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| How I roll... (also, yesss....) |
[Sung to the tune of “When I Root", even if the meter’s a bit off.]
The Portland Timbers won’t be in “action” until next Wednesday when they get in the second half of their sleepwalk through Commerce City, CO, but that won’t stop the world around them from shifting. Various Western Conference rivals – some more immediate than others – will take the field this MLS Week 24. This post looks at where the relevant ones have been…and where they’re likely to end up after this weekend.
To finish the thought on that word, “irrelevant,” I’m pulling Real Salt Lake (and therefore RSL v Orlando City SC) and FC Dallas (and therefore Colorado Rapids v Dallas) from the sample – and on the grounds both sit too high in the table to matter for a Timbers team that’s struggling and with no “mightily” about it. And, yes, bad results for those teams in those games, plus the Timbers picking three points in the back nine of next Wednesday’s game will haul both teams back into the mix. Until that unlikely and likely hideous event, however…
With those ruled out, the following games from the MLS Week 24 slab should hold some interest for Timbers fans (listed in the order they’ll be played):
Minnesota United FC v Austin FC
Houston Dynamo FC v Sporting Kansas City
Los Angeles Galaxy v Philadelphia Union
Los Angeles FC v San Jose Earthquakes
Those first two count as two-fers – i.e., both teams are close enough to Portland in the standings for any result to matter – while the only thing that really matters with the other two is what happens with (or, ideally, to) the Galaxy and the ‘Quakes. Before picking through the relevant data, all this comes with one major caveat: any team that’s anywhere near the Timbers in the standing is almost certainly as erratic as Portland and therefore not good. I know dick about “the underlying numbers,” but do know that all those teams come in on or under average on the attacking side (25.0 goals for) and, with the exception of Houston and Minnesota, all allow goals on the wrong side of the average in the West, 26.7, or thereabouts. As such, any and all predictions should be taken in the spirit of a something between calling a coin flip and predicting the number that will come up on…let’s go with a ten-sided die. Again, I don’t do predictions, just expectations.
The Portland Timbers won’t be in “action” until next Wednesday when they get in the second half of their sleepwalk through Commerce City, CO, but that won’t stop the world around them from shifting. Various Western Conference rivals – some more immediate than others – will take the field this MLS Week 24. This post looks at where the relevant ones have been…and where they’re likely to end up after this weekend.
To finish the thought on that word, “irrelevant,” I’m pulling Real Salt Lake (and therefore RSL v Orlando City SC) and FC Dallas (and therefore Colorado Rapids v Dallas) from the sample – and on the grounds both sit too high in the table to matter for a Timbers team that’s struggling and with no “mightily” about it. And, yes, bad results for those teams in those games, plus the Timbers picking three points in the back nine of next Wednesday’s game will haul both teams back into the mix. Until that unlikely and likely hideous event, however…
With those ruled out, the following games from the MLS Week 24 slab should hold some interest for Timbers fans (listed in the order they’ll be played):
Minnesota United FC v Austin FC
Houston Dynamo FC v Sporting Kansas City
Los Angeles Galaxy v Philadelphia Union
Los Angeles FC v San Jose Earthquakes
Those first two count as two-fers – i.e., both teams are close enough to Portland in the standings for any result to matter – while the only thing that really matters with the other two is what happens with (or, ideally, to) the Galaxy and the ‘Quakes. Before picking through the relevant data, all this comes with one major caveat: any team that’s anywhere near the Timbers in the standing is almost certainly as erratic as Portland and therefore not good. I know dick about “the underlying numbers,” but do know that all those teams come in on or under average on the attacking side (25.0 goals for) and, with the exception of Houston and Minnesota, all allow goals on the wrong side of the average in the West, 26.7, or thereabouts. As such, any and all predictions should be taken in the spirit of a something between calling a coin flip and predicting the number that will come up on…let’s go with a ten-sided die. Again, I don’t do predictions, just expectations.
