Sounders just set themselves up for what could be an epic run into the Club World Cup

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. And now they truly can start the celebrations It's the Sounders MLS Cup! 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 it sounded horrible to... commentary that we didn't take the outcome 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. Full Pull was founded in 2009, is based in Seattle, and is owned and operated by longtime Sounder 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 on the Sounder at Heart.

podcast network it is friday it is match day minus two which is a little odd to be doing this but we are doing what we learned this week with nico a day earlier than it is technically ready to do but we're here at long acres nico How are you feeling? Hey, I'm feeling all right. It's been, like you said, another convoluted week with some mixing changes. Right now we're also...

kind of changing our own pattern of the Friday sort of situation. And there's a lot going on here. A lot of people. A lot of people at Providence and Sweden's PCC, especially for me to say it.

And, you know, the trophy is going to be here. It's kind of cool to hear that the trophy is going to do a little tour and pipe plays and all of those things. I like it. I do feel like, and I don't want to be critical, but I wish there would have been this a little bit sooner, maybe getting more people interested a lot earlier. Kind of feels like it's almost here. I mean, it is almost here. We're like three weeks.

A little less than three weeks away. It does feel like FIFA suddenly is waking up and being like, oh, people aren't as excited about this as we thought they'd be. We better start turning on the... the promotions. And I mean, like we just saw this last week, or I guess, did we even talk about, I guess we did talk about this on the last show about the tickets kind of going on sale. There's, there's discount codes everywhere now for.

The club World Cup tickets, I think they're looking at a reality of some of these less prestigious opponents are looking at like near empty stadiums, even games like like River Plate.

You can get tickets to some of these, you know, River Plate is a big team. It is a big team. If the sounders are playing River Plate in a friendly, I guarantee sales would be doing a lot better than they're doing. Yeah, I just went online because I did a... a radio show in argentina yesterday and one of the questions was that is how are the tickets going and yeah i mean i got on and you can get in the 100 sections for about 125 you can get in the 200s for like

80 bucks, 60 bucks. And there's a ton of tickets. There's a ton of tickets. So much tickets out there. And that's kind of what I mentioned. So it could be this little bit of lay marketing. I'm thinking that they probably had this scheduled then, but I... I think they would have thought that they would be doing a lot better than they really are right now.

Could it help a little bit before getting people just walking around? What is this? I think that's right. I think one of the challenges that the Club World Cup is facing is that no one knows what it is. It's not a it's not a well-known. You can say, well, it's the Club World Cup, and there's some element of self-explanatory to the name.

But people really don't know what that is. I don't know that there's a big differentiation in people's minds between this and the many other sort of preseason tournaments that European teams have been playing in the United States that are not...

real tournaments and so the idea of what this is is i think a little foreign to people it does seem like the sounders games are selling better relative to the rest of the games But the pricing came out of the gates very aggressive in a, you know, I think... FIFA is really exploring the outer reaches of what people were willing to tolerate for tickets. And I think they found out there's a limit, at least for a tournament like this.

Yeah, and there's still, I guess, a discrepancy of like... The tickets for, like, the Red Diamonds, is that what it is? And River Plate, yep. And then, like, Atletico and Sounders, which is a lot higher for those exact same seats. That's kind of what I was looking into. But, again... This was a lot more expensive a month ago. Way more expensive. That's where maybe people got turned off. And you're right about people not knowing about this. Six out of...

Maybe 710 people who had no idea or are relatively new to soccer. They were like, I thought the World Cup was next year. I was like, that's not the World Cup. It's the club World Cup. What is it? I've had to explain that to a lot of people who I would consider soccer fans. And I think that that sort of underscores the challenges that this tournament faced.

the headwinds that they like, that's a term they like to use. There was a lot of headwinds in this tournament, and I don't think they navigated those particularly well. And, you know, we'll see if things pick up a little bit. It will be interesting to see, you know...

The other thing that's kind of silly to me, and not to get too divergent in this conversation, but they're having this big event today. The trophy is here. There were apparently some kind of back office presentation steps. For the press, there is literally no presence from anyone at FIFA. There's no presence even from people higher up in the Sounders front office. It's basically a Brian Schmetzer press conference.

