Thursday, July 30, 2020

Rapids History By The Numbers: Singles & Doubles Part 2

And we finally reach the end of this trip through history.  The last group of eight numbers.  Six singles and two doubles.

#50
Andrew Dykstra (2018)
William Yarbrough (2020)


A pair of backup goalkeepers.  Dykstra never played a league match for the Rapids.  Yarbrough has played the last two.  Makes the decision as to which one was the best Rapid in #50 fairly easy.

#52
Braian Galvan (2020)

Only one appearance so far, but high hopes for him in the future.

#55
Danny Mwanga (2013-2014)

7 starts and 19 appearances over two seasons, recording one assist.  Not exactly great numbers for a forward.

#57
Carlos Alvarez (2014-2015)

Picked up after Chivas USA folded, he made 11 appearances in 2 seasons and I can't remember any of them.

#77
Diego Serna (2005)

Signed in August, subbed in to one regular season game and one playoff game for a grand total of 24 minutes, recording one shot and getting one yellow card.

#90
Mohammed Saeid (2017)
Enzo Martinez (2018)


Two one-season midfielders.  Martinez was a pickup from Charlotte who impressed in preseason.  Saeid was part of the Burch/Cronin/Gatt/Saeid debacle, about the only good piece of that trade.  Enzo made 22 appearances with 15 starts, picking up 3 assists.  Mohammed made 29 appearances after the trade, 27 of them starts, scoring a goal and putting up 4 assists.  He also became a bit of a fan favorite.  He was released at the end of the season to return back to Sweden to be closer to family.  I think he beats out Martinez for best #90.

#94
Marlon Hairston (2014-2018)

Maybe not as good as the fans made him out to be, but a decent player who struggled to find his position.  Best as a wingback in a 5-3-2 but the Rapids didn't play that very often during is time.  Not defensive enough to play fullback, not offensive enough to play right midfielder.

#99
Andre Shinyashiki (2019-2020)

As we all know Andre was last year's rookie of the Year.  Hopefully we see more from him once things get back to normal.

And that's it.  That's every number used by the Rapids officially over 25 seasons.  Sometime this weekend I'll post a recap with links to all the choices and some random trivia.  Next week we'll get back to looking at the current team.

Monday, July 27, 2020

Rapids History By The Numbers: Singles & Doubles Part 1

Ok, we're getting to the bottom of the barrel.  Of the 15 numbers left that have been used, 12 of them were used by only one player, the other 3 by just two.  Not much to break down or analyze there.  So we're going to split the remainder into two parts and finish the series this week.

#34
Tyrone Marshall (1998, 2011-2012)

Marshall was originally drafted by the Rapids back in 1998, and after one season and one appearance with them left on a grand circle tour of the league, playing for 14 seasons and 4 other teams before ending his career with 2 more seasons in Colorado.  He was a regular starter in 2011 and then started half the games in 2012.  He was a solid defender that made a career out of tough tackles and a never ending work rate.

#35
Rob Valentino (2009)

Valentino was drafted as a defender by New England in 2008, made one USOC appearance for them before being traded to the Rapids in may of '09 for Nico Colaluca.  He never appeared for the Rapids in a league game and asked for his release at the end of the season.

#36
Shane O'Neill (2012)

Homegrown defender Shane O'Neill was signed in 2012 and played one game before switching to number 27 the next season.

#37
Edu (2012)

The infamous Edu signing.  Brought in as a attacking signing in April of the season he managed just 3 starts in 9 appearances, never scoring.  He's up there as one of the worst recent international signings by the team.

#38
Nobody

38 is the lowest number that has never officially been used by a Rapids player.  Early on I'm sure it was just a coincidence but since the founding of Centennial 38 in 2013 I wonder if the team isn't intentionally keeping the number from being used.  Certainly at this point it would likely only be used by either a major signing or a fan favorite.  Say somebody like drew Moor announcing he will play his final season in 38 as a tribute to the fans or something.  I can't see a random draftee picking the number or being allowed to wear it.

#39
Harrison Henao (2012)

A loanee defensive midfielder brought in from Colombia.  He made one appearance before being released from his loan midseason to free up a roster spot.

#44
Gale Agbossoumonde (2014)
Axel Sjoberg (2015-2019)


This is an easy decision.  Gale made 0 appearances for the club, the big Swede was a MLS best XI member and placed third in Defender of the Year voting in 2016, eventually making 88 appearances for the club and becoming a fan favorite.

