Loan Recap and All-Star Selections

Catching up with some of our loaned players.  First of all its been announced by the Switchbacks but not he Rapids that Conor Doyle is on loan in the Springs.  In total that makes 6 Rapids currently on loan.

Charlotte (USL):

GK John Berner - Berner has started 8 of Charlotte's 17 games but his numbers are slightly worse than their other keeper's.

M Zach Pfeffer - Pfeffer has appeared in 11 of Charlotte's games, starting 3 of them.  He has no goals or assists.

F Caleb Calvert - Calvert has started 15 matches for the Independence and is their co-leading scorer with 4 goals and an assist.

Colorado Springs (USL):

D Joseph Greenspan - Greenspan has started both games he's been eligible for since going down I-25.  In his first game he picked up two yellows and was ejected and suspended for the next match.

F Conor Doyle - Doyle hasn't  played for the Switchbacks yet.

Talleres (Argentina):

M Juan Ramirez - Talleres has not started its season yet.

Also this weekend the rest of the All-Star roster was revealed.  After the top teams had nobody voted into the game Jermaine Jones was named to the team by Dominic Kinnear.  All told the top 3 teams in the league (Colorado, Dallas, and LA) had a total of 3 all-start, 1 each.  Meanwhile Montreal, 7th overall, had 3 all-stars.  In fact the teams that got multiple all-stars are 4th, 6th, 7th, 9th, 10th, and 11th overall which suggests that having stars doesn't actually help you win, which seems puzzling.

The most ridiculous thing is that the Rapids are far and away the best defense in the league (5 goals better than LA, 8 goal better than anyone else) but not a single Rapids defender made the All-Star game.  Axel Sjoberg should be an All_Star and you can make cases for MacMath, Cronin, and Azira.

In the end though I think its actually good for the Rapids.  One less game of wear on legs and one less chance for injury.

Clean Sweep

The game was more open than I predicted but in the end the result was what I expected, a 1-0 win for the good guys.  At this point we just have to accept that this Rapids team isn't going to put teams away but they have great confidence in their ability to defend a 1 goal lead late.  They have done so successfully 9 out off 11 times this season.

General Impressions:

• I was really surprised KC didn't park the bus more in this game after playing midweek.  You could see it cost them late as they were running on fumes.
• Most of the game though the Rapids did a good job of forcing KC to make the last-ditch defensive play hoping they would make a mistake.  KC did a good job of not making that mistake.
• Pappa was called offside early and it got to him.  I'm not sure if the call was wrong but Pappa has to be able to let that go.
• The other thing he has to let go is the ball.  He was far too in love with his ball-handling skills and instead of making the safe play he put the ball in risky situations that only paid off half the time.
• Gashi continues to find his rhythm after the Euro break.  He's got a breakout game coming.
• Axel was the rock in defense again.  Amazing he wasn't an All-Star.
• With Miller now returned from suspension and Burling getting healthy Watts needs to sit on the bench for a while.  He's had 3 plays that could/should have been called for a PK in 3 games, but only one was called.  He's been very lucky.
• The late PK shout for KC I thought was actually a good no-call.  It almost any other game that could and should have been called but Fischer was letting contact like that go all night without a whistle.  To call it in stoppage time for a result-changing PK would have been incredibly unfair.
• I don't know what Williams was doing with that ball on the endline in stoppage time but it was bad.  Good thing it didn't cost us.
• Howard din't have much to do (only 3 saves, none of them particularly hard) but he'll take the shoutout.
• When Hairston took his shot I was saying "Hairston has not shot, Hairston has no shot".  Oops
• With the win we're at 14 games undefeated, tied for 4th longest single-season undefeated streak in league history.  A result next week would tie us for 2nd.  Dallas has the longest at 19 games in 2010 (and we all know how that season ended for them).
• The Bodmer Line is now down to .67 pts/game the rest of the way.
• Bring on Dallas for our biggest game of the season so far.

Man of the Match: Marlon Hairston.  For a guy who I've been questioning the last few weeks the offense obviously changed for the better when he came in.  That and the goal was class.