With a trophy ceiling? Yeah. I don't quite understand the point of this. It looks very off. Even for Concraft Champions League, when it was here, there was even a little bit more... headway of certain people even Adrian talked right before the big presser and things like that so I don't know long story short this was supposed to be the intro so I'm sorry I was just kind of throwing it in there because it's kind of interesting to me it is

My son was asking me about it, and he's probably going to go with his friends and go look at it like in Pike Place tomorrow or something. I mean, it's a cool trophy. Yeah, it's a cool trophy, man. I saw it. I was like, wow. You know, that one and the Libertadores, I think that's my two favorites.

like looking trophy so it's pretty cool yeah i mean you win this thing and it is uh it's gonna it's gonna pop yeah yeah it's a bad looking trophy it is it is uh but we do have sounder stuff to talk about so

We have a game. The Sounders had a big win. I think maybe bigger than we totally can appreciate in the moment. A big win over San Diego FC on Wednesday. But there were some injuries.

There are still some injuries that they're dealing with. Unfortunately, we are recording this before Brian talks, so we won't have quite as much of an update, but I think we can make some projections, some reasons, some... educated guesses about availability but let's start with the san diego game the sounders were really outplayed i would i think it's safe to say they were outplayed in that game uh san diego had you know way more possession

They had twice as many shots. They had twice as much XG. Kind of go down. They had one more duels. You can just go down the list statistically. And I think the eyes told a similar story. The Sounders struggled to get out of their own end. But I do think one of the things the Sounders did very well is that for all the possession that they were giving up, for all the frustration of their inability to sort of build...

They weren't giving up a lot of quality shots. And then once they got their opportunity, they took it really well. Absolutely. And what I would add to that is... I thought that Seattle closed the game strong, and I asked Rasmussen about it. I don't think he really got the gist of what I was asking, but I thought that it was a confidence builder how they finished. I looked at that game twice this morning, and... What really kind of came up to me as a highlight is

Ferreira's goal just changes the momentum. And I guess that's very normal. Anybody could figure that out. But Seattle started playing a lot better. It was really two different games. Minute 1 through 57 and then minute 58 on.

Really totally different games. Absolutely. But I will say that defensively, Seattle was even better in the second half. And Brian talked about it. in the way they were pressing. Much more aggressive. Less aggressive. Less aggressive. Yeah, with one...

The press was less aggressive. I thought they did a better job of cutting out passing lanes. Yes, 100%. Yeah, exactly. But by not pressing so high, they were doing such a better job at just staying more compact, keeping those connections from the middle of the field. I thought it was weird that De La Torre came off, and I think that did not help San Diego at all. And interestingly enough, though,

I have to give Brian credit for, one, he said Freddy Juarez was the one that kind of figured out that their pressing was not working. And that was absolutely true this morning. I was looking at it. San Diego was just passing through the press. And it didn't matter if it was the 4-4-2 or if at times it was three. They were just passing through it. So by holding back, they just looked a lot better. And then the substitutions by Brian Smetzer. I think he was...

spot on on every single one. First, hold them off. Pedro La Vega and Musavski. I thought that was classic. I thought that was great. Because after the goal, Ferroa creates another opportunity, deletes the way Albert Rusnik shot. That was a good save. Great save by Musavski. Honestly, watching the replay of that. I don't think I fully appreciated live how good of a save it was, but that ball was dipping and it was not, you know, it was like one of these low.

line drive shots, and it was just dipping right at the end. It had not come off the turf or anything. And it was, I mean, he made a good save, and it almost gets by him as it is. And this is a good goalkeeper, by the way. I mean, he had six clean sheets before this game. Very good.

So he makes a great save. So I thought that was interesting. And then the subs come in and they're great. But the one that really caught my eye was bringing in Kalani at the winger. I thought that he was going to bring him. And for Alex, who looked pretty gassed, he looked tired. We were talking about that in the press box at the time. We were, absolutely. But he does something even better. By playing Kalani higher, he disrupts.

that build-out from that moment on, and Kalani was lights out. I mean, with the exception of that shot that he takes to try to chip the goalkeeper from half field, he could have played Pedro too.

But he made a great play. He made a great interception on that play. He did. So he deserves it, right? You earned it, right? But you're right. He could have played in Pedro, and Pedro is basically in on goal at that point. And it was a pretty, I mean, it wasn't even like he had to make a spectacular pass. He just had to really play it into space and Pedro would have been off to the races. But yeah, I agree with you. He made a ton. He just brought some energy.

and he was cutting out lines, and you could just see his legs had something in them that no one else really on the field had at that point. And it was, we haven't really seen Kalani used.

exactly like that before and I thought that showed a lot of promise in terms of it could be a thing a thing exactly and you know it's funny because there's multiple ways to try to close out a game right and if you are in the ascendancy you have that one zero lead you're going to look for that second goal you're going to be pressing for that and i think it was smart by brian is that he understood the way the game was going

The Sounders were not going to get themselves really into the Ascendancy where they were... Like, their best chances were to get out on the counter and do things like that. And, you know, I'm sure there was a temptation to bring in Georgie and say, like, hey, we can get this guy into open space. But the decision to bring in Kalani may have honestly saved the result.