#45
Josh Gatt (2017)

Gatt was acquired as part of the disastrous Burch/Cronin/Saied/Gatt swap with Minnesota.  He managed 20 appearances and 11 starts, scoring 2 goals, before being released at the end of the season.

Thursday, July 23, 2020

Rapids Manage To Avoid Last Place


The Rapids looked good at times against Minnesota last night and by picking up a point managed to avoid last place in the tournament.  That said, this team still has a long way to go to be the challenging competitive team the organisation built towards 2020 for.  My prediction:
1-1 draw, goal by Kamara.  That will be the 1000th goal in team history, according to Richard Fleming.  I don't have faith the Rapids are going to get over the hump against the best team in the group, and I highly doubt the results elsewhere are going to to their way to allow them to advance anyway.
It turned out to be 2-2, but everything else was accurate, even Kei getting the first goal for the 1000th in team history.  Much like the SKC game the Rapids were arguably the better team for the majority of the game, but a 10-15 minute period where the team lost focus cost them points.  After an easy breakaway for Kamara put the team up 1-0 they allowed goals in the 36th and 43rd minute.

The first came off a well worked corner kick that United just beat us on.  The kick was well placed and a perfect touch by Finlay redirected it into the net.  Sometimes you just have to ti[p your cap and say "nice job" to the other team, and this was one of those times.

The second goal was a defensive breakdown.  Sam Vines got skinned on the left side and Drew Moor was left with a decision.  Step to Vines' man to stop his open look at goal or stay on his man.  Moor stepped to the ball and Gregus immediately put the ball into the space Moor vacated and Finly just needed to be a solid object for it to rebound off of for his second goal.  I'm not sure what the expected decision, or best decision, for Moor is there, so I can't say he made the wrong one, but it didn't work out this time.

As we've seen in three out of five games this season though the Rapids despite being down would fight back.  Lewis would come off the bench and for the third time this year score a tying or winning goal.  This time, unlike Friday, it held up and Colorado avoided going home with nothing.  Even a win wouldn't have mattered though as SKC beat FSL yesterday morning so the Rapids had been eliminated before they started play.

In the next few days I'm going to do an analysis of where the team is as we wait for the rest of the regular season (if it happens) so I'll leave anything more for then.  We finish the MLS is Back tournament with a 2-1-2 (W-D-L) record and a -1 goal differential for the season, and a number of questions.

Man of the Match: Jon Lewis.  The fair, IMO, knock on him so far is that he can't stay "in the match" for a full 90 minutes and that results in inconsistent play, thus he's better coming off the bench.  At some point though with his scoring rate you have to give him another shot as a starter.

Tuesday, July 21, 2020

If This Be The End, Let's Go Out On A High Note

Tomorrow night the Rapids will play what will likely be their final game of the MLS Is Back Tournament, and what is looking like possibly the last game of 2020.  The league wants to return to home markets to play more of the regular season, but I have my doubts that they'll be able to do that given the pandemic numbers we're seeing.  Assuming there's not a late comeback by DC tonight the Rapids need FSL (*sigh*) to beat SKC tomorrow morning to have any possibility of moving on. Should that happen a 3 goal win over Minnesota would put them in to the knockout rounds for sure.  A 2 or 1 goal win might be enough, if SKC loses by multiple goals and depending on what else happens in other groups.  At minimum the Rapids need the SKC loss and they need to make up 4 goal differential, or 3 goal differential and score 3 more than SKC tomorrow.

They'll have to do that without Danny Wilson and Jack Price, who were red carded on Friday night.  They'll also be without Clint Irwin again due to his injury.  Luckily, and shockingly IMO, neither Shinyashiki or Benezet were suspended over their comments about the refs (or in Benezet's case, his elbow) so they'll both be available.

My guess at our XI:


I think we're going to see Moor back in the lineup after resting last game, and Warner filling Price's spot at the number 6.  Lewis has earned a start based on what we've seen so far, especially over Shinyashiki.  Otherwise its getting our best players on the field.

Prediction: 1-1 draw, goal by Kamara.  That will be the 1000th goal in team history, according to Richard Fleming.  I don't have faith the Rapids are going to get over the hump against the best team in the group, and I highly doubt the results elsewhere are going to to their way to allow them to advance anyway.

