Hi, I'm Will Bruin, and I was just recognized as a Seattle Sounders legend. Now I get to do voice reads for the Sounder at Heart Podcast Network. Here we go. Come on. Hey, O'Shea. Let's go. I'm sorry about the drive. And now they truly can start the celebrations. It's the Sounders MLS Cup. Leaves absolutely no doubt. The Saunders rule the region. He's gone! He's gone! Finally!
This feels fucking awesome. This is a tiny dog. Nice work on your little yacht thing. You know, what was the thought process in terms of who you decided to use and who you didn't? Ever since. Carter wrote a commentary that we didn't take the overcome seriously. This episode of Nos Arietes is sponsored by Full Pull Wines, a Seattle-based wine retailer and proud sponsor of Nos Arietes since 2011.
Polpo was founded in 2009, is based in Seattle, and is owned and operated by longtime Sounders supporters. They offer the best boutique wines of the world to members of their mailing list, with special focus on their home, Pacific Northwest. Welcome back to another episode of Nos Adientes. I am Jeremiah O'Shann. And joining me this week, again, reprising his role. I'm not even going to say as Matt Doyle's backup, you're now... You're now now you're back for a second time. You're you're you're.
the guy at this point. So Joe Lowry of backheeled, how the West will be won. after week nine. Welcome back, Joe. Yeah, it's great to be back. First of all, thank you for having me. What Doyle doesn't understand is that the backup quarterback is the best job in sports, right? You cash the check.
You come up clutch every once in a while when your name is called and you get to hang out and have a good time and eat snacks. Like I don't understand what the downside is to this situation. There is no downside. There is no downside. Exactly. So thank you, Joe, for doing this. As we want to do on this show, we're going to kind of go a little freestyle. We're just going to kind of go through Western Conference results, Western Conference thought.
But I wanted to highlight, you do great work at Backheeled. You have at least two must-read features every week on there that are, I hope... part of the regular routine of our listeners. And one of them is winners and losers. And one of them is the, your, your in-depth power rankings. I want to talk about real quickly at the top of the show, because you were so kind to the Sounders this week in Winners and Losers. Did it feel to you like the Sounders sort of turned a corner this week?
A hundred percent in the way that they get the result against Nashville. I think that this team had turned a corner already in terms of their actual performances on the season where they've been playing a lot of good ball over the last month or so now. finally getting their feet back under them a little bit after CCC and working the way back through dealing with all these different injuries.
I think they've been playing some really good soccer. Really, even that San Diego game, I know it was a tough pill to swallow. They weren't three goals worse than San Diego in that game. They were better than San Jose in that 1-1 draw. They were better than Houston in that 0-0, right? And finally, against Dallas.
Get back in the win column for the first time in like a real game. That win over LAFC didn't feel like a real game to me. I agree. That Dallas win on the road was a real game and a super Seattle-y real game at that. And then the Nashville win. They played really, really well just taking over this game against Nashville. And that's what you should do at home against Nashville. But also, and I tried to remind readers in that column because this has gone maybe a bit under the radar.
Outside of Nashville itself, Nashville this year as a team. are a much improved outfit. They have new energy under BJ Callahan. They have a new tactical approach. They're getting production from places under Callahan that they just weren't last season. They retooled part of the roster over the offseason.
This is a, I don't know if legit is probably a little bit too strong, but this is a national team that beat the Philadelphia union. And that was a better team over both Charlotte and Cincinnati already this year. And Charlotte and Cincinnati are the top two teams in the Eastern conference. So Nashville are a good team.
And Seattle took them to task in that game. I thought Christian O'Don and Obed Vargas were phenomenal in that midfield, in probably their best game of the season. Yeah, 100% agree. Obed Vargas in particular, I've been a little slower to hop on the Obed train than I think some people.
I'm there, man. I'm all the way there. The way that he took Jack Mayer and just bent him all around in that assist that he had to Pedro De La Vega. Yeah, it was a great performance. One of the better individual performances I've seen from the Sounders in a hop. Yeah, it was a very positive performance in a lot of ways that you outlined. I'll tell you a stat I just looked up today. I was very interested. I thought it was very telling.
So when Mussofsky or Morris are on the field, the Sounders are outscoring opponents in league play 12-6. When they are not on the field, they're being outscored 5-0. And really, the XG numbers tell a very similar story. They're basically...
1.9 to 0.85 XG advantage versus like 0.69 to 0. 7-2 or something like that like but it's like they're actually playing okay defense when either one of them on the field but the there's almost a 3x difference in their xg when those guys are on the field which is They're basically scoring at two goals a game when those guys play. And what's very convenient about that is that...
They have not played together at all. They've played in the same game, but they've only replaced each other or one of them is in and one of them is out. So it's really easy to actually gather this data, but it makes for something. It's like one of those fun things where the data tells the exact same story that your eyes are telling you.
Yeah, 100%. I think the Sounders have really benefited when that nine has been on the field to actually push the opposing backline back and create space underneath. I'm still waiting. I know Ferreira grabs a pair of assists in this game against Nashville.
Still sort of waiting for more from him. I mean, you can't ask for more than a pair of assists, but assists are kind of a made-up stat anyway, right? Where I could tap a ball to you four yards to my left, and you could go weave through 12 dudes, and that would be an assist for me, right? That's all a bit hand-wavy and fake. But I'm still waiting for a bit more from both Ferreira and from De La Vega, although both of those guys were, I thought.
good in this game but man if you can combine high level number nine play and i think this team has that with the elite double pivot play with really good defensive play You're going to be a good team. And I've never really wavered in that belief in the Sounders this year. I feel like the belief. has been so obvious for anybody who wanted to go out there and grab it because this team has still been playing.
good soccer but it's it's fun to see them actually prove the theory that i think we all had about this team coming into the year which was that when they needed to rotate because of ccc and maybe i thought they'd still be in ccc at this point but inevitably when they needed to rotate in the early season they would still be able to pick up points and they would still be able to look good doing it and missing five projected starters between Morris and Rusnak.
