    - Three Canadian Championships
    - One Delgado sitter from going to the Club World Cup; and
    - Experiencing the brilliance of Ager Aketxe

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    Quote Originally Posted by SoccMan2 View Post
    So let’s hope these boneheads look at the CCL schedule for next year when it comes out and then they work the MLS schedule around the CCL schedule . They should schedule the MLS games around the whole CCL schedule right up to the finals dates of the CCL, so don’t schedule an MLS game the same week as a CCL game , give the team at least a week break before a CCL game and a week break after a CCL game so that you don’t have to sign players from their U14 TFC academy team and play them in an MLS game for God’s sake!
    I found this gem on the internet:

    "I have serious doubts these elite athletes are so brittle as to constantly fill up the disabled lists as they do. Teams that are not scheduled to win anything for the year have their rosters culled to keep them from contending."

    two other great game manipulation techniques are scheduling and VAR

    anyways, i'm pretty sure they won't pull this same shit next year. this was just TFC year to not make the playoffs, I suspect to showcase/highlight Atlanta in 2018
    Last edited by stevep; 09-25-2018 at 11:46 AM.

  7. #487
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    Speaking of firing Robbo, the Whitecaps have finally acted:

    http://www.tsn.ca/1.1180414

    ... and in case anyone's thinking of it, we should not let any sentimentality over him being a former Red lead to calls for hiring him.
    Last edited by Oldtimer; 09-25-2018 at 11:54 AM.

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    Quote Originally Posted by stevep View Post
    I found this gem on the internet:

    "I have serious doubts these elite athletes are so brittle as to constantly fill up the disabled lists as they do. Teams that are not scheduled to win anything for the year have their rosters culled to keep them from contending."

    two other great game manipulation techniques are scheduling and VAR

    anyways, i'm pretty sure they won't pull this same shit next year. this was just TFC year to not make the playoffs, I suspect to showcase/highlight Atlanta in 2018
    I think this more so applies to sports where the draft lottery has a huge incentive (mainly, NBA but others too to a lesser extent). The sixers ran a tank strategy so shameless a few years back the league office pushed them to actually start trying.

    Does a MLS team who gets little benefit from the draft, an unknown amount of graver bucks, and hammered at the gate (their primary revenue source) have the same incentives. Me thinks not.

    I believe guys were hurt. Question is the cause or causes. And yes, we clearly have some issues but I find it tough to believe they tanked.

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    More excuses.

    Red Bulls beat a Mexican side just like TFC. They were eliminated by the second team 1-0 on agg. They let 1 goal in again a team we let 3 in from. So I guess the Red Bulls must be a much better team than TFC.. oh wait the excuse at the time was injuries already... we lost because of injuries... Red Bulls just needed a little more offensive power and they could have made it to the finals. If they were able to play their second string players well then bully for them.

    In the end it is excuses... It's not the coaches fault, it's not the staffs fault, it's not the players fault. It's injuries. It's the schedule... it's cats meowing outside vanney's windows on the wrong days.

    It is the Staffs fault in the end it is Vanney's and/or Bez's fault for not making sure the team had the pieces it needed. We focused on positions we didn't need in the off season not the ones we did. Plain and simple. Stop making excuses. The only thing Vanney did right was realize his imbecilic desire to play 4-4-2 with 2 wing back which was really just 2-6-2 was just that and quickly moved back. I'm almost certain that is why no offensive power was brought in. The idea that Mavinga and Moor or one with the youngsters would be enough.. minus the whole if both go down you are screwed issue.. of course he has nepo glasses and doesn't realize Zavelata is not ready to lead a defence.

    But you will just say.. "your opinion doesn't matter blah blah hate Vanney blah blah" the issue is what I'm saying isn't wrong. It's the truth. We had an off season. Vanney wanted to play 4-4-2 with wingbacks. We didn't bring in any defenders to play in the centre in a competent way. We brought in Wing backs who on paper could play a supporting role in a 3 man back line. He took on Injuries.. or Defence collapsed. We destroyed our season. And in 10 months Vanney the great tactical coach was never able to figure out a way to win games or keep points. Or even to stop allowing two goals within 10 minutes of each other without Mavinga or Moor in the line up. That is the season. This is on bad planning, bad player acquisition, and not enough tactical ability. Heck even as the season went on Vanney didn't say shit we need more Centre backs in case we lose one ... no no.. he decided to keep going with his nephew and a 7 million dollar midfielder taking of a defender role, rather than bringing in what we needed long term. This isn't hindsight this is a situation iirc people wondering why we didn't bring in defenders in the off season.

