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| Yes, sometimes players need their rest. Even "sexy" rest. |
The original title for this post read something like, “I Got
What I Wished for and Everything Went Horribly,” but, with one magnificent, uncontroversially
controversial shot (that shot is over the line; don’t play), team scapegoat/proximate
measure for the Portland Timbers’ ceiling, aka, Lawrence Olum, scored the equalizing goal that his team always seemed destined to score. The Portland
Timbers utterly frustrated the New England Revolution tonight, knotting them up 1-1 at the middle-of-nowhere they call Gillette Stadium (build a goddamn
stadium, Bob; you’re rich and New England fans deserve better), and they did it with
a team deep enough into the Bs to register as a B-, maybe even a C+. [ed. a bit of hyperbole, there.]
On a personal level, tonight was huge: the Portland Timbers finally rested some key players - something I’ve been shouting into this tiny
megaphone since The Dog Days of 2018 (shit…”Tiny Megaphone,” gotta claim that
name before someone else does) - most notably Diegos Valeri and Chara, and, in
a welcome twist, they also sat Samuel Armenteros, aka, the only forward who is
presently within a freakin’ mile of Portland’s starting line-up (more on that
later). I got what I wished for tonight and, won’t lie, tonight also made a
pretty good case for why I should not want this. This was a fan’s game, something
that any sane neutral would turn off for C-Span, or the radar pattern they
showed on the Weather Channel way back when (my dad watched that stuff for
hours…probably should have worried about that a little more). I also think that
suited the Timbers just fine.
Through the first half, Portland was disconnected enough to
make me wonder whether they’d ever practiced this particular starting eleven.
Things didn’t improve enormously in the second half, though they did improve.
Maybe. Here’s the thing: on the one hand, I have loose memories of seeing
Timbers players in New England’s half more often in the second; on the other, I
can’t remember a single stand-out moment for any one Portland player. Instead,
I see Alvas Powell making a miraculous run into the Revolution’s half, only to
pass to some phantom into the right-side spaced he opened by cutting inside, and
Lucas Melano making a similar run up the gut, only to shrug and shoot with a
head full of doubt somewhere around the 80th minute.
The more remarkable thing is that I can’t recall many similar
stirring moments for the New England Revolution, a team leaning fatally hard
into the ropes right now. Cristhian Penilla dribbled through some puzzles early for the
Revs. They almost broke the Timbers defense right away (seriously, both Jeff
Attinella and Larrys Mabiala stayed down longer than even jaded Timbers fans
should like), and Scott Caldwell finished off Kelyn Rowe’s strong shot to score
the Revs’ one goal (against Steve Clark), but, overall, the Timbers defended
well and attacked adequately…and that was enough against a New England team
that, arguably, should start thinking real fucking hard about tomorrow, if only
because today is unrelenting misery.
Before wrapping up Portland’s night, I want to pause quickly
to sympathize with…just everything about New England. I floated a theory - can’t
remember when either - that there’s no bigger “fuck you” in sports than
thinking you can start, like, a bunch of dudes besides your starters. And Portland
absolutely started the most defensive line-up I’ve seen from them in a while,
one, but for the grace of Sebastian Blanco, starved of attacking talent. I
just checked the box score and, even if I didn’t think Portland’s passing
accuracy didn’t suck that bad, the actual number wasn’t far off. There’s no way
this talk about this without coming off as enormously disrespectful to every player, but Andres
Flores, Cristhian Paredes and Dairon Asprilla - especially Asprilla - spelled “playing
for one point, and no more” in fucking neon. I mean, I’d give my third nipple
to see every one of those players get their groove, back or otherwise, but I
feel like Flores is the only one I truly understand as a player. The other two,
meanwhile…I mean, I’ve watched them, but I still don’t feel like I see the
upside yet. Sure, they got in the way with the best of ‘em, but…y’know, at some
point a team has to go forward and score goals. Also, and related, this isn’t
the first time I completely forgot Asprilla was even on the field.