100%. I was even thinking, are they going to bring in Jackson and give him some minutes and take out Bell? Yeah. Something of that nature. And go to add another center back. But he didn't. And I thought it was great. And that's why I think it's funny that people were like bent out of shape talking about.

you know, why are we parking the bus after the goal? And I'm thinking everything that could go wrong went wrong in the first half. Kinky heat went out. You put an 18-year-old kid that, look, he looked nervous. And I thought he was...

I knew I said at one point he didn't look out of place. He had a couple moments where he looked a little rough. Yeah, no, no. I mean, look, I'm going to go ahead and say it. Brian obviously wants to uplift the young man, and I talked to him after the game off camera, and I thought...

That's courageous. And I literally said, the mistakes that you had, now they're like a band-aid. You rip them off and now you're going to be ready to go, right? But there was a couple of moments that he had that were bad. There was a couple of passes that he probably makes. seen him make those same passes here in the training field and he didn't make them, right? But...

All of that happened, and you were still able to come off with the win against a top team, against a team that is so hard to defend. We talked about this. Who has punished a lot of opponents in that exact situation. 100%. The front three for this team.

moves more than just about any team in MLS because it's drier. He starts out wide, but Valkyrie sometimes would push out wide and he'd be drier in the middle. I mean, there was so much movement that I just thought that it was great the way they did it. But going back to when... We were talking about the decision to bring Kalani completely worked because he wasn't just limiting Chucky Lozano, who came in and did absolutely nothing, which was odd or credit to the Sounders.

And Kalani was all over him. And it was Kalani and it was Alex. And there was a lot of reference to that side. But then what he did off of that, that play where... Travis Koff, number six, he's waiting for the ball, and Kalani just rifles right past him. He picks up the ball. I mean, he was just all over the field. So it is something that I think we'll see, not just to maybe close the game, but if...

There's a game where you're not getting the ball enough and you need the ball and you feel like you need to pick that up. He can be a guy that comes in and does that, man. It was interesting. It was interesting. And it was, you know, it was one of these games where I think if. This happens in a season where you're struggling. Obviously, you always take the result, but there were some maybe red flags in the way that the Sounders played.

But if you take it in the larger context, they've been so good. They've had so many games this year where they've... Or not so many games this year. They've definitely had games this year where they were the better team and they didn't get the full three points. They've had games... And then they've had plenty of games where they've been the better team and they had...

the result they deserved, right? And so it's not like they've been struggling this year. They've sometimes struggled to get the result that their performance deserved. And so in that context, you take absolutely, I just don't think you can look too... critically at how they got the result because, again, they have John Bell.

Stuart Hawkins as your center back. So if you tell me you're going into a game against a top opponent with John Bell and Stuart, no offense to those guys. No. You are up against it. Of course. You've got your third choice center forward on the field. You've got all these...

all these issues going on and let's actually let's get into the jesus ferrero part too because yes that's important it's a good goal And what I thought was kind of funny, I just watched the Mikey Varis interview where he is talking after the game, and he said he was frustrated that that play was allowed to happen. I guess...

There is a player getting, like, he's cramping, and so he's getting attention from a teammate, and the sounders get this quick restart. And he felt like that put them at a disadvantage, and he said, I've never seen that happen before. I'm thinking... I don't know that a referee is going to stop play so your guy can get treatment from a teammate for a cramp. That's not a serious injury. It's not a head injury. We see this type of thing all the time.

I don't really, I don't know. I mean, Kim was on the ground and he like pushes himself out of the field. Right. Just. in the first half so what are we talking about exactly and if there's anybody that takes advantage of restarts is san diego it was a very strange comment and i think it was a collision now that i remember because the in the broadcast now that i'm going over to my head

You cannot see a lot of it because obviously the broadcast is kind of moving around. But there is some sort of collision and a foul, and there is a quick restart, and that's where the play starts. But it's not like it was... one pass and it was vertical, like Seattle had some time to get on the ball. But, yeah, that's odd. That's funny. Yeah. So, anyway, it was a very good play by Alex to play.

Rothrock. Rothrock in. And then Rothrock makes a great play to first-time pass to Jesus. And then Jesus makes the exact kind of movement that he has built his career on. Very clever, right-footed touch. to open up some space and then just a smooth left-footed finish inside the near post. It was the exact kind of play that we know he's capable of that you are so happy to see him making. And it was just a good...

