Last Ditch Effort

Well, Colorado is back on the road tomorrow night trying to bounce back from that embarrassing loss on Saturday.  They're in Nashville to face Gary Smith and other members of the 2010 MLS Cup winning team.  Nashville is the last team in the playoffs (based on PPG) so this is a true 6 pointer.  Anything short of a win and whatever last remaining playoff hopes the team might hold will be essentially gone.  Even a draw means we'd likely need 15 points in our last 6 games, and I don't see this team winning 5 of siz with trips to the Galaxy and Austin, and Dallas at home. on the schedule.  Kickoff tomorrow is at 6:30 and this is the first of the last half dozen blacked out games.

Injury Report: 

OUT: D Seb Anderson, D Jackson Travis, M Ollie Larraz, M Jack Price, F Yaya Toure

Disciplinary Report:

SUSPENDED; D Gustavo Vallecilla

Along with that, the Rapids announced today that defender Michael Edwards has been loaned to the Switchbacks for the rest of the season.  Notably neither Danny Wilson or Keegan Rosenberry (who was Questionable on Saturday) are on the injury report.

Its all hands on deck time.  I think in a less critical game Fraser would give Wilson and Rosenberry some time to heal, but after Wednesday he needs a win here and his best options playing.  The only question mark is who plays in Warner's spot, could be him, Priso, Max, or a 5th defender.

Prediction: 3-1 loss, goal by Rubio.  In the end the answer to that last question won't matter.  There's nothing that's happened in the last 72 hours that says anything but a loss to me in this one.  The season is over and everyone knows it, but nobody wants to admit it yet.  The hobbled backline is going to give up goals to Nashville and we won't respond.

Rapids Tie Second Worst Loss In Team History

On September 5th, 2015 the Rapids hit what we hoped was their low point.  This was the infamous Joe Nasco game where the Rapids went down a man in the first minute in LA, and eventually set an all time worst team loss (and at the time a top 3 all-time league loss) at 6-0.  Sadly, that wasn't the low point even of that era.

Three years later, on August 25th 2018, it got worse.  This time at home the Rapids would go down a man in the 9th minute and a second man in the 45th minute, and again lose 6-0.  This time though, it was to their Rocky Mountain Cup rivals FSL.  That is still the worst loss in team history, because it was at home and who the opponent was.

On Saturday Colorado repeated their 2015 game, losing 6-0 on the road to the Union.  This one might even be a little worse than that, considering that they were down 3-0 in the first 30 minutes while playing 11v11, then got a red card and gave up the last 3 goals in the last 10 minutes of the match.  Against LA all 6 goals were given up down a man (since the red card was in the first minute).  Colorado showed up not ready to play as individuals or a team and the second best squad in the league was surgical in taking advantage of that.

There's no need to break down the details of this game.  The match exposed everything the fans have been saying about the team this season.  No depth, no pride, and not enough skill or effort.  Fraser put out a B lineup, trying to rest players for the more winnable games in this 3 game week, and our reserves are no longer good enough.  The only players in the starting XI for this one that I'm confident I'd be happy to see in the starting lineup for the opening game of 2023 were Yarbrough and Rosenberry.  Everyone else needs to be playing for their jobs the rest of the season (there are players like Rubio and Price who didn't start for various reasons that don't need to worry about their jobs either).  Even including the subs only Drew Moor should have a guaranteed spot in 2023 (if he doesn't retire).

The worst part about it, as a fan, is that we see the same disinterest from the organization as we saw after the other two 6-0 losses.  No attempt to address it, no statements by leadership or even the players* taking responsibility, and no reason for the fans to think the club sees the deeper problems this team has right now.  For a Front Office that has talked about earning the fans' trust, the last two months has done nothing but throw away whatever they had managed to earn.  Right now they look like every other leadership team this club has had over the last 15+ years.

If anyone was still thinking about the playoffs, this weekend pretty much put paid to that idea.  The Rapids looked nothing like a playoff team while at the same time the teams they are chasing made a strong move to separate themselves from the back.  The playoff line is now at 47 points, to to get to 48 and avoid any tiebreaker scenarios Colorado would need 16 points in the last 7 games, a Bodmer Line of 2.29 pts/game.  And we still have to go to Austin, who just ripped the Shield winners apart on Friday night.  Its quite possible that the Rapids could lose to Nashville on Wednesday and DC on Sunday, leaving us a max possible total of 47.

Obviously, nobody deserves a MOTM award after this one.  On to Nashville with a patchwork defense against the 2nd scorer in the league.

* - if I remember correctly a couple of players did make an extra effort to make a statement taking responsibility after the FSL loss

Doin' A Little East Coast Swing

Colorado heads East for a 3 game week, presumably staying out there all week (I really hope they're not flying back and forth after each game).  First stop, Philly and the Eastern Conference leading Union.  Philadelphia is coming off their third (3rd!) 6+ goal win of the season and their second over DC United alone.  They're also completely healthy and have no players missing, so the Rapids have a mountain to climb to get points tomorrow.  Kickoff is at 5:30pm, and there are 7 games left in the Altitude blackout.