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| We all have our own version of a "bad neighborhood." |
Minnesota v Austin
Remember that one time, when Minnesota kicked the Timbers all over their stinkin’ nethers? If that team shows up against Austin, Minnesota will come out of the weekend five points ahead of the Timbers and with a game still in hand. An Austin win, meanwhile, would lift them to the same lofty distances as Dallas and RSL. So, how likely does either result look?
To confess my greatest fear, a Loons loss would confirm the global dread about just how bad/broken Portland is in 2023. Minnesota hadn’t won in five games before landing blows in two couplets on the Timbers; hell, they don’t win much at all (just six total) and have one just more home game before the trampling of Portland (v Houston). [Ed. The source for all that kind of stuff here and below is the usual: the Form Guide; bookmark that shit.] The four goals they dropped on Portland accounts for nearly 1/5 of their entire attacking output for 2023; maybe Reynoso changes that, or maybe Minnesota just played a brain-fucked Timbers team their last time out. As for the other side of the ledger, Austin’s road record is worse, they’re literally average on the attacking side and trying to get one or two past the second-best defense in the whole damn sample. The main thing pointing in Austin’s favor comes with the fact they arrive in Minnesota with a decent, recent grouping of wins - five in their last nine games. Sure, the last four of those happened at home, but Austin still pulled out of the poisonous funk that smothered them between mid-March to mid-May and that could give them the li’l jolt of confidence to steal some points.
Expectation: Going with a draw and Minnesota ending MLS Week 24 on 25 points, aka, the best Portland can get and if and only if they beat Colorado - and the Timbers could be ahead of goals scored is the first tiebreaker (don't know, won't look it up). I can see either team winning, for what it’s worth – i.e., this is a good game for the right (i.e., shitty) neighborhood – but would prefer Austin on the grounds that Minnesota stands between the Timbers and the playoff line while Austin doesn’t.
Houston v SKC
Home wins for Houston still feel like something close to automatic – 7-1-1, baby - but I’ve heard rumors of a resurrection in Kansas City...the question is how seriously to take them. SKC rests immediately above Minnesota, lofted on a pillowy cloud of goals for...wait, hold on. Here are the barest-bones standings for all the teams discussed in this post:
San Jose Earthquakes: 28 points, (21 games played, aka, gp)
Houston Dynamo FC: 27 points (20 gp)
Austin FC: 26 points (20 gp)
Vancouver Whitecaps: 25 points (19 gp)
Sporting KC: 24 points (22 gp)
Minnesota: 24 points (19 gp)
Portland: 22 points (21 gp)
LA Galaxy: 19 points (20 gp)
Got it? Good. Back to this one...
With SKC, the question is how seriously you take that 0-1 loss at home to (freakin’) Chicago because, not unlike Austin, they recovered from a terrible start (horrific in SKC’s case, 0-7-3) to become a basically normal, middlingly competitive team. Also not unlike Austin, they’re mostly doing that at home, but, they’re doing better with holding teams to draws on the road lately (three of the past four, though St. Louis did run them over) and, regardless of what happens over half a Colorado v Portland, a draw will keep SKC ahead of the Timbers. The only question is whether it’s by three points or zero....and, to draw out the subtext, no, I don’t see SKC winning this one...
Remember that one time, when Minnesota kicked the Timbers all over their stinkin’ nethers? If that team shows up against Austin, Minnesota will come out of the weekend five points ahead of the Timbers and with a game still in hand. An Austin win, meanwhile, would lift them to the same lofty distances as Dallas and RSL. So, how likely does either result look?
