The Space In-Between: Catching up on MLS, the Portland Timbers and FC Cincinnati

Perfection is perfection, Mike Brady.

Major League Soccer’s offseason has lasted long enough for me. With an eye to keeping limber and toned, I’ll be tracking the league the same way I always do: once a week and from somewhere between a bird’s eye view and an airplane flight path. I will drill down on Thing 1 (Portland Timbers) and Thing 2 (FC Cincinnati) when there’s something to talk about with either – more on that below – but I’ll never see enough about any of the other teams to go granular on them. Fair warning.

Whether this starts a tradition or steps off from the wrong foot, I’m going to talk about MLS as a whole first – not least because the main point there applies to every team in MLS, including Thing 1 and Thing 2. (No, I’ll stop that right now…and has anyone ever done a version of that using penises for the “things”?)

When I read through (most of) Matt Doyle’s (aka, The Armchair Analyst’s) 2018 Global Review (which takes some time), two loose concepts kept surfacing: first, and most important, it gets a little easier every season for teams to lose touch with the pack in MLS, never mind the leaders; think your pudgier cyclists during the Tour de France. For those who journey through Doyle’s Labyrinth, you won’t read a naked and proud positive about any team until you get to the Number 18 spot (of 23 MLS teams), where he notes that Mauro Manotas balled out for the Houston Dynamo in 2018, scoring 25 goals across all competitions. The teams below Houston’s playoff-dodging squad are 2018’s pudgy cyclists – e.g., your San Jose Earthquakes, Orlando City SCs, the Colorado Rapids, the Chicago Fire, Toronto FC – the squads who put one foot in front of the other here and there last season, but never enough to really be part of the playoff conversation. Doyle used a really clean call-response to sum up Orlando’s season, but the same applied to them all (and Houston, honestly, and probably Minnesota United FC too):

“DISAPPOINTMENT: The whole season, really.”

Still, one team underlines the point about falling behind better than the rest: San Jose. They ended 2018 the worst team in MLS, none of their signings returned on investment, the head coach, Mikael Stahre, never really settled in and got yanked before the end of the season (having built no confidence), and Chris Wondolowski aged another year. Shit was bleak, basically, even if admirably scrappy. San Jose also won the Supporters’ Shield in 2012 with a sound defense and a set of brawlers for forwards. The league moved on, the ‘Quakes fell behind, and, despite some effort (but….the world’s longest outdoor bar?!), they haven’t yet figured out how to catch up. Every team in MLS: This could be you. You don’t want this to be you, so don’t let it be you.

MLS Cup & A Season Review from an Unreliable Narrator

Is safe, comrade.

I’ll start with my post-match analysis of MLS Cup 2018: the Portland Timbers lost.

What? Matchday Central never put up a...but…fine.

To start, I didn’t mind the way the Portland Timbers approached MLS Cup; the coaching staff actually impressed me a little. They set the line of confrontation higher than I expected, but that worked out, at least until a goal forced them to chase the game. Prior to that, Portland did a good job keeping Atlanta United FC in front of them. I hadn’t looked at the box score till now and…wow, that’s a balanced game, even to the point of equilibrium. Well, everywhere else but the score sheet. And that’s how you lose a game, people.

Here’s the thing with the last game of a season: there isn’t much to say beyond who won and who lost. No matter how feverishly the players itch for that shot a redemption, the next game won’t come till the next season. And what happened was really simple: Portland let in two crap goals, both of them dismal two-steppers. The broadcast team lamented the heavy touch by Jeremy Ebobisse on the first goal, but it was Ebobisse’s search for a better pass that slowed him down long enough for Michael Parkhurst (dude, not the fastest) to pick the ball off his toe. Parkhurst’s tackle left nothing between Josef Martinez and Portland’s yawning goal but Liam Ridgewell’s failure to stick all the way in. In a bit of cosmic unfairness, Ridgewell starred again on the second goal, this time by losing track of Josef “Single-Season-Fucking-Scoring-Record” Martinez, who would knock a header to a streaking Franco Escobar at the back post, aka, the guy Jorge Villafana lost. Two massive two-step mistakes, two goals, and the rest of it becomes what might have been – e.g., what if Ebobisse powered the ball across the goal instead of cushioning the deflection too near Atlanta ‘keeper, Brad Guzan? Had the Timbers leveled the score four-five minutes after Atlanta’s opener, who knows what might have been?