Monday, July 20, 2020

Rapids History By The Numbers: #33

We're at our final long list of the series.  After this the remaining numbers have only been worn by one or two players total.  33 does seem to be popular though with eight different players:

Matt Okoh (2000)
Ritchie Kotschau (2001)
Eugene Sepuya (2005)
Daniel Wasson (2006-2007)
Cesar Zambrano (2008)
Tony Cascio (2012)
German Mera (2013)
Jared Watts (2014-2017)


That's a real mixed bag.  Sepuya and Zambrano each made one appearance so they're out.  Mera only made 13 appearances, with only 6 starts and Kotschau arrived midyear and only made 11 (all starts).  He switched his number the next season.  I'll eliminate both of them as well.  That leaves us:

  • Matt Okoh - Attacking midfielder that went to Regis Jesuit High and DU.  After bouncing around for a while he made it on the Rapids for a season before being traded to the Revs.  In that season he made 12 starts and 21 appearances, scoring 2 goals and racking up 6 assists.
  • Daniel Wasson - Defensive midfielder that grew up in the Springs and went to the Air Force Academy and the University of Texas before being drafted by the Rapids.  He made 22 appearances over his two seasons, but only 9 starts, recording one goal.
  • Tony Cascio - Winger that was a first round draft pick.  In his rookie season he made 29 appearances, with 18 starts.  He had 3 goals and 3 assists.  The next year he changed his number.
  • Jared Watts - Defender that was a second round pick.  In 4 seasons, mostly under Pablo, he made 71 appearances with 61 starts, recording a goal and an assist.
Looking at that we can eliminate Wasson, considering he didn't do any more than Okoh or Cascio did.  Cascio played almost 1700 minutes in 2012, contributing to 6 goals.  Okoh played a little over 1000 minutes and contributed to 8 goals.  Hard to say Cascio deserves to be picked over Okoh given that.

Comparing that to Watts is difficult.  Watts started the majority of the games in the 2016 season, when we had the best defense in the league.  He also played a number of games for the 6th best defense in 2015.  The defense in 2014 and 2017 was woeful though.

In the end I'm going to go with Okoh, but i wouldn't disagree is people thought Jared Watts was the better choice.  Surprisingly there doesn't seem to be a picture of  Okoh in a Rapids uniform that doesn't belong to Getty Images.

Sunday, July 19, 2020

MLS Does Hatchet Job On The Rapids

It took me 24 hours to calm down from the farce on Friday night, then I found out what happened before the game and it took me another 24 hours before I felt like writing this.  I'm going to dispense with the game recap just to hit the big issues.

The Dever Post reported yesterday that the Rapids got screwed by MLS before even taking the field.  They arrived at the field from the Dolphin hotel a little after SKC did.  Because of lightning in the area the Rapids were asked to stay in the bus instead of going into their locker room, while SKC was already in the locker room.  Then, after 30 minutes of being cooped up on the bus, they were allowed out but they were told they weren't changing the kickoff time, so instead of their normal changing in the locker room, warming up, then returning to the locker room for final preparations the the team had to go straight to the field and change pitch side, then get in an abbreviated warmup.  Meanwhile SKC had their normal warmup having already changed in the locker room.  This is not how you run a professional sporting event.

Once the game got underway it started well, with Acosta getting the early goal.  The Rapids were very lucky not to be down a man right before half as Benezet sent an elbow into the face of a KC player.  Most VAR officials would have sent that down for review, and I expect to hear tomorrow that Benezet has been suspended by the Disciplinary Committee (DisCo) for it.

Then we saw the 15 minute meltdown by Gantar and the VAR.  Wilson hauled down a SKC attacker as the last man.  The attacker hadn't yet corralled the ball and wasn't going right at goal, but if Gantar had called the red I probably would have grumbled a bit but moved on.  Gantar showed yellow.  Then the VAR official alerted him that he had made a "clear and obvious" error, and Gantar reversed the call to a red.  I don't think the mistake was "clear and obvious" but fine, call it a makeup from not giving Benezet the red he likely deserved.

12 minutes later a long shot across the box went out for a goal kick, but the VAR alerted Gantar to a possible handball in the box.  On further review its possible the ball touched Rubio's arm, but again, it did not appear to be "clear and obvious" it was a handball.  Still, the call was made and a PK given, and converted.

