Pre-Holiday News Dump

I take a day off and in the 48 hours since I last posted the Rapids sign 3 players, draft 6 others, drop the 2024 schedule, and Burgundy Wave announces info about Armas' contract.  Oh, and the USSF says no to MLS's idea to skip the Open Cup.  So buckle in, this is going to be a large post going over all of it that will likely wrap up 2023 for Rapids news (I hope!).

Lets start with the singings.  First Colorado re-signed homegrown players Seb Anderson and Oli Larraz to one year deals with team options for a second season.  Anderson's deal also has a team option for a third season.  Pretty clear that this is a make it or break it season for both of them, I'm really hoping to see Larraz get some time with the first team after a strong season in MLS Next Pro in 2023.

Then last night the Rapids signed free agent winger Omir Fernandez,  He came up through the RBNY Academy and has made over 110 appearances for the Red Bulls in the last 5 seasons.  Fernandez is 24, making him one of the youngest free agents in MLS history.  He is likely to become the starter ont he right wing but he can also play more centrally or up top.

Yesterday Colorado drafted 5 players and traded for a 6th draftee.  They started the day with the #2 and #4 picks which the club used to select sophomore midfielder Wayne Fredrick out of Duke and Generation Adidas forward freshman Kimani Stewart-Baynes out of Maryland.  Fredrick has the option to return to school while the Rapids keep his rights while Stewart-Baynes, as a GA player, has already signed a contract with the league and will be turning pro.  Both of these picks are long-term picks, though you would hope that Stewart-Baynes could contribute a little in 2024.

Then the wheeling and dealing started.  By the end of the first round the Rapids had acquired $300K in GAM, an additional second round pick and the rights to the #5 pick in exchange for their other two first round picks and moving down in the second round.  The #5 pick was defender Nate Jones out of my alma mater, the University of Washington.  Jones is a junior and is the most likely of our six picks to get notable playing time in 2024.

With their two second round picks and their third round pick we selected sophomore forward Palmer Ault out of Butler, senior defender Anderson Ross out of Central Florida. and junior forward Gunnar Studenhofft out of Manhattan College.  Studenhofft has also debuted for the Cayman Islands National Team, playing in a World Cup qualifier already.

Since none of these players are seniors they can all return to school if they want, other than Stewart-Baynes.  I expect Jones at least to come out of school and the others may depend on what kind of feedback they get from the Rapids on their chances of making the team vs. making Rapids 2.  I assume there's already a plan of what they want to do with Fredrick as you wouldn't use the #2 pick on him otherwise.

If you combine the trades last season with the trades made yesterday, the Rapids traded Michael Barrios, Anthony Markanich, a first round pick in last year's draft, and the #31 pick this year.  In exchange they got the #4 pick, the rights to the #5 pick, the #34 pick, the #42 pick, and $300K in GAM.  No matter how you look at it, that's good business.

Today started with the U.S. Soccer Federation telling MLS that their plans to play MLS Next Pro teams in the Open Cup instead of the first teams was not allowed.  MLS responded that they could continue to work with the USSF on their Open Cup plans.  In the end what will likely happen is that teams will play in the Open Cup but they'll be given more liberal rules for calling up '2' players for those games.  Still its a positive step by the USSF to protect the Open Cup.

Then this year's schedule dropped.  For the first time the Rapids will face Inter Miami, but in Miami.  Messi is not coming to Commerce City.  That will be April 6th in Florida.  Colorado will start the season on February 24th in Portland and then have their home opener a week later on March 2nd against Gary Smith's Nashville side.  They then jump across the Divide for the first of three Rocky Mountain Cup matches the next week.  The second RMC match is in Sandy on May 18th, and the competition will finish on July 20th in Commerce City.

That's also the last match before the Leagues Cup break, and Colorado won't have another league home match for almost two months, when Portland comes to town on September 14th.  We have our home finale on October 5th against Seattle before finishing the regular season the next week in Austin.

Along with Miami we travel to NYCFC and Cincinnati, while welcoming Nashville, Montreal, RBY, and Toronto at the Dick, along with home and aways against all the Western opponents, plus the extra 3rd match with FSL.    We never have more than two road matches in a row, but 3 of our first 4 are on the road.  We have one run of three home games in early July, starting with the 4th of July home match against SKC and then St. Luis and RBNY over a total of 9 days.  We do have multiple 3-game weeks, but only one of them involves two road matches.  Memorial Day week we play at home on Memorial Day Saturday and then go to Houston midweek and Vancouver the following weekend.

Last, but not least, tonight Burgundy Wave is reporting that Chris Armas' contract is a two year deal.  Unless we have an Anthony Hudson situation I expect him to essentially see out that deal even if we don't see great improvement in 2024.  Coincidentally, or not, Robin Fraser's contract was also through the end of the 2025 season so one way or the other by 2026 there will be no legacy contracts on the books.

And with that, I'm calling a wrap on this post and hopefully 2023.  If anything happens over the holidays, unlikely as that is, I'll be back but I'm expecting everything to be pretty quiet for the next week and a half.  Happy holidays to all of my readers and I'll be back after New Years with hopefully enough time to do a piece on Soccernomics and the Rapids I've been hoping to do before the start of camp.

SuperDraft Tomorrow!

Before we get to tomorrow's SuperDraft a word on MLS's decision to pull the first teams out of the Open Cup and play only MLS Next Pro rosters.

Disappointing

I understand the realities of the schedule and the fact that its a financial loser, especially compared to the Leagues Cup, but the USOC is the one competition all American teams play in and MLS bailing on it is short-sighted.  If I weren't already not renewing my season tickets this decision would push me towards not doing it.

Now, on to tomorrow's SuperDraft which may be more significant than most for the Rapids.  As of tonight the Rapids hold 5 picks in the 3 rounds:

2nd Pick in the 1st Round - Natural pick

4th Pick in the 1st Round - Barrios trade with Galaxy

12th Pick in the 1st Round - GAM/pick trade with Charlotte

21st Pick in the 1st Round - Markanich trade with St. Louis

2nd Pick in the 2nd Round (31st overall) - Natural pick

2nd Pick in the 3rd Round (60th overall) - Natural pick

Three picks in the top 12, 4 in the top 21.  Even in a SuperDraft that's lost a lot in recent years, that's significant.  And the league made a change to the draft rules this year, for the first time sophomores and juniors are eligible to be drafted.  Those players can choose to return to school rather than enter the league but they can't re-enter the draft until their rights expire (after two seasons).  So there are approximately 400 players eligible for selection tomorrow.

Recent history has shown Padraig Smith targeting one player in the draft, making moves to get him, and then really letting the rest of the draft go.  This year, with so many high picks and the added depth in the draft, I'm expecting to get at least two solid players, either two draftees or a draftee and trading a combination of picks and xAM for an already established player.

Normally I'd try to update here in real-time on draft day and a recap tomorrow night, but my work schedule and the fact that I have tickets to Godzilla Minus One means I might not get it all written up until Wednesday.

Football In Paris, And A Rapids Move

Things have been quiet here largely due to the fact that I've been on vacation.  Part of that vacation included a chance to catch a match but before we get to that we do have one piece of Rapids news, namely a trade.

Colorado sent Andrew Gutman to Chicago in exchange for $450K in GAM and left-back Miguel Navarro.

From a bottom line that's a decent move.  We traded $400K of GAM plus an international spot for the rest of last season to Atlanta to get Gutman in July.  So essentially we broke even on GAM, got 1000 minutes out of him, and got Navarro for free.

Overall though, moving one of the few pieces that looked like a MLS starter is not the way I wanted to see the offseason moves start.  Our track record for using GAM recently isn't great, and Navarro seems like a bit of a loose cannon in defending so I don't see how this made us better.

