Portland Timbers 2020 Retrospective: The Season I Let Jesus Take the Wheel...and How the Car Wound Up in the Ditch

I still feel good overall. (Nailed it!)

Fucked up year, yeah, yeah, yeah. Just thinking that reminds me of the ads at the beginning of the lockdowns when all the commercials included some perfunctory spin on the phrase, “as we go together through these [random adjective generator for new/difficult] times.”

It’s fitting there, though, because for the first time I can remember, I more or less shut down the critical capacities in my brain fairly early into the 2020 season and just decided to believe everything would work out just fine. Maybe that goes back to some lizard-brain coping mechanism of basically going limp in the face of danger (e.g., the way I quietly muttered, “oh well,” as my car slid into a ditch just before last Christmas), but I think something simpler suggested the choice.

I’ve insisted that either or both Diego Chara’s or Diego Valeri’s legs would give out “this year” for longer than I should have - and it’s always been Valeri’s that set off the most agist-predictive concern. I didn’t recall what numbers Valeri posted in 2020 till I checked (8 goals, 7 assists) and, sure, they had to manage his minutes, but the former came in higher and the latter didn’t stop him from continuing to serve as both key cog and inspiration for the Timbers - and his set-pieces (corners, in particular) have never looked better. Chara, meanwhile…maybe he can keep retirement eternally at bay by tackling that shit before it sees him coming.

It absolutely didn’t hurt that every player Portland signed ahead of 2020 worked out well or better. Felipe Mora never looked like much, but maybe that’s the same voodoo he uses to lull defenses asleep (and does he double in size when shielding the ball? And do defenders’ eyes somehow see the same thing?) I remember Jaroslaw Niezgoda looking on the verge of passing out after scoring his first goal for the Timbers (what? he came in with a heart issue), but, until his knee blew up toward the end of the season, he showed he could score all kinds of ways and his combination-play added still more fluidity to a much smarter and trickier Timbers attack. Yimmi Chara looked like a miss at the start of the season, but found both feet in time to hold Portland’s attack together as a succession of injuries took one player after another out of the team. On the other end of the field, and no disrespect to Bill Tuiloma, Dario Zuparic gave Larrys Mabiala his missing partner in central defense…also, hold that thought…

Portland Timbers 1(7) - 1(8) FC Dallas: Outta Gas...

That's the thing...you never know when it'll hit...

Glimmers of hope aside - e.g., the seven to eight of the final ten minutes of the second period of extra-time (but…keep reading) - things looked bleak for the Portland Timbers from the precise second Ricardo Pepi’s shot caromed off the post and…right back to set up Pepi for the perfect finish over the sprawling Steve Clark. It’s like the rather big little shit planned it or something.

Long story short, when fate tells you you’re fucked, there’s not a lot of room for negotiation. Sixes meet sevens, good gods, where to begin?

It was fitting, if nothing else, for the season to end on an ill-timed goal against one of those Major League Soccer teams that lives and dies by grit. Portland hardly put in a dominant performance, but they managed to play the ball inside the six-yard area, and with minimal contact from any FC Dallas player at various, if sporadic moments over the first 70 minutes, but the Texans always had one last defender to block the shot or poke the ball away (this is what I meant in the preview thread when I said they nearly always have someone in the way). When a toe, foot or shin couldn’t get in the way, Jimmy Maurer jumped in front ofeverythingelse - and all the way to the death as it happened.

That penalty shoot-out possessed a twilight kind of vibe, something that hinted it could go on forever, with shooter scoring and ‘keepers missing indefinitely…and then Jorge Villafana did and, as noted above, Jimmy Maurer got in the way one final, decisive time and, just like that, game over, season over, and sweet Jesus, how am I going to keep body and soul together until the 2021 MLS regular season/dodgeball with COVID resumes? I guess I’m still getting over the shock of losing one of my favorite stabilizers amid the madness. If you’ve got movie/TV/youtube recommends that don’t traffic in flaming paranoia, I’m listening…