Immediately after kicking off from the PK the Rapids sent a long ball into the corner that Kamara headed on.  Lewis tried to come in and play it with a high boot but was late.  He was right in front of the AR who signaled for the foul and Gantar ran in and flashed yellow.  He then turned, pointed towards the center of the pitch where Jack Price was (off screen) and showed Price a straight red.  It was, apparently, for Offensive or Abusive Language.  Nobody yet has reported what Price said, and as he went off the field you can hear him asking Fraser "How is that a red card?".  If we assume, probably fairly, that Price didn't use some slur that would obviously be out of line (racists/sexist/homophobic/etc.) then what he likely said was some cursing at the ref and/or openly questioning his impartiality.  Given my questions about Gantar's judgement up to this point in the game and from what we could see on screen (Jack telling him F*** You, which is bad but not necessarily a red) i have my doubts that what Price said would normally be considered a red by most refs.  In the end though, the ref has the final say on what is or is not Offensive/Abusive to him.

Down two men and a goal the game was thought to be over, but kudos to the team for fighting back and leveling the score before an unfortunate deflection off Vines in stoppage time lead to an own goal and a loss.  Post game both Benezet and Shinyashiki (and retired former Rapid Jared Watts) have been quite vocal on social media questioning the quality of the officiating and suggesting that things weren't on the level.

This is one of those cases where you can find justification for all the calls made, but having a VAR red, a VAR PK, and a red for language in a 15 minute time span is indicative of a game the ref let get away from him.  Combined with the mess of a pregame (not the ref's fault, that's on MLS), you had a team that was likely on tilt and that's what probably led to Price losing his head.  That' no excuse though, a player, especially a team captain, has to be more aware of things than that.  The postgame ongoing critique from Benezet and Shinyashiki is bush league stuff.  Somebody should have stopped it as soon as it started.  It will likely lead to Shinyashiki (who's done more) being suspended, and if Benezet isn't suspended fro h is elbow he'll likely get one too.

So we're going to go into Wednesday's match without Danny Wilson and Jack Price for sure, and likely without Benezet and Shinyashiki.  That leaves us a midfield of something like Warner - Acosta - Lewis - Namli - Bassett.  Which isn't ideal for a must win game.  Its only a must win if FSL beats SKC that morning, otherwise we'll be eliminated before we even kick off.  If FSL does win, we need to win and we need to make up 4 goal differential on SKC (or 3 and outscore SKC by 3).  That, alone, may not be enough because we'd still need to be one of the top four 3rd placed teams to advance.

Barring a miracle, the Rapids are headed back to Denver Wednesday night/Thursday morning.  They let themselves get completely outplayed against FSL, and then they made mistakes at critical times against SKC while still likely being the better team.  Then they compounded the error by letting the officiating get in their heads.  Barring surprise advancement there's no way to look at this tournament as anything but a failure, and if the league finds some way to have a regular season after this, Colorado needs to decide what kind of team they really are.

Thursday, July 16, 2020

Rapids Face Must Win Tomorrow Night

Well, after that disaster against FSL on Sunday Colorado is up against it facing SKC tomorrow night.  A loss all but eliminated them from the tournament, and a draw barely keeps them alive.  SKC is in the same boat after losing their opener to Minnesota.  They also lost their starting keeper to a red card, which means they'll be starting an untested backup.  Kickoff is at 6pm MT and the game is on ESPN2.  This is a change from the original schedule which had us on ESPN due to moving games around to deal with the delayed Atlanta-DC game.

Still no injury report but one note out of camp is that Clint Irwin took a head knock, so we might be in line to see William Yarbrough get his first start.


Just a couple of changes.  If Irwin can go he will, I just bet he won't be able to.  Rosenberry gets his starting spot back now that he's likely match fit.  Shinyashiki had a horrible night on Sunday, I think we see Lewis get a shot in his place.

Most importantly though is does the attitude of the starting XI change.  If we come out completely flat like we did against Salt Lake we might as well just head back to Colorado after the game.

Prediction: 2-1 win, goals by Kamara and Namli.  I think the team bounces back.  Normally I wouldn't be confident in a win even in that case but KC looked not great once they had the red card and I think their keeper will be vulnerable, which will be just enough.