Injury Report: 

OUT: D Seb Anderson, M Ollie Larraz, M Jack Price, F Yaya Toure

QUESTIONABLE: D Keegan Rosenberry

Disciplinary Report:

SUSPENDED; M Bryan Acosta

ONE CAUTION FROM SUSPENSION: D Lalas Abubakar

Toure's injury was confirmed as a season=ending ACL tear this week, so I'll be leaving him off the report for the rest of the season alongside Keita and Galvan.  Keegan and Seb are new additions to the injury report, both with right leg injuries.  Needless to say, this is not good.

This is the lineup I'd expect Fraser to play if he's trying to win this game and not worrying about our trip to Nashville on Wednesday and DC next weekend.  We may see some players rotated out, especially since this seems to be the toughest of those 3 games.  Priso and Barrios would be the most likely to rotate in.

Prediction: 3-1 loss, goal by Rubio.  A full-strength Union squad, at home, trying to stay on top of the East against a weakened Rapids squad on the road with a questionable playoff chance?  Yeah, we're not getting anything out of this one.  As they say, No Price, No Points.

Season Ends On Final Kick Saturday Night

For 90+ minutes the Rapids did just enough in an ugly game to get the 3 points they needed to stay in the playoff race.  Then once again, like we've seen all season, the defense switched off for a second, the opposing team took advantage, and now realistically the season is over (we'll get back to that conclusion).  In this case it was, once again, Esteves who switched off.  He took two steps outside to cover empty space while his man moved inside to the ball.  Danny Wilson, now overloaded with two men to cover followed the ball.  Drew Moor dropped off to take Wilson's extra man, leaving a wide open hole in the middle for Ferreira's shot to fly through to tie the goal.  Abubakar was also defending space instead of stepping up.  Sound familiar?

Other than that there's not much to talk about the game.  A nice strike by Lalas early in the second half to g get the lead but otherwise it was a game the ref called very tightly leading to little flow and a lot of back and forth in midfield.  Outside of the goals the teams combined for 5 shots on target, and the goal was the Dynamo's only shot on goal of the second half.

So, lets talk about why I'm calling the season over.  Currently the Rapids sit at 32 points with 8 games to play.  They are on pace for 42 points.  The average number of points for the 7th placed team in a 34 game season is 44 points (the so-called Bodmer Line).  538's projections has Seattle as the 7th placed team with 45 points.  Since 2018 (not counting the COVID-shortened 2020 season) the 7th placed team has had 48 points.

So we know the Rapids will likely need somewhere between 12 and 18 points in the last 8 games to make the playoffs.  Their remaining schedule is three home games and five road games.  If Colorado wins all 3 of their home games they'll still need 3-9  road points in those 5 games.  Right now, after 12 road games, the Rapids have earned 6 points.  They have trips to two of the top three teams in the league (Philly & Austin), two mid-tier teams in a playoff spot, one of which already beat us at home (Nashville & the Galaxy), and the probable Wooden Spoon winner (DC).  If they pull off the win in DC, no gimme given our road  play, and maybe they get draws in Nashville and Carson, that gets them 5 points.

But that's only part of the battle.  The rest of it is winning those 3 home games.  That's a game against San Jose (currently 1 point ahead of Houston and 5 points behind Colorado, Vancouver (2 points ahead of Colorado, and just beat us somewhat convincingly on Wednesday), and Dallas (10 points ahead of the Rapids and trying to clinch a home playoff game).  Can we really expect a team that couldn't close out Houston to win all 3 of those games?

And one last piece of the puzzle.  The Rapids have this week off, then will go to Philly, Nashville, and DC in a week.  Then they'll have another 7 days off and they'll host SJ, Vancouver, and go to Carson in a week.  6 games in 20 days, 4 on the road.

So IF Colorado can get a draw and a win on the road in 3 days, coming off a probable loss in Philly 4 days earlier, and IF they can win back-to-back home games in 4 days and follow it up with a draw 72 hours later in Carson, then they can host Dallas knowing a win over a team fighting for a top playoff spot would likely put them in the playoffs.  If not, then they can go on the road to one of the top teams in the league on Decision Day and hope Austin has everything wrapped up and nothing to play for.

To me, that's a pretty unrealistic set of circumstances.  For all intents and purposes, our season ended on that Houston goal.  We should play the kids the rest of the way and plan for 2023.

Man of the Match:  Nobody.  In a must win game everyone was so flat its not worth giving the award out.