In the event I haven’t mentioned the score yet, the Portland Timbers went up 1-0 in the…are fucking kidding me? 82nd minute, and through the kind of goal that, near as I can tell, they’d tried to score all night. For all their faults - and those started with letting Dallas bestir themselves in the second half of the first half - the Timbers managed to pin Dallas against its own backline on multiple occasions tonight; moreover, they came within one step, one spin, one poke, one lunge of playing the ball to within 12 feet of Dallas’ goal-line and having nothing but daylight and a yawning goal resplendently before them…only to have something go awry at the last second. For what it’s worth, I think the box score tells a fair story: Portland posted 22 shots, and with 8 on goal, so they found enough chances. Dallas kept them out by defending all the way to their back-line - which is something you can really see around the tiny fucking spaces in which Valeri and Villafana had to operate for the go-ahead goal.

Los Angeles FC 1-1 Portland Timbers: Running Through Hell to Glory

Ma tenders!

There was a lot to love about the Portland Timbers’ late, late (late, late, late, late) equalizer against Los Angeles FC tonight e.g., the way it felt like Portland looking at the right side of the mirror, for once, after they’ve looked at it from the wrong side too often this season, or the fluid beauty of the full faith and execution with which all the players involved found the right passes and made the right runs, not to mention seeing Diego Valeri drop the cross on a goddamn dime to Jorge Villafana’s back-post run. This was after 90 minutes into an exhausting duel and running on legs I’d given up on, frankly, too many seasons ago.

Personally, I most appreciated the aesthetic of the way it played out on my TV. I got only as far as “wai” into “wait, where’s that cross going?” before I spotted Villafana’s run. Watching the ball fly through the air as Villafana sprinted to meet it, seeing LAFC’s goalkeeper and defender pinch together to stop it - swear to God, it brushed the defender’s hair (who was it? no one important, just another victim) - and to see that it always could only land exactly where it did: ah, thing of beauty…

…what’s that? What about the 90 sweaty minutes passed before it? Yes, yes, LAFC pinged the woodwork like it was the object of the game - twice if byDiego Rossi, once if by Carlos Vela, and through disturbingly clear openings - but I’ve got caveats for days from Portland’s side of the “what ifs,” and Timbers fans got their fairy tale ending in a 1-1 draw that booked them a date with FC Dallas. In the grand scheme of everything, I’d call that result a steal worth not asking too many questions about.

First, either forget the box score (too even) or know that LAFC ran good-golly-gosh-darn riot for nearly all of the first half; hell, the Timbers could barely get out of their defensive third for the first 25-30 minutes. Portland settled down their affairs as the game continued, but I doubt even one dollar’s worth of the live betting shifted in their direction until the 80th minute. That said, the smart money would have started moving in the Timbers’ direction around the 85th, even if in search of a big payoff. They finally posted someshots and, I’m guessing, did most of the work to doing those last-minute revisions to the box score.

Seattle Sounders 1-1 Portland Timbers: Theories on Erosion

Wears one down a bit...

Personally, I can spin the Portland Timbers' 1-1 draw on the road to the loath’d Seattle Sounders several ways. A sampling:

The Optimist: The Timbers paced the first 60 minutes and could have scored several times over the next 20 minutes. The last 15 minutes never happened, there were no last 15 minutes.

The Pessimist: When your bend-don’t-break defense keeps breaking, you no longer have a bend-don’t-break defense. (Hold this thought, because it’s a biggie.)

The Fatalist: The Timbers can score on any team and pace large portions of any game; they also reliably give up goals: this is the unbendable nature of this timeline.

The Psychologist/Gambler: Everyone makes the playoffs and, with Portland and Seattle at No. 1 and No. 2 in the Western Conference and wholly manageable regular season schedules ahead of them* and only Sporting Kansas City as immediate competition (e.g., seven points separate both teams from Los Angeles FC (today)), there’s a decent chance that the Timbers and Sounders won’t meet until the Conference semis and Portland has a 2-1-1 edge in the series for 2020 - i.e., they grabbed four of those seven points in the series in Seattle - so they’re deep enough in Seattle’s head to hold the edge in that eventual match-up.