Wednesday, July 15, 2020

Rapids History By The Numbers: #31 & #32

One roster note, right before the game  on Sunday the Rapids traded $200K in GAM next year, plus a possible $25K in GAM in 2022 to DC for an international slot for this year and next year.  That allowed them to roster Briain Galvan officially.  This is notably more than the reported $100k-$150K teams wanted from the Rapids at the beginning of last season when they made the decision to cut Gashi to get within the international limit instead of spending that much.  Now back to the history.

And that history is really getting into the weeds at this point.  We're going to cover two numbers again today, with some meh choices.  First at #31:

Sasha Gotsmanov (2005)
Steward Ceus (2009-2012)
Clint Irwin (2013, 2019)
Maynor Figueroa (2015)
Cody Mizell (2017)


This goes to Irwin pretty much by default.  Combined the other 4 made 15 appearances, less than Irwin made in 2013 alone, and 2013 was arguably Irwin's best year as a Rapid.  He had his most appearances, tied his most starts, and had his most shutouts.  He also had his best goals against average at 1.09 goals/game in his rookie season.

For #32 its not as obvious

Miguel Comminges (2011)
Brenton Griffiths (2013-2014)
Jack McBean (2018)
Collen Warner (2020)


4 starts for Comminges, 1 appearance for Griffiths, and Warner has yet to appear since he's only had one chance.  That leaves us with Jack McBean and his 22 appearances (13 starts) with 2 goals and an assist.  As frustrating as McBean was in 2018, that's better than anyone else who's worn 32.

Monday, July 13, 2020

Rapids Return Not With A Bang But A Whimper


That was, hands down, the worst league performance the Rapids have put on the field since Hudson was fired (the USOC match last year might have been worse). While I knew we'd be rusty this looks nothing like the team we saw at the end of last season or the first two games this year.

Friday will be very interesting. Do we get this team again, which should set off all kinds of alarms, or is this yet again a poorly timed letdown when we play Salt Lake and we bounce back to something looking more like we've seen under Fraser?

Its really frustrating to see the Rapids have these completely flat games time and time again against FSL.  Something needs to change in the preparation.  At least this most recent disaster won't count for the RMC.

I'm not going to dissect this game too much.  Three players played average or better (Acosta, Irwin, Benezet) everyone else sucked.  And Benezet's play amounted to a lot of work with almost no payoff.  I will say that Ale Moreno has no idea what he's talking about as a broadcaster, the play by Irwin was nowhere near a red card, because in 20116 the Laws of the Game were changed to remove the double jeopardy of a red card and a PK.  Now as long as you make a legitimate attempt to play the ball (you're not just trying to take the man out), even if its a bad one like Irwin last night, a Denial of an Obvious Goal Scoring Opportunity (DOGSO) in the box is a yellow card and a PK.

Man of the Match: Kellyn Acosta.  His best game in a Rapids jersey in a while.  Too bad most of his teammates decided to play their worst.

Friday, July 10, 2020

Back With A Bang


What's this?  A game?  So I guess I have to remember how to write a game preview huh?  At least they make it easy on me by starting out with a game against that team.  Yep, Sunday night at 8:30pm on ESPN its Rapids - FSL at the MLS Is Back Tournament.

To be very clear, the Committee of 10 that organizes the Rocky Mountain Cup has decided this match will not be used in deciding the RMC in 2020.

I'm actually (back) on the committee and the discussion was that since we aren't sure how many games there will be this season and who may or may not have home games we would pass on this one, and the idea of awarding a Rocky Mountain supporters cup in Florida without fans didn't make much sense.  If/when the regular season continues in home markets the Committee will make an announcement about what will happen with those games.

That aside though, both teams are talking about this being as much a rivalry game as any other, so I don't think the lack of the actual Cup will change much.  Plus both teams are anxious to get on the field again.

There is no injury report for this game, and I doubt we see one at all in this tournament.  What we do know is that the whole team other than Ford and the players loaned out are in Orlando and available (and apparently Matt Hundley was recalled from loan as well).  My guess on the XI:


RosenberryKelly being because there was a rumor that Rosenberry was one of the players that arrived late and as such, may not be fully ready to start. I think Kelly is more likely to take his place in that scenario than having Moor shift over and Trusty starting in the middle.

