Pareja versus Smith

Not surprisingly its been popular with our inconsistent start of the season to question if the coaching change was the right move.  I supported the move at the time and I continue to support it now.  Apparently I'm not alone as the Burgundy Wave blog has a great Hero Worship article about the flawed comparisons between Gary Smith and Oscar Pareja.

I really can't disagree with the article, but I can throw out some facts to show why I think some posters (particularly on the Rapids Facebook page) are being unfairly harsh when judging this season so far, especially in comparison to prior seasons.

First, let's start with our horrible injury issues this season.  A number of Gary Smith supporters think that the MLS Cup lineup is still our best lineup and the changes that have been made away from that have been a mistake.  So using that as a baseline, I counted the number of games lost due to injury by the starters in MLS Cup 2010 in the first 15 games of 2011 and 2012 .  I considered any game where the player was on the injury report and didn't play more than 15 minutes a game lost to injury.  In 2011 I also counted the game Omar Cummings missed due to his Nats team callup.

2011: 25 games lost to injury, 1.66 starters per game.
2012: 65 games lost to injury, 4.33 starters per game

Least number of starters missing:
2011: 0 (Games 1 & 3)
2012: 2 (Game 15)

Most number of starters missing:
2011: 3 (Games 9 & 12)
2012: 7 (Game 13)

So Pareja has been dealing with 2.5 times as many injuries as Smith did at this point last year.  Until last week's game against San Jose Papi's healthiest lineup was as healthy as Smith's most injured lineup.

According to a number of ranking systems the Rapids have played one of the toughest schedules so far this season.  ELO+ has the Rapids with the 2nd toughest schedule behind Houston, while Jeff Sagarin has them with the 3rd toughest schedule behind Houston and San Jose (by .01).

Since MLS dropped the Shootout after 1999 the Rapids have averaged exactly 19 points through 15 games through 2011.  Last year under Smith (actually all 3 years he was in charge) the Rapids had 22 points, the last three of which were gained when the Rapids scored an last minute goal in Portland that should have been ruled offside and the Rapids should have only gotten 1 point for a draw.

Right now the Rapids have 19 points, losing out on a point in the last game when the ref probably incorrectly gave San Jose a penalty kick for a last minute goal.  If the last minute calls in game 15 each of the last two years were made correctly then the Rapids would have had 20 points after 15 games in 2011 and 2012, pretty much dead on their average since 2000.

So with one of the toughest schedules in the league and an injury list 2.5 times worse than Smith had last year, Pareja has managed to lead the team to pretty much the same place Smith led the team after 15 games last year.  This while being a first-year coach trying to institute a new style of play and integrate a number of new players.  Call me crazy but I have a hard time understanding why people are calling for Pareja's job.  To me it seems like he's achieving essentially what Smith was able to achieve while dealing with greater challenges.

Smith Out As Head Coach

Well, that time off was a grand total of 3 days. Within the last hour the Rapids have announced that Gary Smith will not be returning as head coach in 2011.

Smith was out of contract and it had been reported a month or so ago that Colorado and Gary had agreed on financial terms for a new contract. However Smith was reportedly unhappy working with Technical Director Paul Bravo and stated that he wasn't willing to sign the new contract until that issue had been dealt with. Apparently the Rapids weren't willing to do enough to suit Smith and both sides decided to go their separate ways today.

It won 't surprise regular readers to learn, unlike a large portion of the Rapids fanbase, that I'm OK with this move. Smith has been the best coach in Rapids history, but that's not a high bar to cross. Clearly he was more successful than any coach in Colorado history, bringing the Rapids their only significant trophy in last year's MLS Cup. Outside of that great playoff run though, Colorado has continued to do just enough in regular season play to stay in the playoff hunt but not really dominate at any point. His roster handling during the CCL was poor and his decision to not even travel to Metapan for the away game was a bad decision. Combined with the "either Bravo goes or I go" stance he seemed to take in his public comments recently it was enough for me to be OK with him going.

Now the question is where the Rapids go from here. Steve Guppy is the first name that pops to mind, following the same path from assistant to head coach as Gary Smith took. He was brought in by Smith though and may leave with him. Some other names that have been floated have been former NE coach Steve Nicol, former Rapids player and Fire coach Denis Hamlett, and former Rapids assistant coach John Murphy. I'm sure we'll see more names surface in the coming days.

Turmoil In The Front Office/All-Time Team Recap

I was just going to do a recap of my All-Time Team tonight but the Denver Post had an interesting article about tension in the Rapids Front Office this afternoon. It seems that Gary Smith is happy to sign a new contract for next year, but not if he has to continue to work with Technical Director Paul Bravo.