(* Portland’s remaining schedule: v. LA Galaxy, v. Vancouver, v. Colorado (maybe), @ LAFC;
Seattle’s remaining schedule: @ Vancouver, @ Colorado (maybe), @ LA Galaxy, v. San Jose)

All those arguments strike me as reasonable, for what it’s worth, because, per the fatalist take (aka, my jam), this is the team that Timbers fans have in front of them right now. What causes those late, fatal defensive mistakes? Beats the hell out of me. Also worth mentioning, the Timbers have only done the “draw-that-feels-like-a-loss” thing four times in 19 games this season. On the one hand, yes, that is just north of something happening 20% of the time. On the other hand, and prior to the recent shitty, 0-1-2 stretch, Portland won five straight games. Most of those happened at "home" (see the Vancouver Whitecaps), but the real blowouts - e.g., the 6-1 dismantling of San Jose and the 6-3 fun-fest against the Galaxy - happened on the road. Like tonight’s draw against a team that is, by common consent, the best in the Western Conference…except the Timbers for some damn reason, but, when the only real measure is who lifts the trophy in the end, who fucking cares about the chatter?

Los Angeles Galaxy 3-6 Portland Timbers: A Dream-Logic Romp

Ooh, better than my metaphor...

That was weird, right? Fun, for sure…but weird.

No question surrounds the game’s decisive factor: the Los Angeles Galaxy’s defense, which fucking s-s-s-s-s-sucked tonight. I’m going to check something, but I swear I’m not peaking. How many shots on goal did the Portland Timbers post tonight?

Ah, off by one. I was almost certain the Timbers had as many shots on goal and they had goals tonight, but that still makes the same point: Portland put just 10 shots on LA’s goal tonight, and that’s a rarefied strike-rate, six to ten. Or the indication of a defense - and a back-line, in particular - at odds with itself. When Portland broke down the Galaxy’s defense tonight, I damn near shattered - see here and definitely here. How many things had to go wrong, all the way down to LA’s defense almost miraculously keeping Jorge Villafana onside for the knock-back to Eryk Williamson (right?) - and, like most miracles, you don’t want to look too closely (fuck off, VAR!) - for that goal to come together? And yet, the Galaxy still had a couple more fuck-ups in ‘em, and on that one play, God bless ‘em.

That takes nothing away from Jeremy Ebobisse’s hammer of a short-range free-kick (and I’m always shocked when they go in clean from that close), or Diego Valeri’s cross-body, seeing-eye lob over LA ‘keeper, David Bingham, who probably didn’t even know he was exposed until he watched the ball sail over his head. In true Timbers fashion, they gave fans reason to doubt they’d hold a succession of leads, but they held on for what, when you add it all up, was a solid 6-3 win. And, for those not keeping track, Portland has built an impressive road record since coming back from Orlando. That kind of resilience serves a team well in playoff systems.

LA fought sporadically but fought hard when they did. For stretches of the game, they pushed the ball back into Portland’s half as if sending wave after wave of fresh players at them (it’s good; it was just the same eleven dudes). And congrats to Julian Araujo on his first MLS goal, because breaking your duck that hard sticks nicely in the memory, but it captured the essence of LA’s attack tonight: if you take away Christian Pavon’s final attempt to throw his team a life-line, something about the Galaxy attack felt over-improvised. I held out Pavon’s goal because, going from memory and broadcast-booth chatter, he tries that same move all the time. At times, LA took a basketball-style approach to Pavon - e.g., give him the rock and let him loose.

Portland Timbers 2-2 New England Revolution: A Must-Win You Don't Win

Is that a curtain you can walk through or just a set?

I’ve never seen extended comments from Jeremy Ebobisse, so that post-game interview was a personal first. I’m not entirely sure how to describe the moment, but to call that the last honest interview I’ve seen. Still waters and all that.