Must win Game In Commerce City Tomorrow Night

Currently the Rapids sit on 31 points with 4 home and 5 road games remaining.  Realistically we probably need at least 16 points to feel comfortable with our playoff chances.  That means even if we win all our remaining home games we still need 4 points from trips to 1st placed Philly, 8th placed Nashville who beat us at home already, last placed in the league DC, 6th placed Galaxy, and 2nd place Austin.  I highly doubt we get points in Philly or Austin.  So as you can see, dropping any points at home to Houston tomorrow night would be all but fatal for our playoff hopes.  Do you see 6-7 points out of those remaining road games?  I don't.  Kickoff tomorrow is at 7pm, and the Altitude blackout count is at 8.

Injury Report: 

OUT: M Ollie Larraz, M Jack Price, F Yaya Toure

Disciplinary Report:

ONE CAUTION FROM SUSPENSION: D Lalas Abubakar

There's been no official update to the injury report since Wednesday's game, so I have to assume Price is out again for this one.

I think Fraser probably wants to rest Wilson for this one, but the disaster on Wednesday with Vallecilla doesn't leave us many options other than Wilson and Abubakar.  While Danny didn't play well, he was the better of the two starting CBs.  If Priso doesn't start after what he brought to the play on Wednesday I don't know when he will (unless Price is back and starting).  Everyone else needs to get through one more game before getting some rest.

Prediction: 2-1 win, goals by Rubio and Barrios.  By any measure Houston is a worse team than us, and we're at home.  The one thing against us is that Houston didn't play midweek and we did.  Despite that I think Colorado bounces back from Wednesday and picks up the vital 3 points, just to keep us hanging on this season a little while longer.

Rapids Throw Away Chance To Move Into Playoff Position

There was a chance for Colorado to jump to 6th and solidly in a playoff spot with a win last night.  Instead they showed up flat with a questionable lineup and instead their opponents, the Whitecaps, are now in a playoff spot after a 2-1 win.  The loss turns this Saturday's game against Houston into a huge must win for the home side and even at that point they're going to need to pick up some surprise results on the ensuing East Coast road trip.  This was a significant setback for a team that seemed to be heading the right way over the last few matches.

Random Musings:

• I raised my eyebrows when I saw both Max and Vallecilla in the lineup when Abubakar and Priso were available.  Its possible that Fraser was concerned about Abubakar being one yellow from suspension with the big match this weekend, but Max was a very questionable start, as we'll see.
• I was happy we got through the first 10 minutes without giving up a goal finally, only to give one up 3 minutes later.  The sequence started with Vallecilla making a poor choice to play the ball back to Yarbrough when he had no outlets.  Instead of launching a long ball Will had Wilson come closer and played him the ball.  Danny, with his back to the field and a Whitecap on him tried to get the ball out side to the only option he could see, Beitashour on the touch line.  Unfortunately he didn't get enough on it and Beita made no effort to come to the ball.  That made an easy interception and immediate goal opportunity for Vancouver and we were down 1-0.  Playing it out of the back is fine, but somebody on the defense needs to recognize when there's no play and just boot it long to remove danger.  Nobody did on this one.
• The rest of the half was pretty ugly for Colorado.  They only managed one shot on target in the half, and spent most of the time just trying to move the ball up the field as they had no ability to break through the home side's press.
• Once again we gave up a goal in the last 5 minutes before half.  This time Max played a lazy ball back in the general area of our central defenders, but not to either one of them.  Had Wilson read the ball as soon as it left Max's foot he probably would have gotten to it, but it took him a second to realize that while it wasn't going to him, it also wasn't going to Vallecilla.  At that point it was 50/50 at best if he would beat Gauld to the ball and he made the right choice in staying back rather than trying and failing to get to the ball first, which would have led to a 1 on 1 with Yarbrough.  Sadly though, Gauld had a head of steam, and lets be honest Wilson isn't fast, so even staying back he was unable to stop Gauld's run and goal.  Really though, he takes very little fault for the goal, the mistake was Max's.
• The second half was more of the same, until the last 15 minutes.  Suddenly the Rapids that we needed to see from the start of the game showed up.  They were aggressive, they attacked Vancouver's goal, and Zardes got a goal and hit the post on a second opportunity.  It shouldn't take going down and hitting crunch time before we start playing though.
• A lot of the positive play we saw in that last 15 minutes was due to the introduction of Priso.  Compared to the non-entity Max was Priso clearly needs to be getting all of the minutes when Price and Acosta aren't available.  He had a good argument for man of the match despite only playing 10 minutes.
• With this draw the Bodmer Line is back up to 1.44 points per game.  Realistically though we need to get to 47-48 points, so we're looking at more like 1.8 pts/game to have a good playoff chance.  Last year we played at 1.79 pts/game.
• That means we probably need at least 6 points from Saturday's home game against Houston (12th place) and our 3 game road trip through Philly (1st place), Nashville (8th place) and DC (12th place and last overall in the league).  Given that we have 1 road win this season, its hard to expect any on that road swing, even against DC, which means 3 points this weekend is an absolute must.