And you could just feel the weight lifting off of him. He shakes it off. He shakes it off. He has the whole celebration. It was a feel-good moment, and I was really glad for him. And hopefully it kick-starts him a little bit, because I... I think it's true that he has been effective as a playmaker. I think it's absolutely true that he's been a good defensive player as a forward. That is...

It is absolutely also true that he has not been effective in front of goal. He hasn't done it. We've talked about it so many times. And hopefully this is something that gets him some confidence and he can start going. Yeah. And not just that, but...

To me, just the fact that he took that shot, even if Dos Santos would have stopped that and they would have saved it, I would have been happy that he took it. Because he did have Albert in the back in this particular team, in this particular system. And I'm seeing it. I saw it against Dallas. And now it's one more step forward.

I continue to be confident that he's going to be a more than serviceable nine. I think he's going to be a contributor until Jordan Morris comes back, and then we'll see what happens thereafter. But I was very pleased by some of the moves that... he makes by the defensive that he's always good on defense. And like you said, that weight off.

goal scorers go through streaks, this could start a big one for him. So I'm excited. I thought he deserved that. Very well deserved. And he talked about how he had that same move in the first half where he does that same thing where he's kind of trying to shift his body and turn. but he just hits it too far out. So it's not like it just happened. This guy has quality. He practices these moves.

I also want to give Rothrock credit. A lot of people get on Rothrock. A lot of people were wondering, why is he in? The kid can play, and the kid is going to give you 110% of him every single time. He also came off gas, although he probably... would deny that because he is that type of dog where you don't want to come off the field. But I got to praise him for that pass, that run.

I thought he was good, too. Absolutely. Well, we're going to take a break. We're going to come back. We might actually have a chance to talk to get some more insight into what's going on today. But you're listening to Nos Adientes on the Sounder Heart Podcast Network.

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Welcome back to Nos Adientes. So we actually did get to go to the press conference. Yes, we did. And we got some updates. Nothing that was super surprising, I'd say. No, there were a couple of golden nuggets here and there, but nothing that is going to be incredibly newsworthy or eventful. But we did get at least an update on Danny and Jackson.

who will both be available. He did not get into details of how available. We tried to push him a little bit on what kind of minutes we can expect from him. We got nothing, really. No, but as someone that likes to think he's fluent in Schmetzerism, I would say that that means that Stu's going to start.

Yeah, I would agree with you there. I think if Jackson was ready to start, I think he would have just come out and said Jackson's going to start. Maybe even the same with Danny. If Danny was ready to start, they would have said Danny's going to start. Yeah, because if you're thinking about...

maybe testing Jackson, you'd be basically saying, I'm going to play you 45 and I'm going to take you out. That doesn't make a lot of sense. Rather, just start stew and if something happens, then you break the glass and you bring in Jackson. And, I mean, there's other ways that they can run around it. I mean, if they have to, they can put New next to Bell and try to figure out Left Bag. But, yeah, I think that's kind of what that means. Yeah. Which...

I don't know. I guess that's not the ideal scenario. It's not. Minnesota is a very dangerous team. They play a style that is sort of taking the... We've seen the broad game plan work before, where a team is willing to give up the ball in order to kind of like... press higher up the field and create turnovers. They're big on long throws. They're big on set pieces. They're big on counterattacking. They're a reasonably aggressive defense.

but man, they really don't want the ball. I've talked about this a lot. They are on pace to have less, like a lot less possession than any other team in MLS history, at least since we've been keeping track of this stuff. They're on something like 38% possession. No team in the databases that we have available. We're ever below 44. that equates to like 50 or 60 fewer completed passes per game. That's a big disadvantage that you're sort of working with.

but they're making it work and they're making it work really effectively. They have some players who are as dangerous as anyone in the open field and they have some big bodies that like to get forward. They have a guy that can really throw the ball. I mean, it's a funny thing. We never talk about long throws, but this is a team that has made long throws a real weapon.

I don't know. How do you feel? And this is a big game for the Sounders. Let's not undersell the importance. The Sounders are looking at a potential scenario where they are a point or two out of the... out of the Supporters' Shield race when they go into the Club World Cup break if they can win these next two games. And there's every reason to think that they have a chance to do that. And you don't want to kill the momentum that you have built.

This is the team that you've owned here at home. Never lost to. Never dropped points to. Never dropped points to at home. So that's something that I know that the team would want to continue. What I will say is that... Eric Ramsey has done a great job at building an identity and created his principles so deeply within his team that everything's instinctual. It doesn't work every time. The last game at Vancouver was a perfect example of that. The coach...

