We Have A Coach!

First reported by Tom Bogert and confirmed by many the Rapids will name Tottenham Hotspur assistant coach Matt Wells as the team's 11th official head coach sometime next week.

Wells is a name out of left field, but to be fair with the lack of rumors anyone outside of the league would be out of left field.  Most Rapids fans spent the day researching what they could find on him and asking friends who were Spurs fans or Tottenham social media accounts what we're getting.

What we do know is that Wells is a 37 year old born and raised North Londoner who played in the Spurs academy before injuries derailed any hope of a senior career.  He then moved over to the coaching side at Spurs Academy, as an assistant eventually leaving to follow Academy coach Scott Parker as he took over Fulham's first-team and continued with him to Bournemouth and Clube Brugge.  He returned to Spurs under Postecoglou for the 2023-24 season and became the senior assistant to Ange last season, before stepping back down to assistant under Thomas Frank this season.

Postecoglou is known for giving his assistants a lot of responsibility and Wells is credited the game plan that Spurs used to win the Europa League final last season.  Under Postcoglou and Wells, and continuing to this season, Tottenham has been playing with a strong defense and this year in particular going with a counterpressing strategy.  Not exactly Pablo-ball boring but certainly a more defensive focus than what Armas brought the last two seasons.  Of course we don't know what Wells will use when he's the one calling all the shots.

With what little we know right now this seems like a middling hire with more potential to be an improvement from Armas than a step back IMO.  I do like that we didn't go for another unsuccessful MLS retread or elevated Bushey.  I don't like that, yet again, we're hiring somebody without successful first-team club head coaching experience.  It has been 25 years (arguably just 20) since the Rapids have done that and maybe its time to try it?

Chris Armas - took over a RBNY team and runined it, lasted less than a season in Toronto

Robin Fraser - Failed at Chivas USA

Anthony Hudson - Never had a first-team club job, only international experience

Pablo Mastroeni - First coaching job

Oscar Pareja - First head coaching job

Gary Smith - Only youth experience

Fernando Claivjo - Did take the Revs to 2nd in the East but lost in the playoffs

Tim Hankinson - Did succeed and make the semi-finals with the Charleston Battery

The reality is that with Padraig Smith still making the decisions on player recruitment its hard to get to excited about an unknown hire.  Its going to take significant upgrades in the roster to make this team competitive.  If Wells is successful he's likely back to England with a better first-team job in 2-3 years.  If Wells is unsuccessful he'll become the next in line of a list of failed hires by KSE.  I do not expect Wells to be coaching this team by the time the 2030 World Cup rolls around.

Rapids Announce Year End Roster Decisions

Colorado announced their player decisions today.

Options exercised: Nico Hansen, Jackson Travis, Darren Yapi

Options declined: Daouda Amadou, Sam Bassett, Michael Edwards, Nate Jones, Andreas Maxsø, Rafael Santos

Free agents: Calvin Harris, Oliver Larraz

The option to purchase Noah Cobb has to be exercised by December 15th.

The Rapids are negotiating new contracts with Amadou, Harris, Larraz, and Santos.  Bassett, Edwards, Jones, and Maxso will not be returning in 2026.

Looking back at my review of the upcoming decisions most of this was expected. The two ones I missed on were Santos and Bassett.

I was glad to see we are negotiating with Santos because letting him walk would be crazy.  Hw only started 5 games yet was our best left back of the season.  Either we want him back at a lower number, but he was only on $400K, or we're giving him a longer, better contract and by passing on his option we're smoothing out negotiations so he gets his raise right away instead in a mid-year negotiation.

While Sam Bassett didn't light the world on fire he was cheap and Cole clearly liked playing with his brother.  I figured those two factors would lead to him coming back next season.  You have to wonder if Sam and people in his orbit have decided he'll do better somewhere other than the Rapids.

Other than those two most of these were obvious or we didn't have enough information to evaluate.  I'm hoping Santos gets signed quickly and I would be fine with Larraz and Harris coming back for depth but its not a huge loss if they leave.  Amadou is a long-term project.  Hansen and Yapi were absolute no brainers to keep and Travis is good depth if we can't get Santos signed.