You have no Jackson Reagan, no Rodon, and Areola. All those guys to varying degrees of injuries. And you still go out there and you just absolutely decimate another team that has a high-quality opposition. Yeah, it's a good weekend for the Sounders. Yeah, and to be able to bring on Jordan Morris, Albert Rusnak, Ryan Kent. Jao Paulo, Alex Roldan, when you're already up 3-0 is a pretty sweet position to be in.
We didn't see a ton of Ryan Kent in this game, and I don't want to get too bogged down in the Sounders because we'll have plenty of time to talk about that later. But I liked what I saw. It was sort of what we've been seeing in training, which is he looks like he's got quick feet. He's got a good touch. He sees the game in a way that I think we can all appreciate. No standout highlights, but there was one moment where he did this.
chess trap, played it around, and then did a little bit of footwork and nearly slipped in Jesus Ferreira late in the game. And that to me was sort of like, okay, this is a potential piece that might... Yeah, I don't disagree with any of that coming into the season. This was before the areola injuries, but coming into the season, I described Seattle as probably the deepest team in Major League Soccer outside of South Florida. And I think they're like on par with Miami in terms of depth.
I just don't look at the squad and think that they are obviously deeper than that Miami team. Ryan Kent is a part of that, right? At this point, I know Craig Weibel has a mixed rep in Seattle. At this point, when Craig Weibel and the Sounders sign somebody, my default is that they're going to be probably pretty good. And of course, there's tons of factors that go into a transfer. Ian Graham, formerly at Liverpool, maybe still is.
I've talked about this before. There's so many things that can scuttle a transfer, right? But when Seattle signed players and that group of players that came off the bench in this game was a pretty good mishmash of players throughout the eras. They're probably going to be high-ish level contributors in this league. So I'm excited to see more of Kent.
And I'm excited to see more of Seattle because I think this year, and I'm glad we're doing this sort of show and that you and Doyle have been doing this on the Western Conference. This year, the West feels up for grabs in a way that I didn't quite expect it to be. And for Seattle to be marching up the table, even after a slow start, there's, there's room for them to continue pushing and pushing and pushing up the West.
No, I totally agree. And it's funny, I'm just looking at the tables right now, and we're not going to get into this, but I do think this is kind of interesting, that Charlotte and Cincinnati are at the top of the East. Even though Miami and Columbus were the last two undefeated teams going into this weekend. I don't know. It's just that the.
Easton, I agree with you, though. The West does seem very wide open. And part of that, and we might as well just a good transition into the Whitecaps, who continue to get results. who continue to put up almost mind-boggling performances in CONCACAF Champions Cup. And the underlying numbers say they're great. The real numbers say they are maybe the best team in MLS right now. They've got a plus 11 goal difference. They are on 20 points through nine games.
They are through to the Champions Cup semifinals. They got a tie this week, which wasn't necessarily a great game, but they just seem to have – especially against St. Louis, who you would have thought maybe this was a game they were going to – where they'd be able to win that one. I don't know. What do you make of the Whitecaps right now? Is this a team that we should be taking very seriously as a...
And part of why I say it seems wide open is because I'm not sure. I totally believe that they're for real. It feels weird, right? Everything says they're for real. Yeah, yeah. It feels weird. And this whole season for Vancouver, we're now a quarter of the way, more than a quarter of the way through the regular season. This whole thing has felt.
like a pinch yourself moment. And then you pinch yourself again the next weekend. And I don't think we're the only ones feeling that. I think Vancouver fans are feeling that. And. And I don't blame them. It has been year after year after year of finishing between 6th and 9th in the Western Conference. Right. You come out of last season and you're once again close but not quite against LAFC in the playoffs. And then your second best player and Stu Armstrong walks and he goes back to England.
And that's not supposed to work. You're not supposed to have that happen and then become the best team in Major League Soccer. And then Ryan Gall gets hurt. Yeah, and then Ryan Gall gets hurt. And then you're still playing CCC games when Vancouver are never still playing in CONCACAF at this date. None of this has been what anybody expected. You get a 93rd minute winner at
It's ridiculous. They are single-handedly reversing CCC fever and turning it into a different type of disease, and it's beautiful. I didn't see this coming, but one thing that does seem pretty clear to me, and you talked about the underlying numbers, the actual numbers. Well, I've watched a lot of this. I've watched every game Vancouver's played this year. They...
They're legit. Like they look to me like an incredibly dangerous team. They topped my and Ben Wright's power rankings over a backheel last week. I haven't seen Ben's rankings yet this week. They are also on top of my rankings yet again this week. Even with that draw, which was not their best game against St. Louis. St. Louis rounding back into semi-fitness, which I think is a factor there. And the Caps maybe with half an eye on that game against Miami coming up this week.
Big game for them, and it's certainly a bigger game than this regular season match. And they are missing Ryan Gould, right? This game, and part of the reason why I don't think this was their best game, they couldn't find a lot of really great chances inside the 18. And when you look at the 11 that Jesper Sorensen put out there...
Shouldn't be a huge surprise, but it sort of feels surprising now to look at it from the other perspective because Vancouver had been so good at manufacturing chances under Sorensen so far. They have a clear way of playing Vancouver. They're a monstrous team defensively. Even away from home, they didn't concede a ton of chances in this game. They were right in it, and I think a draw was a fair result.
They are monstrous against the ball with a structure that is... always prepared in what is is often referred to as rest defense right so rest defense meaning um when when you have the ball how are you setting up your structure so that when you lose it you're not in a tough spot right off the bat, right? How are you set up around the ball to have numbers to go win it back or at least maintain your shape?
to push the opposition away from dangerous areas when they come at you. And Vancouver do that as well as anybody in this league. They are an incredibly well-coached team and they have done an incredible job through nine games so far this year. The only reason they're not still undefeated, Jeremiah.
is that they were stuck playing without like six starters against the Chicago fire during that international break. That wasn't an international break. That's the only game they've lost this year. Like they, they should be undefeated at this stage of the season. They look to me like the one team in the West that I am really sure of is going to be in a top four spot come play. Well, and since we're on that subject, a part of the reason that I think.