Ramsey, he talked about the passing wasn't as sharp and that maybe being something that had to do with the field at BC Place, which we both know that is not very different than necessarily here. And so... You know, those are things that maybe he's going to have to look into because when you do decide to give all of the possession of the ball and you rely on three things, set pieces, which they're second in the league at scoring from.

counters and good defensive discipline, if you take a goal, if you go down, it kind of changes everything and it makes you go against what you originally planned. You got to add numbers forward and therefore... It's a very marginal system that if something goes wrong, even if it's in the slightest way, it could kind of get out of hand.

I do believe that Seattle, although they've had issues with breaking down teams, even against Dallas when Dallas decided to bunker down, I think that... If I'm being honest, a result in this one could be a tie because it's going to come to the point where they are a very good defensive team. Jefferson is a fantastic Colombian center back. He's been very mobile, very agile.

a dog, although he's just coming back from my suspension for saying some silly stuff. I'm not going to say some ignorant stuff, apparently. And Boxo, who's just a leader in that back line, and they get forward so quickly. Jeboa has gone. He had four goals in four matches back in March, and he hasn't scored since. Yeah, it's funny. I was just wondering what's been going on with him because I feel like I haven't heard his name much lately. And...

Yeah, it's because he hasn't been nearly the player that he was at the start of the year. I guess he did score on May 21st, but that was in Open Cup play. So you're right. He hasn't played. He hasn't scored a league game, a league goal since March. Yeah, since March. So they just do things very well. I think that the X factor for me in terms of that team and what they can do offensively is start with Joaquin Pereira, a creative midfielder.

dad can do a lot of different things when he has the ball at his feet. I know that the Sounders were scouting this guy for a while before Pedro, and he's been excellent up top. And I think he's a guy that, to me... Along with Lod, they are the two players that you want to tame. And defensively, although they do things well collectively, I would highlight...

Sinclair the most, the goalkeeper. I think he's a guy that when things do break down, he's a guy that has, I think he leads the lead in clean sheets. And because he's such a good goalkeeper, the system... It's advantageous to kind of move in the stats there. But whenever the team has needed him, I think he's responded. And that's why I think it's going to be a difficult game for Shatter to score on, especially not what you're going to do necessarily up top. I'm very curious.

of what's going to happen. Do you rotate? Do you start Georgie in this one? Do you start Masowski in this one and play Ferreira somewhere else? Do you rest Ferreira? This is maybe something that could impact. This weekend, I know that Jesus Ferrer's wife is near the due day line. If something does happen within the weekend, then he might be off for a couple of games.

Maybe Masavsky does get the start. So there's a lot of components that make me feel like this might be one of those chess match games that... are not very exciting and entertaining for the fan base. But I think a draw wouldn't be a bad result. Yeah, I mean, at the start of this homestand, I said seven points would be an acceptable... Correct. You know, acceptable...

I think if they, you know, the fact that nine points is there for the taking, you want to be greedy. You want those nine points. But I would agree with you that seven points would be... A tie would be an acceptable result. I'll go back to the game that Minnesota just played against Vancouver.

I do wonder if we can see a replay of that. Basically, Vancouver dominated that game from front to back. Both teams rotated a little bit. Vancouver was bringing Brian White off the bench. They were bringing Pedro Vitae off the bench. But Minnesota also brought...

Gressel off the bench. They brought, who else did they bring off the bench? They brought Tani Oluosehi off the bench. So, you know, they had some guys that, you know, that will be reasonably rested. Both those players came in at halftime, basically. And so they'll be reasonably rested coming into this game. But that game ended 0-0 despite Vancouver dominating the game. Most of it, yeah. And Danesk only really had to make three saves.

So it wasn't necessarily his, it was just kind of strong defensive play, but it was kind of a classic. Minnesota game where they just did not feel like they needed to expose themselves a whole lot. Vancouver outshot them 19-4. I can imagine it being a very frustrating match to watch if you were... whitecaps fan in the stand but i mean that's that's the way some of these midweek games go you know with this you know sometimes you just got to be better in the moment and uh

I don't know. Some of the things that I saw in that game is that... Takaoka did a good job at times really pushing the ball from his stance as a goalkeeper. He saw whenever you have a team that bunkers and plays as well defensively as they do, whenever they do get a chance and they have to push numbers forward,

and there is a chance to get them on a counter quickly, Takaoka did a great job of just pushing the ball forward. I think that Vancouver wasn't as sharp as they usually are in this one. I'll admittedly say that. Jalen Nelson, there were times... where he could have gotten a lot more out of the chances and space that he'd gotten, but he just wasn't sharp. So I think Seattle could expose some of those things, depending on who's all out there. But again... The beautiful thing about what...