But this is all a guess.  These guys have been off, without even friendlies, for 4 months.  Who knows who's rusty, or not ready to go 90, or just lost their starting position.  I don't think Yarborough is going to be the starter over Irwin, but I'm not going to be shocked if it happens.

Prediction: 2-1 win, goals by Kamara and Shinyashiki.  The Rapids are a better team, on paper, than FSL and I think their style of play, particularly focusing on set pieces, will be easier to return to than FSL's.  But its going to be sloppy and ugly and we're going to be happy to get out with 3 points.

Thursday, July 9, 2020

Rapids History By The Numbers: #29 & #30

Before we get started, a slight update from the tournament.  Based on pictures the Rapids have posted and other sources it appears that every player, other than Kortne Ford (ongoing knee injury) and those already loaned out to USL sides, is in Florida.

Now, on to today's lists.  We're starting to crape the bottom of the barrel as we exit the 20's and get into numbers that aren't used very much.  First the group at 29:

Scott Garlick (2002)
Scott Palguta (2009-2012)
Kory Kindle (2013)
Caleb Calvert (2015-2018)
Matt Hundley (2019-2020)


Kindle never played in a league match and Hundley hasn't yet, so we can eliminate them.  Calvert only make 4 starts in his time, and averaged 20-30 minutes in most of his sub appearances.  Garlick started 15 games that year with a goals against average of 1.6, 8th of the 10 keepers who played 15 or more games that season (9th was Tim Howard of all people).  Which brings us to Scott Palguta.  While Palguta was never more than a replacement level player he did get 30 starts and 50 appearances in his four season here (and won MLS Cup), more than everyone else on the list combined.  He appeared in half of the games in our Cup winning season (though he only started 5, and had no playoff appearances).  While that's not great, its the best to wear 29.

Now we're into the 30s with a rather infamous list:

Zizi Roberts (2003-2004)
Amir Lowery (2005)
Thiago Martins (2006)
Gabriel Torres (2013)
Abe Rodriguez (2020)


Now I think in a few years Rodriguez will be the obvious choice, but he hasn't played yet.  Lowry had a grand total of one appearance.  So that leaves us with three somewhat infamous forwards.  To break them down:

Roberts: 17 appearances, 12 starts, 1091 minutes, 6 goals
Martins: 25 appearances, 14 starts, 1390 minutes, 3 goals, 4 assists
Torres (2013 only): 7 appearances, 5 starts, 507 minutes, 3 goals, 1 assist

To be fair to Torres, he was signed with only 9 games left in 2013 and the only two games he missed were due to National Team duty.

These three are actually remarkably close.  Roberts had roughly double the minutes and double the goals of Torres.  Martins didn't have as many goals but did rack up a few assists.  In the end I'm going to go with Torres for doing as much as he did in as little time as he had in 2013.  Too bad after that he decided he liked the training table buffet more than playing.

Tuesday, July 7, 2020

Rapids History By The Numbers: #27 & #28

After a break for real news we're back to our recap of 25 years of Rapids players.  We're now to the point where the lists are short enough and the choices obvious enough that I'm going to cover multiple numbers in most posts.  Tonight we get two fan favorites.  First, the list for #27.

Byron Foss (2005)
Kosuke Kimura (2007-2012)
Shane O'Neill (2013-2015)
Luis Gil (2017)
Deklan Wynne (2018-2020)


Yeah, this is obviously Koz.  The heart of the 2010 MLS Cup team and maybe the biggest difference between player value and fan love.  The only players I can think of that are more loved by the fans are all in, or will be in, the Gallery of Honor.  Honestly, Koz is probably more loved than some of them even.  He's the only player who's returned to the Dick with another team and had to take a lap of honor after the game to acknowledge the fans.  The only other candidate, O'Neill, played in about half as many games as Koz, never really fully locked down a starting spot, and left under less than ideal circumstances.

Oddly, despite his long time at the club he doesn't appear in the top 10 of any records and his only league honor, other than winning the Cup, was being a finalist for the Fair Play award in 2011.  He had the winning goal to put the Rapids into MLS Cup 2010, even it was meant to be a cross. 