I fretted a little theatrically over Ebobisse’s mental state in a since-deleted tweet, but that’s misplaced nonsense because good players learn from mistakes. We’ll see how he handles this one, not just next season, but over the next couple; that’ll drop the relevant hints on Ebobisse’s ceiling. On that, Ridgewell had a bad night, an unfortunate capper on a season where he’d shown the mental resilience of three men by swallowing a benching and surviving an injury to become a key steadying influence during the MLS Cup run. How far did he climb in my mind: a trip down memory lane revealed that I’d written Ridgewell out of the team’s script somewhere in the middle of the season (Game 17, as it happens). The man enjoyed a side of redemption with his solid season, basically.

Atlanta United v. Portland Timbers: An MLS Cup Preview That Devolves Into Animal Metaphors

Spirit animal.

[Ed. – For those interested only in a breakdown/preview of MLS Cup, skip down to the double asterisk. For everyone else…let’s dig in.]

I went to bed two nights ago with the grand ambition of scouting Atlanta United FC by watching three of their archived: their two 2018 post-season home wins and their home win over the Montreal Impact back in April. I’d whittled that down to two games last night – the 3-0 home rout over the New York Red Bulls (patoo-patoo, [salt over my left shoulder], [cross myself in both the Catholic and Eastern Orthodox tradition], a pox, and may such an abomination never come to pass until 2019, amen) and the Montreal game.

I realized I’d already watched the win over the Red Bulls by the second minute (why didn’t I remember watching it? While I was stone-cold sober, my wife talked over that whole damn game, hence the hole in my head), and decided I’d only watch the Montreal game. That’s when I learned that ESPN+’s archived footage would only let me go back to November 1...

…and so, thankful that circumstances saved me from my most excessive impulses, I just read some stuff and watched a couple videos of people doing the lifting for me. Like a normal person.

** After a week of being completely checked out of MLS, I don’t have a ton of specifics on what will help or hurt the Portland Timbers when they battle Atlanta for MLS Cup. After a battle of my own – How MLS Organizes Content on its Home Page versus Me (MLSoccer.com won; seriously, it takes a fucking divining rod to tick through their content) – and considering those inputs, here are my take-aways.

The Layout Favors Atlanta, but There Is No Underdog

In the one in-depth preview video I found (before giving up; work on it, a-holes), Taylor Twellman and Matt Doyle (also Calen Carr) made smart comments about Atlanta’s greater flexibility in terms of how they can attack, and I think those are accurate. Doyle leaned harder into the argument that Portland is a one-trick pony – e.g., stay organized (a word that needs refining) and counter – but the Timbers are really good at that trick; moreover, “really good” leveled up to fucking great around the beginning of October. Better still, this “you had one job” style of play travels well. I don’t know whether to call it irony or accidental brilliance, but the MLS home page’s article on that same point puts more time into talking about the Timbers’ other long-suit instead: how thoroughly capably this team plays for another. Portland has been on the same sentence of the same page for the entire post-season, something that has made them so damn hard to beat that no team has.

To the extent Atlanta holds an edge, those factors – e.g., a reliable game-plan that every player understands and believes in – push back against it.

Sporting Kansas City 2-3 Portland Timbers: Conditioned to Believe

You are my God, there is no other.

