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Episode 422: Interesting off-season ahead
87 Plays2 years ago
With more than half the Sounders' salary cap potentially freed up this off-season there should be some big changes ahead. We discuss the possibilities.
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Transcript
Sponsorship and Introductions
00:00:00
Speaker
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, the Pacific Northwest.
00:00:21
Speaker
Hey, this is Christian Roldan. And Jordan Morris from the Seattle Sounders Football Club. And you're listening to... There's no study at this. Here we go. Come on! Hey, Ocean! Let's go! What a save by Fry! The Seattle Sounders have done it! MLS co-pointers! Here come three games through the middle to crowd it! The vehicle! And now they truly can't stop the celebrations.
00:01:04
Speaker
Seattle Sounders the greatest MLS team in history This is a tiny doll
00:01:34
Speaker
Is
Episode 422 Overview and New Platform Announcement
00:01:38
Speaker
Welcome to another edition of Nos Arietta, sponsored by Full Pull Wines, Watson's Counter, and our new subscribers. This is episode 422 and we're recording on Wednesday, August 9th, 2023. I am your host, Jeremiah Shannon. Joining me as usual is my co-host, Aaron Campo, and of course, our producer, Lickit.
00:01:42
Speaker
that why you young people call twerking?
00:01:55
Speaker
So the eagle-eared of you, I don't know if that's really a term, well notice I did say are subsex subscribers and that's because we come to you with some very big news. This week, this is a bye week obviously for the Sounders. It wasn't really expected, went out in a league's cup, maybe it was expected, I don't know.
00:02:13
Speaker
The reason we're recording is we two things. We're going to talk about the roster, but we also have some very big news about the future of no study at this and sounder heart and round of Valkyries. In case you didn't notice, we have already have heard we're combining forces. We're going to be.
00:02:32
Speaker
living under the banner of something we're calling PNW Soccer Media. And we're all going to essentially be working together on Sounder Heart as one organization. It's going to be reader supported. And the key element of that is we took all of our Subsac subscribers
00:02:52
Speaker
many of which are listening right now, I imagine, and we moved them onto a new platform called Ghost, and that's also where Sounder at Heart is going to live.
Sounders' Offseason Strategy and Roster Changes
00:03:02
Speaker
We're going to have more details on all of that move later in the show. We'll do a whole segment on it. But the big thing to keep in mind is that if you want to read about it, there's an article on Sounder at Heart, there's an article on our sub-stack. It should give you everything you need to know.
00:03:21
Speaker
That said, with no games to discuss, we do, I thought this would be a good opportunity to look forward. I actually wrote a column on Sounder at Heart this week, or today, actually, on Wednesday, where I basically outlined what I think's gonna happen in the off season. The TLDR of that column is that the Sounders have about, or actually have more than half of their salary cap space that is potentially opening up this off season.
00:03:50
Speaker
That means there's a potential for a ton of change. Aaron, what moves do you think you most want to see this offseason? I think that this offseason, the critical thing is to sign somebody who is going to replace some of the
00:04:09
Speaker
production you would expect from the designated player spots. I think you kind of talked about this in your article. It's probably unreasonable to suspect that they are going to fill every DP spot that they're going to be guns blazing. We've talked years past.
00:04:24
Speaker
that the Sounders have traditionally liked to do their business during the summer window, which is the primary window in most of the world. A lot more players available and so forth. So probably unreasonable to expect them to fill every spot over the summer. But I do think that if there's as much turnover as I think we're all expecting, they've probably got to replace at least one of those guys.
00:04:49
Speaker
Uh, Nico Ledero seems the most obvious. Yes. Um, or at least the most obvious to leave right away. Uh, I think it's unlikely also that Albert Rusnak will be back at least taking up a key piece spot for sure. But, uh,
00:05:03
Speaker
They're probably going to have at least two spots to play with. So I think filling one of those is important. And I think that there are, even though there are likely to be more players available in the summer window, it's not like you can't go out and get somebody in this window, especially if it's somebody you're going to pay a transfer fee for. I think that if you're looking for a free agent signing or something like that, which is a pretty common way of acquiring players in MLS,
00:05:30
Speaker
That's when you really want to wait for that window because that's when all the guys are available for free. But if you're willing to pay a big transfer fee, and I think especially the kind of player the Sounders are likely to be targeting, it's either going to be a big enough transfer fee that teams are going to be willing to let them move in the winter.
00:05:49
Speaker
Or it's going to be players who are maybe not critical to their team in the current moment. Like guy, maybe that's in their mid early to mid twenties, who is a contributor, but not a centerpiece of a good team. Those are players that teams are maybe willing to let move a little easier. So I think somebody who's going to be a creative force, I think you said a 10. I don't, I don't think it necessarily has to be a 10 in the tradition, but I do think a creative player.