We did release three centerbacks today, leaving us Holding and Murphy as true centerbacks from this year, plus the incoming Herrington.  Cannon and Rosenberry can both play there if needed too.  I would expect we would exercise Cobb's purchase option given that, plus be looking for another starter/top sub in the offseason.  I don't think a back pair made up of Holding/Cobb/Murphy/Herrington is going to get it done over 34 games.

The next major date for the Rapids is Dec. 10th and 11th when free agency opens and then the first stage of the reentry draft.

Schedule Surprise!

Late this morning word started filtering out that MLS could announce some of the schedule details today.  Instead MLS announced the whole schedule, at a time much earlier than they ever have before. This is likely the first time we know next year's schedule before we know which of this year's players will have their options picked up.

Of course the big news in the Rapids schedule is that Inter Miami is finally coming to Colorado.  This is their seventh season so it gets harder and harder, from a competitive standpoint, for MLS to excuse why Miami has never been here but even with that I did not expect them to pass up the big bucks of sending the GOAT back to LA or Seattle or something.  April 18th Miami will be here.

Of course, where will here be?  There was nothing said about a change of venue in today's announcement but many fans think that the game will be moved from the Dick's Sporting Goods Park to Empower Field.  I, for one, hope it isn't.  The Rapids are celebrating not only their 30th anniversary this year but also 20 years in the Dick.  Since they made the move on April 7th, 2007 they have played every competitive home match there.  They didn't move games for Beckham.  They didn't move cold weather CCC games to a better venue.  They didn't play USOC home games at a smaller stadium.  The Dick is our home and we shouldn't give that up just to get 15K extra fans to show up, watch Messi, eave as soon as he's subbed off, and never think about the Rapids again.

The other question is, of course, will Messi travel/play.  The good news is that there are no competitive Argentina matches around that date.  The bad news is that if Miami makes the quarterfinals of the CCC their trip to Colorado comes right after the midweek second leg.  If that happens, I could see them not bringing Messi.  Its also the start of a three game week for Miami, they'll go from Colorado on Saturday to Utah on Wednesday before heading home to face the Revs, which would be followed by the first leg of the CCC semifinals.  If they're eliminated before the quarterfinals I would expect Messi to travel and play some (barring injury) but if they're in the quarters all bets are off with that schedule.

Now that we've dealt with the GOAT elephant in the room, on to the rest of the schedule.  We open in my hometown of Seattle on Sunday February 22nd i what will be the Sunday Night Soccer opening match.  We then come home and face another Cascadia team in our home opener the next Saturday in the Timbers.  Traditionally we do fairly well with the Timbers as our home debut.  Our first long road trip is March 14th through April 4th with 3 road games, including two of our three East Coast trips to NYCFC and TFC (Hi Djordje!).

That Miami match is the first game of our first 3-game week with trips to LAFC on Wednesday and Vancouver the following Saturday.  Our second three-game week starts May 9th when we host St. Louis and then we make a midweek trip to Minnesota before heading to the dark place for the first leg of the Rocky Mountain Cup on Memorial Day Saturday.  We then host Dallas a week later before a long World Cup break.

MLS restarts right after the World Cup final with the Rapids hosting San Diego on Wednesday, July 22nd.  There's a noticeable break in everyone's schedule the second week of August, which will presumably involve Leagues Cup.  That's also in the middle of our only run of 3 straight home games, with Austin on the 1st, SKC on the 15th, and LAFC midweek on the 19th (we pop over to San Diego to finish another 3-game week).  Then to finish August FSL comes through for the second half of the RMC.

Another week break and we're right back to a 3 game week as we go to Columbus, Austin and host Montreal.  October starts with another 3 game week after the International break with San Jose and Minnesota visiting before we go to Portland.  We get a midweek off and, stop me if you've heard this before, another three game week as host Vancouver, go to San Jose, and host Chicago in the home finale on Halloween.  Then we finish the season the next weekend in Dallas.

