^ Let’s be honest, the new guy just got in his seat and TFC management are probably just bracing to see if they’ll be part of the go-forward plans or quickly disposed of.
I doubt they come forward to the board with any bold moves until they get a sense of this.
Mind you, I'd have assumed he'd have been killed a long time ago for gross incompetence, but I have to assume the second Manning says "Remember that $100m+ I told you to spend on turning us into a great team with sold out stadiums, only for us to turn into the worst team in MLS? I'm gonna need you to spend 10s of millions more just to get rid of one of them" he's gone. Any semblance of pretending there's a plan would go out the window at that stage. Not only would we never spend the money, but out of self preservation, I cannot imagine Manning ever suggesting buying out the Italians - even for a man as seemingly, inexplicably invincible as he is. I think that's a non starter.
the days of the 6mil to 15mil a yr dp at tfc are over regardless of the new guyOriginally Posted by ag futbol
We thought that before the Italians too, don’t forget. I’m not clear on what the budget for this team is but the fact they aren’t using the WC to majorly re-do the stadium feels like a bit of a tell.
Yeah my read is the days of us being a top spender in the league end when the Italian contracts expire, but will admit that I too was thinking something similar before the Italians signed so take that for what it's worth - I was absolutely emphatically wrong at that time.
I do think everybody, still, underappreciates how much Mannings incompetence fucked us. The opportunity cost is absolutely absurd. Gone another way, it's possible we head into 2026 with a permanently expanded and, ideally, filled BMO field and a return on spend that means we'd continue to be one of the big spenders in the league - I have to assume that was the vision sold to them when they had that huge spend. Now we may end up with a mid tier budget struggling to fill BMO as it currently stands, the world cup passing us by and us not getting anything close to the kind of momentum we could have gotten from it. IF that's the case, the damage of the Manning reign will be felt for a long, long time and goes far beyond a few seasons where we sucked when we could have been good.
Last edited by JoesphNdo; 04-10-2024 at 10:18 AM.
the coverage of this club is so bad...we have no clue.did we use the buyout on dio?what happend to safe standing are we keeping some of the redo of bmo after the world cup...the only news we get is a 10 min presser on fridays before the game
I don't want to rerail too much but I think I'd forgive Mannings incompetence if he just followed through on his regular promise of safe standing. He keeps promising it, and then not doing anything, and then promising it again. I really wonder what's happening there...
I think the league is moving away from it a bit though in some ways. Inter Miami are spending huge but are not dominating in anyway.
It feels like having a starting XI of all 1 million + players is better then having one guy making 7, 2 making 1, 3 making 400k etc.
Good. There are as many failures at $10M as $3M and frankly we don't deserve any high priced DPs anymore.
I'm going to say it's coming in 2027. They want seats for WC.
I'll prob get some disagreements about this since its more a subjective take... but this debate above is partially why I'm hoping Oso as a DP is temporary (if he still is one or what the scenario is, someone can help me out).
When looking at gravity/influence on the pitch, only way were gonna be more balanced is with an absolute baller and game killer in the middle at 6 slot or even sitting a bit higher up. Not talkin bout old school James style number 10 or someone that just receives a ball and is always just lookin at every scenario as a through ball or pirlo esque over the top chip pass. Talking complete all-around midfielder who plays on both sides of the ball, but is tempo setting and attack minded from transition to goal scoring
This is the role Oso/longstaff is supposed to play. And if i'm being honest, he's a great serviceable upper mls player be he 'isn't that guy'. We need a 5-6 million dollar version of Oso. someone who's head is on a swivel in the middle of the park, can one touch a pass out wide or forward and has ability/nuance of when to get forward to overload a box and be a tap in merchant, or one who sees a game where nobody is shooting; and looks to make more outside the box shots to influence rebounds and scrambles. Someone who has so much influence and control of the middle of the park in between the attack and defensive lines that it forces the italians to stay outwide - or they respect the players ability to control the middle, and they work with them as they cut-inside for one-twos. I'll just be honest. Oso isn't that guy. We want him to be that guy, he's a great club guy and he's our captain. But he isn't ever going to reach the levels we need in that part of the box.