To confess my greatest fear, a Loons loss would confirm the global dread about just how bad/broken Portland is in 2023. Minnesota hadn’t won in five games before landing blows in two couplets on the Timbers; hell, they don’t win much at all (just six total) and have one just more home game before the trampling of Portland (v Houston). [Ed. The source for all that kind of stuff here and below is the usual: the Form Guide; bookmark that shit.] The four goals they dropped on Portland accounts for nearly 1/5 of their entire attacking output for 2023; maybe Reynoso changes that, or maybe Minnesota just played a brain-fucked Timbers team their last time out. As for the other side of the ledger, Austin’s road record is worse, they’re literally average on the attacking side and trying to get one or two past the second-best defense in the whole damn sample. The main thing pointing in Austin’s favor comes with the fact they arrive in Minnesota with a decent, recent grouping of wins - five in their last nine games. Sure, the last four of those happened at home, but Austin still pulled out of the poisonous funk that smothered them between mid-March to mid-May and that could give them the li’l jolt of confidence to steal some points.
Expectation: Going with a draw and Minnesota ending MLS Week 24 on 25 points, aka, the best Portland can get and if and only if they beat Colorado - and the Timbers could be ahead of goals scored is the first tiebreaker (don't know, won't look it up). I can see either team winning, for what it’s worth – i.e., this is a good game for the right (i.e., shitty) neighborhood – but would prefer Austin on the grounds that Minnesota stands between the Timbers and the playoff line while Austin doesn’t.
Houston v SKC
Home wins for Houston still feel like something close to automatic – 7-1-1, baby - but I’ve heard rumors of a resurrection in Kansas City...the question is how seriously to take them. SKC rests immediately above Minnesota, lofted on a pillowy cloud of goals for...wait, hold on. Here are the barest-bones standings for all the teams discussed in this post:
San Jose Earthquakes: 28 points, (21 games played, aka, gp)
Houston Dynamo FC: 27 points (20 gp)
Austin FC: 26 points (20 gp)
Vancouver Whitecaps: 25 points (19 gp)
Sporting KC: 24 points (22 gp)
Minnesota: 24 points (19 gp)
Portland: 22 points (21 gp)
LA Galaxy: 19 points (20 gp)
Got it? Good. Back to this one...
With SKC, the question is how seriously you take that 0-1 loss at home to (freakin’) Chicago because, not unlike Austin, they recovered from a terrible start (horrific in SKC’s case, 0-7-3) to become a basically normal, middlingly competitive team. Also not unlike Austin, they’re mostly doing that at home, but, they’re doing better with holding teams to draws on the road lately (three of the past four, though St. Louis did run them over) and, regardless of what happens over half a Colorado v Portland, a draw will keep SKC ahead of the Timbers. The only question is whether it’s by three points or zero....and, to draw out the subtext, no, I don’t see SKC winning this one...
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| Fuckin' baller. |
...but, if they did, all the teams around them should be damned concerned – and with the concern rising in direct proportion to proximity. I also don’t see that happening. Recent signals point to Houston getting even better at home – e.g., not only did they win their last three home games, they out-scored the opposition 10 goals to two (v ATX, v LAFC, v SJ, btw). Formidable...and do yourself the solid of saying that with a French accent.
Expectations: Houston freezing SKC on 24 points, opening for the Timbers...with an extremely rare game-in-hand thrown into the mix.
LA Galaxy v Philly
The Union started eating all the furniture in sight at the end of April. Home, road, didn’t matter: they ate everything in sight all the way into the beginning of June. It was the road form, specifically, that dried up with loses at San Jose (not surprising) and Atlanta (more surprising), and a draw at Orlando (who the fuck knows, honestly?). The juggernaut stopped barreling forward, basically.
The Galaxy, meanwhile, spent most of 2023 playing very, very badly – to the tune of a piling up some team’s season’s worth of losses (nine) by June 1. Some of that happened with a “yeah, but the numbers love them” dialogue bubbling in the background,” but the Galaxy have...started to back that up – i.e., they haven’t lost in six, with four of those coming on the road – and, of course, they just beat LAFC in front of a historic crowd. [One sidebar on that: In preview notes posted to Reddit, I made note of all the space Colorado left LA in front of the defense; turns out a lot of that was just Riqui Puig; the Timbers don't have a player like that. Dammit.] They’re no longer helpless, it’s...possible LA’s finding their way back, and yet...
