Transcript
Speaker: Hi, I'm Will Bruin, and I was just recognized as a Seattle Sounders legend. Now I get to do voice reads for the Sounder at Heart podcast network. Here we go.
Speaker: Come on. Hey, O'Shaughness. Let's The Seattle Sounders have done it. MLS Cup winners. The Sounders rule the region.
Speaker: Ooch of a gooch! All creatures, great and small! Rothrock gonna collect it, he does just about, runs into the advertising order. Low to our left, ball goes in! Oh, what a Where's my copy? got bunch of them How many do you cost them? 50 bucks.
Speaker: I'll deadline you.
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.
Speaker: They offer the best boutique wines of the world to members of their mailing list, with special focus on their home, Pacific Northwest.
Speaker: Welcome to a special mailbag episode of Nos Adietes on the Sound of Her Heart Podcast Network, which is now part of Soccer Wise Media Collective. It's been a while since we've done one of these. And with Aaron out of town, I figured now it would be ah good time to do one, especially with the game coming up tomorrow.
Speaker: i won't be able get back with Aaron until next week. So ah we opened it up to our Discord, which is always how we do our mailbag episodes these days. And if you want to get in on our Discord, just a reminder that you had to be a...
Speaker: paid subscriber at the supporter level or above and then just email us and we will get you a link to get into our discord. lot of fun there. As always, one of the perks getting to ask questions on this thing.
Speaker: am before we get to all that. I do want to give a little bit of a um my take on the annual business meeting and specifically the possibility of the sounders moving to rent. ah First off, I am definitely against the move. I think I have established that position pretty well over the years. We are one of the only places that have been talking about this move. We have always framed it as something that we don't love. And I don't think that we heard anything, frankly, from the annual business meeting that would change our opinions. Didn't certainly didn't change my opinion.
Speaker: i I don't like the idea of the Sounders moving to Renton. There's a lot of reasons that I could give you. why I don't like the idea of the Sounders moving to Renton. ah But I think the biggest one for me, and it's maybe it's the most cynical reason, but it's, it's that the Sounders have always fashioned themselves as a big club. When they first came into the league,
Speaker: They immediately set out an aspiration of winning CONCACAF. They did that. They immediately ah made a goal of playing competitive games against some of the biggest clubs in the world in the Club World Cup.
Speaker: They did that. They've they've actually played in in the Club World Cup twice now. The only MLS team to have done that. And they always sort of had aspirations of being a big club, not just an MLS, but a big club in the region, ah maybe even a big club in the world if it got to that point. and You know, they would compare their attendance across the globe. At one point, I believe they were in the top 30 for worldwide attendance.
Speaker: And that's really what made the Sounders special in the in the Seattle sports landscape. ah You know, this was before the Seahawks had ever won a Super Bowl. This was before, you know, the the sea this the Mariners have obviously struggled ah to to be competitive over the years. They've never been to a World Series. ah The Sonics had just left. they and And they had only won a title back in the seventy s This is a region that has not had a lot of success at the highest level. And the Sounders immediately came into the market and said, we intend to be this kind of club. We want to be essentially the Yankees of MLS. And for the most part, they have fulfilled that obligation.
Speaker: yeah They've won two MLS Cups. They've won four U.S. Open Cups. They've won Champions League. They've won Leagues Cup. They're the only team, ah they've won the Supporters' Shield. They're the only team in MLS who have won all those trophies. And up until this year, they were the only team in the region ah in in North America to have won all of those trophies as well, if you kind of swap out Megan Mechies for MLS. But I don't have to get into that.
Speaker: Point being that they've always fashioned themselves as a big club. And the thing that gave them really their superpower was the support. And not in a, we've got the best fans in the world kind of way, but in a real sense that they had the numbers and that they had the relevancy inside their market that gave them an ability to do things that other teams just couldn't do. Certainly not in a sustainable way.
Speaker: And my concern is that when if they move to Renton, that they will lose that superpower. The one thing that really separates them from every other team in MLS, their ability to draw the ah the other teams, draw big crowds.