Rapids Try To Sweep KC

Time to clean the spork

Once again we face Sporting KC tomorrow.  After beating them earlier this season both home and away the Rapids are looking to sweep Sporting for the first time since 1999 (when they were the Wizards and we wore green), and some of those wins were via the Shootout.  Kickoff tomorrow is at 7pm with an expected temperature of 91 degrees at that point so anyone coming out to the game remember your sunscreen and stay hydrated!.  The tailgate will start at 4 for C38's annual pig roast!  TV coverage will be on Altitude.

Player Availability:

OUT: D Bobby Burling (knee surgery); D Sean St. Ledger (knee); M Dillon Serna (season ending ACL tear)

SUSPENDED: D Eric Miller (red card vs. Vancouver)

ONE YELLOW FROM SUSPENSION: D Axel Sjoberg (3 games for good behavior reduction); F Shkelzen Gashi (5 games for good behavior reduction)

That's the official injury report.  The Rapids game preview lists Burling and St. Ledger as Questionable and adds Jones as Questionable as well, which isn't good.  KC has one player out and 3 as questionable.

Starting XI Prediction:

This seems obvious.  If Jones can go he takes Powers' place.  If Burling or St. Ledger can go (which I highly doubt) they would take Watts' place.  In fact since Burling and St. Ledger are listed as Out on the official injury report they may not be able to play in the game.

Prediction: 1-0 win, goal by Gashi.  This will probably be a somewhat negative defensive game.  Both teams have above average defenses and below average offenses (Colorado more so than KC in both cases) and KC is on short rest having played on Wednesday.  They'll probably play conservatively hoping to grind out a draw or steal a win on a counter-attack, a strategy the Rapids haven't excelled against this season.  The home altitude and added rest will give the Rapids the advantage they need for another one goal win though.

Looking At The Back Half Of The Season

So far this year has gone almost as well as we could have dreamed.  The only real blemish is that loss to FSL.  That has left many fans talking about what could be this year.  Best ever finish?  Win the conference?  Win the Supporters Shield?  So let’s take a look at some scenarios.

Just to set some parameters:

Current pace: 1.89 pts/game

Current points: 34

Best all-time finish (points): 51

Best all-time finish (pts/game): 1.59 including Shootouts, 1.53 in standard format

Best ever placing: 3rd

So the first challenge, best ever finish, is easy to calculate.  We need 18 points in our last 16 games to set a new point record.  That’s a pace of 1.125 pts/game.  That would tie our best pts/game standard format record as well at 1.53.  To set our overall best we’d need 21 points in 16 games, which is 1.32 pts/game.  For comparison, our pts/game pace over the last two very bad years was 1.02 pts/game.  So we have to play just a bit better than we played in 2014 and 2015 in order to set new team records.  I think it’s safe to say at this point that if do not have our best ever season this year that it’s a pretty massive failure.  We probably need to play at less than a point per game to make the playoffs so failing to do that would be catastrophic.

The next two questions, win the conference and the Shield, are a bit harder to calculate since it not only depends on our play but also the play of other teams.  The additional complication of course is as we do better the other teams (on average) do worse as they lose points to us, and vice versa.  So who’s our real competition?

At this point here are the teams at or above 1.5 pts/game (prior to the 7/13 games):

Dallas – 1.85

FSL – 1.61

LA – 1.61

Philly – 1.53

NYCFC – 1.5

An easy way to look at this is to project out those team’s totals if they maintain their current pace:

Dallas: 63

FSL: 55

LA: 55

Philly: 52

NYCFC: 51

As we discussed above, 54 is in our reach without too much work so we can probably disregard the Eastern teams.  That’s not to say one of them couldn’t get hot but the odds are not in their favor.  These are also worst case scenarios as these teams will beat each other up and they won’t all be able to maintain their current pace.  Also, as mentioned above, if we continue to play well we’ll take points out of them and drop them off their current pace (we have 2 games still to play against Dallas and 1 each against FSL, LA, and NYCFC).  Given all that, breaking 55 looks like a good indicator to finish 2^nd in the West, which would be our best ever finish.  That’s 1.375 pts/game the rest of the way, which seems reasonable.  To be sure we probably want to go for 58 points or so, or 1.5 pts/game.  A little harder but still achievable.