I look at the West. I think you look at the West. is that once you get past the whitecaps who everything says they're for real, even if our mind is telling us, sure, maybe not, maybe not, but everything. Everyone else, you can just go down the list. It's like bizarro world table in some ways. Austin is second right now. They have scored seven goals through nine games.
They managed to get a 1-0 win this week against a very bad Galaxy team that is just... circling the drain right now uh and They get a penalty saved. Brandon Vasquez. It is funny. It's been sort of like a monkey paw situation where when this one of the stories Sounders fans all told ourselves was. Well, if you can get Jesus Ferreira for $2 million in GAM, I would never spend $10 million on Brandon Vasquez. They'll probably be about as good as each other.
And it turns out they are about as good as each other right now, but not for the reasons that any of us expected. Browning Vasquez does get a goal in this game on sort of a tap-in. but he first has a really bad penalty taken that gets saved. But what do you make of this Austin team? They are getting results, so I don't want to take it, but they have a negative one goal difference. Through nine games and they're in second place. I don't...
My head is exploding. Yeah. Yeah. And I don't blame you for that. The way I've framed it for backheeled so far this year and the way that I've been thinking about it is there's good Austin FC and there's bad Austin FC. Right. And good Austin FC. is the one that can play against the ball, right? Where maybe they have a lead early in a game and that was the theme for them a lot early in the year.
And they can play against the ball and attack in transition. That's good Austin FC. And they are quite good when they can go out there and do that stuff. Between Vasquez and Mirtu Izuni, they've got Speed and Jadar Obreon and Osman Bukhari. Owen Wolfe was a good little player. There's some juice in there on the break. Bad off an FC is when they have to have the ball and do something with it. And Nico Estevez, that's never been his MO.
Certainly wasn't with FC Dallas where they were a defensive first team. That's been the theme in Austin so far. You mentioned them not scoring goals through nine games so far this season. They're not a great attacking team. And that has come back to bite them at times so far. But still, despite those challenges, they're sitting in second and they're picking up points left and right. I don't.
I don't think that when all is said and done that this Austin team will finish second in the Western Conference. I think they will be dropping points. I think they are still quite flawed in terms of defensive personnel, even if the structure is papering over a lot of that stuff. And Brad Stuber being a very good goalkeeper helps there as well. I don't love all of their midfield personnel. And I don't think Estevez has figured out exactly how he wants to use his attacking personnel.
Mirta Wazuni is over the weekend against the Galaxy. He switched from a striker spot over to play on the left wing, more of a 4-3-3 instead of a 4-4-2. That's the first time we've seen Estevez go to that 4-3-3 so far this season. He's still looking for answers, Nico Estevez.
But I think this team's floor between the points that they've stacked early in the season and the fact that they're good on set pieces, especially attacking set pieces, and they are a defensively compact team, even if they steadily drop little bit by little bit from that two spot in the West. they're still going to be a playoff team and they should be right. When you go out and spend as much money as they have, you should be right. I am not sure that they spent.
any of that money wisely at this point but they have certainly gotten better in the attack this year than they were last year even if those numbers aren't all the way there yet their floor is high even if their entertainment threshold is Yeah. Yeah. So they played the galaxy, like I said, and we may as well talk. I wasn't necessarily planning on talking a lot about the galaxy because I feel like we've, I've buried them a lot on this show and I'm not here to sort of like kick dirt on them.
They are now winless through nine games. They're on negative 10 goal difference. I guess it's not. so bad they just have no answers offensively they they are not necessarily a disaster defensively which maybe is what you would expect for a team this is a team that has historically not been great defensively But man, they cannot find goals right now. They just do not have answers. And that is with Joseph Painesville, Gabriel Peck.
Marco Royce, Christian Ramirez. There's offensive talent. Diego Faguda. There's offensive talent on this team, and they just are not. the offensive numbers we would have expected, even if they are missing Ricky Puj, which at this point is a irrelevant fact that barely worth, you know, merits men.
It is interesting. I think we all knew how important Ricky Pooge was. I think we all knew that he was important, I should say. I'm not sure I, at least at clock, just how important he was to this team. He clearly should have been MVP the last two seasons. It really looks that way. It really, really looks that way. And I'll take the L on that one.
the galaxy are in a tough spot even before you get to the on-field stuff just the reality of where we were talking a little bit about this before we started recording the reality of where they are right now in the table through nine games they are nine points back of the ninth spot in the western conference that's the last wild card spot
They're essentially set up to have having to pull off a 2023 sporting Kansas City, which is when SKC picked up three points through 10 games. So the Galaxy have one more chance to sort of exceed that. And they ended up sneaking into the bottom of the playoff field. They were a wild card. They win the wild card game. Then they go and upset St. Louis city. And you know, they almost progressed from there. That turned out to be an okay season for SKC when all is said and done, but it started.
A lot like the Galaxy had started in 2025. There are so many issues. I actually, you're talking about the attack. I am worried about the attack. Don't get me wrong. I do trust Peck and Painsillow to find some answers, even while not counting on Marco Reus to be anything because he looks washed.
I think those two wingers will, once they actually learn for the first time ever, because this is happening in real time, learn how to play with each other without Ricky Poosh. They've not had to do that since it got to LA. And they've only had one 90-minute game where they've both been on the field together, and their team has been playing with 11 men for all 90 minutes. Once. We're nine games through the season, plus CCC.
And they still have not. They have four CCC games and nine regular season games. And it's only happened once. And that was in the 1-0 against Austin. That's a problem. So they need reps there, and that's going to come. I think they're going to get better on the attack. I'm worried defensively because Zanka has looked very poor. A 34-year-old Danish center back they brought in over the offseason.