Speaker: Look, I know Atlanta has most of our attendance records. ah Charlotte has been right up there in terms of attendance, but look at those games on a week to week basis. How many people are actually in the stands and yeah, the Sounders crowds have dwindled over the years. There's no question that, you know, they announced 29,000 or something the other day, and there were maybe 18,000 at most in the stadium.
Speaker: But compare that to Atlanta, compare that to Charlotte, where they oftentimes will announce crowds of 30,000, and there'll be maybe 10, at most 15,000 people there. And, and you and I think the reason for that is that the Sounders have a market relevancy that's just different than everywhere else.
Speaker: ah the The Sounders back when they had local broadcast routinely had local broadcast ratings that were right up there with with every with other teams in the region, not the Seahawks, obviously, but, you know, up there with competitive with the Mariners and competitive with, ah you know, other teams in in other top leagues, but definitely some of the best in MLS. And even now they still have some of the best ratings on Apple.
Speaker: And I bring that up because. Part of what I think Sounders fans have fallen in love with is the way that seat yeah that the way that the Sounders really are Seattle's team in a way that ah you know the Seahawks are really the greater Pacific Northwest's team.
Speaker: And the Mariners even are are not as much of... There's more Mariners fans here, don't get me wrong. But the Mariners have a much wider ah regional fan base. The Sounders really are a team that is about Seattle.
Speaker: And yeah, there obviously there are fans in other parts of the region, but this is the most centrally located part of their fandom. And I don't know that you can take the Sounders out of Seattle and transport that. And and there's a million ways that we can illustrate that.
Speaker: And I don't need to get into all those reasons right now. But I'm just worried that this is a generational mistake that the Sounders may never, frankly, recover from and that this would ultimately change the trajectory of the club and turn them into just sort of another MLS team that doesn't really that isn't differentiated in any meaningful way from, you know, like.
Speaker: from Portland, from Vancouver, from Columbus, from Austin, ah go down the list teams that all have great atmospheres in their own right, but are different.
Speaker: And, and I think that that's, you know, ah something that we could potentially lose. But one of the things that's kind of bummed me out and, and frustrated to me a little bit is the way that this has turned into a referendum on not Sorry, that's not the right way of putting it.
Speaker: The way that people have talked about Adrian Hanauer and all this, and I don't think that he necessarily acquitted himself well. I'm not here to defend his honor or anything like that.
Speaker: But I do think that there is this idea going around that this is a selfish move by him. that he is seeing this as a way to just line his own pockets, a way to make his investment more valuable.
Speaker: And I think that misses the mark a little bit. ah you know Adrian Hanauer is far from perfect, obviously, and i and he's and he's not entirely altruistic that he's in this. But I do think that what he's ultimately saying is we need more money to compete with the rest of the league. The rest of the league has these billionaire owners who don't mind losing money, who don't mind writing checks. And we don't know how long that's going to go on. I mean, that's the that's the reality of this is that it's all fine and good when billionaires are writing checks and they say they aren't worried about short-term losses. But at some point, billionaires do care about losing money over the long term.
Speaker: And so I think what Adrian Hanauer is trying to do is find the the right calculus to be able to compete with these owners in the short term without bankrupting the team in the long term. And so, yeah, it is about bringing in money. It's about increasing revenues. And yes, of course, his valuation will go up.
Speaker: But I don't know that he I don't suspect that he's going to start pulling money out for his own accord on a year to year basis. I think this is much more about keeping the Sounders competitive in his mind.
Speaker: And I think that's a miscalculation to be clear. I don't think that this is the smartest way to go about it. I think that the, the Sounders are better off in the longterm if they're in Seattle and maybe even if they are still at Lumen field. And I, and I think you can certainly make the argument that it's entirely possible that that and MLS has just gotten to a point where Adrian Hanauer is not necessarily the best position to be the majority owner. And maybe, you know, in a perfect world, I think you can imagine that the Seahawks ah owning the Sounders and the rain would probably be better off for everyone. I mean, there is some economy of scale there that it would make sense to keep them at Lumen Field.
Speaker: And we've seen, you know, to Adrian's point, we've seen how that can work in Charlotte. We can, we see how that works in Atlanta, where those teams are treated where it feels much more like home games for those teams because their owners want to make it feel like a home game.