Now on to a more interesting discussion.  I spent last week on vacation in Paris, and on Tuesday night I made time to go see Paris FC play Rodez.  Paris FC is currently the second most successful club in Paris metro, behind the powerhouse of Paris Saint-Germain (and the only other professional team other than PSG to be playing inside Paris' city limits).  Interestingly the original Paris FC merged with Stade Saint-Germain in 1970 to form  PSG.  Two years later Paris FC split off from PSG after the latter was not getting support from the city of Paris due to being based outside the city limits in  Saint-Germain-en-Laye.  Paris FC originally kept the first division status and the professional players, but in the 50 years since PSG has gone on to become a top 10-15 team in the world while Paris FC has struggled in the lower divisions.  Paris FC first started playing at Parc des Princes but surrendered that ground to PSG when they were relegated (at the same time PSG was promoted to Ligue 1).  Paris FC would get back to Ligue 1 for one season in the late 70's but has not seen the top-flight since then while PSG has never been relegated since they made it to the top tier.

Paris FC has been as low as the 5th division but has been in Ligue 2 for the last seven seasons.  This year they're sitting in 10th, 5 points from a playoff spot.  Their opponents last week were Rodez who sit right above them in 9th.  PFC play at Stade Charléty in the 13th arrondissement of Paris, a 20K seat venue that's best known for hosting multiple Rugby World Cup games.  There's also a venue below the stadium where Paris' top pro volleyball teams plays.

For this season Paris FC is the first European team to give away essentially all of its tickets.  In order to increase support everything but the VIP level tickets are free for all league matches.  About a week before the game I just went on the website and picked my seat and paid absolutely nothing.  It also worked out that where we were staying in Paris was around the corner from a bus route that terminated at the stadium so all I had to do was take a 12 minute bus ride to get to the game.  Here's the view walking up to Stade Charléty:

Once I got in the gates I found a nice stadium that had been recently renovated, but it was clearly a municipal stadium that PFC uses, not a PFC stadium.  Everything Paris FC related was in the form of things that could easily be put up and taken down as the stadium is used for other events.  There was no club shop, just a club van that sold kits, jackets, and scarves (I bought a kit and a scarf for my collections).  The pregame fan zone was all portable things that could easily be set up and taken down, and the banners and logos in the main arena weren't permanently attached.  That said it was a good family friendly environment and everyone was having a good time.  Plus I found somebody that clearly shares an ancestor with Rapidman:

Once I got to my seat I found that it had a similar feel to a midweek Open Cup game at the Dick.  A small but loyal fanbase in a much larger stadium.  With the exception of the travelling Rodez supporters all the fans were on one sideline (looking at the highlights later I realize we were all facing the camera used for the streaming coverage).  There's also a track around the field so fans are a bit of a distance from the field.  Here's the view from my 4th row seat:

There was a vocal supporters group in the second deck, as well as a decent travelling contingent from Rodez:

The game itself was enjoyable to watch, with the home side scoring in the first minute, then following up with one of the great goals I've seen live.  Pierre-Yves Hamel scored the first goal and in the 23rd minute he dispossessed Rodez at midfield, looked up and saw the keeper off his line, and took a shop from the midfield stripe.  He managed to place the ball just under the bar to give the Parisians a two goal lead, which they would hang on to through the end of the match.

This makes the third European country that I've seen a lower-league game in (Spain, Tenerife vs. Malaga; England, Blackburn twice and Wealdstone vs. Dulwich Hamlet) and I've enjoyed everyone.  Obviously the big spectacle is a PSG game (they didn't play at home while I was in PAris) but I prefer seeing the smaller teams.  Plus its cheaper!

Here's the highlights from the game.  If you pause it at 9 seconds that group of white seats on the right, 3rd row, I'm the one on the aisle.

Colorado Finally Announces Roster Decisions

Friday was the deadline to pick up player options for 2024 and the Rapids made their announcements today:

Options exercised: Andrew Gutman, Calvin Harris, Ralph Priso

Options declined: Sebastian Anderson, Steven Beitashour, Oliver Larraz, Jack Price, Abraham Rodriguez, Gustavo Vallecilla, William Yarbrough

Out of contract and leaving the team: Luis Diaz, Diego Rubio

Loan ending: Danny Leyva

Option triggered earlier this season: Danny Wilson

Currently signed for 2024:

Lalas Abubakar, Max Alves, Cole Bassett, Moïse Bombito, Kévin Cabral, Daniel Chacón, Michael Edwards, Braian Galván, Alex Gersbach, Andrew Gutman, Calvin Harris, Marko Ilić, Aboubacar Keita, Jonathan Lewis, Andreas Maxsø, Rafael Navarro, Sam Nicholson, Ralph Priso, Connor Ronan, Keegan Rosenberry, Sidnei Tavares, Jackson Travis, Danny Wilson, Darren Yapi 

The Rapids are negotiating to bring back Seb Anderson, Olli Larraz, and William Yarbrough on new (presumably cheaper) contracts.  Beitashour, Price, Rodriguez, and Vallecilla will not return.

A couple of notes.  Danny Wilson's contract had a clause that automatically triggered when certain metrics were achieved, which he met earlier this year.  Hat-tip to Matt Pollard at Burgundy Wave and Brendan Ploen with the Denver Post for finding that out.  The team has an option on him for 2025 that sounds like doesn't automatically trigger.

Max is still listed on the roster for 2024.  My assumption is that there are legal reasons that his contract can't be terminated for cause yet, my guess is that they can't do it until the legal process plays out in Brazil.  They could buyout his contract but each team only gets one buyout without taking a salary cap hit and they would still have to pay him if they bought him out, while terminating him for cause means the league isn't on the hook.  Unless he gets an absolutely clean pass from Brazilian authorities he'll never play here again and I'd be surprised if the contract is still in effect by the time the season starts.

There were really no surprises with the decisions today.  Gutman was an obvious pickup and while Harris wasn't particularly notable last year he's young and cheap so bringing him back makes sense.  Priso is really the only player I wouldn't have brought back, I'm not sure he adds anything but being a warm body at this point.

As far as who we let go, we knew Rubio and Price were leaving, and just yesterday news came out that Diaz was looking at European options.  We also knew about Leyva already.  

Vallecilla goes down as, so far, the worst trade Smith has ever made and potentially a top 3 worst trade in team history.  $800K of GAM and reportedly paying of his remaining transfer fee for 568 minutes of play.  We did get $185K of that GAM back by loaning him to Columbus this season, but even with that you're looking at a guy who made 12 appearances and had 2 red cards (in fact, he has a foul-to-card ratio of under 4 to 1 in his 49 MLS appearances).  Just a debacle of a knee-jerk move when Keita went down injured last season.

Beitashour is likely to retire and Abe Rodriguez seems to have been passed by Adam Beaudry for the "keeper fo the future" role so no surpises or real loss in letting them go.  Hopefully AbeRod can find a starting job either in MLS or the USL Championship.  Brining Seb Anderson and Olli Larraz back makes complete sense, especially the latter.  I hope they get that done.  I'm a little surprised that they're talking to Yarbrough, I don't know that paying him what he's worth makes sense as a backup, but we'll see.

Not counting Max there are only 23 signed players, and that includes Chacon who's out on loan in Costa Rica and Tavares and Navarro who are only here on loan through midseason.  So its really 20 players who are available to Armas for the whole 2024 season, and that assumes guys Lewis isn't traded.  There's a lot of holes to fill.

Rapids Make Armas Signing Official

The Rapids made it official this morning, announcing Chris Armas as the 10th permanent head coach in team history.  A full press conference will be held in almost two weeks, on November 30th.  We've covered my opinion of the hire last night so I won't get into that but there are a couple of more details that came out today that I want to mention.

First the timing of all this is odd.  Announcing the biggest hire a team will make on a Friday, and one going into the very busy Thanksgiving week, is a good way to see the announcement lost in the typical weekend and holiday chaos.  That leads me to believe that either they weren't originally planning to announce the hire today and last night's leak forced their hand or they knew the reaction to this hire would be extremely negative and they want it to get lost in the holiday.  Or they just have a very strange media strategy.  None of those options fill me with a lot of confidence.