    But I'm going to leave it there because I've said the same thing over and over, and you refuse accept it.

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    Quote Originally Posted by Chevy View Post
    +1. Disappointing season end to be sure, but I don't believe we even need a pass for this season. IMHO, the CONCACAF CL matches early on were the best football this club has ever played. We should all reflect happily with some perspective on the last three years:

    - Two MLS Cup Finals at BMO
    - One MLS Championship
    - One Supporter's Shield
    - Best season in MLS history
    - Three Canadian Championships
    - One Delgado sitter from going to the Club World Cup; and
    - Experiencing the brilliance of Ager Aketxe
    Ok you had me until that last one

    But, seriously, those 3 Mexican sides in the spring were fun to watch. I know this year has been dreary ever since, but I'd still go for it in CCL if I had a chance.

    Frankly, the schedule sucked in terms of fun regardless of the results. 1 home game in June, 2 in July? vs 7 away games. August was closer to balance but still 2 home and 3 away. (I'm excluding V Cup games)

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    Quote Originally Posted by Kaz View Post
    More excuses.

    Red Bulls beat a Mexican side just like TFC. They were eliminated by the second team 1-0 on agg. They let 1 goal in again a team we let 3 in from. So I guess the Red Bulls must be a much better team than TFC..
    Two things: 1. Tiajuana << UANL and America. 2. Guadelajara were able to field their full team against TFC because their season was functionally over by then. Not sure if they were full strength against NYRB but it would not have been *stronger*.

    Quote Originally Posted by Kaz View Post
    But I'm going to leave it there because I've said the same thing over and over, and you refuse accept it.
    I don't think people disagree that improvements in the regime can be made (improve the training, staff, and field). But you continually harp on decapitating the organization as if that's going to solve the problem. It's wrong and more importantly it's boring. So, yeah, we won't accept it.

  12. #492
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    Quote Originally Posted by Kaz View Post
    In the end it is excuses... It's not the coaches fault, it's not the staffs fault, it's not the players fault. It's injuries. It's the schedule... it's cats meowing outside vanney's windows on the wrong days.

    But I'm going to leave it there because I've said the same thing over and over, and you refuse accept it.
    I'm not going to accept that it's 100% Vanney's fault because facts are facts. Jozy out for 2/3 season is a fact. Drew out for almost all the season is a fact. Not one sports journalist or sports analyst has said that Vanney is "idiotic" (and using hyperbole and mocking a reasonable position will hardly convince anyone).

    Where you and I do agree is that the decision to prioritize the CCL was a bad one, and it's on the staff (and more importantly Bill Manning) that they did that.

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    Quote Originally Posted by Oldtimer View Post
    I'm not going to accept that it's 100% Vanney's fault because facts are facts. Jozy out for 2/3 season is a fact. Drew out for almost all the season is a fact. Not one sports journalist or sports analyst has said that Vanney is "idiotic" (and using hyperbole and mocking a reasonable position will hardly convince anyone).

    Where you and I do agree is that the decision to prioritize the CCL was a bad one, and it's on the staff (and more importantly Bill Manning) that they did that.
    I don't think it was a bad decision, considering the ambition of this team.
    After the season they had last year, winning the CCL was the next natural step in the progression imo.
    Once they won everything in MLS, what's next.....win MLS Cup again?
    And while I do think that was a goal as well (MLS Cup that is), I guess us (and the team) kinda took for granted that they would have plenty of time during the season to make up whatever may have been lost during the CCL run to at least make the playoffs (and hence, another run at MLS Cup).

    I said at the beginning of the year that I was a bit worried that we were only carrying 4 CB's (5 after Hernandez was re-signed), and that turned out to get us in the end.
    Might not seem a lot, but consider how 1 more CB on our roster would allow guys like Bradley and VDW to keep their position.
    Instead, management gambled on Mids and lost.
    BUT, it was just that....a gamble. There's nothing to indicate incompetence from our management, and I fully expect adjustments for next year.

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    Quote Originally Posted by Oldtimer View Post
    I'm not going to accept that it's 100% Vanney's fault because facts are facts. Jozy out for 2/3 season is a fact. Drew out for almost all the season is a fact. Not one sports journalist or sports analyst has said that Vanney is "idiotic" (and using hyperbole and mocking a reasonable position will hardly convince anyone).