That’s what felt good on a night that ended with a kind of bitterness that it would take eating, like, ten whole grapefruit rinds to fully experience. Ebobisse scored a beautiful goal, one that came after a couple minutes of pressure from the Portland Timbers had the New England Revolution defense scrambling badly enough to lose him. He later scored what can only be described as a dumb goal, a sort of lunge-sprawl toward an incoming ball that looped in off his extended right foot. For all that I think he followed through consciously, Ebo couldn’t score the same goal again in 200 tries – one’s body simply doesn’t do…that in the normal course of coordination (honestly, if the rest of us so much as attempted it, we’d just collapse to the ground and wet our pants and cry) – but that only made up for the increasingly creative ways he’s found to fail to fire a shot toward (or next to) goal in recent games (the touch he gets in that highlight reminds one of the insane shit he does periodically). Well, Ebobisse found the goal tonight – and twice. And then everything else fell the fuck apart.

The Revs equalized on a late, deserved penalty call when Larrys Mabiala’s shirt-tug invited Wilfried Zahibo to very theatrically fall down. With that – plus an earlier (ominous) goal from Gustavo Bou – those two goals cancelled out Ebo’s brace, and the game ended 2-2. Larrys did, in fact, have plenty of shirt (saw the stretchy that proved it), so the only suspect thing about the call was the timing – i.e., the earliest phases of the 95th minute, after referee Jair Maruffo called for just four minutes of stoppage time. I don’t think there’s an argument to win in there, but feel free to make one. I wouldn’t have blinked about the clock running to 96 minutes, but for the Revs’ goal. If memory serves, New England won a corner right around the 94th, then another immediately after that, so it wasn’t crazy letting it run that high. It just ended with shit hors d’oeuvres for an entire fan-base who’s eaten their fill of them.

OK, that’s the end of jokes involving bodily functions. Last one. Promise.

The Late Tackle, 02 14 2017: Of Returning Prodigal Sons

Ah, Fredy! Ya beautiful prick! Come on in, son!

I want to start with a couple quick notes, then it’s on today’s topic (moving fast, people, go go go!).

First, I decided to skip rolling out preseasons results as they come in. Think I’ll just roll that into the final All-MLS preview post for 2017 that I’ve been fantasizing about since late January. Wholesomely fantasizing, ya sickos.

Second, articles like this one (e.g. “10 Observations about the New England Revolution Preseason” or something like that) are starting come out and these are just nice for getting a bead on where fan-bases are on their local team’s rebuild. I’m working this week to combine them into a big mega-post. I hope to post by the end of the week, but failing that, I’ll post it Monday.

Or I won’t finish it. You know how these things go. Just know I wanna (and that’s usually enough).

Coming Back And Why A Player Does It

A couple things come together for this one. First, MLSSoccer.com pulled together a list the author (Ben Couch) titled, “Which Former Players Should Return to MLS”? I resisted the initial temptation to come up with my own list – because, that’s a bigger universe than I want to wrap my head around for so little return – but it does include a nifty player or two – e.g., Andy Najar, Krizstian Nemeth and, for all you Portland Timbers fans, Jorge Villafana.

The thing I want to flag with this is how much more contingent this whole concept has become. Jorge, for instance, wouldn’t feel like the same homecoming as, say, Fredy Montero, who’s rumored (strongly enough to call it done, right?) to return to MLS with the Vancouver Whitecaps. Along with Seattle’s new kid, Gustav Svensson, Montero’s could follow from not so much success or failure during his one year in China as a change to the care and handling of foreign players in the Chinese Super League. A quick review of Montero’s CV shows a guy who’s continued to score for the teams he’s gone to (the main ones being Portugal’s Sporting CP and China’s Tianjin Tedo), even if he’s not lighting it up quite like he did with Seattle.

The Portland Timbers’ 2015: The Unexpected Inevitable Run to Glory

It's a rough approximation, but a fair one.

[Author's Note: This will be the last post on Conifers & Citrus. It seems fitting to leave things here, as this blog becomes one story about how the Portland Timbers won MLS Cup. There'll be more about the move at the end. For now, though, let's talk Timbers and 2015.]

I'm not sure how I expected to feel about winning the league. What I do know is that what I did feel is hard to explain. And probably a little unsatisfying.