Amiro Garces has taken a big step back as the Galaxy have literally on the field stepped back into their own third because they haven't been able to control games in the same way without Ricky Puj. And Garces is just a tragic box defender, even though he's a truly elite. center back sweeping up in behind the line, and Sounders fans will know that well.
Garces is great at some things and not good at all at other things. Eric Zavaleta got his first start in over a year for the Galaxy over the weekend. Their, their center back play is not good. Their goalkeeping situation has not been good. They have issues all over the field. It just so happens that the attacking ones are the ones I think are going to.
like come back slightly for them right man i i don't know what i don't know that we can expect anything from the galaxy at this point because of the hole that they have dug themselves Well, it is interesting because this is a team who I don't think any of us, and I include myself in that, really appreciated how many. how many things Ricky Pooge was able to paint over. And Edwin Cerio is a player who was limited, but the limitations were fine when he was just the guy who had to defend.
and sort of like be a shield to the defense. But he didn't have to touch the ball almost at all. And now all of a sudden, now that he is... playing with more normal sort of uh midfielders yeah he's not he you know He doesn't make as much sense, I guess, is what I'm saying. And it's like they have – I don't think we appreciate how many players like that the Galaxy had where –
If you can play a certain way, this player makes a lot of sense. But if you can't play this way, this player does not make sense and he can barely be on the field. Yes. Yeah, I think that's the case with Serio. I think that's the case with basically every Galaxy midfielder at the moment. I think it's the case with Garces, as we've already talked about. It's everywhere. And then you toss in the fact that. The Galaxy went all in last summer. They basically put themselves right up against the cap.
To sign Marco Reus, right? And I don't necessarily blame them for that, if I'm being totally honest. Yeah, they go and they take his wing. Yeah, right. And Reus did play a role in that, even though he was basically never all that good for the Galaxy. He was starting playoff games last year.
And it just turns out that Marco Reus in the year 2025, at least, is not that guy. Or it doesn't seem like he's that guy. He's been injured when he's been on the field. He hasn't been effective. It's a huge problem. And so the Galaxy had to go and not just... be reminded of how many regular players they have they had to dump players that were useful and i think impactful players in that midfield especially when you think about martocato they had to get rid of gaston brugman they got rid of
Then, of course, Dejan Jovalic, who I think, you know, I sort of thought that Ramirez was going to be able to produce in this team because the wingers were going to be at that level. And again, I underestimated how good Ricky Puj was.
like that that hurt and a lot of that stuff at least some of that stuff was necessitated by them going out there and adding marco royce and needing to dump from the cap and it just it hasn't worked i don't think the the ideas behind it were poor But when you miss on your new number 10 and your actual number 10 and Ricky Pooj goes down for a year, this is what happens.
I'll take a page out of Doyle's book when he said there's not really much to say about Minnesota United because they're just sort of doing the same thing every week and it works. And there's not. Like I think they're probably a for real team somewhere in the top in that middle third of the of the playoff positions. I don't really need to. They had to draw this week. We don't really need to spend too much time on them. But.
The Timbers are a team who, of course, near and dear to my heart. They played another game this week that was wide open, that was super entertaining from a neutral perspective. They took the lead. They basically led the entire game. That sort of masked a defense that was just wide open. They gave up two goals that were ruled out for offside. They give up a free kick and then they give up and they were just so.
This game was all played. This whole game seemed to be played in transition going both ways. And then it ends up getting decided on a penalty. Late penalty, Danny Buonga drives into the box. He gets stepped on essentially by Diego Chara and Buonga then converts the penalty. And then after the game, Phil Neville just loses his mind. And he's talking about how the referees ruined this game. And he decides to focus on.
Steve Truendolo getting red carded, which it's funny, the replays were shot from a weird angle. And so I don't think it's clear what happened. I think what happened is I think he stepped on the field while yelling at the referee and the referee was like, well, you dummy, you shouldn't have stepped on the field. And he kicked him out. So I don't know if that's such a travesty, but he... This discussion of the penalty on Buonga, I look at that, and it's a stone-cold penalty to me.
And there was a lot of discussion about like, oh, well, they waited a whole minute to stop the game. The ball was in play. Like they stopped play in the game. Like the ball was in play when they stopped it. That's not taking a long time. That is just doing the basics of what VAR is supposed to do.
I don't know. To me, that's a stone-cold penalty. It's a bad play defensively. Am I... being harsh no i i don't think maybe ever so slightly with the term stone cold but there is contact even if it's slight and buonga's momentum is already sort of carrying him forward
which makes it just all the easier for, for that foul to happen. I will say I'll preface anything else I say about this with saying that I find few things in this sport more tedious than like detailed refereeing discussion, because I really believe, and I'm going somewhere with this. I really believe that, that these things all pretty much even out over time. Like you play enough games and I think they even out.
If Phil Neville believes that, I'm not so convinced because his quote, I guess you can take Phil Neville out of England, but you can't take the England out of Phil Neville. He had a quote after the game. I think his exact wording was, they just want to be the kings of the castle. Shout out to the monarchy. That's just great stuff.
I think this is Phil Neville. I just thought it was a great plot reference. Oh, there's good stuff in there one way or another. I'm not going to quibble with that. I think this is Phil Neville. Still frustrated from, I don't know, a month, month and a half ago, whenever this was, where Amiro Garces clears out one of his guys in the box at Providence Park.
This one I don't understand. I don't agree with you. I have no idea how that was not called as a penalty. And that would have changed a little bit of that game against the Galaxy. I think Neville's still seething a little bit after that draw and now a month on has another opportunity to uncork at somebody with a, with a meaningful call late in the game. It's, it's bad, but.
I also just don't buy that really that was the single biggest difference-making factor in this game. Portland playing at home, you said it, Jeremiah. This game was so open. That's how the Timbers play so often is that they cannot control games against the ball. The other flip side, and this is me very much enjoying them as a neutral, and you said something similar, they can score goals, man. Like Jonathan Rodriguez is back.
He played the second half of this game as, as this target winger on the left side, which I think is maybe the most interesting individual player role in all of major league soccer. Rodriguez is built like a center forward. He played a bunch of center forward in his career. He, he is. He is way up in the box on that assist that he has.