Secondly Burgundy Wave is reporting that it wasn't a final 4 but a final 5, but Wilshere still wasn't one of those 5.  I'm curious who the 5th name is but it sounds like it doesn't matter as BW is also saying that coming out of the final round interviews Armas was the top choice.  This isn't a case where they had one or multiple other candidates turn them down and they settled on Armas.  It's mind-boggling to me that somebody with Armas' track record could be the front-runner for a team in such desperate need of taking a public positive step.  Instead they stepped on a rake, again.

Maybe in the end Armas will prove us all wrong.  I truly hope he does.  But there is nothing in his history or in the recent actions of the Front Office and KSE that makes it seem like 2024 will be anything but a completely lost season.

On a semi-related note Jeremiah Oshan tweeted from Sounders practice today that Danny Leyva was there and training with the team.  If you remember we loaned him in from Seattle this season with no purchase option.  It always looked like he'd go back to the Sounders but this seems to make that official.  Based on his play here its no loss to Colorado, he wasn't very good.  Sounders fans have a much higher opinion of him though.  Note that because of the roster freeze he can't play for the Sounders in the postseason, but it makes sense that he continues to train with them now that the Rapids season is over.

Rapids Doom Themselves, Hire Chris Armas

Well, we should have seen this coming.  The Rapids Front Office, led (presumably) by President Padraig Smith and Sporting Director Fran Taylor* have hired Chris Armas as the 10th permanent head coach in team history, according to reports tonight from The Athletic, Denver Post, and Burgundy Wave (among others).  

* When you click on Taylor's bio from the staff page of the website (which lists him as Sporting Director) the bio page lists him as Assistant GM still.  Presumably the web team haven't gotten around to updating his bio after his recent promotion...seven months ago

The universal and immediate condemnation of this move from MLS fans across the league, seen in the last hour on Twitter/X, on the Athletic story reporting the news, and on BigSoccer should tell you what kind of hire this is.  The Rapids have been immediately written in ink at the bottom of the standings for 2024, as nobody believes Armas is capable at coaching at this level.  A recap of his head coaching career in MLS:

2018: Named head coach of RBNY in July 8th for the departing Jesse Marsch, he kept a Shield-leading team on top of the table in the second half of the season.  Beat the Crew 3-1 in the conference semis, but a tactical change in the first leg of the conference finals cost them a 3-0 loss and an eventual 3-1 series elimination

2019: Took RBNY to a 14-14-6 (W/L/T) season, 6th in the East and 12th overall (coming off a Shield winning season).  Lost to Philly 4-3 in the first round of the playoffs.  Lost to New England in their first USOC game.

2020: Took RBNY to a 9-9-5 record in the COVID-impacted season.  Went 1-2-0 in the MLs Is Back Tournament.  Finished 6th in the East again and 13th overall.  Was eliminated 3-2 in the first round of the playoffs by Columbus

EDIT: Arms was actually fired in September of 2020, going 3-3-2 in the 8 games he managed, including 1-2-0 in the MLS Is Back tournament.  He gets no blame for the playoff results.

2021: After being fired by RBNY he was hired by Toronto in the offseason.  Went 1-8-2 before being fired on the 4th of July.  Beat Leon in the CONCACAF Champions League before being eliminated by Cruz Azul.  Coached a total of 15 games.

So here's a guy who has failed at "big" spending clubs like RBNY and Toronto, and has shown a distressing lack of ability to win a knockout game (he won 2 of 6 knockout games/series in his career), something the Rapids already suffer from.  In what world does this look like a resume that will succeed at one of the least supported clubs in MLS?  The only thing he has going for him is that he's likely cheap and desperate.

With this, I'm done.  I'm not renewing my season tickets for the first time since I signed up for them the day Fernando Clavijo stepped down in 2008.15+ seasons and I'm out.  Maybe. maybe, if they have a miracle run of singings this offseason I'll come back but I find that almost impossible.

That's not to say I'll stop following the team.  I'll buy MLS Season Pass and watch them from home, and I'll probably buy a few tickets through C38, but they aren't getting $325 from me up front to watch the disaster the 2024 season is going to be.

Coaching Update and Roster Analysis

Its still all quiet on the Commerce City front when it comes to the coaching hire, and according to Burgundy Wave it may be a while.  Sounds like either their preferred candidate isn't happy with the offer or is trying to stretch the process out while they feel out other opportunities.  Either way its not a ringing endorsement of this organization.  If they don't announce tomorrow (and that sounds unlikely) they won't announce anything for a couple of weeks.  Making a major announcement like this during Thanksgiving week is just asking for it to get lost.  That also means the new coach will have no say on which current players we extend new offers to (those are due by Thanksgiving) or likely which options we pick up (those have to be decided by December 1st).

Burgundy Wave also reported that Jack Wilshere is no longer a candidate for the role and it sounds like he removed himself.  Its unclear if he just decided it wasn't a good match for him, or if he would still be interested but the compensation package wasn't enough to get him to make the move.  BW believes the unnamed 4th candidate is likely Efrain Juarez, to go along with Little, Armas, and Kah.

With the absence of coaching news lets get to my normal year-end roaster analysis.  Normally this is breaking the roster into core pieces, additional players worth keeping, and areas to upgrade.  That's really not the case this year.  This is a bad roster no matter how you look at it.  There's maybe a handful of players I would keep if I were building a MLS team from scratch, otherwise everyone is replaceable. (For this exercise I'm considering Price and Rubio as already gone, given their announcements)

Those players:

Cole Bassett - If this team has any heart, he's the center of it

Moise Bombito - Good young defender

Andrew Gutman - Experienced MLS defender in the prime of his career

Conor Ronan - What offense we have goes through him

Three others that might be worth keeping with a better team and organization around them:

Andres Maxsø - I think he's better than he showed this year, but not sure he's a DP

Keegan Rosenberry - He had some rough games this year, but he was playing with a questionable backline

William Yarbrough - He didn't need to go out like this, though I expect he will

Literally everyone else can go and be replaced by whomever we can find with little loss of quality.  A combination of being too expensive, ,taking an international spot, or just not being good enough means nobody else on the roster has earned their spot.  That might be a bit harsh on a couple of the homegrowns like Rodriguez and Larraz, but with so little playing time in a year where it couldn't hurt to have played them leads me to believe we shouldn't expect much in the near future.

So that's a maybe-MLS quality backline of Rosenberry-Bombito-Maxsø-Gutman, backed up by Yarbrough (or more likely Ilic) and a couple of number 8s in midfield, but nothing else to build from.  The new coach will have a lot of work to do when he gets here in order to make this a team that won't be embarrassed for a second-straight season.

Just for completion's sake, here are my thoughts on the rest of the roster:

Lalas Abubakar - A max salary player that's backup MLS defender quality

Max - We all know the issues there

Seb Anderson - He would have done it by now if he was going to be a MLS player

Steven Beitashour - Almost certainly retiring

Kevin Cabral - The biggest waste of $$$ and an international slot on the roster

Luis Diaz - Who?  $500K player that I barely remember at the end of the season

Michael Edwards - See Seb Anderson

Braian Galvan - Doesn't have the brain to go with his physical talent, too much of a hothead

Alex Gersbach - Thankful that Cabral is here to take the biggest waste of an international spot

Calvin Harris - Bench player that we spent $200K+ to acquire

Marko Ilic - Why pay a transfer fee and use an international slot on a keeper?

Aboubacar Keita - Never healthy

Jonathan Lewis - At some point you have to accept its not going to happen

Danny Leyva - Well, he's better than Priso?