Man of the Match: Jonathan Lewis.  Any dangerous chances we had before Priso entered the match came through Lewis, and while he struggled on his crosses through most of the game he kept Vancouver on their toes and mad them work to keep him from causing those dangerous chances.  In the last 15-20 minutes he was finally finding those crosses and probably should have had an assist or two if we could have finished.

Water Faces Water North Of The Border

Fraser River entering the Salish Sea at Vancouver

Rapids and Whitecaps, two forms of disturbed water.  Tomorrow night we'll see which can dry up the other as two teams fighting for their playoff hopes face off in British Columbia.  The Rapids go north in a weakened state, missing multiple players and their equipment manager after a late red card on Saturday night.  Kickoff is at 8pm tomorrow, and we're down to single-digit games left on the Altitude blackout with only 9 to go.

Injury Report: 

OUT: M Ollie Larraz, M Jack Price, F Yaya Toure

Disciplinary Report:

SUSPENDED: D Lucas Esteves, M Bryan Acosta

ONE CAUTION FROM SUSPENSION: D Lalas Abubakar

There's an unconfirmed report that it was the worst case for Toure after his knee buckled on Saturday night, his ACL.  We'll see if its confirmed but if so, that would obviously end his season.  Jack Price was downgraded from Questionable to Out, so that's not great to see.

Its always tough to predict the lineup of the second game in a three game week, especially when its on the road.  Given the importance of this one though I think Fraser will worry less about rest than he may have earlier in the season. I can't see the backline being much different than last week other than the necessary Beitashour/Esteves swap, and Zardes is almost certain to start up top.  Its really the midfield that could go any number of ways.  This assumes that Fraser doesn't try to reintroduce the 5-man back line of course.

Prediction: 1-1 draw goal by Rubio.  Essentially I have to choose Rubio as a goal-scorer at this point.  Barring injury or a real cold streak he's almost certainly going to put up the best offensive season in team history.  As far as the overall game, Colorado is a better team than Vancouver.  But we're missing some critical pieces and we're on the road.  Plus we haven't shown a real ability to stay focused defensively for 90 minutes.  Given all that the best I can see us doing is a draw.  A loss would put any playoff hopes on life support.

Colorado Gets A Point From An Ugly Match

While the weather was better on Saturday night than during the Minnesota game the prior week, the soccer was worse.  Lots of play in the middle third with very little happening at either end.  The teams did have 8 shots on target but very few of them were at all dangerous and both teams seemed to just be going through the motions.  That's not good enough for a Rapids team in a playoff dogfight.  A point really puts the burgundy boys into some required results in this 3-game week.

Random Musings:

• Another game, another early goal.  At some point either Joseph Samelson or I are going to go through and count the number of goals given up in the first and last 5-10 minutes of the first half this year and the number won't be pretty.  Its a sign of a lack of concentration.
• This goal is a really bad look for the Rapids, no way to sugar-coat it.  The sequence starts with the Crew making a stab into the box that Lalas and Wilson successfully defend and Columbus cycles the ball back out to the Rapids right side.  Out there are two Crew players with only Diego Rubio to pressure them.  Abubakar is manned up on a Crew attacker in the box, Acosta is on Zelaravan, and Esteves is keeping an eye on Cucho.  Meanwhile there are another four Rapids, plus Yarbrough, just hanging out in the box, with Zardes just outside of it.  For some reason Rosenberry is over on the left near Esteves.  Diaz releases the ball to Santos, and Santos goes right past Rubio who seems to think he has support behind him.  Lalas's man tried to pull him out of position but he doesn't bite, so Santos whips in a cross.  At this moment there are 9(!!!) Rapids physically in the box, including Will, against 2 Crew attackers.  Despite that the cross gets through the box clean, and Esteves loses Cucho who puts away the tap-in.
• Cucho is a great player, and the Crew got a little lucky in that his awkward touch actually directed the ball down into the turf and then up into the goal, where an "expected" shot directly into the goal might have been saved by Yarbrough, but there's no excuse for 9 players to allow an open shot from one of two attackers.  Bad by Esteves to lose Cucho, but overall bad team play to  leave your striker as the only player available to pressure 2 attackers while 5-6 guys defend space.
• Moving on to the waved-off goal, it was the right call.  The replay in stadium focused on the shot Zardes scored, but the offside was on the entry ball.  Zardes was just offside when that ball was played to him.
• The PK was an easy call for the ref.  And great job by Rubio putting it away even as the Crew keeper guessed correctly.
• After that the game really got stuck in the mud.  It took almost 30 minutes of the second half for either team to get a shot on goal, and both teams looked gassed at that point.
• Fraser played it safe, making like for like subs primarily and not really pushing for the win, which was disappointing to see.
• You never want to see a player go down, but it hurts more when its a young kid who's just getting his feet under him.  No work yet on Yaya Toure's injury, but it didn't look good.  We're all hoping its not as serious as feared.
• Rapids defended a man down after that due to being out of subs, but the Crew never threatened and seemed to be satisfied with the draw, oddly.
• The teams ended up tied on xG at 1.4.  But 0.8 of the Rapids xG came off the PK.  Outside of that the Crew had double the Rapids xG.
• Colorado will be without Acosta and Esteves in Vancouver on Wednesday due to yellow card accumulation, presumably Toure due to his injury, and their equipment manager who got sent off late.
• The Rapids will need a result north of the border too.  Given the upcoming schedule after this week its hard to see how we could make a real playoff push without getting at least 4 points from Vancouver on Wednesday and Houston on Saturday.