That just leaves one team and one challenge left, winning the Shield (and with it, the Western Conference).  It’s looking like the Shield will come down to us and Dallas.  We’ve got a slight edge at the moment with a slim lead and 2 games in hand on them.  They also have some schedule congestion coming up as they’re still in the U.S. Open Cup and they have Champions League play this fall.  Since the Copa break though Dallas has looked like the better team.  On pace for 63 means we need to maintain our current pace to get us to 64 and a win.  The twist is those two head-to-head matches.  If Colorado wins them both then if Dallas maintains its current pace in the other game the Rapids only need to play at 1.43 pts/game in the other matches.  Not an easy run but certainly not overly challenging.  Flipping that around with Dallas winning the 2 head-to-head matches means that Colorado would have to play at 2 pts/game the rest of the way which is very unlikely.

If the Rapids can average 1.5 pts/game the rest of the way they’ll have their best season ever and they’re all but guaranteed a top 2 finish in the West for the first time.  In order to win the conference and the Shield they’ll need to keep their pace from the first half of the season going or sweep Dallas in the 2 games. 

#KeepFighting

Well, that game was a bit of a roller coaster.  A rough first half led to a great 2nd half offensively combined with a pair of horrible defensive decisions that resulted in a fair 2-2 result.  it was both a point gained with the last second goal and probably 2 points lost through poor decision making.

General Impressions:

• This game was a perfect example of this team's mentality this season.  Down a goal twice and both times the team came back for the draw.  #KeepFighting
• Jones being a late injury scratch is a bit concerning.  Still waiting for an update.
• Williams lost his man (the tallest guy on the field for Vancouver) on the first goal.  Howard was left out to dry and still got his hand on it.
• The rest of the first half was somewhat dull.  Once again the midfield struggled without all 3 of Jones, Pappa, and Gashi being available.
• In a scenario such as that I wonder if a 4-4-2 with Solignac moving up front to replace the missing man of the trio wouldn't be more successful.
• About 7 minutes before the first Rapids goal I posted that one of Pappa/Gashi/Doyle needed to step up and earn their money.  Instead of one of them stepping up Pappa fed Gashi who placed a great pass to Doyle for the goal.  That works. ;)
• Eric Miller's red card was well earned.  I know Balboa talked about the possibility of overturn on appeal but the teams were informed before the season that the refs would be cracking down on those tackles.
• Until the red card the Rapids really looked like they had another goal coming and had Vancouver on the back foot.  I think a win was likely without the tackle.
• Gashi really led the charge in the 2nd half.  He was putting balls into dangerous places and was a bit unlucky not to get another assist or even a goal.
• The PK was a debacle from Watts.  He poorly heads a ball back but not out of play, was lucky not to be called for handling while trying to recover, then puts himself in position for an easy PK call on a ball going out of play.
• I don't think Watts really brought the Whitecaps player down, but the attacker knew he had a good shot at a PK when he felt Watts hand on his shoulder and took it.
• Great move by Pablo to push Sjoberg up front as soon as that PK was scored.  There was nothing to be lost by losing 3-1 and getting a tall guy on a header was our most dangerous play.  And it worked.
• Actually this is the first time this season where I think we earned points by out-coaching the other team.  All of Pablo's subs were the right ones at the right time and his tactical changes worked  outside of Watts' mistake.
• The only times the Rapids have allowed more than one goal this season have been the games in Canada.  I don't think that's how the exchange rate is supposed to work...
• With the draw Colorado maintains its league lead in points per game, but only by .04 over Dallas.
• The 13 game undefeated streak is tied for the 6th longest single-season undefeated streak in league history.  Two more games without losing would put us in a tie for second. (2010 Dallas went 19 games without losing)

Man of the Match: Kevin Doyle.  A goal and an assist makes this an obvious choice though it could have gone to Howard or Gashi before that late equalizer.