So we have 5 3-game weeks and a 2-game Wednesday/Saturday week coming out of the World Cup break.  Half our games are played with another league match within 3-4 days of it, instead of the "traditional" week on either side.  And that's before the USOC and Leagues Cup games are added.  Its tough to get a whole schedule in when you're taking June and most of July off.  Good thing its a once every 4 years thing...oh wait.

Other than that though the schedule actually stacks up fairly well.  No ridiculous trips where we play on the East Coast and then on the West Coast in 4 days or anything and no real long road trips or home stands.  One note is that the home opener in February and the Miami games are 2:30pm kickoffs and the home finale on Halloween is TBD.  The other 14 are the normal 7:30pm kicks.  

Unlike this year where the run in looked fairly brutal we finish @Portland, Vancouver @San Jose, Chicago, @Dallas.  You never know who's going to jump up in a given year but outside Vancouver those are teams roughly on our level right now.  Our toughest stretches are the 3-game Miami week (Miami, @LAFC, @Vancouver) and late August/early September (LAFC, @San Diego, FSL, @Columbus).

Massive Day Of MLS News

Well, just as I thought I was slowing down for a while MLS dropped a gigantic piece of news, a major piece of news, an important piece of news, and a minor piece of news today.  Taking them in that order, because the biggest one impacts all the others:

MLS is moving the season from a spring-to-fall schedule to a fall-to-spring schedule.  Lots to cover here:

• MLS will play the 2026 season as planned, with a gap for the World Cup
• MLS will then play a "sprint season" in the spring of 2027 where every team will play 14 games (just enough to play everyone in your conference once) followed by playoffs and MLS Cup
• They'll then break for the summer and start the new 2027-28 season in late-July/August
• The league will then run from late-July/August through early/mid-December, then take a break until either the first or third weekend of February (avoiding restarting the second weekend due to the Super Bowl)
• The regular season will continue through April, with playoffs and MLS Cup in May

And that will be the schedule going forward.  As part of the announcement MLS stated they still are following the principle of having teams play no more than 3 home or road games in a row but some of the statements from the individual teams after the news are suggesting cold weather teams (like the Rapids) could see their December and February games on the road every year.

Notably, but not surprisingly, Colorado's "statement" was just reposting the MLS announcement with no additional comments.

Those are the facts, as we know them.  My opinion of this is that this is being done incredibly poorly and will likely hurt a lot more than it helps in the short to medium term.

I've said for a while now that I can see how this might be better for the league as a whole (but I have my doubts).  But I'm absolutely sure this is going to crush half a dozen clubs and it will take at least 5 seasons for them to get back to where they are now.  And I don't think anyone who's being honest about the situation would really disagree with that.

Given that the fact that MLS is jamming this through, in less than 2 years, without even the union on-board, has me very nervous.,  Japan is making the same change and they've spent the last 3 years being very open about the change, talking to the teams, players, sponsors, and fans, to get everyone on board and rowing the same way.  They are carving out budget chunks to help the further northern teams to adapt.  They're offering deals to fans who will be impacted.  In other words they know that this will only be successful if everyone is bought in.

Here we get MLS just making a decision and expecting everyone to fall in line.  No effort at all to talk to the fans that will be impacted the most.  Apparently no care for the clubs that have to make major infrastructure investments.  The players haven't even agreed to the move according to reports today.

Given all that, why should I expect this to be a success for the heavily impacted teams?  Why should I think MLS values me as a fan?

I can go on more about this, and likely will in the future.  The scheduling problems alone, especially if they send teams out of market for 3 months at a time, are legion.  But we need to move on to other news for now.

MLS is changing the season format when the schedule changes

MLS will go to a single-table model but there will still be divisions.  The 30 teams will be split into five 6 team divisions based on geography.  Teams will play their 5 division rivals home and away (10 games) and everyone else in the league home or away (24 games) for a total of 34 games.  Division winners would automatically qualify for the playoffs, the other playoff teams would be determined by the single-table.

The division makeups have not been announced yet but the most common suggestions for the Rapids are the Cascadia Cup teams, San Jose, and the Rocky Mountain Cup teams or the RMC teams and the four Californian teams.

This is probably an improvement.  I like the idea of seeing every team every year.  As long as they keep FSL and Colorado together I don't have a strong opinion of who else we're grouped with.