Man of the Match: Lalas Abubakar.  Broke up a lot of attacks and didn't give the ball away.  He also avoided the yellow card that would have suspended him alongside Acosta and Esteves on Wednesday.

COL VS. COL

The former and once again Crew are in town tomorrow night after the All-Star break.  The Rapids, not having any All-Stars, are coming off a week of rest while Darlington Nagbe represented the Crew in the game (and took a hard knock).  Columbus  is on a hot streak, with only one loss  in their last eleven games (five wins and 5 draws).  Kickoff tomorrow is at the normal 7pm time, and we're into the final 10 games of the Altitude blackout.

Injury Report: 

OUT: M Ollie Larraz

QUESTIONABLE: M Jack Price

Disciplinary Report:

ONE CAUTION FROM SUSPENSION: D Lalas Abubakar, D Lucas Esteves, M Bryan Acosta

Yes, Jack Price started last week and yes, he's still on the injury list.  This time though its an upper body injury instead of the leg injury he was recovering from.

Hard to tell exactly how the midfield is going to lay out.  Price starts if he can, but I'm assuming he won't be able to.  You could see a more attacking midfield with Gutierrez instead of Priso, or possibly in place of Acosta if they want to keep the more defensive midfielder in.  Columbus is weak on the flanks so I expect Esteves, Lewis, and Barrios to start over the more defensive options there.

Prediction: 2-2 draw, goals by Zardes and Rubio.  Zardes had a less than pleasant separation from the Crew when he was traded and I think he's going to want to show them what they're missing.  That and the weakness on the flanks should be enough to keep us in the game, but I'm not sure we get over the hump for 3 points.

Cole Bassett To Fortuna Sittard

Cole Bassett is currently, well as of earlier this week, on an 18-month loan to Feyenoord in the Netherlands.  Despite a strong pre-season where he started a number of the final games and scored twice, the talk coming out of Rotterdam is that Feyenoord isn't planning to play him much this season  Recently there's been a lot of scuttlebutt about him being loaned out to Fortuna Sittard, also of the Eredivise.  They barely avoid relegation last year, so they're om the other end of the table.

Well today it looks like that talk has become all but official, as numerous social media accounts reporting on Fortuna Sittard have reported the deal as done, and Sittard's own Twitter account teased an announcement with a blurred picture that does seem to be Cole.

The interesting thing here is that Feyenoord is not allowed to loan a player on loan.  So one of two things happened.  Either Feyenoord triggered the purchase option in Bassett's loan deal, and then loaned him to Fortuna, or the Rapids and Feyenoord cancelled the loan for Basset and Fortuna Sittard and Colorado created a new loan deal.  Early reports were all sides were working towards the latter option, but that the new loan would include Feyenoord having the right of first refusal on buying Cole before Fortuna Sittard could.

Regardless of how its being done, it appears that Bassett will be playing for Fortuna Sittard this season.  Hopefully he'll get more playing time than it appeared he would be getting at Feyenoord.  Otherwise there's a team in Colorado that could use his help.

Rapids Win Sloppy Delayed Match

Last week the Rapids shipped 7 goals, but the good news is that they scored 9.  For the first time in their history they put up back-to-back 4+ goals games to pick up 6 points.  A 4-3 match isn't ideal, but as long as you score more than the other team you take the 3 points.  Now the team gets a week off at home since none of them were selected for the All-Star Game on Wednesday before facing Columbus next Saturday.