Our list for #28

Alex Blake (2003)
Jordan Cila (2004)
Leo Cullen (2005)
John DiRaimondo (2008)
Davy Armstrong (2010-2014)
Sam Nicholson (2018-2020)


Ironically I was planning to post this on Thursday night, when the news of Nicholson's release pushed it down the schedule.  To show you how easy this pick is, Sam Nicholson had 48 appearances for the Rapids, and was clearly about to rack up more this season before COVID-19 and his personal issues at home led to his Rapids career ending.  The rest of the players who wore 28 had 53 appearances combined.

Monday, July 6, 2020

As The MLS Bubble Turns

I hope everyone enjoyed the holiday weekend as Denver blew up half of Wyoming's inventory of fireworks.  We had some significant developments around the MLS Is Back tournament in the last 36 hours.

Sunday the Rapids were scheduled to fly to Orlando, until they weren't.  The final round of tests conducted on Friday returned two positive tests, which meant that nobody could fly yesterday and the whole travelling group had to be retested.  Yesterday the Rapids sent out an official update that the team would fly down tomorrow (Tuesday).

That lasted about 24 hours until news broke that the team was back at the Dick this afternoon preparing to leave, and sure enough they did.  When they reach Walt Disney World tonight they'll be the final team to enter the MLS bubble in Orlando.  This evening the team sent out another official update saying the team had gotten the results of the tests from yesterday back and everyone tested negative.  The two people that tested positive yesterday still stayed in Denver and will join the team in Orlando once they have a second negative test returned after at least 24 hours.

Once that news came out the big news of the day broke, that FC Dallas has been withdrawn from the tournament by MLS due to having 10 players test positive since they reached Orlando.  Even after having rescheduled their first game it was determined that it was not viable to have them try to compete.  MLS has not yet announced how the tournament will change to deal with this missing team or how Dallas will make up the three group stage games that are meant to count towards the regular season standings.

That may be because there's more to come.  There are reports that Nashville has 5 to 8 members of their party that have tested positive.  If accurate that may lead to them needing to be removed from the tournament as well, which would leave the league with a much easier 6 groups of 4 teams to deal with.

I said it last week, and I still feel that this tournament is a bad idea at this time.  The best move is just to end it now.

Thursday, July 2, 2020

Rapids And Nicholson Mutually Terminate Contract

Surprising news this afternoon as the Rapids announced that they had reached an agreement with Sam Nicholson to terminate his contract.  There are some reports that Nicholson has an ongoing personal issue back home in Scotland, and the official announcement states that this decision is what's best for Sam and his family's well-being, which does seem to lend credence to those reports.

First of all, obviously, we hope that whatever is going on with Nicholson and/or his family turns out for the best.  Sam has been a fan favorite since he got here and I have heard nothing but good things about  him.  This is not how you want to see a players' time with a team end.

As far as the on-the-field impacts, the Rapids should be able to absorb Nicholson's departure without too much drop off.  As it was he was likely to see his playing time reduced with the addition of Benezet and Galvan.  He was already in a three way battle with Shinyashiki and Lewis last season, plus the wing is one place where we can get Rubio on the field with Kamara.  We'll miss his speed from time to time but overall I think we'll be ok.

Wednesday, July 1, 2020

Rapids History By The Numbers: #26

As we get into the higher numbers our lists get smaller, which in some ways makes my life easier.  For example, this group.

Nat Borchers (2003)
Alberto Delgado (2004)
Fabrice Noel (2005)
Conor Casey (2007)
Michael Holody (2009-2011)
Deshorn Brown (2013-2015)
Dennis Castillo (2016-2017)
Cole Bassett (2018-2020)


We can quickly whittle this down.  Delgado, Holody, Castillo, and Noel aren't in the running.  Borchers and Casey had good to great Rapids careers, but their first season at the club wearing this number isn't enough to make them the best to wear this number.  That leaves us with Deshorn Brown and Cole Bassett.  While I think Cole is the future of the club and will either become a significant player or get sold for a significant price, he has not quite reached the level of Deshorn Brown yet.

Despite only playing for two seasons and one game, Brown is in the top 10 in team history in goals, shots, and shots on goal.  For most of the decade, befre Kamara joined us last year, his back to back 10 goal seasons were the highlight from a Rapids striker.  On top of that, in maybe the team's best ever "strike while the iron is hot" moment, he was sold to Norway for over $500K at the start of 2015, and immediately became a wanderer who has played for 7 teams in 6 years, including a brief stint with DC United, which cost them their spot in the allocation order.