    Where you and I do agree is that the decision to prioritize the CCL was a bad one, and it's on the staff (and more importantly Bill Manning) that they did that.
    The decision to prioritize CCL was 100% the right thing to do. If Deglado scores a sitter, or one of many things that went wrong in the final went right, we would have been CCL champs and who cares what would have happened in MLS. Okay but, he missed and we lost the CCL Final. So, we come back 1-4-0 from the CCL or you can say 1-4-1 because we tied Chicago due to fatigue / CCL hangover.

    So 1-4-1 with 28 games left... at 2 points per game like how we played in 2017 we would have had 60 points no problem. Or even playing at a reasonably lower level at 1.75 points per game, we would have still had 53 points and safely qualified for the playoffs. BUT we didn't play at that level because of injuries. The fact is, injuries didn't happen because we prioritized CCL, injuries just happened. We threw away the 3 MLS games (MTL, COL, HOU) by playing B teams and no one got injured in those games or even traveled. They all got injured in training, or during CCL games which they would have been playing in regardless (instead of CCL it would have been getting injured in MLS games).

    So the problem isn't prioritizing CCL, it was the training staff or the fact that we just had horrible luck and had too many injuries. Not to mention, we simply have not played well at all this season and that is just due to our own fault.

    Why on earth would we not try in CCL? It is a big competition (you can argue about how big, but it definitely matters) and we should go 100% for CCL next year as well.

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    Somebody here really seems to be enamoured with NYRB's performance. Yet in their 22 seasons before this one, they've never won the MLS Cup. In fact they've never even made it to the final!?! Best they've done is the reach the semi-finals (usually equivalent to the conference finals), but only 3 times, and they've never won those. Sucks to be them! (Maybe this will be their year...???)

    https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/New_Yo...s#Year-by-year

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    Quote Originally Posted by Auzzy View Post
    Somebody here really seems to be enamoured with NYRB's performance. Yet in their 22 seasons before this one, they've never won the MLS Cup. In fact they've never even made it to the final!?! Best they've done is the reach the semi-finals (usually equivalent to the conference finals), but only 3 times, and they've never won those. Sucks to be them! (Maybe this will be their year...???)

    https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/New_Yo...s#Year-by-year
    They made it to the Cup final in 2008 only to get kicked by the Pisstains.
    TORONTO FC, 2017 MLS CHAMPIONS!!! (Still the greatest in league history!)

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    Quote Originally Posted by Redcoe15 View Post
    They made it to the Cup final in 2008 only to get kicked by the Pisstains.
    Oh you're right, I missed that one. I skipped "Runners Up" in the Wiki article, was not scanning for that word. Although I already knew they had never won the cup (it's a big bone of contention among RB fans), frankly I was surprised that they had seemingly never made it to the final in 22 years, reason for my !?!'s.

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    Quote Originally Posted by Auzzy View Post
    Somebody here really seems to be enamoured with NYRB's performance. Yet in their 22 seasons before this one, they've never won the MLS Cup. In fact they've never even made it to the final!?! Best they've done is the reach the semi-finals (usually equivalent to the conference finals), but only 3 times, and they've never won those. Sucks to be them! (Maybe this will be their year...???)

    https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/New_Yo...s#Year-by-year
    There's an argument that if push for CCL success that means your MLS season has to implode because all your players will be injured for the season. NYRB are an example that you can push far into CCL and succeed in MLS. They did that this season, their history isn't relevant.

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    Quote Originally Posted by SirBobSaget View Post
    There's an argument that if push for CCL success that means your MLS season has to implode because all your players will be injured for the season. NYRB are an example that you can push far into CCL and succeed in MLS. They did that this season, their history isn't relevant.
    Or maybe NYRB got lucky with their (slightly shorter) CCL schedule, no games at -27 wind chill and fewer injuries? As lucky as they rarely have in 22 years of MLS playoffs? Plus they had over a month longer winter break, with their season ending Nov. 5th instead of Dec. 9th.

    My point is, people can cherry-pick all they want. You can find examples for everything. Last year, most NYRB fans would rather have been in TFC's shoes. This year some TFC fans would rather be in NYRB's shoes. I think NYRB is often a well-run club; but it's not all roses there. When Vanney started here, many TFC fans were skeptical (me included). Some pined for a coach like Jesse Marsch, who did quite well at NYRB, the most successful coach in their history, with a winning % of 50.3%, but who also couldn't quite get it done, and who was canned. (Marsch is still available BTW.) More TFC fans were hoping for Jason Kreis, who kinda bombed since then. In the meantime many were happy with Vanney. Bez could seemingly do no wrong for a while. Now Vanney & Bez are both in the doghouse again.