Random Musings:

• In the last 13 minutes (plus stoppage) on Tuesday and the first 15 minutes on Saturday the Rapids scored goals.  As best I can tell, 28 minutes is the fastest Colorado has ever scored 6 goals in.
• Game didn't start on a good note with the defense giving up a goal inside 5 minutes.  Vallecilla played a ball he could have easily cleared out for an unnecessary corner, then lost his man on the ensuing dead-ball.  Otherwise the defense was pretty tight on the free kick but it only takes one mistake.
• Notably Vallecilla was starting in Abubakar's place.  It certainly appears that Lalas was benched after his atrocious play on Tuesday.  Its good to show the team that poor play has consequences, but long-term Abubakar and Wilson have to be the starters.  Vallecilla just isn't ready yet.
• Colorado bounced right back with three quick goals.  Two of them were set up by throwi-ins by Rosenberry.  Dropping a ball right into the middle of the box for an unmarked Rubio, and creating a fast break from midfield for Barrios.  That's a nice little weapon we haven't seen enough.
• With his 11th goal Rubio is now barely ahead of the pace of Conor Casey's team record 16 goals in 2009.  He's also on pace to shatter the team record of goals + assists, which is 21 held by both John Spencer and Mark Chung.  Rubio is on pace for 25.  That's without two unofficial assists this weekend where his long shots were spilled by the keeper right into the path of Zardes to finish them.
• Colorado let their opposition back into the game right before half, again.  To be fair, this was a nicely taken goal with Esteves being unfortunately nutmegged and then Wilson's man playing a back-heel pass to himself and then taking a sliding shot just over Danny's leg and just past Yarbrough's outstretched hand.  A tip of the cap for a nice play, but Esteves and Wilson could have done a bit better as well.
• Then the lightning hit and we sat around for 90 minutes before the second half kicked off.
• Kudos to the Rapids for continuing to press and getting Zardes' hat-trick.  If it weren't for some big saves from Minnesota's keeper it could have been a couple more.
• They couldn't make it easy though, giving up another goal on a set piece.  Wilson lost his man on the corner, with a bit of nice work from Kallman.  In order to lose Wilson he ran Danny into the scrum in the middle of the box and used it as a pick to get free, and the ball was placed it the right spot for him to finish after that.  Smart play by the attacker, but Wilson needs to not get sucked in like that.
• Yarbrough came up huge after that, blocking a tying goal from a one on one with a kick save.
• Barrios was on fire Saturday night.  When he's on, he's the best winger we have.  But, much like the rest of the team, his biggest negative this year is his inconsistency.
• Jack Price was back, unexpectedly!  It made total sense to pull him after the weather delay, there's no need to risk injury after sitting that long.
• That gave us our first look at Felipe Gutierrez.  He didn't do anything to really stand out, good or bad, but good to see him getting minutes already.
• Zardes, Rubio, and Fraser all made the MLS team of the week this week.
• The Bodmer Line is now at 1.27 pts/game, which is below the season average of 1.29.  Somehow we've climbed back into the race.  We probably needs 1.64 pts/game to feel really confident though.
• One last thing, happy birthday to Rapids legend Marcelo Balboa!

Man of the Match: Gyasi Zardes.  I mean, the league named him the Player of the Week.  He scored a hat-trick.  Its the easiest choice possible.

Duck Hunt

Yeah, I stole that title idea from the Rapids Twitter post.  What can I say, it was good!  Colorado is back home tomorrow night facing the Loons from Minnesota.  United comes into this game very week, with 3 significant players on suspension for yellow cared accumulation and another handful out with injury.  The Rapids are hoping to ride their high off the crazy comeback on Tuesday night.  New signing Felipe Gutierrez will be available for this one, though I don't expect him to start.  kickoff is at the normal 7pm for home games, and we have 11 games left on the Altitude blackout.

Injury Report: 

OUT: M Ollie Larraz

QUESTIONABLE: M Jack Price

Disciplinary Report:

ONE CAUTION FROM SUSPENSION: D Lucas Esteves, M Bryan Acosta

I've seen an unconfirmed report that Price is still a week or two out, so I'm not expecting to see him tomorrow night.  Otherwise everyone is available.

Even though Lalas had a horrible night on Tuesday I expect him to start.  I really, I mean really, hope that Fraser learned his lesson about the 5 man backline and goes back to this 4-1-4-1 formation.  With next week off since nobody made the All-Star roster and back-to-back home games so there's no travel, I don't think Fraser is going to be too worried about rotating the lineup from Tuesday night.

Prediction: 2-1 win, goals by Rubio and Zardes.  Minnesota is weakened and on the road, though more rested than us.  We're coming off a high and I think we ride it to 3 points.  A draw wouldn't shock me though.

Another Transfer Window Ends With A Whimper

The transfer window closed last night.  Its not unusual for the paperwork to get submitted at the last minute and the announcement to come the next day but the move that sources were reporting as "done" yesterday seems to have fallen through late last night based on the latest rumors.  I'll state up front, if the Rapids pull a rabbit out of a hat and announce multiple moves later today I'll admit I was off base with this post and take my lumps.  But with a game on Saturday and a game preview to write tonight it was either now or sometime next week that I can cover this.

That said, let's go back to Padraig Smith's comments about this window a month ago when we traded MAK to Toronto.  At that point we had already brought Sam Nicholson back and we obviously acquired Ralph Priso in the trade with TFC.