I’m going to end this post on the balance between two
approaches to the same idea, one half full, the other half empty. In no
particular order:
Half Empty: Tonight, the Portland Timbers demonstrated the
puddle-shallowness of its own depth, especially on the attacking side.
When any players but the permanent attacking trio of Armenteros, Blanco and Valeri
take the field, this team can barely connect enough passes to play into the
opposition’s defensive third, never mind score from anywhere. Sure, they can get
lucky (again, Olum scored the equalizer), but that will carry this team as far
as one step into the playoffs and no further. All in all,
the players who took the field - and this applies to Paredes and
Asprilla, especially - they did as close to nothing tonight as I did by
watching from a bar in Hillsboro (Fucking), Oregon (and come visit, ya hear).
Even a semi-regular starter like Guzman suffered, in that he regressed to the players
around him. “Anemic” is the polite word for the Timbers’ attack tonight; “pointless”
feels closer to the mark, and with all its connotations.
Half Full Thought (which I’m favoring tonight): who gives a
shit? Maybe the Timbers can stuff a team with a B-/C+ line-up on the road
and/or when it makes sense just to grind out a one-point result when they have
to, and then give it to the opposition - and, more to the point, the same
opposition - with both barrels when it makes sense, or, crucially, on the away leg of a home/home series. Also, if I could wink any harder with where I’m
going with this, that’s a signal strong enough to solve world hunger…(I’m
talking about the playoffs. Just think about it.)
More directly, the Timbers leaned all the way into defending
when they fielded this line-up tonight, and it worked. Sure, against
one of the league’s (at best) middling attacking and/or structural teams, but
it worked and, no less crucially, key players got some much, much, much needed
time off to get ready to play games ahead that look more must-win every time
the Timbers lose outright. Which, again, they didn’t do tonight, and against a
team that’s struggling with all the effectiveness as a panicking senior citizen
in quicksand.
If I have a frustration with tonight's game, it follows from a persistent refusal to give the bench a chance - the attacking players in particular. In practical terms, if you're tied at 1-1 and have Jeremy Ebobisse (never mind Armenteros) on the bench, why don't you go for the win - and against a fragile team? This is the mystery of the Guzman for Bill Tuiloma substitution in a nutshell: bluntly, wasn't this game there for the taking? If so, why didn't the Timbers take it?
As anyone who follows my twitter feed knows, I didn’t care
much about this game - especially after Portland rolled up Toronto FC 2-0 at
home midweek. I also believe that Portland has an optimal team that can
beat a lot of teams in MLS, if under laboratory levels of care. No matter how high I put the odds against the Timbers carrying that to, say, MLS Cup, this team has
a good starting core, and that can take them places. The active question is
what else it has. Tonight answered with a resounding, “not enough,” at least not
without focusing with something other than an opportunist’s eye at success. Even
with all its starters present, healthy and suited up just so, I can’t see this
current Portland Timbers team surviving all the way to MLS Cup - and that’s no
matter how much I would enjoy the ride. (Going the other way, I wouldn’t…enjoy
it, I mean, not unless the whole thing met this set of criteria that even I,
the author of this fucking plot, pretty much fail to understand…I’m married,
and to a lovely woman; think of that for, like, an hour and fist-bump her in
your head for putting up with that little of pointless discontent.)
There’s been a subtle change in narrative, at least for me,
within the time the Timbers’ 15-game unbeaten streak died and the happy end of
the four-game losing streak that followed it. If you’ll excuse the word, a kind
of Realpolitik has slipped into the Timbers’ daily reality, a sense that fans
have to deal with the team that they have as opposed to the team they want.
Sure, it’s possible that some “Secret Weapon X,” whether between personnel or
formation, could unleash one of those dragons we all thought dead (because that denture-lisp was the last gasp), but, on evidence of tonight’s game, that feels
really, really unlikely.
To lean as hard into the positives as I can - and, for the
record, I believe in this - the best thing the Portland Timbers can do this
season in order to ensure success, and this is 1,000% arguably, is to try to
cheat to results in games where they can, while going for wins in the games
where they should get them. This goes completely against the fan-mind, but I
think it’s where this team is right now.
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