Rafael Navarro - Didn't show anything to be worth a DP slot and a $5 million fee

Sam Nicholson - Love you Sam, but you look like a League One player in a Championship league

Ralph Priso - Simply not MLS quality

Sidnei Tavares - Depth at best, not worth $525K and an international slot

Gustavo Vallecilla - Maybe we'll get lucky and Columbus will keep him

Danny Wilson - His time is up, he just can't keep up at the MLS level anymore

Darren Yapi - He's got one more season to prove he can make an impact, maybe

No Coach Yet? OK, POTY And Prediction Recap

Well, all signs were pointing towards a coach announcement this week, but here we are on Thursday night watching the Kraken beating the Avs (Fear the Deep!) and no announcement yet.  Teams usually don't make announcements like a coaching hire on a Friday, unless they want it to get lost in the weekend so I'm assuming we won't hear anything until next week.  If we don't hear by a week from now eyebrows should be raised.

In the absence of a new coach lets look back at this season, if we must.  Instead of going back and looking at who I gave man of the match to each game I'm going with a gut feel for this one, mainly because there's really only 3 players in the running IMO.  

• William Yarbrough, for being the rock in the back until his injury.
• Conor Ronan, for making what little offense we had go.
• Cole Bassett, for being the Golden Boot and actually speaking some truth and caring about this club.

In the end it was that last piece that made the decision for me.  In a season where it seemed like the team just gave up in multiple games and nobody seemed to care, Bassett did.  You could see it at the final whistle of the season finale.  Losing for a fourth time to FSL, a third time in our house, to end the worst season in club history obviously hurt him.  He stood for a couple of minutes midway between the box and the center circle staring at the ground just trying to come to grips with what happened.  Even when he turned and joined the team to thank the supporters you could read the pain on his face.  Combined with some of the comments he made in post-game interviews, especially late int he season, you could tell that if anyone in the locker room cared it was him.  In a season where nobody played well, at least Cole realized it wasn't acceptable.

I won't disagree with anyone who goes with Ronan or Yarbrough.  They are certainly worthy of the award this season.

And then we get to the annual tradition of reviewing my predictions to see how badly I did.  I'll warn you this year was really bad.  But, here we go!

• Colorado, on the back of great goalkeeping from Ilic, beats a lower league side in their first USOC game but then gets eliminated by a MLS side in the next round

I'm claiming this one as accurate as we did beat a lower-league side and then got eliminated by a MLS side.  Technically it was two lower-league sides and we didn't need great goalkeeping, but close enough.

• The Rapids surprise some people and actually make it out of the group stage of the Leagues Cup, getting a draw in Nashville and beating Toluca at home.  But one knockout match is all they get

LOL, no

• We bring the Rocky Mountain Cup home by beating FSL on the last day of the season

I literally could not have been more wrong on this one

• With that win Colorado leapfrogs FSL into 7th place, avoiding the wild-card play-in game and qualifying for the playoffs

• But its one series and done again, but with the new format at lease we get a home game

I said this was going to go poorly for me...

• The summer transfer window is quiet for the Rapids, other than exercising Ilic's purchase clause.  No other major moves are made (in or out) but some depth is added

I wanted to take half credit but that seems like a stretch.  We did bring in Gutman and loaned in Navarro and Tavares (though the latter does seem like no more than a depth move) .

• By midseason Ilic will be the clear #1 in net

Ilic only became the starter because of Yarbrough's injury, though I expect he'll be the starter when we start next season.

• Diego Rubio wins the team Golden Boot with double-digit goals but less than 15

Bassett was the Golden Boot, and with significantly less than double-digit goals

• Cole Bassett is the team MVP, cementing his status as an everyday starter and getting interest from Europe again by the end of the season

Taking full credit on this one, especially as his game improved once Little took over.  I doubt he has much European interest but the rest is accurate. 

• Jack Price returns to being one of the most underrated players in the league

One of the big "what if's" of this season is Jack's injury.  Without that maybe we see a very different team.

• Maxsø is the clear defensive player of the year and makes a push for the league's best XI

I think he's better than he showed, but based on his play he's not even a definite starter right now

• Ronan and Max both struggle to claim the third starting spot in midfield, creating a rotation all season

Half credit.  Max certainly won't be a starter, and Ronan did have a dip in midseason that had Max been available would had led to a rotation I think.  Still by the end of the season he was clearly a starter.

• Cabral finds himself in Colorado and while he doesn't live up to the DP money the Galaxy paid to sign him does justify the GAM we traded to bring him here.  10 or more goals + assists this year.

Nope, not even close.  3 total goals+assists and nowhere near justifying any of his price 

• Yapi shows he's a year away still, but really looks set for a big 2024

Half credit, as Yapi might have been a year away from being a year away this season

4 out of 14 possible points.  4.5 if I want to be really generous.  I had 4.5 out of 12 last year, 5.5 of 11 the year before that, and 8 of 11 in 2020.  I'm getting worse by the season. 

One More Name To Add

Late last week one more name was added to the coaching list, Pa-Modou Kah.  Kah is former defender who is Gambian by birth but his family emigrated to Norway when he was 8 and he played for the Norwegian national team 10 times.  He played in Norway, Sweden, the Netherlands, Qatar, and Saudi Arabia before he finished his 19-year career playing for Portland and Vancouver.  He immediately moved into coaching as an assistant with both Vancouver and Cincinnati before taking over Pacific FC in the Canadian Premier League, taking them to the title in his second season there.  He was then offered the job as the coach of North Texas (aka FC Dallas 2) which he took for one season before spending 2023 as an assistant in Charlotte.

So what we have is another manager with experience as a MLS assistant and a little head coaching experience (two seasons in Victoria BC with Pacific FC).  This matches up well with Chris Little and rumored name Efrain Juarez.  With Kah, Little, and Armas supposedly on the final 4 list that means either Juarez or Jack Wilshere is not a finalist (possibly both of them aren't).  If I had to guess its Wilshere that's no longer a finalist.  He's the only one of the 5 names that doesn't have any MLS experience, and he's also the one most likely to take his name out of consideration given his current situation and the possibility of getting an offer in the future.

With the names leaking late next week I'm expecting a decision shortly.  I would not be shocked if we hear at least an unconfirmed report if not an official announcement tomorrow, and I'll be very surprised if we don't get an announcement sometime this week.

Based on the names we know, I'd prefer Juarez, followed by Kah, with Wilshere an interesting wildcard.  If its Little or Armas its a very bad sign.

Rapids Reportedly Down To Final 4 Including...Chris Armas?!?!

After some time off I was planning to get into some post-season analysis tonight, but this afternoon there were reports that the Rapids are close to naming the new manager, with a final 4 that includes interim coach Chris Little and new name Chris Armas.  The only other two names seriously linked to the job have been Jack Wilshere and Efrain Juarez.  So a quick recap on the first three and then more on Armas at the end:

• Jack Wilshere

Current Arsenal U-18's coach, a position he took last summer (2022) after retiring from a 13 year playing career, primarily with Arsenal.  34 caps with England.  Took the U18s to the U18 FA Cup final last season.

• Efrain Juarez

Recently joined Club Brugge as an assistant after being at Standard Liege as an assistant last season, and NYCFC as an assistant the three years before that.  In all of those spots Ronny Deila was the manager while Juarez was his right hand man.  Before that a 13 year playing career in Mexico, Europe, and MLS and  almost 40 caps with Mexico.

• Chris Little

Obviously was the interim manager of the Rapids after Fraser was fired, leading the team to a 1 PPG average in his 8 games.  Has a 20+ year career of being an assistant in MLS and lower leagues, and a head coach of youth/reserve teams or college teams.  A very short playing career before he became a coach.