First, I've been here before, sort of. I fell in with DC United after Major League Soccer's inaugural season, drawn, at least in part, by one of MLS's few non-ridiculous team name/uniform combos (e.g. Dallas Burn, Tampa Bay Mutiny, San Jose Clash; times were not good, and the uniforms, worse). I had moved to DC in 1997, in search of a place to fit (as it happens, I fit DC as snugly as a hand in a shoe). One thing hadn't led to another, at least not directly, but I still bought season tickets and took in just about all the games. Seeing a team win with that kind of consistency was something, at least until it wasn't. All that winning, for lack of a better word...well, it bored me. 1997 wasn't so much a campaign as a coronation: it had all the suspense of a Tom Cruise movie. (Does he win in the end? Of course he does.)

As the Portland Timbers' run went from encouraging to the, uh, motherfucking championship, I assumed that I'd experience something different, something more powerful. I never knew bad times with that DC (there, sniff....wasn't time). Also, it's not truly love till shit has got, however briefly, real – which, here, means continuing to watch a team, even love them, after you've spotted some warts, a trio of stray nasal hairs, and breathed into the reeking pit of halitosis that is your beloved's mouth. When you can look past all that and lay down every night next to that person, maybe even make sweet, sweet love, that's when you get to call it love. Anyway, with those warts, maybe your team, say, failed to reach the post-season one season and then didn't look a whole lot like clearing a lower bar to reach the post-season for much of the following season...stop me if you've heard this somewhere before...

Timbers fans all know what comes next: Portland's players bouncing like sugar-high toddlers in a big bouncy-house (or stadium) in central Ohio with fireworks shooting skyward behind them. They weren't alone, of course, not with 2,000 – 3,000 of friends bouncing right along with them. Meanwhile (roughly) 2,000 miles west, tens of thousands of Portlanders spilled out of bars and other ad hoc venues (e.g. the Crystal Ballroom and Revolution Hall) to raise their voices to the clouded heavens. I sang with some people for a while. And it was good. When Timbers fans stumbled out of the bar across the street, we sang at them a while. And that was good, too. Everyone looked very happy. Social media feeds rattled with disbelief and elation. The best description here is Hemingway-esque: it was good.

As I walked away from the bar that afternoon, hints of that old 1997 boredom followed me all the way to the train and rode with me over that long trip home. All I could think was, why don't I feel as excited as everyone else looked? Did it have something to do with the game?

Timbers Triumph: On a Plan Coming Together

Not my fault. That show was manifestly stupid.

Everyone knows the super-agent movie trope when the super-villain sets up some Rube Goldberg contraption to kill the super-spy, often one that functions on a glacial time-line, as opposed to just putting a big bullet straight through the friggin' head of his nemesis. That approach to taking care of the biggest of one's 99 problems is so obviously silly that only an obvious movie could lampoon it (one of the not much lamented Austin Powers franchise; funniest thing I've ever seen Seth Green do, for sure).

But I understand the super-villain mind. When some asshole has foiled your plans for world domination over and over and over – maybe he even hurt or killed that fluffy white cat you love with all your nefarious heart – you don’t want to just kill the guy: you want that son of a bitch to spend his last hours (and good revenge totally requires hours) tallying up all the ways he's fucked. All the ways that you, Master Super Villain, have 100%-guaranteed, and from every possible angle, that he is fucked. The goal isn't just to vanquish one's foe. For all I know, it's to see if you can't make him cry a little. (NOTE: Roger Moore squirted a few every time he had to run for a scene by the time of his long-overdue retirement from the Bond franchise; NOTE to NOTE: Apocryphal; NOTE to NOTE to NOTE: I heard he had a stunt double run for him, which isn't remotely Bond-esque, but my story about tears is 100% fabricated.)

I'm not saying I wanted the Portland Timbers to dominate and humiliate the Vancouver Whitecaps yesterday. First of all, that would be just rude, what with the classy tweet they posted today congratulating the Timbers and the Timbers Army. I mean, I can be vulgar, crass, etc. etc. I do, however, aspire to some basic quantity of class. Good taste...I'll do that later (Edit, Randall: Oh, the punches he pulls; there's some rot in the attic, people; war crimes in his head earlier today).

