Rapids Beat Chicago

It was nice to see the Rapids pick up their 3 win in 5 games with Gary Smith in charge on Sunday. The only other time the Rapids have gone into half-time with a 2-0 lead this year was the July 4th game against New York Red Bull. That game was also at home at Dicks Sporting Goods Park.

With better finishing and possession against Chicago, the Rapids could have done more damage to the league's best road team. Their fast start lead to Colorado being more than happy in the 2nd half to sit back and absorb Chicago's pressure. The Fire, with Brian McBride and Cuauhtémoc Blanco, mustered a few decent chances but that was it.

Most glaringly missing from Chicago's game were free kicks in goal scoring range. This year alone we've seen Chicago pull themselves back into a match they were out of after getting one in a dangerous spot for Blanco to put in the back of the net. On Sunday Pablo Mastroeni own Blanco. Blanco was kept so quiet that the most entertaining moment of the game was watching him in a foot race for the ball with fellow non-speedster Mike Petke.

Speaking of Blanco, in his short time in the MLS he's earned himself a reputation as a diver. He lacked opportunities to show off that "skill" in the match. But he did show himself to also be skilled in the art of whining. Toward the end of the match he went up for a 50/50 ball against Mastroeni. They both ended up falling to the ground. It was directly in front of referee Terry Vaughn. From the beginning of the match, Vaughn established that he was going to let the boys play. While writhing on the ground holding his back, Chicago got the ball and was attacking in the box. This prompted Mexican team legend Blanco to get up and trot toward the box all the while holding his hand on his back. Last I checked, there isn't a medical doctor in the US that espouses healing back injuries via your team getting the ball. But it seemed to work for Blanco.

After the match, Blanco proceeded to head over to match officials to show off his side and plead his case. It's a shame that a player with so much talent can't being a man and just take his lumps. It leaves feeling sorry for his mother. If he's whining like this at age, just imagine what a pain in the rear he was as a child.

With the win, the Rapids still have a good chance of making the play-offs with 6 games remaining in the season (3 at home). But talk about a revival under Gary Smith, like that over at Major League Soccer Talk, are premature. This team still has a way to go in turning around their overall level of play. Sure they've won 3 of their last 5. But note that MLST offers up nothing in tangible evidence of a revival beyond the wins. Nevertheless, the Rapids are on the right path. Could we be seeing Gary Smith at the helm in 2009?

Bouna On The Move? Fire In Town

Nick at We Want Rapid Man takes a look at Bouna's situation. The Denver Post also covers it here. It looks to be headed down the same path that lead Herculez Gomez to Kansas City. Will things turn around? Will we see Bouna in nets for the Rapids again? Or could we see him traded to a team looking for a goalkeeper?

The Colorado Rapids take on the Chicago Fire tomorrow afternoon at Dicks Sporting Goods Park. The Fire are lead by first year coach and ex-Rapids Denis Hamlett. The Fire are 2-7-4 in Colorado. They have not won here since 1999.

On the other hand, the Fire have hands down the single best defense in the league this year. Thanks to that they've managed 6 wins on the road in 2008. And they have Cuauhtemoc Blanco and Brian McBride.

While the Rapids beat FC Dallas on the road a week ago last Thursday, they haven't won back to back games this year. The last time the Rapids won games back to back was in October 2007 when they beat Toronto at home and traveled to Los Angeles and snatched a win from Chivas USA. The Rapids are 2-2-0 under interim head coach Gary Smith.

Just a follow up on Herc's move to Kansas City. The Rapids got a 4th round 2009 SuperDraft pick and a first round (Why can't we just say 5th round?) MLS Supplemental draft pick. They also got some allocation money. How much is undisclosed. It's not a bag of balls but is it enough to make up for Herc's loss?

Road Rapids

The Rapids are in Houston this weekend to take on the Dynamo. What changes will Clavijo make? And which Rapids will show up? As much talk as their has been over Houston's slow start, they have yet to win a game, I have a hard time taking Dominic Kinnear's Dynamo lightly. After all, the last time the Rapids had an easy game was against San Jose at home against Dicks Sporting Goods Park. And in that game the Rapids failed to come out and play, gifting the expansion Earthquakes an easy 2-0 win.

A Quick Question : What does the Rapids 2-0 win over DC United mean after seeing the Screaming Eagles fall 2-0 at home to the Chicago Fire? And why did the league schedule DC United for a Thursday night game right after a Sunday game?

Fire Illuminates Rapids True Colors?

I haven't watched this game. But a quick look at the stats had me wondering what the Rapids were doing. Last week the Fire lost 1-0 to KC. They had 19 shots to KC's 10. The week before they traveled to San Jose, winning 1-0 and getting off 9 shots to San Jose's 19. The week before that they beat NE at Bridgeview 4-0 getting off 10 shots to New England's 7. To open the season they tied Real Salt Lake at Rice-Eccles 1-1 getting off 8 shots to RSL's 17. In their 2-1 win over the Rapids on Saturday they let the Rapids get off 13 shots to their 12. That is, the Rapids got off 1/3 more shots than previous Bridgeview visitors this year. Obviously it's too simplistic to say shots tell the whole story. Nevertheless, it shows that the Rapids weren't shy to pull the trigger. What went wrong? Are the 2008 Rapids going to be any different than 2007?