• Chris Armas

Armas is the new name here, but isn't a new name to American soccer fans.  Armas had a long MLS career with the Chicago Fire and the National Team.  He missed out on the 2002 World Cup after blowing out his knee in a match that spring, which opened the door for Pablo Mastroeni to take his place on that roster.  After retirement he was an assistant in Chicago and NY, with a stint as a college women's coach in-between.  In 2018 when Jesse Marsch left for Red Bull Salzburg Armas was promoted to head coach and led RBNY for 2.5 seasons before being fired near the end of 2020.  After that he was hired as Toronto's head coach that offseason, but was fired after 15 games.  Since then he's been an assistant at Manchester United and Leeds, again under Marsch, being promoted to co-interim manager when Marsch was let go.

Chris Armas is largely considered to have been one of the worst coaches in recent MLS history.  He took over a Supporters Shield leading RBNY side in 2018 and kept them in that position, but in their first playoff game that year immediately changed their tactics and lost 3-0 at home to Atlanta, leading to a 3-1 series loss in the first round.  Each year after that the team got worse, dropping to 6th (12th overall) in 2019 and 6th (13th overall) in the COVID-shortened 2020 season and crashing out of the MLS Is Back tournament in the group stage.

His time in Toronto was worse.  Hired in the 2020-21 offseason he won 1 of his first 11 league games (along with 2 draws) an was fired after a 7-1 loss to DC on July 4th.  That's a 0.45 PPG rate in Toronto. 

The idea that Armas is a finalist for Colorado just reiterates that this organization is deeply unserious about being competitive.  The near universal response to this news across MLS social media tonight is sympathy for Rapids fans that might have to put up with their club hiring him.  He has shown no ability to manage a team in any sort of successful way, his greatest success came when the team was set up for him with investment and coaching by Jesse Marsch and Red Bull, two things he won't have in Commerce City.  The only box he checks is that he's cheap and desperate to get another chance.

In these four candidates you have a youth coach, an assistant coach who's made a career for working for one manager, an internal hire that has no top-level management experience, and a retread who's been fired by two other MLS clubs (who in recent times have appeared to be almost as poorly run as the Rapids).  None of these guys are likely to come in and turn this organization around.  At least with Wilshere it would be an indicator of trying to do something different, and Juarez has some experience in Europe and maybe some connections in Mexico (and has been the right-hand man for a solid manager).  there's a possibility that they could be a surpising young manager.  Little or Armas would be very poor choices that would set this team back even further from the hole they're already in.  No other team would even consider them for the role (though I understand why you would leave the current interim who's under contract for next season in the running until the end).

Annus Horribilis

Its done.  With one final loss the worst year in Rapids history is over, finally.  I only have two things to say about the game.  First, it was good to see a bunch of the kids get playing time.  Second, there were a lot of complaints that the ball was out on FSL's goal.  Going back and looking at the replays I didn't see any angle that showed the whole ball over the whole line.  Remember the Japan-Germany goal in the World Cup where they ruled just one sliver of the edge of the ball was still over one sliver of the line?  Same thing here, every angle I saw it was very believable that part of the curve of the ball was still over the line.

Ok, one more thing about the game.  Cole Bassett was obviously broken up and angry after the match.  More so than anyone else by far.  He feels the pain of losing to FSL 4 times in a year and of this whole season.

What we move onto is the impending rebuild.  And based on the last 48 hours, it will be a rebuild.  First of all, minutes after the final whistle Diego Rubio tweeted this:

Thank you Colorado, my family and I will miss you!

Then yesterday Jack Price tweeted: 

Thank you Colorado Rapids fans me and my family have had the best 6 years. The support and love shown towards us from day 1 has been top class. Wish the lads all the success in the future an honour and immense pride to captain this club for 4 years cheers, Pricey

Reportedly Rubio has already left Colorado and Price flies out tomorrow. Those are two big pieces that we'll need to replace (but also two big salaries that are freed up to do it).  ITs not an understatement to say that those are the two best Rapids over the last 5+ years and the only other player that has an argument (Yarbrough) is possibly on his way out as well.  Diego and Jack will be hugely missed, not only for their on-field play but also their leadership.  Price in particular is a fan favorite (and a favorite here too) and on a team that doesn't have many fan favorites right now that's a hole that will need to be filled.

Following up on that news, Burgundy Wave is reporting that Jonathan Lewis will not be returning, and is likely to move to an Eastern Conference team.  Lews is under contract for 2024 so this would have to be a trade or a buyout.  Lewis never panned out into the player we hoped for, in 4 seasons he had 104 appearances but only 56 starts, 5409 minutes, but only 18 goals and 5 assists in league play.  That's not much for the $650K in TAM we gave up (pluis an international spot for a year).

Assuming we can get Lewis' salary fully off the books, combined with Price and Rubio that's $1.8M in base salary cleared.  And all but about $70K of it counted against the cap (Price was slightly over max salary and had to be paid down).  That's some nice flexibility to have going into the offseason, which I guess is the silver lining in all of this.

I have a feeling this is just the start of an active offseason, at least with players leaving.  Speaking of the offseason, look for posts over the next couple of weeks going over the roster, naming a player of the year, and reviewing my predictions.  Otherwise I think things will be somewhat quiet through the playoffs, with things picking up around MLS Cup.

Lets End This Thing

Tomorrow this horror of a season finally comes to an end as the Rapids host FSL for the final game of 2023.  Most importantly, because its Decision Day, the game starts at 7pm not 7:30.  The Rapids have nothing to play for other than pride, which hasn't been enough to get them many results this season.  FSL is currently in 5th but could rise as high as 3rd with a win and other results or sink one spot to 6th.  Sadly the Rocky Mountain Cup is not in play with FSL having won the first two matchups this season.

Availability Report:

OUT: GK William Yarbrough (surgery), D Alex Gersbach (surgery), M Danny Leyva (U.S. Pan-American Games Team), M Max (removed from team activities), M Sam Nicholson (surgery)

QUESTIONABLE: GK Marko Ilic (illness)

So, there's a chance we'll see Abe Rodriguez or maybe even Adam Beaudry in the nets tomorrow.  Really we should see as many of the kids as we can.  Bring up all the Rapids 2 players we can, they deserve a chance after their success this season and there's not reason we need to see players like Rosenberry or Rubio at this point.

Prediction: 2-1 loss, goal by Bassett.  This assumes we play mostly first team players.  If we play the kids we might lose by more but that will actually be less painful than having our "best" players lose all three games to FSL this season.  Regardless, 24 hours from now the 2023 season will be history and we can move forward.

Worst. Season. Ever.

The Rapids drew Dallas on Saturday night "clinching" the record for worst season ever on PPG, regardless of what happens against FSL this weekend.  To credit the team they did look better than their average this year but really there's not much to talk about other than setting that record so like with the game preview we're going to move on to three other pieces of Rapids news.

We'll start with the Rapids 2 game last night.  I haven't covered Rapids 2 much this season here, which is my bad as they've had a really good season.  I blame the first-team being so bad that it sapped my will to blog about much.  Anyway Los Rapidos made the Western Conference Final of the MLS Next Pro playoffs and hosted Austin 2 at the Dick yesterday.  Sadly after a scoreless 120 minutes the home side lost in PKS 4-1.  Still a great season for the young guys, winning the conference and having the second best record overall. Hopefully we'll see some of them rewarded with playing time on Saturday against FSL.

Two pieces of info on the coaching search hit today.  First Arsenal correspondent Charles Watts urges Jack Wilshere  not to take the Rapids head coaching job.  He says there's lots of fan unrest at the club (true, see below) as well as a lack of support from ownership (ditto).  An article about his comments is here, while the video of him making them is on YouTube.

Secondly a rumor surfaced from TUDN tonight that Efrain Juarez is a finalist for the head coaching role.  Juarez is a 35-year old former Mexican national team player (d-mid & right back) and has spent the last 4+ seasons as an assistant coach at NYCFC (3 seasons), Standard Liege (one season), and Brugge (started this season).  I know nothing about his coaching style but combined with the Wilshere report its clear that the Front Office is looking for somebody young to lead this team.