That said, beating Vancouver the way the Timbers did last night, and at the end of this season, shares more than a couple things with the super-villain's Super-Spy Death Trap. Timbers fans have studied its shape and structure for months now. Over time, they came to understand that the mechanics of the Timbers machine is overly complex, it has too many goddamn parts – and most of those don’t ever seem to fit together right – and it took far too goddamn long to function well, never mind as promised. And yet, isn't that glorious, mangled contraption working like gangbusters right now? I mean, holy shit, the goddamn thing works!

Portland Timbers Draw Sporting KC: A Study on a Work in Progress

Sacrificed my smallest finger. What have you done, Timbers?

I have to admit it. The Portland Timbers goal-less draw against Sporting Kansas City left me feeling...feelings.

As the Twitter-verse pointed out, and against the general way of the drinking world, can we all agree that we're all better off forgetting that first half and holding onto the bright memories of the second? The second half presented the Timbers Army, and affiliated fans, with a great big doozy of expectations. My right hand still bears the reddened evidence from all the times my fist hit a barroom table. (Consider that an offering: if I break my hand on the table after the miss that inspired it, can I parlay that brief moment of pain for a Timbers goal at their next attempt? If not, why not? Trade makes the world go 'round, allows the wheels of commerce to turn, etc.)

Getting back to the first half, however, that played out pretty much as expected. Kansas City plays to make the game ugly; they're a classic high-press, disruption-first kind of team; they set out to make it hard to play just about anywhere on the field (which makes them an excellent primer for the Timbers' next opponent, New York Red Bulls). Something shifted at the half that gave the Timbers the moxie and space to attack – and I hereby raise my hand to confess that I have no idea what that would be – but would humbly submit that maybe it was nothing more than that little bit more moxie that created the space...these are the mysteries of soccer, especially when one sits down to try to write the first, second draft of history (in this modern era, the first draft always goes to Twitter).

Whatever happened, Portland piled on the chances in the second half – and in a manner reminiscent of last week's loss to Seattle Sounders FC – only to find themselves "Melia'd" at every turn (and, sweet Jesus, is there some kind of passing of the torch going here, wherein KC's Tim Melia becomes the heir-apparent for fucking over the Timbers, a la Nick Rimando?). As a very smart man I watch games with suggested, does Portland just bring out the best in opposition goalkeepers? I mean, is this our club's fate?

The pisser comes with the fact that that little edge – e.g. a standing-on-head performance from a 'keeper – is all any given team needs to take a gigantic shit on a basically acceptable night for the Timbers. Being the sociable type, I didn't catch every single minute of tonight's game - there will people to meet, etc. - but I damn-skippy caught Graham Zusi's shot off Adam Kwarasey's left post (as well as a couple headed shots off set pieces that rather kindly landed at or near Kwarasey to make for comfortable saves). KC wasn't good tonight, really, but any team with enough talent, or even just a reliable trick up their sleeve – can steal any game against the Timbers on a night when they don't score...

...suffice to say that the second half of tonight's game made up for the first half, excitment-wise. Heart-in-throat stuff. And that's why we tune in, isn't it? Is that enough random junk in the  (long) lede? Let's review...

The Houston Game Showed Portland the Way: Can They Take It?

A Portrait of the Author on the Silver Screen. Or in World War II. Been to both.

In a post last week, I wrote a check against future credibility that I'm not 100% sure I can cover. To refresh memories, I studied all 25 goals the Timbers have scored in 2015 (now 28; thank you to persons involved) as a frame to discuss what the Portland Timbers do when they attack the opposition, or try to. I ended that post, 1) a bit in my cups; and 2) by suggesting...no, stating that I would talk about how to fix the problem this week. And with the personnel on hand.

Looking back on it all, I feel OK saying that whole idea was crazy. Or, better, beyond my knowledge and talents. If I could put together a post on that, and one worth reading, I may as well go start climbing the coaching ladder. Because professional stability is my personal "woobie" and on the suspicion that I'd probably start hiding from my players after the first confrontation (think Major Major from Catch-22), that's out. Another obstacle came with a morning-after-sane-light-of-day realization that the only things I could think to say on the subject echoed things I've said in the 20+ game reports on this site – e.g. I'm a fan of overloads. And...and...well, this is why I don't coach. Well, that plus the conflict anxiety thing.