Minnesota is doing is that the simplicity of their game makes it very consistent that every game, because you play and you have the exact same concepts and you have almost the exact same results and you frustrate teams in the exact same ways. it's almost a sure thing that you're going to be able to come in here and frustrate the Sounders. And if there's anything that the Sounders have had issues with recently...

It's just sometimes they're off and especially in transition moments just gets a little stagged and they're unable to really get going so by the... The fact that, in my opinion, you're going to get a lot of rotation, if I have to be honest. I think that you might see JP start this game. I think that you will see... I think Pedro might start, but Kent won't. So because of that, you're also going to have to give... some time for that to kind of

settle into the game, but it's gonna be interesting at least in the terms of how did the Seattle Sounders manage their current momentum, what they've been able to build, and if depth is what we've kind of decided. very early this season that was going to be the reason why the Sounders were going to be in every single competition. This is the perfect testament for it because Minnesota is no slouch and they are third for a reason.

And so now the Sounders get to play against them and see where they lie against them. Yeah, so the Sounders can potentially jump. If they win this game, they would likely jump into...

Second place, potentially. Vancouver does not play a league game this weekend because they have the CONCACAF Champions Cup final. And then they would face off in a week from now, potentially with first place on the line, which is... absolutely wild to me given the way that this season started that this is even a conversation that we're having that the owners could go into essentially the mid-season break with a you know with a realistic chance at

at kind of being where we thought they would be at the start of the season, but then seven games in, it was not going that way. I don't know. It's kind of a funny, funny sport we follow. It is, but I feel like, you know, nothing has been away from... the natural I guess I think we were all very high on the team and there were moments that we maybe doubted some decision making and the total

potential of certain players. But at the end of the day, I think you and I have been very steady on saying, let's wait and see. Even for the bad things, like, I do want to say that...

And I didn't get a chance to ask Brian today because it was a very odd, obviously, sort of situation today. It's not our everyday sort of scrum. But I don't think that Brian answered my rank and question after the game the way I wanted it. I feel like... are planning for Kent a lot more and they are figuring out how to keep him at bay not allow him to do what he wants to do and I wanted to ask him a little bit about how do you get him to get over that obstacle

I mean, I think – and if I'm just – because what you observed accurately is that teams are no longer letting him just get the ball out on the wing and get isolated. He has almost always got two or three defenders on or around him. And what – is going to have to happen is that he's going to have to get better at the two man game of the given goes of doing all that kind of stuff. It can't just be give them, you know, isolate Ryan Kent and let him cook.

And I do think that there's some rust he's still working off. I think we've seen enough of him that I'm convinced of his quality. Sure. It's just I think we're getting a little bit more of a reality check that it's not going to be 100 miles an hour.

all the way from the minute he steps on the field. He's human. He's got some limitations. He's still working himself back into fitness. He's still working himself into sharpness. He's still learning about his teammates. He's still learning about the opponents.

I think we can be a little bit more patient. Of course. It has been very funny seeing this sort of like the rebound of people are, you know, he has two good games and people are like, oh, he's going to be. Sign him right now. Sign him to a DP contract right now. And then it's like. After two games where he's a bit more average, it's like, I'm a little worried about this guy. What are you worried about? Exactly. Because the thing is that they just had two games where he was...

not very good, or three games you can even say that he wasn't very good, and they went 2-0-1 in those games. Clearly, they don't need him to be a superstar to be a good team. Now, if he does turn into a superstar, does that raise their ceiling? Yes. Absolutely. But this is still very much an almost all upside, you know, addition. Yeah, and we still have to see. It goes back to the patients.

Now with Jesus Ferrer getting his first goal, I expect them to be more confident, be more ready to go, and that could essentially change a lot of things. And Ryan Kent's a guy that right now is... Without a doubt, a starter. But we'll see what happens later on. You know, Pedro's rising up. We'll see if Jordan's going to be back.

Sounds like against Vancouver, they're pretty confident, I would say. Yeah, Brian said that they're currently expecting him to be available for playing time against Vancouver. Yes. That's a... I would say that's way ahead of what I thought. I thought he was almost certainly going to miss the Club World Cup. And that's why I think the biggest question...

moving forward, and that includes the World Cup, is Kim Keehee and Yemar Gomez-Andrade. He was coy, Brian was today, about... a calf strain he talked about we don't know it could be three it could be two yeah they basically what he said and I guess this is a good thing to get into uh They got the MRI back for Kim Kihee, and it didn't show any obvious tearing. He clearly has a strain there. He's not going to play this week.

But he seemed to think there's a possibility he could be back for Vancouver. He seems to think there's a possibility that Yamar could be back for Vancouver. Jackson, presumably, will be able to be closer to starting by the time they go to Vancouver. So now you have some good options. But again... But they don't know. We don't know. And that's where I want to kind of just hit the brake a little bit because both the calf and Yamar's hamstring...