As I was writing this another piece of news just broke, reportedly FIFA has removed SoFi Stadium from the hosting list for World Cup 2026 after KSE and FIFA had a disagreement last month over the costs and logistics of hosting.  The biggest newest stadium in the country will be dark and quiet during the world's biggest event.  Seems like KSE overplayed their hand here.

Speaking of, yesterday's Denver Post had a front page article about Victory Crossing and the lack of movement in almost 20 years in building up around DSG Park.  There's lots to digest here but the one thing that stood out to me was this:

On Monday night, Commerce City will once again try to move things forward, this time with an unconventional idea involving a contest for Colorado college students. The City Council will be asked to pay $25,000 to co-sponsor the contest organized by the national Commercial Real Estate Development Association, asking students to design plans for the site.

... 

If picked, six teams from the University of Colorado Boulder and the University of Denver will be paired with professional financiers, developers, architects and engineers to come up with workable plans for Victory Crossing, Aiken said. Those teams will figure out what density level is appropriate, the zoning and environmental hurdles the property faces, and what businesses could be successful at the site. 

Ideas would be presented in April, and the two sides could reach an agreement on what Victory Crossing ultimately will be, Aiken said.

To put this in context, here's what Josh Kroenke said in his response to Centennial 38's letter a month ago:

Over the next few months, we will be finalizing the master plan for our exciting Victory Crossing Project. When this is ready in early 2024, we will be hosting several open forums with supporters and members of the community to gather feedback on our plans for the club, stadium and entire project.

KSE must think we, as Rapids fans, are stupid.  Its only been a month since they had to respond to a letter from the team's biggest supporters group and their most substantial promise made in the response is to unveil plans for Victory Crossing in early 2024.  Now we find out KSE's big plan is to pay half of a $50K sponsorship to get college students to work on a design.  Does that sound like a project that's ready to be rolled out for "open forums with supporters" to gather feedback in "early 2024"?  Does KSE not think we can connect the dots between what they said on September 14th and what the Denver Post reported on October 15th and see they don't add up?

Even if they have bigger plans and this college competition is just a small part of it, their willingness to not engage with the Denver Post and allow this to be the story is almost as bad for an organization that was recently called out for their lack of communication.  Once again we see KSE is all talk and doesn't really care about the Rapids.

The badge, the fans, the players deserve better.  Make Rapids fun again.

Coaching Rumors. Injury News, Oh And We Have A Game

The Rapids play in Dallas tomorrow, the rescheduled game from last Wednesday's rainout.  There's nothing on the line so we're mainly going to focus on the news this week.  We'll get back to the game later.

The big news, well more like pretty much confirmed rumor, is that Jack Wilshere is on the Rapids list of coaches they are considering.  Wilshere is a former Arsenal and England midfielder who retired after the 2021-22 season (he played for Danish side AGF that season) and was immediately hired as Arsenal's U-18 coach.  Last season he took the U-18s to the FA Youth Cup final.

Obviously I think we would hope that we could sign a coach with extensive first-team experience, either in MLS or an equivalent or better league.  Before Fraser we had a long list of coaches getting their initial shot at managing first-team club football.  The reality of the situation though is that we've fired our last three coaches with multiple years left on their contracts and given KSE's lack of investment we have to assume that we don't have a big number to dangle in front of a name coach to want to come into that situation.  Given that I don't mind us looking a bit "outside the box".  I'm not sure Wilshere is the right match for us, but at the same time in this situation I doubt any name we hire is going to feel like the right match.  At the very least hiring Wilshere would at least get some eyeballs on the team.

In other news Colorado announced today that Sam Nicholson underwent surgery on his ankle to relieve an ongoing problem he's had for most of the season.  Recovery time is 12-16 weeks so he would be back around the start of the 2024 season, which he's under contract for (and the team has an option on him for 2025).  This is obviously a "season-ending injury", for the 2 games of this season that are left.

Back to tomorrow's game, kickoff is at 6:30pm.  Dallas is hanging on to the last playoff spot in the West but with this game in hand they can clinch their spot in the postseason and move up to a position where they would avoid the play-in game.  Meanwhile as I mentioned the Rapids are guaranteed to finish last in the West and next-to-last overall in the league, the only thing to play for is two wins in our final two games would avoid our worst season ever.

Availability Report:

OUT: GK William Yarbrough (surgery), D Moise Bombito (Team Canada), D Alex Gersbach (surgery), D Aboubacar Keita (lower body injury), M Danny Leyva (U.S. Pan-American Games Team), M Max (removed from team activities), M Sam Nicholson (surgery), F Diego Rubio (Team Chile)

Well, we got Tavares back at least.  I expect, given the wide swath of our team that's unavailable, he'll get some playing time.

Prediction: 1-0 loss.  This was my prediction 10 days ago and the only thing that's happened is that we have even less players available.  I don't see any reason to change it.

Nice Goal Bassett

The team made it very clear early in that game on Saturday that a number of them have given up on the season, so I'm not going to spend much on writing it up.  Put it this way, the last time the Rapids gave up 4 goals in the first half was against FSL in late 2014, two weeks after the infamous Joe Nasco game (where they also did it).  Setting defensive ineptitude records we haven't seen since the early Pablo-years is not what you want to see from players who are theoretically playing for jobs next year.

The one positive note from the game as a very nice backheel goal from Cole Bassett.  That pretty much wraps up the golden boot for him with 6 goals.  Rubio is second with 3 but he'll miss next week's game while on international duty with Chile.  Bassett is also the only person who's saying the quiet parts out loud in post game press conferences, stating that things aren't good enough and suggesting changes need to be made.

Mess With Texas Fortnight: Act 2

Ok, lets try this again.  The Rapids are still trying to mess with Texas, but now a week of that has been spread out to two weeks.  The cancelled game Wednesday night has been rescheduled for next Saturday in Dallas, at 6:30pm.  Tomorrow night the team will be in Houston, also at 6:30.  They stayed in Dallas and trained there the last couple of days but I assume they'll come home with a week between games.  With the other results on Wednesday night a win tomorrow would clinch the Wooden Spoon for Toronto, and would put us within 2 points of avoiding our worst season ever.  Meanwhile a win for Houston would clinch skipping the play-in game and would put them in the mix for a home playoff game.

Availability Report:

OUT: GK William Yarbrough (surgery), D Moise Bombito (yellow card accumulation), D Alex Gersbach (surgery), D Aboubacar Keita (lower body injury), M Max (removed from team activities), M Sidnei Tavares (illness)

Bombito was actually out for the game Wednesday night but wasn't included in the availability report.  Since the game didn't get played he has to serve his suspension tomorrow night, then will miss the rescheduled Dallas game as he'll be on Canadian National Team duty.  Tavares will get, at most, 7 appearances which is not what you're hoping for from a big summer signing.

Prediction: 2-1 loss, goal by Bassett.  Houston is one of the best home teams in the league, I just don't see us getting a result here.  Maybe the team will surprise me with the unexpected rest by not playing Wednesday night.

No Messing With Texas (For Now)

Tonight's game has been postponed due to lightning.  A makeup date will be announced in the future, but it will have to be either on the international weekend next weekend or on the Wednesday on either side of it.

Mess With Texas Week: Act 2

After beating Austin to kick off Mess With Texas week the Rapids head to the Lone Star State for back to back games with the other two teams.  First up, Dallas tomorrow night.  Or as we like to call them around here, the 2010 MLS Cup losers.  Dallas is hanging on to the last playoff spot by 3 points over SKC and Minnesota (but SKC has played one more game than the others) so they're going to be pressing hard to get a win.  Of course when Dallas' playoff hopes intersect the Rapids bad things tend to happen for them.  Kickoff tomorrow is at 6:30.

Availability Report:

OUT: GK William Yarbrough (surgery), D Alex Gersbach (surgery), D Aboubacar Keita (lower body injury), M Max (removed from team activities)

QUESTIONABLE: M Sidnei Tavares (illness)

No changes there.  Unfortunately one of the benefits to adding a player midseason is that they get the rest of the season to adjust to MLS before really stepping up the next season.  Tavares has lost almost all of that benefit.