Speaker: And I think all those complaints that Hanauer has are totally legitimate that the Sounders and rain don't have locker rooms, totally legitimate that the Sounders can't sell the same sort of admin inventory is a problem for revenue purposes.
Speaker: We could go down this list. And I and i think all those things that he he showed are absolute problems. But I also think that the Sounders at some point need to answer, well, what are you willing to give up to get a locker room? Like, are the Sounders willing to spend the money to put their own locker room in at Lumen Field?
Speaker: i kind of suspect not, since you know you're you're talking about making ah improvements consistently. on ah on a property where you are a renter. But if that's something that the Sounders really need, I would like to think that the the Hawks would be open to allowing the Sounders to do that. The ad inventory stuff is definitely more complicated.
Speaker: The Sounders being able to customize the stadium on game day is a little bit more complicated. But they to me, they've got to figure out a way to like put a permanent ring of honor in the stadium. they they They should be able to do things like build statues if that's what they want to do.
Speaker: and And hopefully those are all areas that can be compromised on with the Seahawks. And it is worth reminding everyone that even though first and goal is who's operating Lumen Field, that Lumen Field was ultimately ah paid for by a public entity and that the public entity still technically owns Lumen Field and Soccer was always envisioned to be a big part of that. And I would hope that on some level, we get to a lobbying perspective where we're lobbying the Washington stadium authority two make sure that the Sounders are equal partners, that the rain are equal partners and that there is some compromise to be found and, and we can all you know be in a better place. And if they can't,
Speaker: Hopefully the Sounders are able to start looking around Seattle and maybe that's what this is about. Maybe this was Adrian Hanauer doing two things. Maybe it was him positioning the Sounders so that they have the best ah ability to negotiate with the Hawks.
Speaker: or maybe it's a plea to the larger Seattle community help find a stadium location. I've always thought that the old six stadium over in Mount Baker, where the Lowe's is now, that seems like it could be a potentially good property. I believe it's not currently being used, but,
Speaker: I would, I would, I mean, at least show us that you are looking in Seattle. I think that would go a long way. So I don't know how this is all going to end. i suspect that the reason it's getting talked about publicly is because we're getting to a point where something has to happen.
Speaker: And, ah and I, I just don't, I, I guess what I'm saying is I'm not totally convinced that there are as many bad guys in this thing. There are just people that are trying to make the right decision that are maybe misguided in, in their decision-making.
Speaker: ah With all that said, let's get to some of your questions. You guys sent in a bunch. And we may as well start with some questions about the the direction of the club.
Speaker: you know It's All Goody suggested that maybe Sounder Heart should be doing something to organize. They suggested maybe even a boycott. I don't think we are calling for a boycott.
Speaker: ah But I do think that... you know Our job in this thing as both a journalistic outlet and as well as an advocate is to shine a light on what's going on out there. We're not going to lead protests or do anything like that. But- We want people to know what's going on. And so I think our role is to be informative and to push the agenda and to make sure that this is being discussed and that the sounders just don't quietly move off to Renton in the dead of night, that this is something that that we're we're bringing ah ah chance to to discuss it. And so that's sort of the what I see our role as. ah and And hopefully people will take it from there. I mean, that that is sort of our position on it.
Speaker: um This is from of an unrelated subject. This is from W. he's And there's a few questions that were all sort of related to this. Colin Lamont asked something similar. Danicus also had a similar question. The way Colin Lamont put it may have been the most succinct.
Speaker: And he says, is new investment the critical piece to accelerating our roster acquisitions, external meaning external from MLS, or are they completely ah unrelated? And so that my question,
Speaker: The point was that there was a lot of questions about investment and when we can expect the sounders to change the way that they're doing things. And I've always been a little skeptical that the investment thing was connected to like the way that they're using GAM, for instance. And I and i do think that those are unrelated. i don't i don't think investors are looking at things like GAM and GAM.