We were hoping that he gets back, but they both got to get back into rhythm. They both got to get game fit. Until they're back, they're not back. Until they're back, they're not back. And until that time, it's going to be young Stu Hawkins. leading the way next to Jay Bell. Obviously, Jackson Redmond will get back eventually against Vancouver. But just to finish off the Minnesota topic.

Tommy, for me, is the most dangerous, current, informed forward. He's extremely fast. And if Stu has some of the little boo-boos that he had in his first game... If there's a team that is going to make you pay in there, it's Minnesota. So those are things that we're going to have to figure out. It was nice to see them both settle into the game because I thought that they did settle into the game.

It's always risky when you're going against a team that we just described where there's one moment and they get a goal and they park the bus and the semis. I mean, it's going to be tough. Yeah. I thought Brian had a good comment about Stu, which was it might be better for him that he got into a game like he did where there's no thinking about it.

get warmed up and get on the field i'm sure he was nervous but he didn't have a whole night to think about it this game he will have at least had the experience he's been in front of the home crowd he's had gotten the butterflies First start is a big deal, but I think it's a much better situation that he's potentially coming in to start in this game than what he was thrown into the last game.

Absolutely, but I agree with you with how big this game is, and I think they're going to treat it as such. It's your last home game, and although the fans want to be entertained, I will say that... points are more important at this particular moment in time. Then you go to Vancouver and then we'll figure out what Vancouver throws out after the CCC final, whether they're going to continue to.

use the same lineup or they're going to rotate heavy like we all expect, it could end up being very good for the Sounders to go into Club World Cup. Just in terms of motivation and inertia, just in a good level of momentum. It would be. Well, that's probably a good place to call this. We could go on and on. We could get into Craig Weibel's statements about the Club World Cup.

I guess we may as well just kind of address this. He made it sound like there is not a big signing immediately on the horizon. I think it's important that we talk about that, yes. I think that he's leaving open the door very much for a signing this summer, but I would say he was... Whatever the opposite of non-committal is about a signing coming in during the June window. I don't think it's going to happen.

And it's what we were talking about, is there is no rush. And that's what I want people to understand, that no one is sitting here, whether it's you and I, and correct me if I'm wrong, saying that it's not... advantageous to have a 10-day window and that it would be stupid to bring in a player in that 10-day window. What we're saying is that you don't want to panic and rush.

and get a player that might not be available or not the one that you want now to get him into the Club World Cup because it doesn't matter for the specific tournament. Craig Weibel said, I'm not planning for three days of a week. I'm planning for the whole year. That's something that we've been saying consistently. But I saw a comment online about, well, it's not about that. It's about getting that guy here quicker, sooner, getting him integrated.

faster. That is an absolute fair statement. I don't think there's anything wrong to use that 10-day window to expedite visas, to expedite adaptation to the area, adaptation to the team. But once again, you're only going to... go for the right guy because there's no point of if you can use it it's advantageous exactly if you if you can use it right if you if the guy you wanted you can get it you don't i guess what the point is that you don't want to get the guy who's available

Because you have this opportunity, you want to get the guy you want. And if that means you have to wait until the summer, you wait until the summer because there's just no real reason to panic and just use this spot. You can argue that they should have been in a position to make the signing already. That's a valid statement. I think you can be frustrated that they haven't made, that they're probably not going to use this window. I'm just saying that now where we are today.

There's not really a whole like the player that they were gonna sign Probably wasn't gonna factor into this tournament regardless. It's not gonna make the difference between them advancing or not advancing And I will say that... Earlier is better, but... It is, but it also has to do with other teams. Right. The guys that they're looking at, at least the two that I'm looking into, they both play for top teams in South America.

top-ish teams in South America, at least one of them top team. And therefore, they're still competing. They're still having other competitions. And the 10-day window might be good for the Sounders, but it may not be good for other teams.

You kind of have to factor that in, and maybe that's why they might be able to take a little longer to get the right guy. The other thing that I thought was important that we could just talk about briefly is the fact that he said that there's not a team in the world that's not... Aware.