MLS Ends Season Pass, Merges With Apple TV

Starting next season (2026) MLS Season Pass is going away.  Instead of a separate MLS-only subscription MLS games will now be under the Apple TV subscription (until recently Apple TV+ but Apple renamed it to Apple TV).  MLS season ticket holders will get a free Apple TV subscription instead of the MLS Season Pass subscription they have been receiving.

This is a good step, probably driven by the recent Formula 1 deal Apple signed that placed F1 coverage inside the Apple TV subscription instead of a separate F1 Season Pass.  At that point neither MLS or Apple could likely justify having a separate subscription.  This opens MLS up to Apple's reported 45 million subscribers world wide.  And MLS fans get to watch Slow Horses and Ted Lasso.  Win, win.

FIFA and CONCACAF agree that Canadian MLS teams can be considered domestic

This has essentially no impact on the Rapids but will help keep everything on a level playing field.  Up until now the Canadian teams were tied to the CSA's timing and rules around transfer windows and the like.  Now they'll be part of the USSF's rules around those areas.  That makes everything easier for the league.  A note, this does not change the domestic/international status of players.  That's driven by employment law in the the countries.

Well, that's plenty.  More to come as we find out more details of the season timing and structure changes.

Final Bow On 2025, Reviewing My Predictions

Ok, the last thing we need to do before moving on to the offseason decisions and 2026 is looking back at my predictions for this year.  This...will be painful.

• Its one series and done in the CCC.  Our track record at LAFC is very bad and I don't see that changing this early in the season.

Off to a good start, full points!

• Likewise the new Leagues Cup format puts us at a disadvantage and we don't progress.  In fact our chances are so unlikely that going into our final game against Cruz Azul in LA Armas pulls the rip cord and uses a heavily rotated roster to save legs for the run-in to the playoffs.

Wathuta, Sam Bassett, Alex Harris, Fredrick, and Travis started the Cruz Azul game.  Plus Nico Hansen.  I'm giving myself full credit here. 

• The Rapids do make the playoffs, but they host the wild-card game (8th overall).  They actually win the wild-card game before bowing out in the next round.

Missed the playoffs on the tiebreaker, missed 8th by 3 points.  I'm giving myself 0 for this one, much like the Rapids this year.

• Sadly they end up in the wild-card because the curse of Sandy bites us again and we lose the Rocky Mountain Cup in the next-to-last regular-season match (I'm half tempted to say we retain it after points & goals are tied, but I've seen this story too many times before).

I'm giving myself half a point for my dead-on accurate half temptation.

• At some point, either just before the window closes in May or when the window opens this summer, the Rapids make a move for a short-term backup striker.

Nope, Yapi came good this year and made this (somewhat) unnecessary.  That's going to burn me two ways.

• Mihailovic is once again named Player of the Year and makes a run at Valderrama's record of 16 assists in a season

Ah...no.  He still lead the team in assists with 7 despite being sold during Leagues Cup.  No points.

• Navarro is the Golden Boot but will not get to 16 to tie Rubio and Casey.

Got to 12, 3 more than Mihailovic and 4 more than Yapi.  Full point.

• Steffen, Mihailovic, and Bassett all get call-ups this year

We now know Mihailovic got a call-up in January but had to turn it down due to recovering from his injury.  And Steffen was called up in the summer.  I'm claiming half a point.

• This is the last year Yapi really features for this team.  He may still be on the roster in 2026 but as a deep bench option only.

The exact opposite, for the first time really Yapi showed he can be at least a solid bench option in MLS.  He will be back and will feature as a seconday striker.

• Atencio will be seen as the sneaky-good acquisition of this offseason, justifying the expense.

Nope.  I'm not sure there was a sneaky good acquisition this offseason.  Signing Santos midseason looks like the closest.

4 points out of 10.  That's an all-star batting average but not great for predictions.  Still a step up from 3.5 out of 11 last year, which itself was a slight step up from the year before.

Unless we get some player or coach rumors or news the blog will be fairly quiet for the next couple of weeks.  Once roster decisions are formally announced and we hot the Superdraft there will be something to talk about.