Expectations: As much as I don’t think this is “2023 LA” versus “early May Philly,” I do expect the Union to get all three points from this one. I included the Galaxy in the sample for one chilling reason: if they win this game and, god forbid, Portland actually loses to Colorado, LA will be tied with Portland on points (but still behind them), with a game in hand in more momentum than the Timbers have seen all year. It’s not much for momentum, still...
LAFC v San Jose
This feels like it shouldn’t be here, right? The ‘Quakes loiter among some of the worst road teams in MLS (1-6-3), and it’s LAFC, right? Right?
Because anything that happens here operates in a space between six and ten points above Portland, I’ll keep this one short and shallow(er). I think everyone knows LAFC is out of sorts at the moment – for what it’s worse, they remind me more and more of Orlando every time I watch them, i.e., competent at everything, effective at nothing – and that makes this file under stranger things can happen. Going very much the other way, San Jose has started to stumble at home, picking up just one point from the last nine on offer (v POR, v STL, v LAG)...
...at this point, the main thing I’m looking for is which teams look mostly likely to either get or stay above the playoff line.
All in all, I believe this weekend’s opens a lane for Portland to get tighter with the rump-end of the playoff pack. The games in hand salted among...oh, pretty much every team above them (thanks, SKC!) means they’re already playing catch-up. It’d be one thing if I felt good about the next game and a half, but..............well, do you?
Till the next one. Who knows? I might be posting to a different channel by then...
Expectations: Houston freezing SKC on 24 points, opening for the Timbers...with an extremely rare game-in-hand thrown into the mix.
LA Galaxy v Philly
The Union started eating all the furniture in sight at the end of April. Home, road, didn’t matter: they ate everything in sight all the way into the beginning of June. It was the road form, specifically, that dried up with loses at San Jose (not surprising) and Atlanta (more surprising), and a draw at Orlando (who the fuck knows, honestly?). The juggernaut stopped barreling forward, basically.
The Galaxy, meanwhile, spent most of 2023 playing very, very badly – to the tune of a piling up some team’s season’s worth of losses (nine) by June 1. Some of that happened with a “yeah, but the numbers love them” dialogue bubbling in the background,” but the Galaxy have...started to back that up – i.e., they haven’t lost in six, with four of those coming on the road – and, of course, they just beat LAFC in front of a historic crowd. [One sidebar on that: In preview notes posted to Reddit, I made note of all the space Colorado left LA in front of the defense; turns out a lot of that was just Riqui Puig; the Timbers don't have a player like that. Dammit.] They’re no longer helpless, it’s...possible LA’s finding their way back, and yet...
Expectations: As much as I don’t think this is “2023 LA” versus “early May Philly,” I do expect the Union to get all three points from this one. I included the Galaxy in the sample for one chilling reason: if they win this game and, god forbid, Portland actually loses to Colorado, LA will be tied with Portland on points (but still behind them), with a game in hand in more momentum than the Timbers have seen all year. It’s not much for momentum, still...
LAFC v San Jose
This feels like it shouldn’t be here, right? The ‘Quakes loiter among some of the worst road teams in MLS (1-6-3), and it’s LAFC, right? Right?
Because anything that happens here operates in a space between six and ten points above Portland, I’ll keep this one short and shallow(er). I think everyone knows LAFC is out of sorts at the moment – for what it’s worse, they remind me more and more of Orlando every time I watch them, i.e., competent at everything, effective at nothing – and that makes this file under stranger things can happen. Going very much the other way, San Jose has started to stumble at home, picking up just one point from the last nine on offer (v POR, v STL, v LAG)...
...at this point, the main thing I’m looking for is which teams look mostly likely to either get or stay above the playoff line.
All in all, I believe this weekend’s opens a lane for Portland to get tighter with the rump-end of the playoff pack. The games in hand salted among...oh, pretty much every team above them (thanks, SKC!) means they’re already playing catch-up. It’d be one thing if I felt good about the next game and a half, but..............well, do you?
Till the next one. Who knows? I might be posting to a different channel by then...
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