Aware of Obed Vargas, but there are obviously no offers currently on the table. And Pedro de la Vega, a guy that I have brought up, at least in lovers' culture, saying that, you know, if the right... offer was to cross the table of the Sounders, you know, they could look at it and what that number is. I don't know. But Craig Webber was very serious about.

not shying away from the fact that he's a guy that's picked up a lot of interest because of his current form. And he said one of the teams that they're facing has expressed some interest. In the Club World Cup. I assume that's Botafogo? I would think is Botafogo. But we'll see. Because I... When... They were in Spain. Apparently, a lot of teams did send some scouts to Marbella. And so, you know, could it be Atletico? I mean, but regardless of, I think Botafogo is a team that has showed us.

very recently that they are very in the MLS market. And, you know, Santiago Rodriguez is a guy that just went over there from New York City of C. We saw what happened with Ameida. So all of these guys, Amara, sorry. So those are the teams that are probably more likely to get them. But it's something to think about. But Craig did say it's difficult at times to sell a player and then...

replace him because there's a lot of limitations on how they can use that money. So then that's also something to look into. Yeah, and I mean, I suppose you would like to think that if they were to sell Pedro that they would have... some dp level players in mind to bring in history tells us that it would be tough for them to sell a dp and sign a dp in the same window considering everything we know about pedro and

how much you spent, and the fact that he's a young DP, but you're going to have to turn him into a DP. He is already a full DP. There you go. But moving forward, you're going to have to keep him there. Right. What would be your number? Your number to let him go. I mean, if I'm the Sounders, I think I need to feel like I'm...

If I'm the Sounders, I don't think I feel like I need to take a loss. Exactly. So you're talking at least $7 million just to break even? Yep. So I would think they'd be looking somewhere in the $10 million range, which... I don't know, maybe it's unreasonable, but that's what it would take for me to sell Pedro right now. Because to me, if I'm the Sounders, I still see upside there. And if I believed in this guy when I signed him, I'm not looking to take a loss on him because...

He, you know, he hasn't put up huge numbers, but you can see the quality. And I'm not saying someone should... be running out of their way to pay $10 million for him, but I think that's what it would take for me to move him. I mean, look, we talked about, we just talked about Darusi was a failure in MLS to a certain extent.

Obviously had more numbers than Pedro because of his tenure and the amount of games. But he went for over $10 million to River Plate. And one that did not work out at all. With a big salary. With a big salary. And that one worked out because he's done well at River.

They seem to really like him. But one that didn't work out was Alan Velasco, who they also paid a bunch of money for. And if you look at his stats in Dallas, they were not impressive necessarily. No, I would say no more impressive than Pedro, probably. Exactly. And they still paid 10.

And he's been awful in Boca Juniors. I mean, they cannot stand this guy. I mean, I just had a conversation with somebody that I had no idea that he had done so poorly. But those are things that, yeah, maybe 10 could be a possibility. I don't know. But I kind of said... that my number might have been eight just because the lowest number I would go. Just because of what you said. I don't want to take a loss. So it would have to be at least eight, including, of course, I'm keeping...

20% of a future sale and things that could potentially help me out if he does blow up anywhere else. Yeah, I would agree with that. I mean, those are the kind of, which also makes me think that he's probably not moving.

I would agree. And I don't think, and I'm starting to think that Obed might not move either unless he does something really crazy. And people are going to go bananas because I have heard some craziness about her. Why didn't he go to America? I thought there was enough for the table for enough money. No, there wasn't. Stop reading the tabloids. Come on. There was nothing from America.

Obed even said, I don't know where that rumor came from. I mean, it's just crazy. So people might get upset, but at the end of the day, you've got to look at, one, what the player wants. He wants to move to Europe. That's what he wants to do. I think if I'm the Sounders, this is what I say. Look, if you don't move in the summer, we're going to give you a U22 contract. And...

We'll see how long and then we'll go next year and we'll see how it goes. And if the worst case scenario is you end up playing here for a few years and you're making good money.

We're happy with that because, I mean, he's a very good player. He's going to be hard to replace. Yeah, and I know a team in the Netherlands is extremely interested, but the Erevedice doesn't call for huge money. I mean, I don't think that Erevedice team is going to... pay a bunch of money for open bargain so that that's kind of in between of

how much money, where he wants to go. I mean, there's a lot of factors that fans need to just understand. Yeah. All right. Well, that's probably a good place to... That is a good place. ...to call this. Thank you, Nico. Of course, you can... follow Nico on Blue Sky. You can follow him on X. You can follow him on Soccer Down Here. You can watch him on Loving Scorchers. You're all over the place, Nico.

And again, thank you for making time for us on Nos Audietes. And yeah, thank you for doing this. Thank you. And thank you to the audience for the constant support, man. Enjoy the weekend, my friend. Enjoy the Sunday night soccer. That's right. Sunday night soccer. Exactly. Yeah. Have a good one. All right. You too. You're listening to No Sarietes on the Center at Heart Podcast Network, and we'll catch you next time.

I expect the 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 brew in the party. Yeah, you guys like that? Awkward joke, dad joke right there, huh?