It's a beautiful sequence. I actually thought it was Sergio Palencia, but it might have been Aaron Long. Maybe there's multiple moments. He wins the ball off Aaron Long and then he does the worst in the box. Yeah, yeah, yeah. He's dominant coming off the bench in this game, and he will be a starter once he's back to full fitness. Cindy Moreno is one of the better non-DP attackers in this league. Anthony, even though I'm not a big fan of his, was actually pretty good in the first half.
Felipe Mora is constantly underrated. Now he's not always on the field, but when he is on the field, he's very effective. Da Costa had a nice through ball that forced Lloris into this penalty early on in the game. The Timbers have some juice. It's just a little, it's a little unfortunate for them that they look a lot like the Portland Timbers of last year in that that juice is coming for both them and the opposition. Yeah, I mean, the Timbers are for real offensively. There is...
They're a scary team to play. There's no question. And it's like, even when they're at home, it's just, it almost seems like when they're at home, it almost brings out the worst tendencies because they just are almost playing to the crowd where it's, it's just.
full you know pedal to the metal type stuff where they're just up and down up and down up and down uh i i don't know if they're you know and and i guess to their credit they i think this is six games unbeaten so they are they're getting results it's it's it's just They have some real issues defensively that are not showing any signs of going away.
No, and really the personnel hasn't changed all that much. Finn Sermon was signed last summer, a 21-year-old New Zealand international. I think he's a promising young player. Kamal Miller still starts this game. Juan Mascara, we know that he doesn't provide a lot of value defensively. Jimer Forey is more of an attack first, ask questions later kind of guy.
It's just not that different. And the Timbers, I think, I don't know what will or will not be done by the time this goes out. I think they're still looking to do some stuff in this window. I don't know how much juice is going to be left in them. They are, to me, truly, they remind me almost exactly of the Timbers of last year. And that's fun and cool as a neutral. I would be a little frustrated about that if I was a Timber.
Yeah, they're really stretching that axiom that so many fans say, which is I'd rather tie a game. three three than win one zero yes and i always question the sanity of people who say things like that because i don't i don't really believe anyone ultimately feels that way over a long stretch but hey uh maybe maybe it's working for the timbers
Just kind of going down the list here and highlighting the Sounders opponent this week, Colorado Rapids are a team who at times seem like they are really putting it together. And at times. Seemed like maybe not. But the one thing that they have, we should say, I should say, I have been extremely critical of Zach Steffen over the last year or two or so.
I think a lot of us who look at these things have been raising the red flag. This guy allows way more goals than he should be allowing, but this year he's been pretty good. Better than pretty good. I think he has been fantastic for the Rapids in goal. And I am coming at this from the exact same place you are. I raised not one eyebrow, but both eyebrows when Pochettino first called him in a camp in the U.S. And that's happened over and over again.
And credit to everybody that's not us, I guess, because Zach has been has been really good this season. I didn't see it coming in order for the Rapids to really. get better this season. I think in some ways, even for them to kind of be back where they were after losing Moise Bambito and like not really getting a whole lot better in the attack from last year as some other teams around them added some pieces. They needed the guys internally to take a step forward. And Stefan.
goalkeepers can have this massively outsized impact on games, right? I think about the Rebs winning the Shield back in 2021. Matt Turner is so important for them. Georgie Petrovich shortly after is so important for the Rebs. The Rebs don't win silverware. The Rebs aren't what they are without those two pieces. And that goes for the Rapids right now with Zach Steffen, who has been fantastic. chris armis recently and i'm a tactics nerd at heart so i hope you'll excuse me chris armis recently has
Please. Shifted his structure. I know I was in the right spot. It was more of a formality than anything else. He shifted his structure away from a 4-3-3 with Georgie on the left wing. to a 4-2-2. And so that's looked like the back four. Sam Vines is back now. He played his second game of the season over the weekend. That's a big add for the Rapids. I think it makes them better, clearly. Vines will get forward on that left side.
And the structure has now changed with Kevin Cabral moving to the bench, which is massive because Kevin Cabral is not a starting player in this league. Finally, Armas moved into the bench and added Darren Yappie onto the field. And this was in that win over San Diego, which was a pretty impressive win, all things considered, for the Rapids two weekends ago.
And it's a 4-2-2-2 with Navarro and Yappie up top and Georgie and Cole Bassett as the two kind of narrow attacking-minded midfielders. And it's a friend-turned-foe, Josh Atencio, in midfield next to Ali Larraz. And it's just a buzzsaw of a midfield to play through. Cole Bassett's work rate's off the charts. The front two do a lot of defensive work. Georgie's kind of in and out sometimes. But Atencio and Larraz are workers at the base of that midfield.
And you have a team that is unpleasant, to say the least, to play against. They press San Diego, even maybe at times more aggressively than the Sounders press San Diego. And the Sounders had some success turning San Diego over at times in that game.
Colorado turned it into goals a couple weekends ago. They had some good pressing transition moments against Houston. They were maybe a bit unfortunate not to win that game. They conceded in the 96th minute, a tough one for them. But the Rapids are getting healthier, first of all.
And I think Armas is figuring out how to really leverage the strength of this team, which is his central midfield group. It's Atencio, it's Laraz, it's Bassett, it's Mihaljevic, even Conor Ronan, who I don't think we've seen at all so far this season with injury stuff.
He was on the bench over the weekend. Ted Kudipietro is getting back and is finally healthy for this team. He made his debut a couple weekends ago. There are pieces here. And Armas has found a system that gets four of the most important pieces in those midfielders on the field together. I like what the Rapids are building right now. What have you made of Josh Atencio so far this year?
He has been, I think, what probably everybody would have expected him to be, which is rangy, aggressive defensively, at times a useful ball progresser, although I think that's still the piece of his game that is lagging behind the rest of his game. But he is super effective as the deepest player in that midfield. And he's done it in a structure that's changed over the course of the season. He's played as more of a single pivot. He's played now as part of a double pivot.
