Houston Dynamo 4-1 Portland Timbers: The (Highly Specific) Curse of Manotas

"The machine" ain't what it used to be.

The thing about science is that the whole damn thing falls apart any time one fails to subsume all the goddamn givens. Sure, a person could assume that refers to the Portland Timbers on-call ‘keeper, Steve Clark - and, yes, he was anything but a pillar of calm and stability tonight - but I’m talking about something that exists beyond the rationale, outside the bounds of science.

The Houston Dynamo’s Mauro Manotas has Portland’s motherfucking number, that’s all there is to it. He scored his first ever hat trick against the Timbers in 2016, another goal in July 2017, and then a brace in tonight. Sure, you say, that’s just six goals. But what if I told you that was six goals out of 27 goals all-time in Manotas' MLS career? That sounds pretty serious until you see that, however vigorously the Dynamo suck as a team, he’s having a pretty good season. His best in MLS, in fact. So let’s get back to blaming Clark for this one, OK?

I kid, I kid. For all his shaky moments (well, hello, X factor!), I only blame Clark for Houston’s third goal; I get the circumstances of the moment, but I also know that any team with any goddamn sense looks for a ‘keeper who handles crosses, etc. better.

So, what to make of this shit? The hyphenated word “must-win” has a lot of meanings. At the top-line, literal level it means a team must either win the game in question, or be cast into perdition. Another meaning holds that, if you want to lurk in the minds of your opposition going into the post-season, you have to win a game like Houston away late in the season, a team that, prior to Saturday, had sputtered through at 0-7-3 in its last 10 games (while scoring only nine entire goddamn goals). That assumes Portland keeps their date with the 2018 MLS Playoffs, and that they aspire to something more than being the team a better one steps on on its way to the next round.

The Timbers didn’t win tonight, obviously. They lost 1-4, in fact, and to a team that (read between the above lines) has been fucking terrible since mid-July. Portland didn’t even score a goal tonight, at least not without a ricocheted assist from the opposition (thanks, Alejandro Fuenmayor!). No matter how you slice it, that’s a terrible look for a team with any ambition. Unless they’ve changed the template (and I don't think they have), the Timbers would have to survive, first, a knockout game as an away team, then a home-and-home against higher-seeded opposition. And, wow, can I just note how much more I like their chances in a Western Conference semifinals match-up than I do in a knock-out road game? Or at least that's how I feel after tonight.

With their prospects out of the way, let’s talk about the game. The Timbers only got slaughtered on the scoreboard…where it counts, admittedly, but the box score will confirm that your eyes didn’t lie to you; the Timbers had chances to score. More to the point, this game looked retrievable all the way up to the 71st minute, i.e., Houston's third goal, and Manotas' second. The warning signs flashed before that, and garishly (flapping like this is why I’m down on Clark), but Portland also had a plausible goal called back for (accurate, yet bullshit*) offside. I can’t remember when Jeremy Ebobisse had his free (and mostly free) headers, and I think only one of them wound up on goal, those were the chances I'm talking about. None of that matters, sadly, when your team starts to cough up goals like they got something jagged stuck in their throats. A team built around defensive principles should probably defend, like, a lot fucking better. And Portland did all of the opposite.

I came into this game optimistic, I’ll own that. That proved wildly far off and I won’t blame that on anything but bad luck and/or perhaps dodgy prognostication. All the same, I’m reluctant to blame the latter because even predicting a win can take several shapes. On the one hand, I believed Portland would win this game - mostly because every sign I saw pointed to that. On the other hand, the fact that the Timbers didn't win this game gives significant clues about their level as a team. This goes back to the "science" question I mentioned at the top of the page: nothing about the match up argued for a Dynamo win. They got it, of course and dammit, and that puts a dent on the "givens" around the Timbers, the things one can count on with them. For instance, the "system" Portland has suddenly doesn't look so viable. If a 4-3-2-1 can’t defend well, what is it but a stuffed bra? [Ed. - I left in that sentence, even though I don't know what it means, but because I like it.]

On that (no, not that [Ed. - the bra, I think]), I had a loose theory about what’s gone wrong for Portland since the glorious, multi-week success they and we enjoyed earlier this season. If I game-planned against the Timbers - especially during that string of wins ‘n’ draws that built the streak - I would have noted the way they just fucked up other teams in the open field; to phrase that in coach-speak, “give them space, give them goals” With that in mind, I would have drilled my team in the art of falling back immediately, and without losing shape, in the week before I played Portland. I think you can play the Timbers a lot of ways - press them, battle them in midfield, or even defend deep enough to go 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea - so long as the way of managing them is always the same: drop your players immediately when the ball turns over, long before the ball comes at your defense, and dare them to break you down.

It’s fun to say that Portland probably can’t break down a team - simpler explanations are satisfying - but, again, they didn’t fail to create chances tonight. No, they weren’t great either, but they made a dozen chances all the same. Honestly, that’s why I tweeted that the Timbers lost this game 3-4 in my head. Yeah, that’s still Houston winning, and the Timbers looking less than good. But…I guess that’s the thing. Is there a “but”?

One of the guys I watched with tonight (hi, @brioe162!) asked for any positives in the wake of tonight’s loss, and that gets to the deeper issue. Even after rummaging around the depths of my ass, I couldn’t really find one. Ebobisse had some incredible moments out there, touches deft enough, and plays smart enough, up to and including an early waltz through a succession of defenders so slick that it could have come out of a movie. Julio Cascante had some clean ‘n’ amazing interventions, the kind of stuff you see in defender-school, and he cleared a ball off the line besides. All that’s swell, but, all the same, it is literally impossible to claim the Timbers should have won this game. And that’s not good enough. I mean, sure, Portland could make the playoffs, but that’s the equivalent of getting in “C” in school, only translated to MLS. (No offense to the C students out there intended). Basically, if the Timbers limp into the MLS playoffs, barring a visible turn-around, there’s no way they’ll read as a competitor to win MLS CUP. If they don’t roll in strong and upright, who cares, right? They’ll die piteously young, if only in competitive terms.

And…yeah, I think that’s the sum of my thoughts. I didn’t mention the usual suspects - Sebastian Blanco, Diego Valeri, Diego Chara, and…I just completed my thought. They don’t deserve mention, and credit to Houston for that at least in part; they shut down the Timbers' money-makers, and that's always a good game-plan. They had their moments - Blanco more often than the rest, and Chara’s goal should have been allowed (again*) - but it’s close to impossible to call this anything but a deserved loss for Portland. On Houston’s side, I don’t even know if my theory about how they managed defense is right - e.g., the thing about “falling back” - but they did seem to draw the line of confrontation about 25-30 from the penalty box and kill from there.

There’s a lot of meandering up above, but it all goes to the same thing: making the playoffs isn’t enough to get excited about. I’ll always love the Timbers, of course, but I’ll also never say they look good to win a trophy until they do. Or that they at least look the part. Among all but the most delusional Portland fan, they don’t. It's probably too late to experiment, at least with risking throwing away the rest of their chances, and, if they've got better options (seriously, do they?), those options aren't coming to me. And that could the Ballad of the Portland Timbers this season: solid, probably good enough to make the post-season, and who cares? The reality is that they’ve been driving in the slow lane all season long, and that’s never gonna change, at least not till the team can bring something different, whether it’s Tomas Conechny, Foster Langsdorf, or someone from the outside.

Overall, this was anything but good. Again, the Timbers can’t drop points out of a game like this. But they did. And that might be all the story we need.

(* I have a standing rule about offside: if it's even close, call the play on-side. I'm a spirit of the law (aka, no cherry-picking) kind of guy, not the letter of the law.)