But the statement obligates some kind of stab at the subject, no matter how feeble. I won't lie. When the first wave of writer's block hit, I consciously blocked out time to watch all of last Friday's game between the Timbers and the Houston Dynamo days after it happened (this is braver than it sounds; I actually caught enough of the match to see all four goals in context; then I watched the 20-minute mini-game; followed that up with the full 90 tonight; my family is looking at me in a way I can't quite translate; will call for help if needed; anyway). The hope was that the team would bail me out; I waited for them to put on a clinic, so I could sit down tonight and simply say, "like that. Portland should attack like that."

The Timbers: How They Score (When They Score)

Again! And do it exactly right this time!!

If you sit down to watch all 25 goals scored by the Portland Timbers in this Year of Our Lord, 2015, and let memory take thought for a little tango, you come to appreciate a few things. Among them:

- It never really got better than that home win over Seattle. The Timbers scored Number 18 in that one and, ah, she was something, that goal.

- Timbers have treated their fans to a few short, sweet mini-narratives this season. Or, per your preference, false dawns: those two, three weeks when Jorge Villafana made it possible to believe the club had pulled a secret dead-ball specialist out of its ass; the two-game partnership between Gaston Fernandez and Maximiliano Urruti that turned out to Gata’s swan-song. The team snuck in a couple surprise highs – see, Jack Jewsbury's late-game-hero cameos (speaking of swan-songs...it's comin,’ Jack) – but the great, fitful constant for the season comes with those wonderful occasions when Darlington Nagbe tore straight through the fucking sternum of a couple defenses, punching right GODDAMN THROUGH TO THE BEATING, BLEEDING HEART...OH MY GOD?! WHY AM I YELLING?! GOAL! GOAL!!!

- Those are cherished moments, those times when Nagbe all but freakin' teleported into that gap 25-30 yards from goal with defenders scrambling before him like panicked villagers with barbarians snapping at their heels. Feels like it's been awhile. Guess that's it. Thought maybe if I yelled loud enough they'd come back. Anyway, it's easy to forget sometimes just how much Nagbe was all over Portland's first seven goals of the season, late(-ish) as they came.

- Finally, who can forget the weird, hopeful waiting for Diego Valeri to come back.

- The feeling hasn't gone away.

- Has it?

The Revolution Comes to Portland: A Preview (+ More MLS Week 14!)

Like New England, only with WAY better kits.

(Editor's NOTE: The rush of a week’s worth of new sights and sounds meant I never made time to circle back to the Portland Timbers' win over the Colorado Rapids. (Bad amateur pundit!!) As such, that will inform the preview below as...context, I guess? And only in the first paragraph.)

For those who haven't heard, this weekend's game against the New England Revolution affords the Timbers the opportunity to do something they've failed to do since ascending into the Major League Soccer orbit – i.e. win three games in a row. One would think that, surely, Portland managed this during the annus mirabilis that was 2013, but apparently not. It’s not inconceivable that trip-‘n’-sputter run goes all the way back to the Timbers USL days…not a ton of hot streaks come to mind (but, yes, in 2009; holy...they even managed a five-game streak!).

Will the visiting Revolution squad play a sufficiently pliable (Homecoming) victim? Tough to say. As I think everyone knows by now, neither Jermaine Jones nor Juan Agudelo will suit up for New England on Saturday (injury and international absence, respectively). Such details sweeten Portland's prospects a little given the Revolution's recent run of form. Let's just say that games 4-9 (5-0-1) treated New England a hell of a lot better than games 10-14 (0-1-4). Game-day opposition might have played a role - the clubs beat in their earlier, glory run (e.g. Colorado, the Philadelphia Union (at their worst), and Real Salt Lake) are on the opposite side of the standings from the clubs they faced in later, leaner games (e.g. DC United, Sporting Kansas City, and the Los Angeles Galaxy) – but there's something neither here nor there, and both here and there, about New England in 2015.