Prediction: 1-0 loss.  These are the two worst offenses in the Western conference, but Dallas is slightly better than we are.  I think we get an ugly game and Dallas sneaks one by for the win.

Mess With Texas Week Starts With A W

In a game that clearly showed why these two teams are at the bottom of the West the Rapids came out the victors, through some decent play and some luck.  Austin won pretty much all the stats, including shots, shots on target, and possession but at the end of the night they had 0 on the scoreboard while Colorado found a way to get a goal.  In fact, they had their first halftime lead since the Open Cup game on May 9th.

Of the last 5 goals the Rapids have been involved in (for and against), 4 of them came from corners.  In this one Ronan got his 10th assist getting the corner across the box to a on-pushing Maxsø, who managed to get just enough space to get his boot on the cross and knock it home.  Not only that, but the 49 minutes in the lead increased our total lead at home time to 130 minutes this season!  (League games only)

Shout out to Ilic who had a series of saves with about 10 minutes left, including one right off his face.  At the end of the sequence when he had done all he could, Will Bruin had him dead to rights.  Keeper on the ground, open net, and an easy shot inside the 6.  And somehow he skied it over the bar.  Sometimes you need a bit of luck in this game.  Also a shout out to Seb Anderson who had a good game in his first start this season.

Man of the Match: Andres Maxsø.  I gave strong consideration to Ilic but Maxsø made the team of the week for MLS so that was the tiebreaker.

A Short Preview Alright (Alright, Alright)?

I was waiting on the Game Notes from the Rapids media email before I wrote this preview, but they haven't shown up so you're going to get a very short preview.  With no updated availability report and no real idea what our lineup will be there's not a ton to talk about.  We've got Austin FC led by their celebrity (minority) owner Matthew McConaughey in Commerce City tonight and rumors are Mr. Austin himself will be in attendance as he's currently up at Folsom Field watching USC-CU.  Meanwhile his MLS team is in something of a death spiral, desperately trying to hold on to their playoff hopes.  They are 5 points out of a spot with only 4 to play, so a loss tonight would all but end their season, and even a draw puts them in a tough spot.  Kickoff at always is at 7:30.

EDIT: And of course as soon as I post this the email shows up.  So here's our Availability Report.  No surprises other than whatever is ailing Tavares is still ailing him.

OUT: GK William Yarbrough (surgery), D Alex Gersbach (surgery), D Aboubacar Keita (lower body injury), M Max (removed from team activities)

QUESTIONABLE: M Sidnei Tavares (illness)

The Rapids actually looked like a real MLS team in the second half on Wednesday, against better opposition than Austin.  If that team shows up from the beginning there's actually the potential for a win tonight.  However I haven't really seen that team for 90 minutes this season so I don't think we can expect it.  Still, I think the odds for a Rapids win are likely a bit higher than an Austin win in this one.

Prediction: 1-1 draw, goal by Bassett.  Yeah, same prediction from Wednesday.  Cole's on fire so I expect that to continue, but I'm not going to go out on a limb and predict more than one goal or a win.

Missed It By That Much

I predicted a 1-1 draw with Bassett scoring,  We got a draw with Bassett scoring...and Rubio.  So close.  The good news is that the additional goal I didn't predict gave us 23 goals for the season, one more than the 22 the 2013 DC United team scored to set the record for lowest goals scored in a 34 game season (and, COVID-season excepted, the lowest goals/game in league history).  So we've avoided that ignominy at least.  Plus the draw gives us a 1 point lead over Toronto in the race to avoid the Wooden Spoon.  By the standards of this season that's a pretty successful evening for the Rapids.

I think its fair to say that the coaching change has improved this team.  We've got 1-1-2 in the 4 games since and score 7 goals.  It took the prior 15 games to score 7 goals and the team was averaging 0.61 points per game this season to that point.  Cole Bassett continued his hot streak, getting another goal to give him 3 goals and an assist since the coaching change.  Make no mistake, I'm not discounting Fraser as a good coach, it was just clear that his methods were no longer working with this locker room, for any number of reasons.

At the same time the improved play of the team has not come with good enough results.  1 PPG looks great against what we've seen the rest of the season but compared to our historical results its still in the bottom 25% of seasons all-time.  That leads me to one of two conclusions, both of which are probably partially true.  One, Chris Little is not good enough to be a MLS coach, even if he's better than Fraser was doing with this group.  Two, as good as the coaching may or may not be, the talent on the roster isn't good enough.  I tend to believe its significantly more of the latter than the former, but both are likely in play.  Your view will likely differ.

Fun note, as mentioned I couldn't make the game, but apparently former Rapids Designated Player Shkelzen Gashi put in an appearance at the pregame tailgate and was then recognized on the field before the game.  You never know who might show up for a C38 party!

Man of the Match: Cole Bassett.  Mainly because he deserves it after this four-game run he put together.

Wait, We're Still Doing This?

Well even though our season is over apparently we have to play out the string. :D  Tomorrow night is the makeup from June's rained out game against Vancouver.  Since that night was scheduled to be Pride Night apparently the Rapids are doing Pride Night tomorrow night.  A little odd, but I appreciate them not skipping it.  Kickoff is at 7:30pm.  Alas I have a work dinner and can't make it.

We don't have an updated injury list so I'm going to hope Navarro is back for this one.  Otherwise I expect the same group we've seen (Gersbach & Yarbrough, plus Max) to be unavailable.

Yeah, this preview is pretty weak, but with nothing to play for and no update on availability there's not much to preview.  The sooner this season ends the better.

Prediction: 1-1 draw, goal by Bassett.  I'm feeling optimistic and predicting we get the goal we need to die 2013 DC United's worse 34 game goal total and a point.  I have a feeling Vancouver is not looking forward to a mid-week trip to Commerce City at this point in the season.  We get a sneaky draw, but that's all.

We End As We Began

Our season started with a bad loss in the Pacific Northwest, we were eliminated from our last possible competition with a bad loss in the Pacific Northwest.  Now we have 5 meaningless games with the only thing interesting to track is where we land on the bad offensive seasons in league history and if we win the Wooden Spoon.

The one highlight from Saturday is Cole Bassett getting a third goal involvement (this time an assist) in three games.  Its good to start seeing the old Bassett a bit.  Otherwise its pretty much the same story once again.  The winning goal was very ugly.  Our big offseason DP signing Maxso completely misplays a header.  Abubakar gets beat to the follow-up header, and then its off to the races.  Maxso can't catch up (either can Danny Wilson, but Wilson couldn't catch Valderrama "running") so our big midseason international signing Ilic has to make the save and he makes a weak effort at it, leading to an easy goal.  A lot of wasted money and international slots on that sequence.

As far as the rest of the season goes we need one more goal to tie 2013 DC United's record for the lowest goal total in a 34 game season, two to avoid owning part of that record.  We're already outside the 10 worst seasons in league history at least, but we need 9 more points to avoid the worst season in club history.  We are currently tied on points, winds, and goal differential with Toronto FC for the Wooden Spoon, but they have the edge on us on the third tiebreaker goals scored by 3.  So right now we're in last place, but we have a game in hand on TFC, which is the Wednesday makeup game against Vancouver.  If we lose then we'll have the "lead" in the Wooden Spoon, if we draw or win TFC will have it.