00:06:17
Speaker
A central-ish player. A central-ish creative player that's going to sort of be the player that the Sounders want to build around going forward. That seems the most likely target and also I think the most important one. Because if you get the right player in that position, you don't really have to finish the rebuild. No. As the Sounders have shown us in the past, you can compete right away if you get the right guy and have solid players around them and then
00:06:46
Speaker
build going forward as upcoming windows allow you to do so. It's going to be interesting because the sounders I don't think have ever been in a situation where they're going to have as much turnover at the top as they're likely to have. Yeah. At least since the early 2010s. Yeah. I would say in the last
00:07:16
Speaker
I don't think they've ever had this much flexibility at the top end of the roster. Now they've had years where they turned over probably more players than they've turned over this year, but most of those players were, you know, um,
00:07:29
Speaker
not designated players, like there's a scenario that I think the sounders could potentially open up all three DP spots this winter. And I feel like it might be worth level setting a little bit, just so people understand what we're talking about. So the sounders have three designated players right now. Those three designated players are Ledero, Rusnak, and Ruidias. Ledero is going to be a free agent.
00:07:57
Speaker
Rusnak is going into an option year and Rui Diaz has one more year left on his guaranteed contract. I think Lidero almost certainly gone. The way I think about that is if you were going to bring him back,
00:08:18
Speaker
I suppose you could talk yourself into bringing him back at a Max Tam level. And I don't honestly think it's even worth talking to him. If you're offering him less than that, you're insulting him a little bit, I think. But even if you bring him back at Max Tam, you're saying, we don't expect you to be our centerpiece starter anymore.
00:08:39
Speaker
I just don't know that Ledero's game translates as a role player or as a guy who comes in late or whatever. To me, it's like he's sort of an all or nothing type of player, at least from what I've seen.
00:08:54
Speaker
And maybe, I guess you could argue, well, you can move them back and then, but the sounders don't need, that's not what the sounders need. Russnak, similar situation. I'm sure his option is for a DP level. I think the sounders have to go in and tell him like, look, we're willing to bring you back at Max Tam. We can't bring you back as a DP. Whatever we told you two years ago, we apologize. It didn't work out the way we hoped it would. We just like,
00:09:23
Speaker
If you were our number 10, if you were our starting number 10, maybe we can justify bringing you back as DP. I don't, I think we've seen enough of Rusnak that,
00:09:33
Speaker
being the centerpiece of the offense is probably not the way forward. And then Rui Diaz is a little bit trickier of a situation. He has one year left on his contract. I don't think the centers are inclined to buy him out. But if like a Saudi team or anyone frankly comes in and says, look, we'll take this contract off your hands, maybe we'll give you a more, maybe you can get a transfer fee for them. But they're not going to get enough of a transfer fee for it to transfer into
00:10:02
Speaker
So you're just talking about literally the cash. And I don't think the Sounders are going to really, like a million bucks or 2 million bucks there. I just don't think that's going to be the, if they want to, if he's going to leave, they want to just get out from under his contract. I don't necessarily think that's going to happen. I think it could happen. I think a lot of that depends on what goes on during the last 10 games of the season. But yeah, like you, I think you almost have to bring in
00:10:32
Speaker
one DP, if you're going to move two DPs out, you can't, you got to bring in at least one. Right. Unless you know you've got something major cooking for the next window. Yeah, I suppose. Yeah. If you want to do something like inner Miami is done, right? Like, okay, you know, maybe it's worth it, but. Right. Like if you know, you could get Killian Bape. Right. Right. Yeah. Probably worth leaving that open for a couple months. Yeah.
00:11:03
Speaker
But yeah, I think you sort of have to, you bring in one in the winter and then you get the other one in the summer.
Analyzing MLS Market Challenges and Sounders' Adaptation Needs
00:11:14
Speaker
And maybe that works out okay. And I think it makes more sense to go after the, presumably you want to get a number nine because I think Jordan Morris can play that role just fine. I also think that that number nine makes more sense to bring in like a young DP, which brings us into the next phase of this.
00:11:32
Speaker
If the sounders only have two senior DPs, whether the third DP is like an accounting mechanism DP or is a young DP, they can sign two more U22 players. And I don't necessarily think those U22 players have to be starters, but that's really where you start to build the next phase of the sounders.
00:11:57
Speaker
And, and so the, like, this is potentially, you know, we're talking about potentially four players you're going to have to pay transfer fees for. And man, I would hope that's in the budget because the Sounders have not spent literally any money on first team transfer fees in four transfer windows. Uh, the last time they, they spent money on a transfer fee was when they brought in Leo Chu in the summer of 2021. And even that wasn't like a crazy amount of money. I think it was two and a half, $3 million or something like that.