Apparently Paul and Gary don't see eye to eye on some of the decisions made this season. There's no details as to which issues have caused the conflict, but given some of the reaction I've heard from various points in the Front Office I'm willing to bet that some of it stems from the choices made for the CONCACAF Champions League. Needless to say this leaves Managing Director Jeff Plush a big problem he'll have to handle quickly to keep it from becoming a distraction.

If it were up to me I would tell Smith that Bravo's the Technical Director next year and he can either accept that and sign the contract offer or he can choose to leave. Its no secret that I have been less than thrilled with Smith's decisions this year and I'm not sure I want the Rapids to bring him back anyway, despite him being the best coach in Colorado history (unfortunately not a tough bar to cross). To add this on top of it means I wouldn't be all that interested in going out of my way to make Smith happy.

**********************

On to better things. Over the course of the season I've been picking my Rapids All-Time Team, which I finished last night. For those who came in late or just to jog your memories, here's the full team:

Cannon

Vermes - Balboa - Kotschau

Limpar - Mastroeni - Paz - Henderson

Cummings - Casey - Spencer

Head Coach: Gary Smith

Bench: Hahnemann, Bent, Moor, Karanak, Ben Dayan, Valderrama, Bravo

Assistant Coaches: Glenn 'Mooch' Myernick, John Murphy

What do you think? Who would be on your team? Discuss in the comments or in the BigSoccer thread I created.

Rapids All-Time Team: Head Coach

The head coach for the Rapids All-Time Team is Gary Smith.

How Joined: Hired as a liaison for the Arsenal Academy.

Years In Colorado: 2008 through present

There have been 6 total head coaches in Colorado's history, but there were only two under consideration for this spot, Glenn 'Mooch' Myernick and Gary Smith.

Gary Smith joined the Rapids in February before the 2008 season through Arsenal with the idea that he would work with the Arsenal youth academy program based out of DSG Park. He was almost immediately promoted to assistant coach under Fernando Clavijo though, a move rumored to have been made by the Front Office and not Claivjo. When Clavijo's family issues forced him to leave the team Gary was given the title of interim head coach for the last third of the 2008 season, then had the interim label removed shortly after the end of the season.

He took over a Rapids side that was teetering on the edge of playoff elimination and kept them ion the race until the final day. 2009 played out similarly as Colorado was eliminated with their loss to FSL in the final game. In 2010 Gary finally had all the pieces and while the team only finished 7th overall they clinched a playoff berth with 2 games to play, and of course they took that momentum all the way to their first MLS Cup victory. This year the team has played very similar to prior years under Gary Smith, and once again we are on the edge of clinching a playoff spot or being eliminated with 2 games left.

In comparison to the rest of the coaches in team history only Mooch comes close. Myernick took over a worse team and let them to MLS Cup in his first year (losing to D.C.), and he also took the Rapids to their only U.S. Open Cup final (losing to Rochester). However Gary Smith's teams average 1.44 points per game in league play, the best in team history (Mooch's teams averaged 1.35). The MLS Cup combined with the best overall record beats Mooch's two finals for the all-time best coach.

Sitting On One Goal Leads

Gary Smith has been in charge, officially, for 17 games going back to last season. He also ran the team (though reportedly did not pick the starting lineup) for Clavijo's final game "in charge" while Clavijo was in Uruguay tending to his family emergency. In those 18 games I've noticed a troubling trend of the Rapids being happy to sit on a 1 goal lead instead of trying to drive the nail in the coffin by extending our advantage. Its happened enough now that I don't think its bad luck, I think this is a strategic decision by Gary Smith, and its not working.

To test this hypothesis I went back through the 18 games the Gary Smith was running the team and looked a the numbers. Here's a list of what's happened:



The first thing that stands out is the fact that the Rapids have only had more than a 1 goal lead under Gary Smith once, against the Fire at home last year. Other than that the best the Rapids have done has been 1 goal leads, which they've held 18 times in 18 games (Including the Fire game). 11 times, or 61%, they've been unable to hold the lead and allowed the opposition to score the next goal. Out of the 6 times we've won one goal games only once did we score first and hang on for a 1-0 win, the other times we've either had to come from behind or we allowed the opposition to level the game and then we scored late to get the win.

The particularly striking number is how many minutes we've been able to hold the lead in our 1 goal wins. On average its only 15 minutes, with a high of 33 minutes against KC in Smith's first game running the team. We've also held the lead for 30, 8, 6, 5, and 0 minutes (stoppage time winner) in getting the win. The 30 minute lead was that 1-0 in Dallas, Smith's second win as coach. Meanwhile when we lose the 1 goal lead we only hold it for 24 minutes, and in only 4 cases did we hold the lead for less than 15 minutes.