He has been the reliable defensive presence that I think the Rapids really wanted him to be. That's how they play. That's why they identified Atencio. I think that was a really, really sharp add for them over the offseason. It's paid off so far. Yeah, he's basically starting every game. He's not necessarily a 90 minute player every week, but he is getting a ton of minutes. I mean, this is I would think from a developmental standpoint.
been a good move for everyone involved, really. Atencio has a clear path to playing time that he never had here. He is getting that playing time, which he was not consistently getting here. And the Sounders have some... salary flexibility. They're able to, I think, you know, and this is not a bad situation for him. He seems to be with a coach who is, who understands how to use them, who wants to use them.
Uh, you know, he's, he's maybe not been a star for them, but he's, he's been, he's been good and he seems to fit in really nicely with what they're doing. Uh, I've, I've, I'm happy that he is, that things seem to be working out well.
Yeah, that felt like it was always going to be a win-win trade, I suppose, to factor in the player as well. I think you said it really well there. It's worked out for everybody. The Sounders just didn't need him, and they would have benefited more from getting the extra cap flexibility.
That's what happened. It's worked out for the Rapids. It's worked out for Atencio, who very much I think is benefiting from playing Chris Armas, who knows a thing or two about being sort of this aggressive midfielder. Yeah, I think it's worked out for him. Yeah, and I honestly, especially if they were serious about moving him to center back, I don't know that he would have been playing at all right now. Yeah, I mean, minutes were going to be hard to come by. Yeah, no doubt. Exactly.
While we're on it, though, while we're on this game, the time the late equalizer came from a new edition. Houston added, they're one of a handful of teams in the West who seem to be pretty active as this window is closing. What can you tell us about this guy?
You just didn't want to say the name, did you? Andres Linger? I've never actually heard it pronounced. So I was watching this game on mute. I didn't catch the commentary. No, believe me, I've been there. I know how to spot it. That's me on a semi-regular basis. Linger is a 26-year-old Czech Republic international, signed from Slavia Prague over in the Czech top flight. Generally one of the best teams, if not the best team over in that league.
He has had a couple of really nice goal-scoring seasons for them over the past few years. I think he had 14 back in 2021-22, and then 11 the year after that went to Feyenoord for a little bit in the Eredivisie, which is a bigger club, no doubt about that. And is now finally in Houston. He'd signed three weeks before he made his debut. It was an agonizing waiting period for the Dynamo who have needed points. Like they have been.
So injured, especially on the wing. They've been missing pieces. They lost Mikael right before the season started moving to Palmeiras in Brazil. They just needed bodies. Like they got worse in the offseason where almost everybody else got better. And so they finally bring in Linger during the season.
He comes off the bench and makes his debut for the Dynamo and looked good. It was a tiny, tiny cameo, 15 minutes plus stoppage time. But came and played on the left wing, tucked inside the central midfield at times. And what Pat Onset highlighted about Linger when they signed him in the press release.
was I think he called him a goal scoring midfielder who's going to make us more dangerous in the box of his presence inside the team. Something to that effect. But he certainly used the term goal scoring midfielder, which I thought was curious at the time because when I watch Houston play and when I've watched them play for the last two years under Ben Olsen.
Since he got there, the Dynamo have been a below average attacking team when it comes to creating chances in the final third. They're great at getting to the final third. And Onset even highlighted that last summer in an interview with Jonathan Siegel over at MLSsoccer.com. They're great at getting the final third. Not so great when they get there.
I thought it was odd that they would highlight somebody and go sign somebody who is more of a finisher than a creator. I still think it's odd. I think it's an incomplete as to how he's going to grade out in Houston. But he is clearly someone who can threaten inside the 18 if he has service. I just don't know until the wingers get healthy for Houston or maybe even pass that.
I don't really know where the service is coming from. So we'll see. Maybe Lingers got some more on-ball stuff to his game than Onstead wanted to highlight in that. Or maybe he's got more than I saw in this game. Either way, the Dynamo get better with him on the field. It's just a question of how much. Yeah. So following the table, San Diego FC feels like they are coming back to earth a little bit.
Maybe hit a high watermark when they just absolutely dominated the Sounders for that stretch. It was really a like a eight minute stretch where they just. said earlier, and I appreciated that you acknowledging this because I feel like there was this narrative around that game where the Sounders got played off the park.
And that the Sounders were, they were just playing through the Sounders press and the Sounders couldn't play through theirs. And it's like, did you watch the game or did you happen to watch the highlights? Because that's not what happened. What happened was the Sounders were actually pressing San Diego pretty well, forcing them into a lot of long balls, but they could not do anything when they turned the ball over.
And San Diego then caught the Sounders in transition a couple of times, not out of pressing situations, just good old fashioned transition. Now in the last couple of weeks, San Diego has not been able to do what they had been doing up until – like through the Sounders game. And they've gotten caught a little bit. They've given up six goals in the last two weeks. And – And, you know, they got outplayed pretty badly against Charlotte.
They did. No doubt. That's the case, without a doubt. They go down to 10 men almost to the end of the first half. Andres Reyes is up to his old tricks. I included in that winners and losers column for backheeled. Winner colon Andres Reyes' brand, where his brand is just being...
The most chaotic defender MLS has seen since Francisco Calvo left the league. That's just, that's his thing. And you got to love it. Keep doing you, man. As far as San Diego. While we're, while we're on that, I just want to. uh, VAR review has to be the most brutal VAR in history. Cause in case people don't know what happened, he, uh, Andres Reyes is red carded in real time. It's a dog. So red card. And then the referee gets called to VAR it. And you're like, oh, maybe there's a lifeline here.
No, there is no lifeline, sir. It is a penalty. And okay, not a red card, but it's your second yellow card. You're still gone. I don't know what to tell you. I mean, it was just the most brutal VAR sequence. It can't get more brutal than that. I don't think it can. It really cannot. Oh, it's not a red card.
