Getting Reacquainted with the Philadelphia Union, aka, the Closest MLS Gets to a Technocracy

The RAND Corporation: Planning Your Future.

[Standing Disclaimer: While I have watched…just a stupid amount of MLS over the years, I don’t watch the vast majority of games, never mind all of them. As such, it’s fair to take anything below that isn’t a hard number or a physical trophy as an impression, a couple steps removed.]

Thumbnail History

In the grand timeline of MLS expansion, the Philadelphia Union arrived fairly early – a couple seasons after Toronto FC, one after the Seattle Sounders, but one before my Portland Timbers – or just 2010. You can pull a couple threads out of that thought, but the one I associate with Philly more than any MLS team doubles as the big feather in their cap: they used that time to figure things, and well. Not perfectly, but still pretty fucking well. Something else about the Union: once you get used to thinking about a team a certain way, that impression becomes sticky. In this case, that meant forgetting they missed the playoffs in six of their first eight seasons. On the one hand, they made the post-season in Year 2 (yay!); on the other, they missed it over the next four seasons. Like any expansion team, most of that first roster came from the scraps they pulled out of the Expansion Draft. When the limits of that approach became apparent, Philly put real effort into signing game-changing players – e.g., Conor Casey and Maurice Edu, or even bigger swings like Cristian Maidana – but those players came and went before their dry spell in the playoffs ended. And then 2018 arrived and the Union hasn’t missed the playoffs since; better, they won the Supporters’ Shield…in the weird season (i.e., 2020) and strolled to MLS Cup 2022, where they contested one of the consensus best-ever finals in league history against Los Angeles FC. Being able to skim a healthy amount of cream from their academy system clearly had something to do with that – players like Derrick Jones, Auston Trusty, Brendan Aaronson, Jack McGlynn and Nathan Harriel don’t grow on trees – but, personally, I consider how much better they got at signing impact foreign signings the bigger story.

Best Season(s)

While I bet winning the Shield felt as good to Philly fans as winning the (one and only…please) MLS Is Back Trophy did for Timbers fans, I have to think reaching MLS Cup feels like their high-water mark*, despite the pain. Again, MLS Cup 2022 was a fucking party…so, why don’t I go with the obvious thing? (Because I’m me.)

(* Also, this call looks past their solid CONCACAF Champions League runs of recent seasons.)

Philadelphia Union 1-3 Portland Timbers: The Day the Road Trip Ended Well

I just feel really good about tonight. Get over it.

After a first half that saw the Portland Timbers two goals up and playing pretty soccer, nothing short of an injury and/or electro-shock therapy could have made me call tonight’s game a bad result. That the Philadelphia Union playing pretty goddamn well has a lot to do with that. After pulling back a truly one-of-those-nights-weird goal at the very start of the second half, Philly piled on 15-20 minutes’ worth of relentless pressure, picking the ball off Timbers’ toes and swallowing up everything that got inside their half. That only leaves me more impressed with how Portland handled the so very many things that Philly threw at them all night. The game ended 3-1 after a Diego Valeri goal of Platonic simplicity put the stuffing back into Portland’s two-goal cushion.

Even if Portland stole two, or even all three, goals tonight, they stole some gems: Andy Polo’s cross on the first demands “exquisite” as a qualifier; 80% of what happened on Portland’s go-ahead goal* was perfect; and, after surviving the soccer equivalent of Leningrad, Valeri scored that glorious, sling-shot of a winner. And all this happened against a good team, playing well, and at home. Tonight’s win over Philly confirms the eye test of the past 5-6 games: Portland, 1) still has viable (healthy) talent, and 2) has its shit figured out. At this point, the Timbers sure as hell look like they’ve got another genuinely competitive season in them, and can I get a huzzah?! (* I just have to note that Diego Chara's touch was long; he didn't "draw out" Andre Blake, but he did hear Fernandez charging over his shoulder, thank God).

Because the rest of this post will probably swim with turns of phrase that will have people saying “jesus, get a room,” I want to close out my thoughts on the Union up top. Based on everything I’ve seen, this is a very good team that got, first, beat by a great cross, then undone by having to chase too much of the game. The teams largely traded blows in the first half, the only difference was Portland landed theirs; Philly threw the more promising punches and dozens more of them. The adjustments the Union made in the second half should send shake the spines of every Eastern Conference team; between Ilsinho coming on and twisting the Timbers’ defensive left into knots and, so far as I’m concerned, Haris Medunjanin forever having too much time for dissection, and too many Union players finding openings, the Union pried at gaps in the defense. It took a series of interventions and straight-up heroics from Steve Clark to let Portland hang on.

And, on that glass-shattering high note, Portland’s 12-game road-trip comes to an end. Assuming I got the math right in last week’s FormGuide ULTRA, they collected 14 points over 12 road games. As someone I watched with tonight pointed out, that’s over a point per game as an average, and I guess he pointed that out because it’s good thing, I do not know. What I do know is that Portland has played well for a while, they seem strangely impervious to meaningful injury (who’s Cristhian Paredes? I’m kidding!), and I’m more concerned with that than a 4-6-2 record, or 14 points. The fact they’re now 4-1-1 over the last six games, and that’s all on the road, all against credible teams (e.g., Toronto, Real Salt Lake, and…Columbus Crew SC, and now, Philly tonight), well, that gives a man leave for a couple huzzahs.

Philadelphia, and Taking One’s Chances in the Shooting Gallery

Opposition defenses feel this, with even less comfort.

In my last "todo MLS" post, I clocked the warning signs that the long season and a little special attention might be catching up with the Philadelphia Union's stout-of-heart, green-in-age defensive outfit. Exhibit A in this argument came with the blind-side losses to the Vancouver Whitecaps in Philly and to New York City FC in New York, to games where the Union scored two goals and coughed up three. It looked like a pattern: after all, even Andre Blake, the man most likely to in conversations involving, say, Nick Rimando or Bill Hamid, slipped up a couple times.

That same game contained the seed of the flipside argument for how Philly survives into the playoffs (and maybe even goes deep): they score more than they give up – something they did against the Chicago Fire just a few weeks before. Yeah, yeah, that failed against the 'Caps; I have seen the Union's attack when it's firing and it's a lethal, glorious thing.

Philly fully embraced a "shooting gallery" approach to their games in June. They went 2-2-0 over the month, scoring goals, coughing 'em up, with eleven falling on either side of the ledger. No doubt, it took some quantity of cigarettes and booze to steady their nerves, but, when they considered those games, I like to believe that every man on the Union's roster knew he had lived that month, and well.