    I just don't think it's all or nothing. Two years of MLS Cup in bad weather on a bad field; two short offseasons; extended CCL cup run with crappy weather, crappy field & crappy travel: all played a role. Continuity is generally very good & a recipe for success; but continuity also gives you older star players who are more likely to get injured or have variable performances when they are needed the most.

    But the coaches, management & players also screwed up. I think Vanney seems to be a pretty good teacher; but not a very good motivator or disciplinarian when things aren't going well. Also sometimes he seems a bit too patient, naive, or stubborn; and he may need another ultimatum from Manning to adjust his roster and strategy to the realities on the field.

    Bradley is a great player; but at the same time a dour introvert who also doesn't seem great at turning things around when they're going awry. (From what I saw, Cheyrou was a better on-field captain.) Bradley's Zen-like focus has done some wonders at time; but sometimes he has a bit too much Zen when things are falling apart around him in the midfield.

    It's all of the above, and much more. No "MLS season has to implode" because of an extended CCL run; but it's one factor among many. For now we're getting more sports science, to hopefully help avoid injuries. (Nobody can tell me that was managed as well as it could be this season. The number of injuries in training seems nuts for example.) And we're getting a new hybrid field, that will hopefully hold up better to Toronto's crazy weather; TFC's crazy schedule; plus the Argos. (I'm still skeptical.) Those things should get rid of some excuses.

    The NYRB field looks great BTW; they also don't have a stupid fucking gridiron team to deal with.

    Bez better do a little bit of magic this offseason, but he has limited room. (Long term I would love if we could get much more efficient with our roster dollars, like NYRB, but w/o getting as cheap as them. But efficiency doesn't seem to be MLSE's style.) If things don't turn around, I think Vanney will be gone soon enough; and Bez a bit later if it doesn't get better. Then we can give the old coach & player turnstile another spin; or is it a roulette wheel?
    Last edited by Auzzy; 09-26-2018 at 01:50 AM.

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    Before we stray too far from the point... everybody knows that the truly great clubs, the key differentiator is that they develop players. If anyone has an unhealthy fascination with NYRB or Dallas, that's why.

    We we seemed to be right there with the best teams doing that last year... Delgado, Osorio, Hagglund, Zavaleta, Edwards, Bono all played key roles.

    But this year only Oso belongs on the list.

    If you've got 6 domestics that you developed that play big roles, you contend. If you have one, you don't.
    “What the world needs is more geniuses with humility; there are so few of us left.”

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    Quote Originally Posted by Kaz View Post
    More excuses.

    Red Bulls beat a Mexican side just like TFC. They were eliminated by the second team 1-0 on agg. They let 1 goal in again a team we let 3 in from. So I guess the Red Bulls must be a much better team than TFC.. oh wait the excuse at the time was injuries already... we lost because of injuries... Red Bulls just needed a little more offensive power and they could have made it to the finals. If they were able to play their second string players well then bully for them.

    In the end it is excuses... It's not the coaches fault, it's not the staffs fault, it's not the players fault. It's injuries. It's the schedule... it's cats meowing outside vanney's windows on the wrong days.

    It is the Staffs fault in the end it is Vanney's and/or Bez's fault for not making sure the team had the pieces it needed. We focused on positions we didn't need in the off season not the ones we did. Plain and simple. Stop making excuses. The only thing Vanney did right was realize his imbecilic desire to play 4-4-2 with 2 wing back which was really just 2-6-2 was just that and quickly moved back. I'm almost certain that is why no offensive power was brought in. The idea that Mavinga and Moor or one with the youngsters would be enough.. minus the whole if both go down you are screwed issue.. of course he has nepo glasses and doesn't realize Zavelata is not ready to lead a defence.