You're still off, though. You gotta go. Forgive me, I don't remember who the commentators were on this game for Apple TV. I thought they did an excellent job of pointing out the nuance there because it does matter for suspension purposes and for card accumulation stuff. Still just utterly savage towards Anders Reyes. But it also added a penalty. That was the thing that was the killer about it was that on top of it being a red card, I mean it's like I guess there's some –
I don't know. It's just the fact that it added a penalty to it. It's brutal. It really is brutal. San Diego never found a way back from that. They were down 2-0 at that point. They'd already struggled early on in that game with direct attacking play from Charlotte, where it's Liela Bada who slips in behind off of a nice assist from Pep BL. And in San Diego, when they're on their back foot scrambling.
they don't have the elite defensive talent to really manage those moments well. I think we saw that at times against Colorado, who are a very direct team, and Charlotte are the same way. They don't press as much as Colorado do. but they are very vertical in their attack. And San Diego do not deal with that well. And it wasn't just Andres Reyes. On the first goal, it's Chris McVie and Patty McNair on the left side of the back line. They didn't do a great job dealing with Charlotte's attack.
And then Reyes goes down. At that point, it's 2-0 after the penalty and it's game over, right? Down two goals on the road with 10 men for the second half. You can pack it in at that point. I think what we're seeing with San Diego... is that they really do struggle with those direct moments. That I think is the big takeaway from these last two weeks.
I still think they're a really good team. I'm not really all that. I think they might even be more than a playoff team, though. I think they still might well be one of the best three teams in the Western Conference when all is said and done. I think that they've had two games in a row against teams that are fairly bad matchups for them.
in a way that they really hadn't been tested so far this season, where they hadn't played a team that was going to press them and attack with as much aggression as Colorado. or were going to come at them in the same way as Charlotte did. They also hadn't played a game with Andres Reyes. And that truly changed the entire complexity of the game when that second yellow actually ends up happening.
So I'm holding my San Diego stock. Yeah, right? I mean, it was a chaotic element that I don't think San Diego were fully ready for. I think they're like... There's sort of like a, you know, maybe ex-girlfriend situation here of like, I can change them, right? I can, I can change. It's hard to change on just Raz. I think that's what we're learning. I think Tyler Heaps really was trying and I'm not sure if it's going to work.
I think San Diego are going to be okay. I think they're probably going to be better than okay. And I'm holding that stock and hopefully I'm maybe even hoovering up a few more shares when other people are. Fair enough. Yeah, I think that's a good time. I guess if there's a time to buy San Diego, this is probably it. So LAFC is... I really don't know what to make of them because on... There are weeks where they look like themselves and then there are weeks where they really don't.
And I'm curious what you make of LAFC. They are, they tied. Portland this week, 3-3, like I said, they created some decent – they created scoring chances. Olivier Giroud finally, finally gets his first MLS goal, which is a surreal thing to be saying. And, of course, it's a free kick. So I saw this goal happen. I saw MLS tweet about it. And the caption from MLS's handle on X, I guess it is now.
was like Olivier Giroud scores his first MLS goal. And I was actually shocked that they went with that caption. I think they're just, they're assuming that people didn't realize that he signed last year. I don't know what it is. Cause that's like, that's a roast. You just got roasted Olivier Giroux by the MLS handle. It's taken you almost a year. No, it's taken you the better part of a year. To actually find a goal for your team, yeah, mind-boggling.
I don't fully know what to make of this LAFC team either. I think there are some things that I believe about this team. I believe that they have gotten... less adventurous in midfield under Steve Terrandolo as the years have gone on, as Eduardo Atuesta has left, Ilya Sanchez left over the offseason.
I think they have struggled to progress the ball and find touches in the box. They were, I don't have the stat in front of me. I looked it up last week. They were like bottom 10 in MLS in box touches per 90 minutes. LAFC, they do not move the ball into the box. And that was a difference in this game. If Denny Bawanga is firing, this team is still going to be really, really, really good. And he had his best game of the season against Portland by a country mile. He was dominant on the left side.
in a way that he just hasn't been he's been off and it's not just him aging right he is still way up there on progressive carries per 90 he's still knifing forward and beating guys on the dribble He just hasn't been goal dangerous or assist dangerous so far in 2025. And that changed over the weekend. If he is, if he's going to be a superstar, like I think we probably all imagine he is.
The other thing I believe about this LAFC team is that if they can get some semblance of attacking production from any of their other attackers, right, it could be Giroux, it could be Devin Martinez, who I've got a lot of stock in. It could be Chen Guizundere, who I do like a lot, even though I don't really think anybody knows exactly what his future is with LAFC. It doesn't seem like he's going to be around past the summer when his contract is up.
It's a weird situation there. They're waiting for Griezmann. They're not getting Griezmann. Now they've got flexibility to actually go and find the piece that they want to be that third DP. If they can get something from one of those other guys. I think this team is gonna be really, really good.
It's just a question of, can they actually get that something? And against Portland, the answer was yes, even with the defensive errors that kind of scuttled that game for them. But going forward, I still don't think we have a clear answer on who the Denny Buonga sidekick is really going to be.
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Again, go to hacksandferments.com, use the code sounder at heart at checkout for a free hot sauce with your order. Hacks and Ferments is a proud sponsor of that sounder at heart. Okay, so we don't necessarily need to dig too deep into the rest of the table here, but there are some moves in the Western Conference that are worth noting. San Jose all of a sudden seems like they got really active. Completing the overhaul that...
Pruce Arena has put them through. They're picking up Noel Buck, right? They're picking up DeJuan Jones. So it's like sort of still getting the band back together from New England. Go ahead. Sorry, I didn't mean to catch up. I was just going to say, and then they also apparently they're loaning out Oscar Verhoeven, who's a promising young left back to San Diego. So this is really like. All the great hits. Bruce is really playing the hit. He is. And he played the hit.
in goal over the weekend for San Jose. He started a former Bruce Arena guy, Earl Edwards Jr., in goal, and that did not go well. I missed that. They shipped five goals to Sporting Kansas City. Sporting Kansas City, of all teams. Oh. Yeah. Juggernaut. Yeah. Juggernaut. Bad result for San Jose there. This is Bruce continuing to get his guys. Like you're saying, Jeremiah, they need.