00:12:27
Speaker
So they got to have some money, you would think, to spend on transfer fees. And this is the window, this is the time to do it. It absolutely is. And I think too that it's a different time than it was in the past where you did kind of, I think it was more important to wait until that primary transfer window to bring in players because
00:12:52
Speaker
players weren't as willing to move to the league. I think now, MLS is definitely a little more well established as a league where younger players from South America, especially, can make a name for themselves and can, you know, hope to move on to bigger leagues. That wasn't as much the case a few years ago. So that gives you a little more flexibility. But I definitely think that we're entering an era in this league where it's pretty clear that you have to spend
00:13:22
Speaker
at least a little bit to be able to keep up. And the Sounders have always been willing to do that. But for a long time, they were one of the only teams willing to do that, right? Right. Now you've got like RSL has spent almost $20 million in transfer fees over the past couple of windows. I mean, everybody is spending. And so the Sounders have got to do it themselves. And it'll be interesting to see
00:13:48
Speaker
how they want to spend the money, what positions they want to spend the money on, what kind of transfer fees they're capable of paying. There's a lot of people who think that the Sounders are a poverty franchise at this point, and I don't necessarily think that that's anything close to true, but are they a team that can pay a $15 million transfer fee if that's what it takes to get the right player? Yeah, I don't know. We'll see. We'll have to see. I will say that I think we're going to find out a lot about
00:14:17
Speaker
if the sounders, you know, there's been, it's been pretty easy, I think, for the sounders to create a environment where it was reasonable not to spend money. And that was, you know, that it is what it is, right? They, they, they,
00:14:45
Speaker
they weren't spending much money and it was because they had so much stability on the roster and there wasn't obvious places to spend that money. I'm not mad that they didn't go out and spend a bunch of money on a transfer fee this last, this recently closed window because where were you going to put that player? Let's assume they had a few hundred thousand dollars of cap space. There's just not a way to fit a
00:15:13
Speaker
a transfer fee player on there unless you're gonna go buy someone out. And even then, like, for what purpose, like, you're gonna buy out, like, you're really gonna buy out Raul Rui ideas, just to bring in a, like, I mean, I guess you could you could do that. But I don't I would hope that they have more of a
00:15:34
Speaker
a plan than what that would have required. So I don't know, they've been able to get out of paying transfer fees, like I said, for four transfer windows. And now we find out if that was for a purpose or not, or if they're just being cheap. Yeah, I mean, I definitely have my suspicions. I think that, like you said, there was a lot of stability on the roster. And when you only have three or four spots that you can even conceivably pay a transfer fee for, and they're all full.
00:16:03
Speaker
There's really only so much you can do. And I think a lot of the anger about the Sounders not doing anything and not spending money is just a manifestation of frustration rather than super well considered thought. The team sucks right now. They're bad. The results are bad. It's bad to watch. It's frustrating to see.
00:16:29
Speaker
players that have been so great in the past be the opposite of that, you know, game in and game out. It sucks. It's a huge bummer, but that doesn't change the reality of the sounder situation. I mean, it's a huge bummer when, you know, I want to buy a new guitar and I don't have the money in my bank account to do it.
00:16:47
Speaker
That doesn't mean I get to get to get mad that I don't have a new guitar. Like it's somebody's fault. It's just right. You can't blame you. You can get mad, but you don't really get to blame anyone but yourself. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. And so on top of all that change, some of the other things I outlined in the story is some other potential changes on the roster. I at this point, I'm gonna be pretty surprised if a bear is back.
00:17:11
Speaker
I think he's shown some positive play at various times this year, but my God, he hasn't scored in 20 games literally. Like a lot of, not a lot of like a lot of those games are off the bench, but
00:17:24
Speaker
He's really the definition of a luxury player at this point, I think. Yeah, I mean, I don't know, maybe he goes on a little bit of a run at the end and it doesn't look so bad, but, you know, he's on something like a million bucks. Hard to imagine him coming back next year, similar with Ariaga. Like, I suppose it's probably like the sounders have an option on both a bear and Ariaga.
00:17:45
Speaker
I suppose it's possible that they pick up Ariaga's option. But I would think the only reason they would do that is because they think they can trade him. And unless if they think they can trade them, okay, fair enough. Pick up his option, see if you can get anything for him that's more than you'd get if you didn't pick up his option, right? I think you got to be real damn sure you can trade him though. Right, you got to be really damn sure.
00:18:12
Speaker
That's almost $2 million of cap space right there. My suspicion is you can't bring back both Steph Fry and Steph Cleveland.
00:18:24
Speaker
I strongly suspect that you're going to go with Fry just because Fry is a much more established player. Cleveland just honestly hasn't done enough this year to prove that he's worthy of the starting spot. I don't think he's been as bad as his stats would suggest. He's given up at least two goals in each of his last six starts, which is a pretty bad run of goals.