    But you will just say.. "your opinion doesn't matter blah blah hate Vanney blah blah" the issue is what I'm saying isn't wrong. It's the truth. We had an off season. Vanney wanted to play 4-4-2 with wingbacks. We didn't bring in any defenders to play in the centre in a competent way. We brought in Wing backs who on paper could play a supporting role in a 3 man back line. He took on Injuries.. or Defence collapsed. We destroyed our season. And in 10 months Vanney the great tactical coach was never able to figure out a way to win games or keep points. Or even to stop allowing two goals within 10 minutes of each other without Mavinga or Moor in the line up. That is the season. This is on bad planning, bad player acquisition, and not enough tactical ability. Heck even as the season went on Vanney didn't say shit we need more Centre backs in case we lose one ... no no.. he decided to keep going with his nephew and a 7 million dollar midfielder taking of a defender role, rather than bringing in what we needed long term. This isn't hindsight this is a situation iirc people wondering why we didn't bring in defenders in the off season.

    But I'm going to leave it there because I've said the same thing over and over, and you refuse accept it.
    So...I just highlighted the only relevant things in your entire rant. I could not disagree more with everything you said. You seem like you must have some sort of ability to look into the future and predict where our pressing concerns for player signings should be...because, I didn't see this coming. We had two top healthy starting CB's last season and won the cup. We had serviceable(some would say) backups in Hernandez/Hagglund/Zavalleta. We lose Beita, but pick up 2 defenders(Auro/VDW) for that position. Good move I would say. We were at 4 CBs, 2LBs, and now 2RBs...not sure what else you would have liked prior to the "season of injuries" starting keeping in mind, when you field a championship team, those players cost a bit more than, say a bottom tier team(usually), so yes, cap is an issue.

    There is absolutely no way anyone knew Moor AND Mavinga were going to be out the entire year, not to mention Auro as well, and Morrow for a good chunk at the beginning as well. I remember there were times it seemed like they were close to coming back, then they are re-injured. THAT is FACT. There is not much to be done there, except deal with it the best the team can, which was play our guys who weren't supposed to be in there every game like Hagglund, Zavaletta, Hernandez and even Bradley.

    Your entire post is based on what you know now, having watched the season/injuries play out. And even still, what would you have done about Jozy, and Vasques? I suppose we should have equal replacements for them sitting on the bench as well. Oh, and Bradley, suppose he gets injured, we should have one for him too, that can do everything he can, and control games the way he does.

    I challenge you to tell me a team in this capped league of MLS, who had a roster this season that could deal with our injuries, travel and amount of games, and STILL produce a quality season. Take away their two best starting CBs, their top LB, RB, their top attacking midfielder, and their top goal scorer. Please show me because this rant of yours sounds a lot like you expect the same result as last season, with an entirely different group of players on the pitch for the majority of the season. We were not the same team as last season, well, because we WEREN'T the same team...not even for an entire game.

    And that, is why we were so poor. It's not an excuse, it's fact.

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    Quote Originally Posted by TMAN80 View Post
    So...I just highlighted the only relevant things in your entire rant. I could not disagree more with everything you said. You seem like you must have some sort of ability to look into the future and predict where our pressing concerns for player signings should be...because, I didn't see this coming. We had two top healthy starting CB's last season and won the cup. We had serviceable(some would say) backups in Hernandez/Hagglund/Zavalleta. We lose Beita, but pick up 2 defenders(Auro/VDW) for that position. Good move I would say. We were at 4 CBs, 2LBs, and now 2RBs...not sure what else you would have liked prior to the "season of injuries" starting keeping in mind, when you field a championship team, those players cost a bit more than, say a bottom tier team(usually), so yes, cap is an issue.

    There is absolutely no way anyone knew Moor AND Mavinga were going to be out the entire year, not to mention Auro as well, and Morrow for a good chunk at the beginning as well. I remember there were times it seemed like they were close to coming back, then they are re-injured. THAT is FACT. There is not much to be done there, except deal with it the best the team can, which was play our guys who weren't supposed to be in there every game like Hagglund, Zavaletta, Hernandez and even Bradley.

    Your entire post is based on what you know now, having watched the season/injuries play out. And even still, what would you have done about Jozy, and Vasques? I suppose we should have equal replacements for them sitting on the bench as well. Oh, and Bradley, suppose he gets injured, we should have one for him too, that can do everything he can, and control games the way he does.

    I challenge you to tell me a team in this capped league of MLS, who had a roster this season that could deal with our injuries, travel and amount of games, and STILL produce a quality season. Take away their two best starting CBs, their top LB, RB, their top attacking midfielder, and their top goal scorer. Please show me because this rant of yours sounds a lot like you expect the same result as last season, with an entirely different group of players on the pitch for the majority of the season. We were not the same team as last season, well, because we WEREN'T the same team...not even for an entire game.