Where to begin? With the ass-clenching anxiety of the final 30+ minutes, the beside-myself joy, or empathy for Sporting Kansas City for having the year they had and, yeah, Zarek Valentin probably really should have been sent off for a second yellow…

…then again, I’m good with that so long as you are…and, clearly, I’m only addressing persons outside the greater Kansas Citys, MO/KS and/or Seattle, WA metro areas. That was fucking incredible, right, a miracle on frosted grass (they play on grass in KC, right?), and a smoldering tribute to the lately infectious power of positive thinking?

As alluded to in the penumbra between the words above, the Portland Timbers advanced to MLS Cup 2018 on the back of a 3-2 road win in Kansas City, MO. Exactly two teams of 18 left Children’s Mercy Park with a win in all of 2018, a fact that threads garish neon threads around Portland’s accomplishment for tonight. And, for the record, I’m entirely serious about sparing a thought for everyone involved in the Sporting Kansas City organization and fan base (except the assholes who threw shit on the field after Portland’s second, stumbling goal; and, while I’m on it, has anyone else ever seen a coach step out to appeal to his crowd’s better angels like Peter Vermes did tonight (#StockRising)?). They believed every bit as inordinately in SKC’s odds of victory as Timbers fans believed in their own going into tonight (i.e., most of the hiccups in faith were my own), but that surely dissolved the second after Diego Valeri sank to his knees in disbelief after he scored his make-your-own-luck header (e.g., the "second, stumbling goal" noted above). I’ve never felt as close to him as I did in that moment (I'm buyin' the rounds, Diego!). And then Valeri got another one, and off the counter that would always follow so long as SKC pressed too high and the Timbers had available outlets…

…sorry, pausing again. Does this feel like ecstasy to anyone else? I mean the drug, not the state of mind. I’m just really, really happy right now, and on the grounds that, holy shit…the Timbers did it. They did all of it. Three fucking goals, in Kansas City, which, for what it’s worth, equals exactly 1/6 of the goals allowed in Kansas City during the regular season. (In the event I’m phrasing that badly, SKC allowed 18 goals at home during the regular season (the source of my math), and three goals tonight.)

I’m grasping at quantity because it’s tangible. But there’s nothing tangible about Sebastian Blanco’s equalizer, aka, the goal he seemed destined to score since 2018 started. That shit is permanently transcendent, just like Dairon Asprilla’s equalizer against Seattle about a month ago; it’s lore for the fan-base, a permanent, defining “where were you moment” that people will share – something that goes double if the Portland Timbers manage to claw their way all the way to the top, aka, hoisting MLS Cup to the sky for the second time in the franchise's short history.

Portland Timbers 0-0 Sporting Kansas City: "He's Had a Poor Night, John" Signed Stu Holden

The waiting is, and is not, the hardest part.

To start with the oft-repeated conventional wisdom from the broadcast – which I happen to agree with – neither the Portland Timbers nor Sporting Kansas City minds this result. To get all the prognostication(/bullshit) out of the way, the dynamics of the return leg play to Portland’s strengths, and for the same reason that this first leg played against them: Portland lived by transition all season, and the second game will put them back in their best shoes.

At the same time, yes, this result was not ideal (maybe; see closing arguments) and, as much as I think the Timbers have the game-plan/personnel to win any one game, 1) there are easier things than winning on the road against Sporting Kansas City, and 2) they could have won “any one game,” say, tonight, but they didn’t…and doesn’t that explode that particular fallacy? So, no, not the ideal outcome – give me what Atlanta did to the Red Bulls, only against SKC – but that’s where my thoughts on tonight’s pregnant, goal-less draw really start:

What specific thing would you have had otherwise? Or, from the other side, which Portland player made a defining mistake, or even generally failed to execute in today's goal-less home draw?