For comparison's sake I looked at what we did under Clavijo for the first 19 games of 2008:



Anyone who's read this blog knows that I think Clavijo was outmatched in MLS and should have been fired before the 2008 season even started. That said, he had a better record in 1 goal games than Gary Smith does, with essentially the same team. Not only were Clavijo's Rapids more likely to hold the lead, they also increased the lead far more often than Smith's Rapids do. Don't take this as a call to bring back Clavijo or anything, but its an example of the weakness in Smith's strategy.

What this shows me is that Gary Smith wants the Rapids want to sit on a 1-goal lead but are unable to unless its in the final 15 minutes of the game. The Rapids best three stints when having a 1 goal lead were right after Smith took over, in his first three wins, and since then the team has been less and less successful. We've seen evidence of that this year against LA (twice), KC, and Chivas. In all these the Rapids took a one goal lead early but were unable to hold it. The two games they won they scored late to take the lead again and didn't give the opposition time to break down our defense to tie the game. We can see that the more that Gary Smith puts his stamp on the team, the more were trending towards not being able to hold 1 goal leads.

The Rapids and Gary Smith need to realize that their defense is not good enough to protect an 1 goal lead in the first half or early second half and they need to keep pressing for another goal. The offense can't take its foot off the gas until the final 15 minutes at the earliest. Anything less than that just allows teams to get back into the game, as we saw against LA on Saturday night.

Petke and Smith Interviews

In recent weeks we've seen interviews on From the Pitch with former Rapids defender Mike Petke and on WeWantRapidman with new Head Coach Gary Smith. Lots of interesting talk, so lets get to it!

I think the Petke interview was the first time a former player really opened up about the way the Rapids organization is run. We've heard some talk from other former player like Mark Chung, Robin Fraser, and kyle Beckerman about how Clavijo handled the team, but this was really the first time a player was talking about the rest of the organization.

You can tell that Petke is not impressed with how the Rapids do things. His comparisons between the win or die attitude in DC and an organization of people without soccer experience here in Colorado makes it clear that he thinks there are severe problems in the Front Office. Petke went out of his way to make it clear that he wasn't talking about Gary Smith and the other players, who he says are "what's right with this organization", but that the rest of the Rapids hierarchy needs to be improved.

A large part of his interview discussed how his injury was handled this past year. He was obviously not pleased with the way things went and said it "Left a disgusting taste in his mouth" and that "If he didn't have a contract he would have walked away". These are some pretty powerful statements from a guy who's been a team player for his whole career. Since we only have his side of the story its hard to make a true judgement on the Rapids, but assuming that Petke isn't just making things up the fact that he needed to get union lawyers involved and a memo from the league Front Office in order to get the Rapids to approve the surgery he needed does not reflect well on the Rapids.

Petke also had a number of things to say about the differences between Clavijo and Smith, statements that back up what we've heard from some of those other former players I mentioned. He mentioned that there was no accountability under Clavijo, that lineups were based on his whim and not who had played well or poorly. He also said that there was never a game plan or team identity under Clavijo, that there was never any idea of what they were trying to accomplish other than just winning the game. Under Gary Smith, according to Petke, this has all changed. Smith has very strong plans for each game, a sense of forming an identity for the team, and extreme accountability. According to Petke that was a "refreshing wake-up call" for him and other players.

The Mike Petke interview discussed the past, while the Gary Smith interview was more about the future. Given that its just as easy for you to read the original post on WeWantRapidman as it would be for me to recap it here (and Nick deserves the hits) I'll just give you my reactions to some of the information Nick got out of Smith.

Its interesting that Steve Guppy apparently jumped the gun on the job. I wonder if this were more "settled" until the early news was leaked and that has caused the Rapids to have Smith to look elsewhere, or if there was miscommunication between Smith, Guppy, and the Rapids.

I'm very happy to hear the Rapids are close to a deal with Bouna Coundoul and I hope they get him signed soon. Anyone who's been reading this blog for a while knows I'm a huge Bouna Time! fan and I really hope he comes back next season. (I'd love to be able to buy a Bouna jersey, but apparently MLS/Adidas doesn't see a market for replica GK jerseys so I might resort to a regular home jersey with 1 Coundoul on the back). It seems like Preston Burpo might be the odd man out on the back line, unless he takes a coaching position. Burpo's a decent backup, but better to go young with Hughes anyway.