Speaker: considering that as part of and their investment. But when it comes to outside spending money outside of the league, yeah, I mean, I do think that there is an element that the Sounders are a little bit stuck while they're trying to figure out how much money they really have. I mean, they were ultimately looking for something like $200 believe,
Speaker: ah in outside investment. And obviously that's, that's a big chunk of money. My assumption has always been that that money was going to mostly be used for a future stadium, but I'm sure some of it will also go towards things like signing new players. So yeah, I mean, I do think they're related.
Speaker: i don't think that we necessarily need to wait until that's totally finalized. I would like to think that, you know, we're, we're ultimately talking about million, like, seven figure investments, which is a lot of money to you and me.
Speaker: It shouldn't be that much money to MLS owners. And from what I can tell, even though Adrian Hanauer might not be the richest person in the league, he has the ability to spend millions of dollars.
Speaker: I mean, they spend millions of dollars on their C-suite as it is right now. So why can't they just spend that on the roster? I think that's more of a philosophical and a roster building choice than it is one about literally not having money. So hopefully, you know, I guess my point is I think they're connected. I don't think that we necessarily need to wait for one before the other. ah All right. This one is from FW Sounders fan.
Speaker: And he says, do you know how they choose which players speak to media after practicing games? I do actually have some answer to that. It's it's kind of a combination of things ah for practice and after game or after practice, it's it's mostly they'll ask us if we want to talk to anyone and and otherwise they'll ask, you know, whoever they think are, uh, notable people. They go through kind of a a similar rotation.
Speaker: They try to not have the same guys talking every week. And, and then the players have to kind of want to do it after games. They usually try to pick one or two players who were,
Speaker: important to the result of the game who are also willing to talk. We don't get as much input into who talks. Certainly we don't get any input into who talks after after road games. We sometimes can get a little bit of input on who talks after home games. We also have the ability, frankly, to go up to people who are still around and ask them questions. They can obviously choose not to talk to us.
Speaker: But it's it's a little bit of this, a little bit of that. It's a little bit of collaboration. It's a little bit of the players who are willing to talk. It's a little bit of who the media staff wants to get us. hopeful Hopefully that that answers your question.
Speaker: Hey everyone, David Goss here from SoccerWise. I am coming to you with our MLS Minute presented by Continental Tire. We are so excited to be working with some of the best local MLS coverage in the league as part of our new collective.
Speaker: So after you're done listening hear about your team, come on over and listen to myself, Doyle, and Tom talk about the USMNT and all of Major League Soccer. Yes, Monday we're talking USMNT because the kids blew out Peru. So we'll have full coverage of that as well as full coverage off the bat of the Chile match on Wednesday. And we expect to have a USWNT roster to break down this week as well. this was of course a chaos weekend in mls with international breaks and a lot of players missing but the points still count and there was a lot of movement in the standings let's dig into it and start with philadelphia who wrote a milan oloski hat trick to a four to win over orlando philadelphia have now taken 32 points from their last 12 matches which is tied for the most points in any 12 game span in mls history with the seattle sounders back in 2018.
Speaker: Nashville kept up the pace at the top of the shield race with a honey moved our brace to knock off TFC. They stretch their lead a little bit with the revs losing to a stumbling ah RSL on the road and Vancouver drawing in a wild 3-3 game out west.
Speaker: FC Dallas took advantage in the west with 1-0 win over LAFC. So now they are three points off the top of the conference in San Jose. Stayed hot on their tails led by Preston Judd and throttled the Portland Timbers.
Speaker: Cincinnati have fallen out of the playoffs with a 3-1 loss in Montreal to a team that only dressed 14 players for this game. It wasn't the only wild result on the weekend. Austin. scored three goals in 14 minutes to come from 3-0 down to draw San Diego at home. And one of the players who might decide the playoff race for every team might be SKC's Andre Luis. The $18 million dollars man has terrorized his opponents and teams are starting to drop points to an SKC team that was on pace to be the worst in MLS history. This week, it was the Houston Dynamo falling off second place in the West with 2-0 loss to Sporting Kansas City. One note to watch out for St. Louis Red Bulls game was canceled due to weather. It's been moved to this Wednesday. So additional and MLS game coming into this international break, which will fare better for St. Louis, who's only missing one player in Damon Downs to the 10 players that the Red Bulls have called up, including, of course, Julian Hall, who scored in his national team debut.