This is not the last deal we're going to make in this window. This is the first of what I certainly believe is going to be a very active window for us, and I think really what has to be done is it has to be judged in terms of the total package of what the overall situation looks like, what the roster looks like when we're finished making those moves

Well, we can now judge what the roster looks like now that we're finished. In that active window since the comment we made one move announced yesterday.  We've acquired Chilean midfielder Felipe Gutiérrez on a short-term loan from C.D. Universidad Católica in Chile.  Gutiérrez will turn 32 on the final day of the regular season and prior to his return to Chile was a Designated Player for Sporting KC.  The book on him while in MLS was that he was a highly talented player, but quite injury-prone.  He was with KC for three seasons, but missed all of the COVID-shortened 2020 season due to injury.  In the two prior seasons he made 49 starts, putting up 19 goals and 5 assists.

Its good to bring in somebody who's familiar with the league and has had success, but he is almost 3 years older on the back-side of 30 since he played here.  He's also only on a short-term loan, and nothing has been mentioned about having an option to buy him at the end of the season.  To me, this doesn't feel like a move for the long-term and more to plug the hole in midfield caused by the injuries to Galvan, Larraz, and Price.

I don't think a short-term loan as the only move counts as "very active".  Nobody in their right mind would.  Clearly, once again, what the Rapids FO sells and what they actually deliver, don't add up.  This was a very disheartening window after some success in prior years.

Lets move on to what we were targeting in this window.  Smith said:

I think when I look at the chances we're creating, I still think we can look at our overall attacking area and say, ‘Okay do we need to bring somebody else in that's going to give us another cutting edge in the attacking third?’ That is something that we're looking at,

I think long-term we're certainly going to look to bring in another center back to challenge, and we are also now are looking at bringing in an 8 to reinforce the midfield. So from my perspective, it's really about looking at the overall group and what we've got for this year – but also what we're planning for in next year as well.

So that's 3 positions.  A cutting edge in the attack, a midfielder in an 8 role, and a center back.  And remember, this was stated after we acquired Nicholson and Priso.  So if we consider Gutiérrez the "cutting edge" that means we're still looking for the 8 and CB.  The failure to sign them wasn't because we couldn't afford it, again, according to Smith:

“We can buy players down, we've got a lot of flexibility,” Smith said about their DP situation. “We've built up a war chest over the past little while in terms of GAM as well

So its safe to say this window hasn't lived up to expectation.  The only reason for that is because the Front Office couldn't get whatever deals they had planned over the line.  I'm expecting we will hear in the coming days that they were close on a number of targets and just couldn't get the deal done, but that's a line that has been so oft-repeated that it has reached the status of cliché.  A "perennial playoff team who regularly competes for trophies", as stated in the Rapids Way, can't throw away a transfer window while they're struggling at the bottom of the table.  Not if they want the fanbase to think they really believe they can achieve their stated goals.

This is sadly, the second window in  a row where we haven't done enough.  While we've replaced the number of minutes lost (+/- 5%) from last year to now, we haven't replaced the production.  Player that have been added since the end of 2021 have 3 goals and 5 assists (all Zardes and Acosta).  Players who have left had 19 goals and 16 assists last season.  Even if you add in what Trusty, Shinyashiki, MAK, and Mezquida did in 2022 before leaving (4 goals, 1 assist, from Shinyashiki and MAK) that's only 21% of the goals and 38% of the assists despite being 65% of the way through the season.  If we had a like for like production replacement we'd have 6 more goals and a top-10 offense.  Just under half our games would have had a different outcome if we had scored one more goal.  Turning two losses into a draw and a draw into a win with 3 goals would have us right on the playoff line.

Obviously we couldn't plan for the injury bug we've had this year, especially in midfield with Galvan, Larraz, and Price missing significant number of games (or all of them).  But our failure to replace our depth over the last two windows is why we're struggling to deal with those injuries and why we're looking up at most of the league.  Coming up empty this window not only likely dooms this season, but it leaves fans questioning if we can be ready for 2023.

What Was That?

I don't know how you explain that game last night.  No team up 2 goals in the first 10 minutes and up 2 goals with 20 minutes to play should come close to losing the game, much less need a PK in stoppage time and barely miss a tying goal due to offside.  Consider that the Rapids hadn't won on the road this season, and they had only scored 3 goals once, in the regular season home opener.  The last time they scored 3 on the road was in Minnesota late last season (another miracle comeback).  The last time they scored 5 on the road was the epic 5 goal win in Sandy to come back and win the Rocky Mountain Cup.  I'm not going to even try to analyze the complete game, I don't think anyone can, but there are some highlights I want to discuss.

