2026 Part 2

Now what are we doing again?  Oh, right, MLS season.  We've already spent enough time looking back so lets just look forward now.  The Rapids need to rack up points in July and August before the schedule gets hard again in September, and that starts tomorrow night with San Diego in town.  Colorado has not made many changes during the World Cup break, Manyoma, Murphy, and Ronan has left (Murphy will be back tomorrow night with SD) and Loic Williams has joined but that's it.  San Diego has been a bit more active.  This is 12th vs. 13th in the table so both sides are looking at this like 3 points they need to jump start their season.  Kickoff tomorrow night at the Dick is at the traditional 7:30pm.

Player Availability:

OUT: GK Zach Steffen (shoulder), D Miguel Navarro (yellow card accumulation), D Jackson Travis (ankle), M Wayne Fredrick (red card suspension), M Ted Ku-DiPietro (shoulder), F Mamadou Billo Diop (knee)

Yuck, though not surprising.  We knew Steffen and KDP had surgeries and would be out long term.  Both M. Navarro and Frederick played dumb last game (imagine yelling at the official who was in the center for England-Argentina and thinking you were going to get away with it) to get their suspension.  Billo Diop was unlikely to ever play a big role in this game, even if we weren't expecting his injury.  Travis is the one that really hurts since M. Navarro is also out.

We don't really know how the break went but I expect this to be close.  I don't think Williams gets the start but he should be on the bench.  If Wells is uncomfortable with Cannon at LB we could see a 3-man back line with Williams starting and a couple of wingbacks (Minoungou and Thompson for example).

Prediction: 1-1 draw, goal by Rafa.  Going to be a lot of rust out there and neither of these teams were good before the break.  A draw isn't great but it would be (barely) acceptable given the time off and the player availability.  A loss would be fairly disastrous but a win is certainly not out of the question.