00:18:48
Speaker
you know, if you look at each of the goals, I think you can say like, he's given up a ton of just absolute worldies. So it's like, I don't want to beat the guy up too much. Sure. But at some point,
00:19:00
Speaker
I think that when you have two keepers that are playing in front of largely identical defenses, and the numbers are so dramatically different, either maybe Stefan Fry isn't as cooked as everybody wants to think he is, or maybe Stefan Cleveland isn't as clear cut of an upgrade. I don't know. I do think he's been somewhat unlucky, but I think the numbers definitely bear out that there's a gap there. Yeah. He's given up something like 20.
00:19:30
Speaker
three goals in six games or something like that, uh, 20 goals and six games. Yeah. I think he's given up one more goal or one fewer goal than, uh, than fry has in like 19 games. So I don't have the numbers right in front of me, but it's, it's pretty stark and.
00:19:46
Speaker
my suspicion and he's on, you know, he's not on nothing. He's on a $200,000 contract. Fry is on 650, which is makes him the sixth highest paid goalkeeper in the league. I don't think Fry is going to, like, I would think the centers are going to, you know, basically tell fry, like, look, if you're willing to take a pay cut, we're willing to bring it back, but we can't bring it back at 650. Yeah.
00:20:08
Speaker
And assuming he's willing to take less, let's assume like somebody like 500, I think Cleveland goes and then you just roll the dice. Andrew Thomas, Jacob Castro are both
00:20:18
Speaker
Perfectly, like I think high upside goalkeepers, either one of them could be the backup next year. I've been pretty impressed with Castro when I've seen him. I'm very impressed with Andrew Thomas. Honestly, I would be okay with either one of them usurping Cleveland right now at this point. And so that's, you know, you put all that together. Again, that's about 2 million bucks of, of salary cap space. And then you have guys like Freddie Monteiro, Kellen Rowe, who,
00:20:46
Speaker
You know, I'm not mad. I think they've been exceeded my expectations of both of them pretty, pretty thoroughly, but I don't.
00:20:55
Speaker
Maybe you can bring back Ro under the right circumstances, but to me, Freddy is, you know, he's not playing a ton anywhere. Let him retire as a, as a sounder. I'm sure we'll see him around. He'll probably be involved in the organization in some way. Uh, and then, and then you get farther down the roster. You have some more players who, uh, you know, may or may not be back like the younger guys, but yeah, you add it all up. Like I said, it's over half the salary cap.
00:21:26
Speaker
commitment and... Yeah, there's really no limit to how different this team can look.
Sounders' Strategic Decisions for Future Seasons
00:21:33
Speaker
And what I think is really going to be interesting is there's a safe approach where they do bring back a decent number of guys that they could maybe pass on. They bring back Rusnak as a tan player. Maybe they don't buy out Raul or Selro while he comes back and is sort of expected to be a starter.
00:21:54
Speaker
They bring in a DP that's maybe a little bit more of a sure thing, slightly lower upside, higher floor, lower ceiling, and try to get right back to competing.
00:22:09
Speaker
Um, or there's the option where they just kind of blow everything up where, right? They absolutely could do that. And, and that's what a lot of people seem to want them to do. Yeah. But if they do that, the odds of them competing right away are, I think very low. And it doesn't really feel like something that they are inclined to just.
00:22:32
Speaker
totally do and, and, and frankly, I don't think they should. I mean, like Joe Paulo is on a, is, as another player who's on an option, I have to assume they're going to pick that up, bring him back. But when you have, they have good pieces to build around. Jordan Morris, Christian Robon, Joe Paulo, Yay Mar. Uh, I'll still put Jackson Reagan in that category. Uh, knew who Alex rolled on. These are all very capable.
00:22:57
Speaker
players, you know, these were all players who, at the beginning of the year, I would have said, are among the best in their at their positions, all of them. And I think that's still, you know, vaguely true. And like, that's a strong raw, like, that's, that's, that's a strong core of a roster, there's no reason you have to totally blow things up, you just got to build some quality, put some quality pieces around them.
00:23:24
Speaker
Yeah, I mean, I think that that's that's the thing about the way this team is playing right now is that it's pretty miserable to watch. The results are very good, but it's not like they are.
00:23:35
Speaker
you know, Cole Booker's on a paper plate. Like they have talented players. They are creating chances. Um, they, they don't, it's not like everyone on the team is aging out. Like Jordan Morris is, is a lot of guys that are in the primes of their career. Christian Jordan both have a couple, a year or two at least left in the very peak of their athletic prime. Oh, I knew he was a young guy. Yamer is a relative. Like there's no reason on this. Yes.