Blame Stu Holden for the title: that was close to his final assessment on Dairon Asprilla, and that wasn’t my thought for him. Sure, Dairon Asprilla killed a couple of attacks, but I’d still rate him at better than his regular season average on the night (if a couple steps below his prime-time playoff prime). More often, though, he and every player in Timbers green stayed composed on the ball, made good decisions/passes, made even better defensive reads, and generally took the game to Sporting KC. Asprilla’s better than average spread around the team to where I saw Zarek Valentin hold down right back as if he dropped anchor there; Jorge Villafana got into the attack wide, inside and judiciously; David Guzman defended better, smarter and more aggressively than he has all season, and Jeremy Ebobisse played bounces like ballet and, holy cow, do I have questions there (What, exactly, was the coaching staff waiting for from this kid?). On top of that, Diego Valeri looks 30 all over again, Sebastian Blanco’s influence continues to grow and Diego Chara needs a firehouse named in his honor right now as in no point in waiting and the people at the cutting ceremony better be damned important. If your primary definition of God is omnipresence, what is Chara but God?

The complicated truth of this moment is that the Portland Timbers are playing as well right now as they have all season. That’s great because it has carried them as far as it has – for those in need of a reminder, heading into the second leg of a playoff series, dead even in everything but (by all accounts, considerable) home-field advantage – but less great because they couldn’t put even one finger on the scale against Sporting KC, and at home.

Seattle Sounders 3(2)-3(4) Portland Timbers: Love Hangover

It's on me, guys. @ me.

I can’t remember whether I wrote it or tweeted it – and I’m not about to find it - but sometime in the very recent past I said that I never needed to see Dairon Asprilla in a Timbers uniform again. Yes, that sentiment resides at the intersection of harsh and ruthless, and you can go ahead and call me a bastard for it, but, obviously, 1,000 erotic poets banging away on 1,000 typewriters and stoned on “molly” could not express my appreciation for the man and his works in last night’s absolutely fucking glorious victory over the Seattle Sounders. In Seattle. Just…savor it. I re-watched the highlights just now and I want a gif of the little dance Asprilla did after slamming the winning penalty kick past “The Dread” Stefan Frei for Christmas.

While I’m in the business of giving shout-outs to Timbers I’ve recently crapped on, I want to single out/salute Andy Polo for setting the tone at “never-say-die-motherfucker” over the match’s opening 20 minutes. Until Jair Marrufo pulled him aside for a little chat, Polo played like he wanted to fight not just the Sounders starting eleven, but every last one of the 40,000 Sounders fans in attendance.

I’ll close out the introductions with a nod to Marrufo, who let both teams play in a way that was brave, even gutsy, and fair. No quarter was asked, and no quarter was given between the teams and credit to Marrufo for toeing what could have been a damned precarious line.

Getting into the usual (or sometimes?) fine-tooth combing over tactics, goals, or game states feels misplaced, like talking about the brush strokes of a beautiful painting instead of stepping back to appreciate the whole thing. Another factor: with all the goals came late in the match, I couldn’t remember half of them (aka, around the time “the root kicked in”); factually, I couldn’t remember even one of Seattle’s goals this morning* and, given my understanding of how trauma works, that’s something. Asprilla’s headed goal, on the other hand, somehow set up permanent, immovable residency in my mind, like one of those “core memories” in Inside Out.

(* Having now relived them – this one and this one, in particular – God bless the root and keep it holy. The intensity of…just everything swallowed up the sheer awfulness of the mistakes involved. Holy shit, how’d the Timbers get out of there alive?)

Diana Ross recorded a song called “Love Hangover” back when, and that’s very much part of my personal hangover collection this morning. Sounders head coach Brian Schmetzer called this “the most painful loss of my career.” Coming at the experience from the opposite side, this goes down as my favorite all-time Timbers victory. Yes, even more than winning MLS Cup in 2015.

This morning, I am sloppy with happiness.

There were moments of doubt last night – none more sticky and ominous than the goal Raul Ruidiaz scored that would have put the Sounders through to the Western Conference finals. I worried that the Timbers had spent too much time absorbing waves of Sounders attacks; I wasn’t sure the team could re-orient to punching back, not just on the road and in that particular stadium. As they did when they went down a goal in the first leg, the Timbers clapped back just 10 minutes later. The gloom and anxiety never had time to settle.