Speaker: We will have all of your MLS, NWSL, U.S. national team coverage for you on the SoccerWise channels all week. This has been the MLS Minute. It's a part of our SoccerWise media collective sponsored by Continental Tire, where we are proud to work with local soccer media partners across the country.
Speaker: Thank you for listening to the Sounder Heart Podcast Network, which recently added Monday Soundcheck to our roster of shows. Soundcheck airs live on Mondays at 1 p.m. You can watch it on our YouTube channel or listen to it at your convenience, however you consume podcasts. It joins a roster that already includes Nos Adietes, which airs on Wednesdays and Fridays, and the Cooler Guild, who cover the Seattle rain. If you like what you hear, please consider becoming a member of Sounder at Heart.
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Speaker: This one's from Andrew and he says, I think... I think you have said that you don't think the Sounders missing the playoffs would really change Aegean's viewpoint on roster building. Technically, I do think I've said that, but I'll explain later. What do you think would multiple years without playoffs sub 25,000 attendance a spoon? i know there is Oh, yeah. Okay. So that's the first part of his question.
Speaker: So what I've said is that I don't think that there's much of a difference between missing the playoffs and being poor like they were for a lot of the season this year. And and the way I said it was, i think the Sounders can still make the playoffs and it would have a similar impact to the Sounders roster building philosophy as missing the playoffs. Yeah.
Speaker: which is to say, i don't think missing the playoffs is suddenly going to change the way that the Sounders operate. Now, if you are looking for a big change for the, how those centers operate, yeah, it's probably going to take multiple years of failure. It's not going to take missing the playoffs once. It's not going to barely be missing the playoffs once. It's probably going to be the, it really falling apart sort of like how it did this year, but for an even longer period of time, uh, I don't,
Speaker: but I, I don't think the sounders believe their philosophy has been disproven. Let's put it that way. Uh, and then he had another question. I know there's very, very unlikely it happened, but should the sounders move Jackson Reagan this off season and fully commit Stu Hawkins and he, and a yay more replacement.
Speaker: Uh, I don't know. I would be interested to see what the market is for Jackson Reagan. i think it would be interesting to go with Stu Hawkins and a Yamar replacement.
Speaker: I think as of right now, though, Hawkins is probably the Yamar replacement. So I think we're probably going to see a fair amount of Yamar or sorry, of Jackson Reagan and Stu Hawkins next year. And I'm actually pretty intrigued to see what that might look like. I think we might see a fair amount of ah that this year even.
Speaker: And then they had one more question is the direction the teams attack based on a coin toss. And if so, how do the sounders almost invariably attack North in the first half and South in the second. My understanding is that the coin toss happens and the team that wins, it gets to choose the direction that they're attacking or they get to choose when they kick off.
Speaker: And I think the sounders always pick the direction that they're attacking and they're so that just skews it because some teams want the ball first. Sometimes teams want it second. Some teams don't care which way they're attacking.
Speaker: If you'll notice, I think when they play the Timbers, they end up attacking the North end a fair amount ah in the second half in part because the Timbers don't want to let the Sounders attack the Brahm end in the second half.
Speaker: ah But Anyway, I think that's how it works. ah Veritatum7 asks, seems like we're on track to win the Fair Play Award. Compared to last year, there certainly are fewer red cards, and we have some of the fewest yellows collectively.
Speaker: Was last season's discipline issues an anomaly, just as miss this year's injury crisis was? And so I actually looked this up and Veritatum's point, the Sounders are currently leading the fair play standings with 46 points, which ah combines red cards, yellow cards, and I think total fouls as well.
Speaker: ah Not 100% sure about the total fouls. but it's mainly red cards and yellow cards. But they only have they're only they're just barely ahead of Columbus Crew, who have 47 points.
Speaker: ah Last year, the Sounders finished seventh in the fair play table, but they were 30 points behind the Crew. And then they were also in 2024,
Speaker: in twenty twenty four which might suggest that the Sounders this year are a little bit more of anomaly, but that's not quite right. Uh, the Sounders were historically one of the leaders in the disciplinary points from 2019 to 2023.