00:24:04
Speaker
Like, there's no reason this team can't compete right away. But I think there is this perception that the whole thing is rotten top to bottom, and they've got to clear everything out. And I just, I think that they really are one or two big acquisitions away. If they're the right acquisitions, if they fit with this court, and if they're willing to make some difficult decisions elsewhere. Right. From being right there at the top again. Yeah, yeah, it's, it's, I will say I don't,
00:24:34
Speaker
I don't expect, I expect this to be the most interesting off season, probably in sounders history. Uh, and if it's not, that's bad. Uh, but I think they have huge incentives. Like this is the thing is that next year is a hugely, hugely important year. In part because they're going to be doing this 50th anniversary thing. They're going to be unveiling a new brand ID or a reef, a brand refresh, I think is what they're calling it.
00:25:04
Speaker
Uh, they are moving into long anchors. There's just a lot of energy around this team. And if they got to know that the, I'm sure they know that you, the, the product on the field has to live up to that. Like they can't, no one's going to go.
00:25:22
Speaker
to Loom and Field because they got a new training center at Long Anchors. That's just not how it works. The Long Anchors thing creates some momentum and it creates some energy, but it's only as useful as people wanting to go out to the stadium. Same thing with the brand refresh.
00:25:39
Speaker
and shows up to a game just because there's a new logo or slightly new colors or New Jersey's or whatever. Like that's not why people show up to the game. Maybe you'll sell some more merch. That's great. Uh, I support selling merch, but they got to have like, if, if this is all ultimately, it's about getting people into the stadium, uh, building energy and hype around the team. And in order to do that, the sounders know as well as anyone that especially when your brand is so explicitly tied to winning. Yeah.
00:26:09
Speaker
They have to. And I think especially when right, wrong or indifferent, the attitudes about the team and where they're at are not good right now. Right. People... And they know that. Yeah. People's dollars do not go as far as they used to, to say the least. There's more competition for people's entertainment dollars these days. And, you know, I mean, attendance is obviously not what it used to be.
00:26:39
Speaker
I don't think the sounders are in any danger of becoming irrelevant by any stretch of the imagination, but I do think if you want to, we're not at a place where people are going to be patient with a multi-season rebuild, right? And I think that seems to be what some people say they want, but I'm just really skeptical of that. And I guess I should also add the caveat to all of this because it does feel a little bit like we're completely writing this year off.
00:27:06
Speaker
I'm not writing this year off at all. What I'm saying is that regardless of how this season goes, there has to be some change because it's just the end of the cycle. And it's like they could go on and win MLS Cup. And I'll tell you the exact same thing. I don't know that there's any of the players who I listed who my feelings about whether or not they should come back or not are going to be changed just because they went on a 10 game or 15 game run. Yeah. And they they win MLS Cup because it's not about them being bad players. It's about
00:27:36
Speaker
they're just reaching the end of their cycles. And, and that's, you know, and so again, like I, I do think that this team is capable of, of turning this season around. They are in a playoff spot right now. They're in a strong playoff spot. Uh, you know, if they just play the last 10 games at the pace that they played the first, uh, whatever 24.
00:28:00
Speaker
they're going to make the playoffs and they're going to be, they're all home field advantage and, and they'll probably advance, uh, at least do a couple rounds. And, and once you do that, who knows what happens, right? But.
00:28:14
Speaker
So this discussion, I think, is somewhat separate from how this season goes. Yeah. And I think in some ways it's good to have the discussion now when we're a little bit more clear-eyed about it. And we're not wrapped up in the emotions of, oh my God, how can you let go of Nico Lidero? He just won MLS Cup MVP. And it's like, because...
00:28:39
Speaker
We saw the first half of the season. Exactly. Yeah. Players don't get better as they age, generally. I mean, certainly not once they're like 35. Yeah. And and I think that.
00:28:55
Speaker
There's always this hope that we can just bring them back into a reduced role and they'll accept that and it'll all work out and it frequently doesn't. I think that's what the Timbers tried to do with Diego Valeri. It is, absolutely. And that didn't work and it was a really bad ending. I think the Sounders can make a clean break this offseason. That's just much better for everyone involved. Yeah, I will say that I'm somewhat hopeful that they'll make some signings
00:29:23
Speaker
Uh, before the roster freeze, but I don't think those settings are going to be like free agents that are going to compete for starting spots.
00:29:32
Speaker
But like, I'll just throw this out there. A guy named Rodilio Rodriguez, who is a I think he's Portuguese, who plays for Tacoma defines how to hat trick today, I would highly urge you to go check out the hat check. He had two of the three goals he had were absolutely spectacular goals. He's an interesting player who I think could potentially be useful off the bench for the Sounders.
00:29:56
Speaker
Paul Rothrock is another guy who I think could potentially be useful off the bench for the sounders. And I don't know if either one of them are like game changers, but it would be it would be nice to have some more options off the bench. And I think those guys are possible to do it.