They needed more juice. This team just needs more talent still. They need especially more talent that can be responsible defensively, and DeJuan Jones can be that. They're playing Christian Espinosa at right wing back right now. And that has some upside in the attack where San Jose had been. Good in the attack this year. The gaping hole between Christian Espinosa and Rodriguez, their outside center back and their right wing back against Sporting Kansas City was...
outer space-esque. It was truly wild to see how big that gap was. DeJuan Jones would be a more responsible player if he does end up at that right wing back spot. Shout out to Tom Bogert for reporting these moves. Noel Buck, another high profile player. Wasn't getting minutes in New England. Caleb Porter didn't like him. Get him back to a coach who knows him, who's played him before.
I don't think he's going to be an every game star for this, for the San Jose team. I'm not quite as high on him as I was when he was first breaking through with new England, but I mean, it's going to add something to this San Jose team and they need something in this group. Right. Yeah. And then the other team who's making some big move or a big move is RSL, who is signing a DP nine. They have really struggled to find goals this year.
They have. It has been brutal for RSL. This team's just gotten worse straight up since last summer. They sell Andres Gomez. I know we've talked about this before. He goes to Ligue 1 and it just falls apart. And you can't really blame Marcel for selling Andres Gomez. He wanted to go take the next step in his career, moving players on as part of convincing the next players to come and join your team in the first place.
especially when there's an eight-figure price tag attached to that and you can cash in. He goes and it's just almost a straight arrow down for RSL. Diogo Gonzalez has not been a good player for them, at least not a consistently good player. Marciuk on the right side has not been Andres Gomez in any way since they brought him in from Poland.
They need more. And when you trade Chicho Rongo, you need even more than that. And so they are looking to sign a player that I'm now going to chicken out on and not attempt the first name. Okay, well, it's Robert, the first name. It's the last name that I'm scared about. Robert from Boa Vista.
It was not put up crazy numbers in Portugal, but I mean, the bar is low for RSL to be a better team. Seems like that deal is going to get over the line. They need talent straight up, especially in the attack. Defensively, they had problems too, but one problem at a time for probably Lester anyway. Yeah, that was a head scratcher for me when I saw the numbers that he had put up.
I mean, I don't know. I always struggle to translate numbers in other leagues to production in MLS mentally. And so I think on some level, you sort of have to trust. the scouting networks with teams and you have to sort of I had the same reaction when Portland signed their number 10.
Yes. Yeah. David Acosta. Yeah. David Acosta. Thank you. And, and it was like, Oh, I don't really see the, what's so attractive, but he's been good. So this feels like a similar situation as RSL. Like I'm, I'm not, I don't know who this guy is. For me, it's a wait-and-see thing until I actually will have a full-on take on that, no doubt.
Yeah. Well, all right. Well, that's probably a good place. We don't need to go through the rest of these teams. I don't think right now I will note St. Louis city just playing absolutely drab. Drab soccer these days. They have scored. They're a total of 11 goals scored in their games.
San Jose, on the other hand, 36 goals scored in all the games. I don't know. And St. Louis, all of a sudden, not getting the results either. It's one thing if you're going to play boring soccer, but you've got to get some results. They got a 0-0 this week, so I guess that's... By definition, there's a result in there somewhere. Yeah, they've had the fewest combined goals in their games of any team in MLS so far, which it's not great. But at the same time, it's not.
not great when you look at how long their injury list has been. They've missed. so many guys so far this season and they're, they're kind of hanging in there just like doing enough to keep themselves in some relevant conversations. They get healthier a little bit over the weekend. We see a sort of return from Olaf Melberg's players that he's needed back in this group. But I'm not trying to tell you that St. Louis are a must-watch team right now because they're not. No.
I appreciate that. Well, anyway. Thank you so much for doing this. Back healed. I hope people are. reading it. I hope people are subscribing. I would like to give a pitch. If you are a sounder at heart subscriber and you want to get access to back healed, if you become a, an advocate level supporter, that is the. I think it's 210 for the year. You get a free subscription to Backyield. I have...
Loved being able to provide that feature. I love it helps support you guys. We basically, just to give you a peek behind the curtain, we pay you guys for the sub. So it's a double whammy thing. You get to support two independent. soccer media sites i love reading backfield i think you guys are doing a great job and it's not just mls it's it's getting into usl which you guys have some of the best usl coverage i think as well
It's really good. So anyway, Joe, thank you for doing all that. And anything you want to plug, anything else you want to plug? No, that is first of all, that's all very kind of you. And I love doing this stuff. I love talking MLS. Probably like it a little bit too much for my for my mental sanity. But this is always fun. I love coming in and pinch hitting whenever you need me.
The one thing I'll plug, I mean, you've been very kind, is we do have what I think is a really fun Obed Vargas feature coming out. It just so happens that it's a Salis Andres thing.
I don't know exactly when, but in the next couple of weeks, that's going to be out. And I think it's going to be some stuff that people haven't heard before. So I'm excited about that. Who's writing it? We've got John Arnold cooking this one up behind the scenes. And John is fantastic, as I'm sure many of these listeners will already know. Yeah, Jarnold, the CONCACAF. Legend himself. Legend. I'm excited.
I am too. Now I'm, I am excited. I'm, I'm really excited to read this. So, all right, well, Joe, thank you so much for doing this again. Backheeled.com is the, is the site that you, you're running. And. Yeah. Thank you for doing this. And I'm Jeremiah Shan signing off for Nos Adietes. We'll catch you next time. I expect an LAFC who's motivated.
to prove themselves at home, to prove to their fans that they're capable of winning in this league. And it's up to us to really ruin the party. You guys like that? Awkward joke, dad joke.