He's a bit of a knob but look how Puig demands the middle of the park in LA. yeah he's an anomaly of an mls signing - but its someone that has so much ownership and gravity of the pitch in his space... has the IQ to know when to spray a ball, when to dribble it forward, when to run into the box or when to say fuck it and ping one from outside the 18. That is the type of DP baller we need in the middle (i'd argue more than an elite striker) - if we want to accommodate the italians. He's a stalwart for European football for years to come... but someone that's an MLS option version of Florian Wirtz, or for the PL readers - J. Alvarez (or how SMS used to play in Lazio). Yeah those type of players are rare, but that's literally what a DP slot is meant for lol and don't think the mls needs precisely someone at that pedigree - there's less talented options out there that would still dominate in this league under a DP price tag.
Anyways that's what i'm seeing at least. We got flores in the middle breaking up plays and while Oso/Coello/Thompson attempt be that linkup guy in the middle we have 0 bravado or anyone in the middle of the park that effectively grabs the tempo by the scruff of the neck and says "lets go". Maybe they are hoping longstaff is that guy, but so far not seeing it either. I'd argue this is what we really need because like someone mentioned above, someone at that pedigree can make a 1M tam striker look like peak Martinez and know how to conduct the influence of both wings in insigne and berna when to combine them both. and someone at that level wouldn't clash with insigne/berna - because they are players who respect pedigree and quality. If you can show you are reliable and dependable and can make the best decisions and help set them up for goals/assists, they won't power struggle with someone that is reliable
Last edited by FiveThreeTwo; 04-10-2024 at 03:17 PM.
I am going to say it's coming never.
Supporters cannot be monitored/supervised carefully enough, and the minority of idiots who want to do something idiotic have more freedom to do so. MLSE will never admit it, but they just don't ever want to go there.
“What the world needs is more geniuses with humility; there are so few of us left.”
Yeah. I’m sure there’s a presentation deck somewhere in the MLSE that outlines TFC’s 10 year plan to move away from supporters and plug in as many corporately paid tickets as they can.
The south end sells corporate tickets - we are part of the entertainment package.
&
The guys in black not withstanding, the demographics in the south end skews 35+ now and I suspect spends at about the same level as most of the rest of the stadium
The reasons I think we may not get safe standing are:
a) it would require a redo of the south that probably can't be done in one winter
b) MLSE will have to be sold on the ROI and I'm not sure they are open to expanding ROI on the people who do pay less then others initially
I could see it not happening based on money but it's actually better for monitoring/safety as you can't step from one row to the next with that railing separating each row. Unless climbing over it.
Reads to me like we are likely done with signings until the summer window when the new roster rules come into effect.
Check out this tweet at https://twitter.com/tfcnewsoutlet/status/1778538154821300568
About this - see the presser today - around minute 12. He indicated a move could still happen but might require a sell off first.
Good we shouldn't panic buy. We need bullseyes.
From the sounds of that presser today, they have a player they would get for the #9 internationally IF they had the cap space. And they are NOT happy with the current crop - Herdman talked about crosses not getting through and as much as said it was because the movement of the forwards wasn't having to make oppossing CB's think.
Just listened to the clip. It does sound like they have something in mind, but the way Herdman was describing the pot of money and needing to move parts out to afford it makes me think this is gonna be another TAM/GAM level striker. Unless they need to accumulate more GAM in order to buy down Oso, which would still require them to wait until the new rules come into effect in the summer with them having 2 u-22's on the books.
My post earlier wasn't supposition, I should've clarified that. I've been directly told they have no cap room and no extra budget to spend. So they have to move someone out to get someone in. Most of the players they could move are under first-team contracts, so they can't just send them to TFCII, and we've already used our buyout on Diomande.
So there is no wiggle room to bring in a GAM or TAM, even, not until the rule changes come into play. The slot I'm sure they can figure out; the money is another issue entirely.
With that information, it definitely sounds like they should just wait until the summer window.
i think they have about 600k to 700k at the moment, the player they are looking at rjght now is probs in the 1 mil range
Last edited by reggie; 04-12-2024 at 04:31 PM.