00:30:11
Speaker
I also think figuring out what you have in guys like that season like this is a good call. Right, exactly. Because what you don't want to do is be faced with a decision on those guys and maybe a few others where you're considering giving them first team contracts for 2024 and you haven't really tested them in a way that you need to test them. So hopefully the end of the season is useful in that way.
00:30:39
Speaker
Yeah, I think that's about what I had to say about that, I think. Yeah, I think that we're largely on the same page here where it is very exciting, but I don't think that the roster is that bad. I think that there are really important spots that good MLS teams have to get a lot of production out of that the Sounders are not getting that production out of. Yeah.
00:31:05
Speaker
I think that if they can fill those spots with better players that will produce, this is still a really good team. The core is still strong. They've still got good players with a lot of years left. They've got a lot of very young players under control, under club control for a long time. The depth is good. They just don't have those stars at the very top end pulling their weight. And if they can get that, I think they're set up pretty well.
00:31:30
Speaker
Yeah, there's been a notion kind of going around. I think that the center's depth got exposed as not being very good this year. And I'm not totally sure that's what happened. I think what happened is the top end of the roster was decimated either through poor performance or injury or whatever else. And if you're not getting that production out of the top five spots on your roster, which the centers haven't been getting over the last four months,
00:31:58
Speaker
It doesn't matter how deep you are. No MLS team has players on their roster that can consistently backfill underperformance or lack of performance at the highest end of your roster. That's just sort of how it goes.
00:32:18
Speaker
But anyway, all right, well, we're going to come back.
Transition to Reader-Supported Model and Community Engagement
00:32:20
Speaker
We're going to talk a little bit more about this transition to, uh, being a reader supported model. And, uh, if you're into listening about that, I highly encourage you to stick around. And if you're not, Hey, uh, be you're forewarned. Yep. All right. You're listening to nos adiates and we'll be right back. Watson's counter wants to thank everyone for their patience, but now the wait is over.
00:32:48
Speaker
Located at 6420 24th Avenue, Northwest in Ballard, they've reopened in a brand new location with the same bomb ass coffee and the same dumb ass vibes. You can still expect their classics like the gochujang fried chicken sandwich and free pebbles French toast alongside their new soft serve program and their world class coffee. Make sure to follow them on Instagram for all the latest and greatest.
00:33:13
Speaker
Welcome back to Nos Arietes. So we wanted to spend this last segment talking mainly about this big transition that we are part of. Again, basically what's happening is Nos Arietes is formally joining up with Sounder at Heart and Ride of the Valkyries. Together, we're all basically going all in on a website together.
00:33:40
Speaker
I am, as you probably know, I have been the editor at Sounder at Heart for a while. So I'm kind of speaking about Sounder at Heart as if it's a third party when it's really not that much of one. But yeah, it's pretty exciting. I'm leaving my job at Vox Media. And Vox Media is basically allowing Sounder at Heart to leave and be its own thing. And so I should say thank you to Vox for allowing us to do that. They didn't have to.
00:34:09
Speaker
And i'm excited about this but it's also super super nerve wracking because.
00:34:16
Speaker
Basically what I'm doing is I'm taking the stability of a job that, you know, I had benefits and I, you know, I was a, I was a full-time employee at, at Vox and I'd been a full-time employee for almost 10 years. And, uh, and now I'm starting my own business basically, uh, with the help of Aaron and Lickett and a lot of other people, but I'm, I'm really the one who is, uh, taking the only one who's quitting their job to do this. Yeah. Uh,
00:34:41
Speaker
And I don't say that to get your sympathy, but I do want to like, be clear about the stakes that we're going through here is that we are gambling that enough people want to support and find sounder heart and no side yet doesn't run out of the Valkyries valuable that they will
00:34:59
Speaker
how they will support the site. Uh, that doesn't mean that we need, you know, 10,000 subscribers tomorrow, but if you want to do that, yeah, if you, or, or do you have a bunch of money you want to throw at us and be a sponsor? Uh, speaking of which we are looking for sponsors. And if you want to, uh, do that, get in touch. Um, but I think a big part of this is that we just really feel, I think all of us felt that this model is.
00:35:29
Speaker
is the most promising. The ad supported model just doesn't seem to be working very well for anyone right now. And this is a way of sort of getting out of that and not being so reliant on, on algorithms and
00:35:45
Speaker
And we're not doing this to get rich. We're not doing it to make ourselves attractive to investors. We're not taking on investors, frankly. We're doing this because we want it to be a sustainable project. We're passionate about it. We think sounders fans, rain fans deserve serious, impactful in-person reporting. And hopefully people want to support that.