Along the same lines, the way Portland opened the game made little room for doubt. They back four defended lustily, winning just about every battle they were called on to fight; I’ll admit that Alvas Powell scared the holy living shit out of me here and there, but he held up, Jorge Villafana put out at least two fires that threatened to rage, and both Liam Ridgewell and Larrys Mabiala won a little place in my heart forever. Every Timbers player on the field dusted himself off every time he got knocked down and was back in the fight seconds later. I’m fully aware of how over-the-top all this reads, but this is as good an occasion for hyperbole as any I’ve experienced. Just freaking incredible.

In one my preview tweets yesterday, I wrote something about how the Timbers wouldn’t be where they are without the players who held the team together when the starters were down. And that’s why I want to close this mash-note with Andres Flores. I don’t think any player on the field played as many shitty passes as Flores did; in the attacking third, especially, “wayward” charitably describes the worst of his passes. All the same, Flores is a dude one season out of the NASL and last night he played in one of the biggest games in the Timbers’ MLS history, and with 40,000 people watching and willing him to fuck up. (In a moment of clarity last night, I finally understood why the crowd really matters; took me 40+ years; I’m slow.) Flores held it together. The whole damn team did, and that’s magical.

The Portland Timbers needed every player on its roster last night, just as they did all season long. I know I’ll be back to calling out players and putting sharp questions to their personal livelihoods. And, yeah, that makes me a bit of a bastard. This morning, though, I want to buy every man on the team a drink, one of those big colorful fancy ones with garnishes and novelty umbrellas, the whole damn nine-yards. Hit me up, guys. There’s room on my credit card.

Portland Timbers 2-1 Seattle Sounders: Success, Wheatfields, and Andy Polo

Middle fingers, all of 'em. YEEAAHHHH!!!

I showed up late to the game, mostly because I like to skip the National Anthem. (Honestly, I’m patriotic and appreciative as the next guy, I’m just not a fan of enforced rituals.) From the moment I walked in all the way through the Seattle Sounders’ opening goal, I never saw a Timbers’ player touch the ball in anything but desperation. In so many words, the omens didn’t favor victory.

I got no better sign of how much this series matters to Portland Timbers fans than the freakin’ wheat-field’s worth of middle fingers that went up all around my section (210) after Jeremy Ebobisse knocked in a finish beyond his years. Just to note it, the more I watch this kid play the more my brain silently repeats, “buy in, buy in, buy in.” Those voices in my head have no idea how hard that is for me.

This game’s actual miracle moment came when Diego Valeri dribbled through at least two tackles and flailed in the aftermath of one more to feed Sebastian Blanco the game-winner. After Blanco shrugged off some Sounders drapery to knock his goal past Seattle goalkeeper Stefan Frei, the sea of middle fingers rose again and underlined just how big this series feels in these parts. Is that healthy? Probably not, but that’s what’s going on and, golly, was I happy to take in the game live and in person. The mob mentality must have got to me because both my middle fingers shot up after both goals; this shit is infectious. The second goal was doubly satisfying after watching Cristian Roldan limp toward the farthest possible point of the sideline before stepping off the field. I have no idea why that pissed me off as much as it did, but I’m confident that Ted Unkel’s ultra-passive calls slid a burner under that and heated it to boiling. I want to sit down with him and ask how he only raised one yellow card through the length of that match…and I’m willing to listen.

After two late misses (one for either team) and an offside goal for the Timbers, that was all she wrote (here, I assume the author is Agatha Christie). Most importantly, the Timbers recovered from getting run over and scored on early to take a sadly slim 2-1 lead in this playoff series. As amazing as that was in the moment, it’s going to take some doing to make that score hold up in the second leg. A 1-0 Seattle win in Seattle is all it will take to send the Sounders through and that score-line fits that teams profile like personally-crafted skinny jeans (even my butt would look good). All the same, this win gives Portland a chance and, deeply apprehensive as I am about the road ahead, that’s all I can ask for, really.