I was told they were at the cap, but I must admit, I'd been getting that message since before Blessing left. So we might have a little. But they clearly don't have enough to get the calibre of player they want.
With that information, we should just Fire Manning, this is so obvious and so painful. I wondered what he promised everyone for the MLS/Fifa world cup meetings. #FireManning …
Last edited by Bushmancan; 04-13-2024 at 07:16 AM.
I know I sound like a broken record, but getting us to the cap without strengthening the position where we just so clearly, obviously need a significant upgrade is absolutely criminal. This winter shows me Bill Manning has learned absolutely nothing and any improvement is in spite of him.
I really don't think it's Manning, and the evidence is ... that he is still there! Manning isn't getting evaluated by the MLSE bosses on the Italian signings, because he didn't do them.
I have never changed my view that Manning doesn't have the authority to "spend". If I had to speculate, Larry has (or had) that authority, but blew his credibility with Rogers/Bell on the Italian signings, which are disastrous by any measure ... plus Larry sold down and caused boardroom tension.
So now someone else is the voice in the room that matters.
Is it Ed Rogers? Who knows... but I think we got a look at how he views spending on the "lesser" sports in the portfolio, when he spiked the WNBA team.
“What the world needs is more geniuses with humility; there are so few of us left.”
Love you to death but absolutely disagree, he bragged about doing the dinners to get LI to come. And if he cant spend anymore, why is he here? It means they have no faith, in his decisions. Also, I do think LI has been professional publicly and i do not begrudge him taking the money. But for TFC once you made the first signing, Bernadeschi was just stupid. One aging star and one highly skilled but disenfranchised player, add up to two skilled wide DPs with nothing to link them together and leverage them.
So skill and passing wont make the difference because they cannot connect.
Now Bernadeschi with a striker I would have been fine with as well but there would be no LI caché. After LI, a Striker DP (even a TAM) was a must, to sign anything else was plain stupid. Even if you say that you agree with letting your team make the decisions, Manning has to step in some time, after all he was the brainchild of Real Salt Lake. He did that with BB, another failure and his time should be done.
The buck stops with him, he is the president, he should resign based on what he has done to the club. Look at what Bez has done with a lot less fanfare. The only reason there is interest right now in TFC (other than the core base, which they are pissing off), is Messi and a World Cup. Hate to be so cynical but prove me wrong, stop blaming Rogers and Bell, except for this. Instead of reigning in an asset, put the right person in place and leverage the asset as best you can…. They have 2 1/2 years to make or break this.
Last edited by Bushmancan; 04-13-2024 at 10:30 AM.
Thanks for the love, back at you… I am no defender of his..
Manning would be hardly the first guy to try to take public credit for things his superiors actually are responsible for. That kind of endzone dancing feels good in the early days…
I agree he needs to go. But I think that guys who take the kind of responsibility you are looking for are few and far between, and it's not fair to expect him to quit. He has a contract, he has a family (not that that matters to my point)… it's MLSE that need to move him out, for the reasons you state (I would have a few more).
“What the world needs is more geniuses with humility; there are so few of us left.”
The Berna contract was flawed by the time the ink was dry. LI needs a way to balance spacing on the field and the obvious way to do that is have a really fast goal scoring threat on the right side to complement your mercurial play-maker on the other. Simple formula lots of MLS teams have used in the 4-3-3. The two of them are glacial in speed and don’t exactly complement each other (other than being high quality footballers) which continues to be an issue.
Leaving that aside, neither of these guys are the right profile for MLS DPs. They are just like Defoe: luxury players who work best in balanced teams, not the types who naturally expand their games when their teammates have obvious shortcomings. That’s why the individualists like Zlatan work so well here. They are naturally inclined to do more and that just fills the void in a way that’s required.
Switching topics for a second, Manning’s continued existence remains frustrating. As long as he’s around I’ll always be skeptical this team is going anywhere. I cyncially wonder if our owners actions here are just another symptom of being lazy, non-competitive monopolists in a country where businesses are increasingly lacking a competitive spirit in general these days. But that’s another conversation altogether.
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