00:36:14
Speaker
Yeah. And I think that the writing is on the wall for media, digital media in a lot of ways. And we've seen... All media. All media. Yeah. I mean, all media is digital media at this point, right? Yeah, that's true at this point. And there's a very real future where all media is either content farmed, AI generated, clickbait,
00:36:41
Speaker
Um, a lot of people are wondering about the best Nike shoes, 2023. Well, when it comes to Nike shoes, like that kind of stuff, or just sensationalist garbage or whatever that is funded by like dark bunny, or maybe you can be like the pet project of a billionaire. Right. Uh, until they get bored of you, or you can.
00:37:09
Speaker
find a niche that is underserved and lean on your community to support it. And because they care about it, it's important to them. And I do think that a lot of people are starting to kind of see that's the way things have gone. That's where we're at. The way that digital media on the internet has worked for a long time. People got accustomed to stuff being free. They've gotten accustomed to
00:37:34
Speaker
You know, the ad supported model and it's just not, the money's just not there anymore. And a lot of that, the money was never there. It was investors throwing money at these projects. Like Vox is a great example of that where there was a lot of startup money and a lot of, you know, a lot of investor money. And the core business had some issues, right? And that's, and that's not to pick on Vox, right? Like that's just kind of a lot of that was.
00:38:00
Speaker
a billionaire who will maybe go unnamed, just lying to everyone and telling them, well, now media, now video is the way we got to do things. It's a whole mess, right? But the reality on the ground is that if you care about this stuff that is not profitable for huge media conglomerates to care about,
00:38:22
Speaker
You have to support it. You have to support it and vote with your dollars. And that's not to say that you owe anyone anything. You owe, you don't owe me anything. You don't know Jeremiah anything. We will do our best to make sure that you're getting your money's worth, but you do kind of have to buy into the new paradigm. And I think people, like I said, maybe I'm naive, but I really think people are ready for that. I think that we've kind of reached a point in the media landscape where
00:38:51
Speaker
The stuff that has always been there before has largely gotten so bad and people feel so underserved by it that they are kind of seeing the writing on the wall and they're willing to start supporting things that maybe a few years ago, it wouldn't have been as much of an incentive to do so.
00:39:09
Speaker
Right. And, and so, uh, a little bit more about what we're, what we're offering, uh, folks, and I, and I'm not going to get into breaking down everything that comes with the various membership tiers, but the membership tiers we're offering, uh, the basic one, $19 a year. It's going to get you all are written in podcast content. I'll be honest with you. That's not a tier designed to really support what we're doing. It's a way of getting you in the door. It's a way of, uh, you allowing,
00:39:37
Speaker
readers to support what we're doing in spirit, essentially. But if everyone subscribes at the $19 a year level, we would need a lot of subscribers to make this work. We're not defector. Right. We're exactly, exactly. The next level is at $74 a year.
00:39:59
Speaker
That's really where I think we can make this work. And so far, most of the signups we have are at that $74 a year. Granted, we are offering a discount for early adopters at $50 a year. And hopefully those people will eventually become $74 a year.
00:40:16
Speaker
subscribers. But with that, you're going to get like there's some discount codes for our merchandise and you'll get access to a Discord server that we've already spun up and we're hopeful will be a value add to people. And then on top of that, there's a $206 subscriber level. We've gotten a fair amount of interest in that.
00:40:38
Speaker
There's a few more perks that come along with that because we're hoping to do some more live events. The perks circulate mainly around the live events. And then there's this other tier that we created at $500 a year.
00:40:52
Speaker
if you just wanted to give us money, frankly. I'll be honest with you, there's not a lot of value add to it other than you just love what we do. We have actually had a couple of people sign up for that, very thankful for. In fact, I'll just go ahead and shout them out because it is one of the things we said we would do.
00:41:19
Speaker
One of them is, uh, why am I blanking on the name of his bar? Oh my God. I'm going to have to edit this out or something. Glenn white though is one of them. Uh, he doesn't have a bar as far as it does not Glenn. He does not have a bar. And, uh, I feel like we're probably gonna have to add this cause I should have been more doctors office. It's the doctor's office. Thank you. Jesus.
00:41:43
Speaker
That was horrible. That was I was panicking there. But anyway, Dr. Chavez, great bar. I would absolutely recommend you going out there and checking it out. It's in Capitol Hill. I've had quite a few drinks there and it's a good time. Anyway.