The End Is Nigh

We started the season with the potential to win 5 trophies.  The USOC (eliminated in May), the Leagues Cup (eliminated in July), the Supporters Shield (eliminated in August), the Rocky Mountain Cup (eliminated in September), and MLS Cup.  Of course to win MLS Cup you have to make the playoffs.  If we don't win tomorrow we'll be mathematically eliminated from playoff contention and thus the fifth and last trophy we had a shot at.  Even if we win we could be eliminated with wins by Dallas, Minnesota, SKC, and either Austin or San Jose (a SJ draw would also do it).  Needless to say based on our play I'm assuming we're about 26 hours for officially having nothing left to play for.  We've had only three meaningful games since Memorial Day, and we lost all 3 (the two Leagues Cup matches and the RMC match).  Kickoff for this one is at 8:30pm tomorrow, so you can watch CU lose to the Zeroa in Oregon then watch the Rapids lose to the Timbers in Oregon.

Availability Report:

OUT: GK William Yarbrough (knee surgery), D Alex Gersbach (tendon surgery), D Aboubacar Keita (lower body injury), M Max (removed from team activities)

QUESTIONABLE: Rafael Navarro (lower body injury)

Yep, our new signing makes his first appearance on the injury report.  *sigh*  That's the way this season has gone.  Otherwise I expect to see a pretty similar lineup.  Based on Tavares play and his illness I wouldn't be surprised if he doesn't start.

Prediction: 1-0 loss.  Portland's not great but they're at home and we suck.

If I Ever Lose My Faith In You

So while sitting at Red Rocks waiting for the start of the Sting concert I was able to stream the first 20 minutes of the Rapids game across town.  I was planning to watch the rest today, but every review I saw of the game told me it wasn't worth it.  Seems like the team didn't show up to play until the last 20 minutes, at which point it was once again too late.  I have certainly lost my faith in this team.

I did watch the goals and saw a team that had checked out on both of Seattle's.  Just no attempt to help teammates, mark anyone, or really care at all.  Full credit to Bassett for continuing to show that somebody cares.  His follow-up run into the box for his goal was a classic Bassett '21 move.  It certainly seems like the coaching change has impacted him positively.

Otherwise just another game where it becomes clear that we're not good enough.  At least with the goal we only need 3 more to tie, and 4 to avoid, setting the record for the worst offensive performance in league history.  And technically we're still not eliminated from the playoffs somehow, though it would require winning out, making up goal differential, and getting a lot of help.  So we'll almost certainly be officially eliminated on Saturday.  The best option though is the combination of results that would cause the last 7 teams in the West (including the Rapids) to end up tied at 40 points.  Two would make the playoffs and one would end up in last place.  With the lack of anything else to root for, that's what I want to see.

Busy Week Continues With Seattle

I'll explain the link between Sting and the match

If we were actually in any sort of playoff race I'd have real complaints about the way the league scheduled our post-Leagues Cup games.  Since it doesn't matter I'm happy to just churn through them and get the season over.  Tomorrow night the Sounders come to town looking to bounce back from a couple of draws while the Rapids hope to ride the success of their second home win.  As of right now C38 is encouraging everyone to continue to wear black and will have some visibility regarding the ongoing protest but there are no plans for a coordinated walkout at this time.  As one person put it, there's not that many people who are going to walk in to a weekday match in late September for a last place team anyway.  Kickoff tomorrow night is at 7:30pm.

Availability Report:

OUT: GK William Yarbrough (knee surgery), D Alex Gersbach (tendon surgery), D Aboubacar Keita (lower body injury), M Max (removed from team activities)

No official update from the team so I'm going with Saturday's availability report.  That report left out that Abubakar was suspended for yellow card accumulation though, but that means he should be back for this one.

I don't think I'm going to do lineup predictions for the rest of this season.  There's really no telling what's driving the lineup at this point, winning this year or seeing what we have for next year.

Prediction: 2-1 loss, goal by Navarro.  Seattle is a much better team than us and they aren't distracted by coaching issues like New England was.  The Rapids offense did look better on Wednesday so I think they might score, but they won't win.

Oh, and the link between Sting and the game tomorrow is that Sting is playing Red Rocks tomorrow night and my wife wanted to see him.  So I'll be west of the city watching the British singer instead of east of the city watching the British coach.

The Power Of Jameson Night

Only on Jameson Night would the Rapids score the first two goals (an eighths of what they've scored all year) against the league's second best team and hold on for only their second win of the year.  With the three points the Rapids avoid ending up with one of the 10 worst season (by points) in league history.  The two goals are a third of what they needed to avoid setting the record for least goals in a 34 game season and worst goals/game average (discounting the COVID year) in league history.  Colorado needs 4 more to tie and 5 more to avoid sharing those records.

The first half was pretty similar to what we've seen all season.  A bunch of midfield play with no real chances at goal.  The one good chance we got Cabral put wide of the post.  I'm not sure what interim coach Chris little said at half but it worked.  Coming right out of the locker room the Rapids earned a free kick in the 47th minute and Ronan floated it right in front of net for Bassett to head home.  It's actually pretty funny when you watch the replay, it looks like Navarro might have gotten a slight touch before Bassett and when he whips his head back around to see what happened and the ball is in the net its clear he thinks at first he scored it.

15 minutes later Navarro did get on the score sheet with an assist, in the form of a cross field pass that Harris brought down, cut back, and sliced into the far netting for the 2-0 lead.  At first I thought it had to be Navarro on the shot because I didn't think anyone on the team had that kind of ball control and footwork so I assumed it had to be the new guy.  New England got one back off a corner kick in stoppage time where Gonzalez got in front of Maxso and outjumped Rubio for a clean header.

Now the other thing to talk about on Saturday's game was C38's protest and walkout.  To be transparent I took part in the protest and helped with some of the administration behind the scenes.  Despite my bias I would say the group was successful at making a clear simple statement.  The badge, the players, the fans deserve better.  Unfortunately the Apple announcers didn't mention the walkout at all, but they couldn't avoid the banners left behind with that message.  The question is, is KSE hearing it?

Out in the parking lot the party was hopping, as you can see here.  Say what you want, C38 can tailgate like nobody else, be it before or during the game.

Man of the Match: Cole Bassett.  A nice goal and much improved play in the second half.  He was also named to MLS's Team of the Week.

Jameson Night - Interim Edition

New England is in town which means its time for one of the great Rapid fan traditions, Jameson Night!  If you're new to this tradition that now enters its third decade you can read the background here.  In total the Rapids have won 8 of 13 Jameson Night games and there's never been a draw.

That record may be challenged tomorrow as both teams come stumbling into this one.  We've covered Colorado's issues extensively but the Revolution have had a chaotic week themselves.  After being suspended for over a month Bruce Arena stepped down as Revs coach, due to reported inappropriate and insensitive comments made to his coaching staff.  Assistant coach Richie Williams was name interim coach but it came out that Williams was one of the ones who reported Arena, and this happened after Arena had informed Williams this past offseason his contract wouldn't be renewed at the end of this season.  Williams had also clashed multiple times with the rest of the coaching staff this season.  On Tuesday the Revs players refused to practice and the leadership decided to name Clint Peay the interim interim manager, dismiss two other assistant coaches, and move Williams to an unnamed role away from the first team.

So we have interim Rapids manager Chris Little versus interim interim Revolution manager Clint Peay, both in their first games.  New England has been great this season, second best in the league, while the Rapids are still just as awful.  A reminder that many fans in Centennial 38 are wearing all black and will be walking out in the 20th minute in protest of the organization tomorrow.  Kickoff is at 7:30, so the walkout will time well for anyone who wants to watch the CSU-CU game.

Availability Report:

OUT: GK William Yarbrough (knee surgery), D Alex Gersbach (tendon surgery), D Aboubacar Keita (lower body injury), M Max (removed from team activities)

Other than Keita who is injured, again, that's a good injury report.  We knew none of those players would be available.

No lineup prediction on this one.  A bad team under a new coach, who knows what we're going to see..

Prediction: 0-0 draw.  I'm sure this week has taken a lot out of the Revolution so I'm not expecting them to play well.  Even with that though they're still a better team than we are.  Removing Fraser doesn't really solve the Rapids' problems.  We'll probably look a bit better but not enough to beat a team like New England.  A sloppy mess of bad soccer.