    And that, is why we were so poor. It's not an excuse, it's fact.
    Cant predict injuries but you can make a tough (unpopular?) decision that Moor shouldn't have been signed to the deal he was. He should have replaced Hernandez, Hernandez should never have been resigned and we should have been on the look out for a replacement for Moor. Its what'll happen this off season, but in my eyes a year too late. That wouldn't have fixed this season totally but it could have looked very different.

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    Quote Originally Posted by michaeltfc91 View Post
    The decision to prioritize CCL was 100% the right thing to do. If Deglado scores a sitter, or one of many things that went wrong in the final went right, we would have been CCL champs and who cares what would have happened in MLS.
    I'm not going to criticize this but I actually take the polar opposite view. If Delgado scores a sitter, we win and who cares that we won. Fans haven't even caught up to this tourney yet based on attendance numbers. It would have been nice, but even with a win of CCL i'd be livid that we wasted an entire season to win a trophy that is really not all the prestigious. Yet.

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    Hernandez was only signed because of the injuries. He wasn't originally signed to start the season.
    Play-by-Play Commentator for League 1 Ontario.
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    Quote Originally Posted by Red4ever View Post
    I'm not going to criticize this but I actually take the polar opposite view. If Delgado scores a sitter, we win and who cares that we won. Fans haven't even caught up to this tourney yet based on attendance numbers. It would have been nice, but even with a win of CCL i'd be livid that we wasted an entire season to win a trophy that is really not all the prestigious. Yet.
    Are you being ironic or serious?

    If we had won that we would have been the toast of MLS for months, and absolutely no one would care about the season. We would be sitting Gio and Altidore now so that they can be ready for Dubai. We would have dozens (actually maybe hundreds) going to Dubai,and talking about that in a thread that would probably already be 25 pages long. Nobody would give a crap about the MLS season. Our home games would all have been one long party. The closer we were to Dubai, the more true that would be!

    We'd be going on endlessly over video of Japanese and African teams, trying to figure out if we can get by them. We would actually be meeting in bars to watch Asian and African champions league games, because we cared.

    We would be one game away from playing Real Madrid. We would all be watching Real Madrid games, and scouting them ffs!

    The world would be unrecognizable if we had won CCL. We would barely even perceive ourselves as in MLS.

    *sigh*
    Last edited by ensco; 09-26-2018 at 12:30 PM.
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    Quote Originally Posted by ensco View Post
    Are you being ironic or serious?

    If we had won that we would have been the toast of MLS for months, and absolutely no one would care about the season. We would have dozens (hundreds?) talking about going to Dubai. We'd be watching video of Japanese and African teams, trying to figure out if we can get by them and play Real Madrid.

    The world would be unrecognizable if able if we had won CCL.
    Totally agree. The season would have been merely a distraction till the World Club Cup if we had won in Guadalajara that night.

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    Quote Originally Posted by ensco View Post
    Are you being ironic or serious?

    If we had won that we would have been the toast of MLS for months, and absolutely no one would care about the season. We would be sitting Gio and Altidore now so that they can be ready for Dubai. We would have dozens (hundreds?) talking about going to Dubai, in a thread that would probably already be 25 pages long.

    We would be one game away from playing Real Madrid. For real.

    We'd be going on endlessly over video of Japanese and African teams, trying to figure out if we can get by them and play Real Madrid.

    The world would be unrecognizable if we had won CCL.

    *sigh*
    Dead serious.

    Yeah I think us nerds would have loved it. I think people may have given them a pass, but I think we would have got the same "why are they so bad this year" and with an added "if they are playing real madrid", from the broader public.

    There certainly would have been a uptick, no denying that. But I honestly think most of us were prepped for a dynasty and that's what is driving this disappointment.

    If Delgado scores that, it likely doesn't change.

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    ^ Agreed. Broader acknowledgment of the CCL is still limited. Further, for a gate driven league, it’s tough to justify sucking at 80% of your games because you were good in 20%.

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    ^You guys are too cynical.

    People would be all over them for missing the playoffs, but ratings/attendance would be much higher than they currently are just because they were in CCL.
    “What the world needs is more geniuses with humility; there are so few of us left.”

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    Quote Originally Posted by ensco View Post
    ^You guys are too cynical.
    In general. Oh yeah. On that we agree.

    I will say that in 10 years, had we won the CCL, it would have been looked back on as MASSIVE.

    I'm just not sure it would have been appreciated right now.

 

 

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