00:41:59
Speaker
getting ahead of our getting lost in this. But yeah, these are this is what we're doing. This is I guess you can this is kind of a maybe we'll make a pledge drive episode an annual or quarterly thing where we just basically beg you to give us money. But I guess the big thing we wanted to also bring up is if if this is something that you think is valuable, if you want in your life,
00:42:24
Speaker
This is the time to step up and show that. We have some runway. We're not going to go away tomorrow, but we won't be here forever if people don't support it. And if people don't support it, that's fine. No harm, no foul. We'll move on with our lives. But this is the model that we're hoping to make work. If you think Sounder at Heart, No Sadiatis, Road to the Valkyries are important parts of your media consumption,
00:42:53
Speaker
consider supporting us. And we hope we demonstrate value to you to make it worthwhile. Yeah. I don't know. Anything else to really add there? Yeah. I mean, I think, too, we are going to do our best to give you the bang for your buck, both in terms of what we, you know, what we, what Jeremiah provides to everyone, what we do on this podcast, all the free stuff that everyone gets. What if there's stuff that
00:43:24
Speaker
we can do to make the subscriber tiers more valuable. Like if there's kinds of exclusive content that you're looking for, we're going to throw, I think it's fair to say, we're probably going to throw some stuff at the wall, see what sticks, see what people like. But if you have ideas, you know, if we hate them, we won't do it. That's the worst thing. That's the worst that can happen, right? But like, you know, let us know what kind of stuff you want to see. I think that would be super helpful.
00:43:51
Speaker
Yeah, that's about all I have, though. I'm excited about this because I know that this is something that I believe in, just in terms of I believe in the work you do and the work the Rite of Valkyries folks do. There's a lot of talented people that make Sounder at Heart and Rite of the Valkyries great and such trusted resources. But I also believe in this model, and I think it's going to be really, really important
00:44:15
Speaker
Not just for soccer, right? Like for everything. This is a really important turning point. I think in digital media there's a lot of opportunity there as the bottom kind of falls out. And it can go a really bad way or it can go maybe kind of a positive way. And we see a return to sort of more grassroots journalism that people are willing to support. People have local news again. People get in-depth coverage on things that are actually really important to them rather than stuff that does good ratings.
00:44:43
Speaker
Um, and so, you know, I really hope that we can make this work because that makes me feel better about the future. Um, it's generally, because I don't, I'm tired of feeling pessimistic about the future. So.
00:44:55
Speaker
Yeah. And I will say, I don't want I also don't want to make it sound like I'm the only person that's getting paid in this whole endeavor. In fact, my intention is I don't really plan on taking a ton of pay. Like I'm not expecting to replace my income in the first, you know, three to six months. But what we're really doing is we're building up a
00:45:20
Speaker
a budget to pay our contributors. Don't get me wrong, my intention is to ultimately pay myself. I have a little bit of runway and really what we're doing here is trying to create, like I said, a sustainable base that we can build off of, that we can grow into and so you can rest assured that
00:45:42
Speaker
the writing that's going on sound at heart, all the work that's going in, people are being compensated. I don't know if we can say they're being compensated fairly, because what is fair, right? But they are being compensated. Hopefully, they're being compensated in a way that will be an improvement over what it was before. And yeah, so you are...
00:46:02
Speaker
By becoming a subscriber, you are absolutely in a very real way supporting independent journalism, local journalism. And that's, I guess that's my pitch for now. And I'm sure I'll come up with a more refined pitch over the course of the next few months, but I'm excited about this. I think people are going to like the new site.
00:46:26
Speaker
Uh, we've been working on getting it functional right now. It's in beta. Uh, and a lot of people are using it. People seem to like it so far and yeah, I guess that's, that's what I got. Yeah.
00:46:46
Speaker
But I don't have much else. No, I think you covered it.
Acknowledgements and Closing Remarks
00:46:49
Speaker
Yeah. And I guess it's a good time to thank the sponsors. We do have already full full wines. Watson's counter. I'll note I went to Watson's counter recently and I had probably the best.
00:47:03
Speaker
Iced oat milk latte I've had in a long time. And it was just about perfect. And they have wonderful coffee there. They have wonderful food. Full Pulled Wines has been such a huge, huge supporter of ours. I can say for sure we would not still be podcasting if not for their support. So it's stuff like that that keeps us going. And hopefully we find some more folks that wanna help us on this journey.
00:47:32
Speaker
Aaron, I do want to say you've been hugely supportive during this entire process. I appreciate it. Likit has done Yeoman's work on the background, making all this stuff. I tend to come up with ideas and then try to help people, try to find people that will help me execute them. Likit is like an expert at taking my dumb ideas and making them make sense. So,
00:48:00
Speaker
I can't say thank you enough. I should probably shout out Dave Clark, who really set this journey on its path way back in 2008, when he started Sounder at Heart, the first iteration of Sounder at Heart.
00:48:15
Speaker
And we've taken it from there. And he's been a very influential part of what we've been doing ever since then. Steve Vogt, Jacob Christobol, Susie Rance over at Red Other Valkyries have also been really helpful. So with that, I should probably sign off. I am Jeremiah O'Shan. This is No Sadietes. And remember, you'll never get alone.
00:49:35
Speaker
We love you. Let's win another one!