To clarify that last mess with clean numbers, the Revolution scores like Seattle, but defends like New York City FC (well...that's among others with the latter, honestly, but most clubs who come near their 18 goals-against aren't doing so hot).

Excited as I am about this one (and I get to go to (half-)watch it live!), this game, along with several others, let Week 14 shape up pretty nicely. I'll do little bullet/point-of-interest previews for those games after previewing the main event: Portland Timbers v. New England Revolution. Let's go with...five talking points this time.

Orlando City Tops Portland Timbers at Home: A Game of Moments

Have things gone better? Absolutely, yes.

Earlier today, Orlando City SC came to Portland, Oregon, and shattered my confident predictions about old dogs pulling over a big one on a pack of young whelps. As many times as I felt a come-back coming on (just once, actually, about 65th minute), the Portland Timbers put together too few opportunities in what turned out to be a 2-0 loss, at home, to one of Major League Soccer’s (MLS) two 2015 expansion clubs.

What we have here is a dead body with many causes of death. Orlando deftly played around the high-ish press team defense that brought Portland reasonable success over the past couple of weeks. While several players had decent games, they had them in isolation from one another; in a word, cohesion was lacking. Just about every Portland Timber had moments today; trouble was, too many players had bad moments to match their good ones – especially the fullbacks, Alvas Powell and Jorge Villafana.

The funny thing is, the damage doesn't always come from the likeliest areas. For instance, Brek Shea tore up Alvas Powell and Portland's right, generally, and yet Orlando's opening goal came from Villafana's side of the field. The Timbers clawed back from the moment that first goal went in, if half-heartedly, and they had some half-chances. Sadly, half never translated to whole and, as I see it, the Timbers attack never made Orlando 'keeper, and former Timber, Donovan Ricketts, work half as hard as should have to earn that clean sheet.

It's not inaccurate to say I lost interest when Kaka knocked in his second crack at the penalty spot...yes, if I was at the stadium, I would have walked, but that also segues wonderfully to the talking points.

Timbers v. Orlando City Preview; All MLS Preview. PREVIEWS!!

Y'know, I do see the likeness...

Just like every week, I'm trying something new this week. Sure, the Review/Preview served a purpose, but, a brief acknowledgement aside, we're deep enough into the Major League Soccer (MLS) season to be past that. In other words, past the briefest look back at the Portland Timbers previous week's outing, I'll turn my attention to what counts: the team that's a-comin' to town (or, in other weeks, that the Timbers will visit) in the weekend ahead.

After that I'll pass on some quick (promise!) thoughts about the MLS games for upcoming weekend. This space is going full preview, basically. Well, after rounding up the past week's Portland Timbers talk.

It starts with some good-esque news (and old news by now): Diego Valeri is almost, sorta kinda in full training (savor that picture, people, and memories of better, simpler days). As for the rest, the tiny sampling of the Timbers community I visit turned in a muddled sample – which was, perhaps, a mechanism used to cope with the confusing sensation of a first win. One popular statistic pointed to the Timbers' superior capacity for bouncing back after a loss. What stuck out most for me, though, even if I didn't state it directly as I would have liked in the second draft, was how well Portland defended – and all over the field. Other people caught this too (see those links, plus parts of #2). Some players came in for some well-deserved praise, whether it's right back Jorge Villafana, or a much-improved outing for Timbers 'keeper, Adam Kwarasey; MotM fixture Darlington Nagbe picked up the usual praise, but it was nice to see a quiet, solid pro like Villafana get another nod in another space. (Personal Note: someone who joined me for last weekend's game kept referring to Villafana as "George." I liked that.)

The big, satisfying take-away from all that is that Portland will be hard to beat. Now, time to measure that against this weekend's opponent, Orlando City SC. I've seen them 1 1/2 times in 2015. And courtesy of MLSLive's ABSOLUTELY FUCKING WONDERFUL "CONDENSED GAME" FEATURE THAT I ONLY JUST FOUND OUT I HAVE, I was able to take 20+ minute look at Orlando in action. Here's what I saw in that 20+, plus a little of what I know.