I agree with Smith that we need another full-back to push Kimura and Harvey for another season. Jose Burciaga isn't the answer and the news he won't be re-signed is good to hear. I think Harvey and Kimura (particularly the latter) can get the job done, but giving them some pressure should help their game. I'm less pleased with the idea that Ihemelu and Erpen will be fighting for the open center-back spot now that Petke has left. I don't think either one of them has the mentality to play well at that position and I'd rather go shopping for a new center back. If I had to choose I think Ihemelu has a better upside.

Smith also talked about adding a 4th striker to the mix. I agree that we need somebody to partner with Casey, and neither Cummings or McManus locked down that position last season. it will be interesting to see what Gary Smith's scouting contacts find. GS talked about looking at players form Holland, South America, and Italy, which is already a wider net than the Rapids have thrown in the past.

As of today there are 91 days until the Rapids start the 2009 season in LA against Chivas. There seems to be lots of work for Smith to do on the field and some work for Plush to do off the field if the Rapids are going to end the 2009 season at MLS Cup.

WeWantRapidman has Gary Smith

I was planning to put up an entry about Petke's interview on From the Pitch last week, and I will get to that later this weekend or next week. Right now though I want to highlight an interview that Nick Thomas of WeWantRapidman had with Gary Smith this week. Some good info in there and a good idea of what we can expect next season.

No coaching "search" done

The Denver Post reports that the Rapids signed Smith to a 3-year deal and Pablo to a 4-year deal. Guppy's contract is still being finalized. They also say that Jeff Plush told them that he didn't interview any other candidates for the coaching position.

Same old Rapids, taking the quick and easy way out. Gary Smith may be the guy, I have hope he will be. If the Rapids had done a full coaching search though, talking to the likes of John Spencer, Robin Fraser, and Paul Mariner (for example), and then settled on Gary Smith I'd feel better about it. They put all their eggs in one basket and they're either going to look like geniuses or fools. Given their track record I'm afraid its going to be fools.

Smith and Pablo

OK, first the news, then the commentary.

As expected the Colorado Rapids named Gary Smith the new head coach today. Terms were not released but the rumor is that it was a 3 year deal. I didn't see the press release until later, but there's some talk that the Steve Guppy hiring was also announced in the press release, then pulled.

Unexpectedly the Rapids also announced the re-signing of team captain Pablo Mastroeni. Pablo was expected to try to move to Europe this offseason, but apparently "Wanting to go to Europe" was just code for "Not wanting to play for Clavijo anymore". Again, terms of the contract were not revealed.

First thing's first. Re-signing Pablo was a great move by the team, and barring a huge surprise I'm betting it will be the best move of the offseason. It locks down the center of the field, gives us veteran leadership and continuity, and allows the Rapids to focus on what to do with Gomez and the central defense.

I think Smith is a safe choice for coach. He's in the system, Plush knows him, he's worked with the players, etc. Given the speed of the signing though I wonder how much time the Rapids spent looking at other candidates. Some of the top names, Mariner, Spencer, and Fraser, are all working for teams that are either still in the playoffs or were eliminated this past weekend. That doesn't rule out the possibility that they talked with the Rapids, but there isn't a while lot of time to do a long interview process with those coaches are involved preparing their teams for the playoffs. It just makes me wonder if the Rapids took the easy way out or if they really took a serious look at somebody other than Smith.

Lastly the Rapids once again botched a major announcement. Steve Guppy spilled the beans last week about the Gary Smith signing, helped on by the Rhinos and "other sources" according to the Post and Soccer America. While I expect that the likes of Steven Goff and Ives Galarcep will break the news a day or two early, its different when a random article from the Rochester Rhinos breaks the news 6 days early. That was then followed by fans talking about the Smith-Guppy pairing as the Rapids coaching staff, and anonymous sources saying that we were "assuming too much" or that those deals hadn't happened yet. Then today they announce Smith (and possibly Guppy) as the coaching staff.

So how exactly were the fans assuming too much about deals that hadn't happened yet? OK, maybe pen hadn't been put to paper, but its pretty obvious that a verbal deal had been worked out. Stuff like this just makes it look like either the Rapids are incompetent at handling the press, or they just don't care. Really, you can't tell your new assistant coach to shut up for a week and not go on a NY radio show?

Soccer America confirms Smith as coach

Still no official word from the Rapids about the press conference or the next coach but Soccer America is running with the story. They confirm the Smith-Guppy coaching pair and mention that Plush has talked to at least two current MLS assistant coaches about the Technical Director/General Manager position.

UPDATE: After an email query to the Rapids press office I got official confirmation of today's press conference at 1pm.