-What View From The Couch has to say
-What We Want Rapidsman has to say
-American Soccer News' two-bits on the match
-The Offside on the match

No DP???

There will no be DP slots for Eddie Johnson, Landon Donovan and Carlos Ruiz next year. Despite originally declaring that the grandfathering in of these players would only occur for one year, the MLS has gone back on it's word. Those 3 players won't count as designated players in 2008 despite making more than $400,000 for the year.

If you're thinking that's good news for all 3 teams, it really benefits Los Angeles the most. Kansas City did not have not used their DP slot. There could be several reasons for it but it's likely they didn't want to make a move for a DP that was beyond a 1 year commitment knowing in 2008 if Eddie Johnson was still around that they would need a 2nd slot for him.

FC Dallas brought in Denilson half-way through the 2007 season. But his contract was only guaranteed for 2007. Even if Denilson had performed wonderfully on the pitch, which he has not, FC Dallas wouldn't be committed to bringing him back in 2008. They wouldn't have had to give away an arm in the leg to keep Carlos Ruiz (well, assuming they'd actually want to do that).

The Los Angeles Galaxy were the only team of those 3 facing a situation where they would have had to secure a 2nd DP slot to keep their grandfathered player, Landon Donovan. It was highly unlikely that the Galaxy would trade away David Beckham. For 2008 they were, as the original DP rule stated, going to need a 2nd DP slot since Landon Donovan is making a something a bit short of a million a year. The problem is every team knows that to be the case. There was no poker to be played; no picking up a 2nd DP slot on the cheap like New York did last year. Worse, Los Angeles didn't have much to offer other teams. And what little they had to offer would also mean giving away what talent they did have on rather mediocre 2007 roster.

I'd love to know why they did this. As the season wound down there was a lot of chatter about the MLS adding a 2nd DP slot for 2008. That seemed odd since they hadn't made the 1st one permanent. It was a limited time deal (3 years, IIRC) that was to be reviewed in the future. More so most teams did not have a designated player, let alone were looking for one. The big three - LA, Chicago and NY - had all used theirs. FC Dallas was the only other team to do the same. And New York had already secured a 2nd DP slot from Chivas USA before the season started. Why would most MLS owner / investors be in favor of opening to a second one? Having a home game or two with a larger crowd would be nice but they're already losing the arms race; why did a bigger hole for themselves?

My two-bits worth on it is that Los Angles was the largest source of that push. Chicago may have played along seeing the attendance boot Blanco gave them. It seems unlikely that many owners were taking the idea of a 2nd DP slot seriously. They may have even recognized that LA was pushing it. And if they thought the league was taking it seriously, they may have felt it had a chance despite a lack of strong support by most ownership groups. So permanently grandfathering in Landon, Eddie and Ruiz may have seemed like a good way to dodge the bullet of having pressure to fill not only one but a 2nd designated player spot. If that's the case, chalk one up for LA in the sly politics column.

The remaining question is how this will be treated for the salary cap. I would assume that they'll be treated as a 2nd DP which means only $350,000 of their salary goes toward to the team's cap. The question is, what will that cap be? It'll be tough to put together a complete roster with $750,000 of cap space tied up in just 2 players when the cap is unlikely to be much beyond $2 million.

SI's article on this one is here.

Not Dangerous Play? Really?

I was indifferent as to who was going to win Thursday night's semi-final (yes folks, it's a semi-final game) with the Chicago Fire and the New England Revolution. I'm not asking this because I was upset the Fire didn't win. I simply do not understand how Taylor Twellman can nearly kick a Chicago player in the face and it's not considered dangerous play. Has anyone seen a good rules of the game explanation for this?

The Newest Coach Prevails

You have to give DCU some props for making it interesting and coming back to tie things up after being down 2-0 at half-time. But they were still down 3-2 in the series and lost out in the end. Both teams had new coaches with DC's Tom Soehn in his first full year as a head coach. Juan Carlos Osorio only had the last half of the season to turn Chicago around and get them into the play-offs. Major League Soccer Talk has a couple good points about managerial mistakes Soehn made that contributed to them losing the series. On the flip side, fans who watched the series should now be able to see that one of the most important things for Chicago bringing in a new coach was that Osorio was able to lure Wilman Conde to the Fire. Without Conde's presence in the back the Fire wouldn't have progressed in the play-offs. He only had 7 games at the end of the season to start to adjust to living the US and to his teammates. That may have been just enough time to work out some kinks and be ready to raise the MLS Cup on November 18th.

Chivas USA With Best MLS Home Record Ever?

The 2007 Major League Soccer season is almost over. Beside playoff significance, the upcoming Chivas USA - Colorado game is important in that Chivas USA could be on the way to set the MLS record for the best unbeaten home record. The 2005 San Jose Earthquakes, since then having relocated to Houston, own the unbeaten record having gone 9-0-7 for 34 Points in 16 games (2.125 points / game). As long as they don't lose either of their last 2 home games, Chivas USA will best San Jose's 2005 record.

