2nd half more of the same?
July 30, 2007 by f4denz.
OK, so coming out of the all-star break and two gutsy performances against international foes, expectations were high going into the Saturday night match against the Revolution (heck we had not lost to them since 2005), but it sure appeared that even with a very different line-up that the old RSL team was back in force. There were both great performances, and typically poor ones. I thought Kyle Beckerman continued to be the brightest spot on the pitch for RSL, followed closely by Nate Sturgis, and at this point of the season our teams MVP Nick Rimando. Average performances ruled the pitch, Wingert, Findley, Kyle Brown, Williams, Pope, and Harris, it seems average just seems to be our norm. Half-hearted performances were turned in by Talley, Chris Brown, Richie Kotschau, and Kirpre (who shows moments of brilliance, and then follows it with awful passes, horrible decisions).
I know that everyone wants to blame this one on the officials who were, in a typical MLS style, horrible. How you can call a straight red card on the Andy Williams tackle in the 67th minute? Yellow card, yes, but there is no way that was a red card. Allowing some other horrible tackles to take place, while awarding a free kick to the Revolution for what was a very iffy call, it seems much like the teams in MLS the officials have a far way to go to become true professionals.
So what does the rest of the season hold? Rumors of international players to fill our DP slot, seem to have been pipe dreams more than actual options, Mackelele is staying with Chelsea, Jay-Jay is well too expensive for RSL, and it seems we would rather pick the reserve rosters of teams like Boca, than chase a world class player. Oh well, I am sure that eliminating almost 1 million dollars in salary cap room this season by cuts, releases, and trades is just a cost saving move and never was a real attempt to find a “cornerstone” player. I mean it fits well with the FO efforts to cut costs by eliminating fan giveaways, replacing programs with generic newspapers and crappy newsletters. Oh to actually get a roster insert, but hey those cost money and besides it appears that RSL fans could care less about the play on the pitch, I mean we still show up, despite the product being offered. I mean heck, how many fans would have revolted if they had actually announced that John Ellinger wasn’t fired as coach but rather he was promoted to run the whole team. After all he lead us to 15 wins in 2+ seasons of play, instead of just saying hey we are putting John in as our new GM, they create some elaborate job title and say they are looking for a GM, 4 months later they still are just looking. Sure, what the hell we will buy it, it seems that nothing is too good for us RSL fans, why not take a guy who performed so poorly as coach that we had to replace him with a player who had no coaching experience, and let him run the whole team into the ground. Oh wait that would be exactly what we have been given. Here is my question, is John just running the on the field team or is he actually running the whole organization? If the latter is true, it would explain a whole lot of things that have happened this year.
So the promise is that perhaps on of the players from Argentina, or one of the guys here on a trial will provide some spark to drag the all time worse MLS team out of our funk? Of course the promise was that Freddy would be here all year, or that trading Jeff, would be good for the team, or that a public letter from the coach, would change player attitudes. I am still waiting to see what happens to those players who simply do not perform, the release of Torres today, is not a bad thing, considering that his play this year has been a far cry from what we expected from him. Is Stewart next? Or maybe Talley, who since the injury has had one decent match? Who knows what is next for the drama that is RSL.
OFF MY SOAPBOX