Random Musings:

• The team deserves a ton of credit for not giving up.  I'll admit that after 10 minutes I had figured this game was over, and even after getting back to 2-1 I didn't have much hope.  What little I did evaporated after we gave up a PK to go back down two.
• Abubakar had about the worst 30 minutes I've ever seen out of a Rapids defender.  He gave away the ball on a bad pass, then deflected the resulting shot leaving Yarbrough stranded for the first NY goal, he lost his mark who scored the second NY goal on a free kick, and he misplayed a simple ball to give NY a break and had to commit a penalty to prevent a 3rd NY goal but the PK was finished anyway.  Just a flaming dumpster fire of an appearance.
• Fraser made the obvious move at halftime to pull Lalas and move from 5 in the back to 4.  The Rapids have been playing better with 4 for the last few games, so the decision to go with 5 and then put Warner in front of them was a strange choice by the gaffer, and it backfired.  Hopefully Fraser learns the lesson and sticks with 4 in the back now.
• The referee had a busy night on this one, with two PKs, two goals pulled out of the net due to offside and rescinding a red card through VAR.  In all the cases the final call appeared to be the right one.  While Abubakar's holding started outside the box the action appeared to continue into the box which is a penalty, but Danny Wilson was close enough to cover so DOGSO didn't apply.  Both offsides were accurate, but close.
• This is now the third time this season the Rapids have had a goal disallowed due to an offside player screening the keeper.  All the calls were correct but its odd to see three so close together.  I think its just coincidence but the coaching staff might want to consider if their tactics are leaving us open to this call.
• Seeing 5 goals from 5 different goal-scorers is pretty unusual for this team.  Getting two from defensive players (Rosenberry and Warner) is a huge surprise.  Shots like that is why I don't have a problem with Rosenberry pulling the trigger when he feels it.  I don't want any other defenders doing it, but Keegan has scored enough of those that he should take the shot when he's got it.
• Max had his best game as a Rapids, though admittedly that wasn't a high bar to clear.  He probably should have had Warner's goal but good positioning from the RNBY keeper denied him.
• Barrios changed the game when he came in for an ineffectual Lewis, unlike some of his more recent appearances.  If we could only get some consistency out of our wingers we might have a chance.
• Shout out to Yaya Toure for his first goal!
• In the end, the Rapids got very lucky in this game.  Despite a horrendous defensive performance the Red Bulls only put two shots on target (not counting the PKs) after their 2 goals in the first 10 minutes.  But even at the very end when all we needed was to clear the zone to win the game Vallecilla was ball-watching/marking space instead of his man, and Esteves wasn't much better.  Luckily their aimless defending pulled them upfield enough for the NY attacker to be just barely offside.  That could have easily been 2 points wasted.
• Interesting note about all of the Rapids goals.  Three of them too a deflection on the way in and the other two were deflected by RBNY to the goal-scorer.  Sometimes its better to be lucky than good.
• The official Bodmer Line now stands at 1.42 pts/game, but I don't think that gets it done this year.  More likely we need to be at 1.75 pts/game to make the playoffs.  A tough hill to climb but this win might be the kickstart we need to get there.  We've been at 1.6 over our last 5 games, just 1 point off that pace, so we're close.
• Next up is a weakened Minnesota United side at home.  They are down three important players to yellow card suspensions.  3 points this weekend will be critical.

Man Of The Match: Diego Rubio.  Easy pick.  He had a goal, two assists, and the shot that rebounded from the Red Bull keeper to Toure for the winning goal.  The Warner goal was the only one he didn't have a direct impact on.  We clearly don't win this game without him.  

Live From New Jersey Its Tuesday Night Football!

 

After a three day delay so the Red Bulls could host a friendly with Barcelona the Rapids are back in action in New Jersey tomorrow night.  After the failure in Seattle, and a lack of reinforcements in the rapidly closing window, its hard to see this season turning around at this point, but if its going to it needs to start with 3 points on the East Coast.  The last time we were here, 3 years ago, it was Fraser's first game in charge and he brought home a win, hopefully history repeats itself.  Kickoff tomorrow is at 5:30,, there are 12 games left in the Altitude blackout.

Injury Report: 

OUT: M Ollie Larraz

QUESTIONABLE: M Jack Price

Disciplinary Report:

ONE CAUTION FROM SUSPENSION: D Lucas Esteves, M Bryan Acosta

I was really hoping to have Captain Jack back for this one, but if he's only questionable my guess is that they don't even have him travel and try to get him ready for Minnesota at home this weekend.

It seems pretty straight forward with the rest we've had.  The only real question is who plays right mid.  Could be Barrios instead of Nicholson.

Prediction: 1-1 draw, goal by Rubio.  RBNY will have played 3 games (Austin last Sunday, Orlando in the USOC on Wednesday, and Barca in that friendly on Saturday) since Colorado played Seattle last weekend.  That's the only reason I'm willing to predict a point on the road right now.  I certainly can't see us getting the 3 points we need, sadly.