Even if Chivas USA win out they'll come up short in 2 other measurements. The 2000 Chicago Fire have the most points overall at home, 40 in 16 games. The 2002 San Jose Earthquakes have the best points per game with 37 points in 14 games for 2.6429 points per game.

Current Record
2007 Chivas USA 10-0-3 : 33 points - 13 games (2.5385 points / game)

Below are the possible home records that Chivas USA could end up with in 2007. They have Colorado and Dallas at home to close the season out. Neither of those teams have been doing anything to show that Chivas isn't quite capable of winning both of them.

Possible final home records for Chivas USA :
10-2-3 : 33 points - 15 games (2.2 points / game )
10-1-4 : 34 points - 15 games (2.2667 points / game )
10-0-5 : 35 points - 15 games (2.3333 points / game )
11-1-3 : 36 points - 15 games (2.4 points / game )
11-0-4 : 37 points - 15 games (2.4667 points / game )
12-0-3 : 39 points - 15 games (2.6 points / game )

Previous MLS season best home records by points :
2006 Houston 12-3-1 : 37 Points - 16 games (2.3125 points / game)
2005 New England 11-2-3 : 36 Points - 16 games (2.25 points / game)
2004 DC United 9-2-4 : 31 Points - 15 games (2.0667 points / game)
2003 Chicago 10-1-4 : 34 Points - 15 games (2.2667 points / game )
2002 San Jose 12-1-1 : 37 Points - 14 games (2.6429 points / game)
2001 Miami 10-2-2 : 32 Points - 14 games (2.2857 points / game)
2000 Chicago 13-2-1 : 40 Points - 16 games (2.5 points / game)
1999 Dallas 13-3 1SOW : 37 Points - 16 games (2.3125 points / game)
1998 Chicago 13-3 : 39 Points - 16 games (2.4375 points / game)
1997 Tampa Bay12-4 : 36 Points - 16 games (2.25 points / game)
1996 Tampa Bay 12-4 : 36 Points - 16 games (2.25 points / game)

Quote Of The Day

I liked this one by Fire blogger Luis Arroyave on Wanchope's performance with the team so far.

I'm not ready to call Wanchope a bust -- he has only been with the Fire a third of the season. But I still haven't figured out how a guy scores two goals against Germany in Germany but can't score against the Columbus Crew.

Chicago Fire For Sale?

The rumor the Chicago Fire are being sold by AEG is floating around right now. So far I haven't seen anything to back this up. But in general it would make sense that AEG's long-term goal, one that I don't believe they've explicitly stated, is to pare down to owning just the Los Angeles Galaxy in the MLS.

Should Sarachan Be Fired?

Should Sarachan be fired? That's the question MLS Underground is asking today. It's not a new one. Many Fire fans have been asking this for a couple years. Going into the 2007 season they were my dark horse pick to finish last. I wouldn't have put a lot of money on them for sure finishing last in the East. But every year we seem to have a team that surprises people and falls apart. The Fire were the best candidate for that. I didn't think Sarachan was changing the team up enough, their back line was too slow and Barrett and Rolfe getting more attention than they deserved.

What bothers me about this question is the timing. I do not understand why teams go into a new season with less than 100% confidence in a coach and when things don't go well they fire the coach only to scramble to find a replacement. Even worse they miss out on being able to give a new coach the off-season to make trades, sign new players and train the team in ways they feel they need. That is, not only do you piss away the first few games of the season but you're making it hard for anything to go well until the season is over.

That is why the question should be what if anything Chicago can gain right now from firing Sarachan. What changes could a new coach make? Who could be the new coach? Who is even available? Bradley and Nowak had their interim label removed for USMNT. Colin Clarke's signed with Puerto Rico. Soehn and Onalfo are in their first year with their clubs. So who? Brian Bliss? Denis Hamlet? I like Hamlett but if you feel things are going so poorly that it can't wait until the off-season to make a change, why would you not completely changes things? Why put the general's under study in charge?

A new coach may be able to squeeze a bit more juice of out the squad but unless they're able to bring in a bit more creativity to their offense and some pace for their defense things won't be very different under the new coach in 2007 than under Sarachan. That doesn't mean that Sarachan deserves to have the job. It's too bad they didn't use last summer to seize the moment, bring in a coach like Onalfo, Soehn or even Morrow with fresh ideas. I fail to see how a new coach right now will change things enough to be worth the risk. The risk being that you give the job to someone who isn't best suited simply because you need to hire someone, anyone, right away. They'd be better served waiting until December to make this move when teams will be willing to part with their coaches and players as they try to change up their teams.

Stay Away From Blanco, Chicago

Steve Davis lays out a good case for why Chicago should not be pursuing signing Cuauhtémoc Blanco. It's not just about the money or his age, 34, but the questions over how well he's still able to play. Just as importantly, Davis questions how big of a disruption Blanco would be in the locker room and on the pitch. I think he's spot on. The question is, what players should Chicago be pursuing for their Designated Player slot?