Portland Timbers 3-2 Columbus Crew SC: SUB VALERI (goddammit)

It's just right.

I want to start these notes on a, frankly, relieving win with an apology. Knowing full well that I had at least two full rows of Columbus Crew SC fans in front me, I yelled something very close to this somewhere around Columbus’ second (or third) shot on goal:

“Fuck it. Move ‘em to Austin.”

I don’t think it was just fans either. I think it was spouses and families. And they heard it. I saw the heads turn for the game of "Spot the Asshole." And...to anyone who heard that, I want Columbus to keep the Crew and get a spruced up stadium to boot...and I hope those aren't mutually exclusive. Just jokes…

A friend was kind enough to extend an invite, I got to watch this one live tonight and, honestly, the experience only continued my love/hate relationship with watching soccer live. The angle is never as good as you get on TV - especially buried deep in the southwest corner of the stadium - but, 1) I caught up with an old friend (invaluable past the age of 35); and 2) I had the best possible view of Andy Polo’s debut goal in a Portland Timbers uniform. It was by no means graceful and maybe a quarter planned, at most, but it was also welcome as Christmas morning, and, if I’m not misinterpreting Polo’s celebration, he had ample reason to thank his Lord and Savior for that one.

It was a night of firsts in some ways. David Guzman scored his first goal of his leggy 2018 season [Ed. - Correction: The author fucked up; that was, in fact, Guzman's third goal of 2018 and, as further penance, here is his first goal of 2018 (nice shot, too), and here's his second goal, Hail, Mary, full of grace, etc.], and Steve Clark played his first all-round sound game in a Timbers uniform…just fuckin’ with you, Steve. In all seriousness, hats off, Steve, not just for every free-kick you covered tonight, or every tough save you made, but for all the times you looked more upset than anyone else at every defensive failing. Respect.

Portland wound up winning this entirely vital game 3-2 - Niko Hansen scored his second of two goals (here’s #1) for Columbus, while Samuel Armenteros owes Lalas Abubakar a…let’s go with a Long Island Ice Tea for knocking his tight-angled effort past Crew SC ‘keeper Zak Steffen. In spite of a positively groggy start by Portland (Columbus families: This was my trigger! I’m usually very, very nice (I think)), the 3-1 that held for damn near 60 minutes of this game gives a more accurate read on its lived experience. As tricky as my view made it to read the game, I still believe I saw the Timbers defense round into shape between 25-30 minutes in (had a decent angle for that) and, once the Timbers switched from chasing Crew SC's attack to managing, I told my friend, maybe even before Polo scored, “I think Portland chokes this out.”

To anyone who doubts the MMA has had an impact on our culture…well, that one’s pretty benign, as it goes.

I’m not going to dwell overly on this game - not least because I experienced it with any appreciable manner of depth perception in only about…3/5 of the field. To give an example, I could see well enough to understand that Diego Chara had found a seam through Columbus’ defense to run into when he set up the Timbers’ third, but I also didn’t have any real sense of whether Steffen should have come out on that one, and I had no damn idea how well Timber was positioned to finish off the play (or even if Chara had a good lane for shooting). My views of the Timbers first two goals, on the other hand: amazing. Just the best possible angles. Now that I’ve made it clear where I sat tonight, I’ll finish my thought…

Portland did the necessary thing tonight (win!), the usual suspects had good games (Diego Chara (again, give this man a star on Hollywood Boulevard), Sebastian Blanco, Liam Ridgewell (how often do I say that?)…etc?), and, more than anything else, players who had contributed for some or all of the season, stepped up tonight; they made differences, they were Difference Makers, and, last I heard, those are the demigods of all sports. Who knows? Maybe this is Giovanni Savarese’s idea of “attack-minded.” On that, I can’t say I know of a better way to deploy this particular set of troops. (I also can’t say I see this players going deep in the playoffs.) All the same, by around the 60th minute, and definitely by the 65th minute, Portland looked in control. If memory serves (mmm…), Columbus had shot 11 of their 16 by the time Polo cracked his duck in motherfucking half (and then shot both halves), and I hold that up as a plausible indicator of the prevailing game states by the time Hansen scored his meaningless little something.

At any rate, my point is, with the game fairly comfortably in hand, and arguably from the moment Abubakar finished Samuel Armenteros’ thought, over as a contest, why in the sweaty Jesus armpits was Valeri still on the goddamn field at the 89th motherfucking minute? Why did I see him stand (trust me, he was in my 3/5, maybe even the 2nd/5th), at most 5 yards from a developing play just inside the Timbers defensive third, only take it in as passively as an acid trip? Because the man was exhausted. Chara played his skin off tonight (as usual), but I’d still really want to see him get a shorter shift, just this once, or even a day off; the same goes for Blanco (who also leaves his skin on the field most nights).

I’m mostly using my quiet voice on this, and will continue to, but literally everything recommended pulling at least Valeri tonight. This thought became consuming by the 70th minute, so, when I saw substitutions line up to take the field around the 80th minute…only to get held back for another five pointless fucking minute because…Gio wants to see if he can kill these players? And then Gio kept Valeri ont the field for a further four minutes, besides.

That’s the one thing I can’t stop thinking about this game...I mean, besides Gio wanting to kill his players. (He doesn’t, obviously.) What I don’t get is the logic of running the risk of breaking this team for no higher goal than making the playoffs. I think I’ve said this before, but making the MLS playoffs is like getting a C-, then bragging about it to mom and dad. This does not impress them. Portland’s next, and final, five games are: @ Minnesota, v. FC Dallas, @ Real Salt Lake, v. RSL, and @ Vancouver. And I have dozens thoughts on that schedule, and with an exchange rate of 2 (that is, 2 new thoughts fall away every time I look at it, but those get replaced with two fresh thoughts), but I will argue this: the Timbers could manage that schedule at their best. On that, I have two (final) thoughts:

1) This wasn’t Portland at its better; and

2) This team has to trust its bench at some point, even this 2018.

I know Savarese rested some players on Saturday - Ridgewell and Armenteros to name the ones I can remember - but he’s not resting the players with the best chance of taking this team anywhere this season. And I get that the playoffs are “like a whole new season,” and that you have to actually make them in order to enjoy Second Season. The MLS playoffs are also bloated as fuck, and I will give $5 to the first 20 people I see walking down the street the morning after the Timbers win MLS Cup 2018, if they win the Cup this season, but I like my chances of never having to make good on that bet (just not enough to risk more than $100 on it). What I really mean is that I don't see a ton of virtue in the simple act of making the playoffs; that's just leaving a corpse in a different part of the cemetery. If your team makes this post-season with virtually zero chances of surviving them, I'm not sure I'd call that an accomplishment*. And this team will go nowhere meaningful in the playoffs if get there with its best attacking players in their current state. So, Jesus Christ, rest Diego Valeri. Especially when circumstances give you a reason to.

* Of course there exceptions - e.g., if your team hasn't made the playoffs in 3-4 years, yes, just making the playoffs is an accomplishment, even if you die early.