Speaker: three And so the last two years seemed like they were more of an anomaly in 2024. The Sounders had seven red cards last year. They had six. So, um,
Speaker: Those were outliers in an extreme. In fact, if you counted up all the red cards that they had in 1920, 21, 22, 23, and 26, that's actually fewer red cards than they had in 24 and 25.
Speaker: So, um yeah, I guess my point is I think the last two years were more of an anomaly than this year's is. is I don't really know how much correlation, though, ah the Fairpoint standings have to the regular standings. I guess I could have figured that out, but I did not.
Speaker: ah All right. This one's from Boomstick315. Given the scale of fraud Citigroup has been found guilty of in the United Kingdom, in your opinion, should their child clubs, including new York City FC, also face repercussions in their various leagues?
Speaker: I mean, i think more than than the repercussions, I don't know how you would enforce that, first of all, but someone else pointed this out on Blue Sky. They said, ah really what this shows us is how little a city football group seems to care about NYCFC because they didn't seem to be cheating at all on behalf of ah of of ah NYCFC, which is kind of a slap in the face if you think about it.
Speaker: um All right. This one's from dudes B when to current DP contracts expire and what new DP signing player types or positions would you speculate could best strengthen the roster? So as a refresher, ah the Sounders currently have three DPs, obviously that is Deon Jovulich, Pedro de la Vega and Jordan Morris. Albert Rusnak is no longer a DP.
Speaker: Jesus Ferreira is not a DP as of this time. And so of Jovulic, I think people know he's signed for several more years. Not really worth talking about there.
Speaker: Pedro de la Vega is guaranteed through the 27 spring season, I believe. And then he has a option for 28. Uh, so theoretically they could,
Speaker: ah They could buy him out ah if they wanted to, I suppose. ah We had a story in Sounder at Heart by Armin Caffane in which he talked about some of the options that the Sounders could do to open up a DB spot.
Speaker: ah Jordan Morris is also signed through 27 with no player option. So his contract actually expires ah in the middle of the 27-28 season. ah all I guess the the other way of putting this is all three DPs are signed through the sprint season.
Speaker: Two of their contracts potentially expire in the middle of the twenty seven twenty eight season. And I don't know what the Sounders are going to do with those. think I'm sure they would love at some like I think of those two. Jordan Morris seems like the one they're more likely to extend, although I don't know why they would be in a rush to extend anyone.
Speaker: um I suppose if it's looking like Pedro de la Vega is not going to get healthy, that they might buy him out. I think it would be crazy, honestly, to try to extend him specifically.
Speaker: ah Jordan, I think they're going to probably want to see how he does in the sprint season, and then they can make a decision on that. I suppose they might do the same thing with Pedro. ah And if Pedro misses the entire sprint season, that's going to be tough.
Speaker: It's going really tough. And I think if they think he might miss the whole sprint season, I think they at least have to consider the possibility of buying him out. But that definitely puts them in a tough spot. All right. This is from Twimperly23.
Speaker: you think there is an argument to vote Weibel out based on his performance leading the sporting side? If there isn't, and the case is to vote Weibel out is a message to ownership, what is the likelihood that actually changes fans' frustrations on the sporting side?
Speaker: All right. So these are kind of two core questions. One is, do I think based purely on sporting merit that Craig Weibel, that there's a case to be made for Craig Weibel being voted out? And simply my answer is, yeah, i do think there's an argument to be made.
Speaker: And it's not based on team results. It's not past based on anything other than if you believe the GM's main job is talent identification, and you're frustrated that the Sounders have not brought in more talent, that's a viable case to vote him out. I'm not saying i would do that.
Speaker: But I think that there's a viable case and I don't really blame anyone for voting him out. Now, I think there's a deeper question here, which is who do you blame for not bringing in more talent? And I think that gets a little bit more complicated. I don't think he's had the budget to work with.
Speaker: And I think that you need to be realistic that any new GM is probably not going to have more of a budget than he is. And so I think the reality is that the next GM is probably going to be working under the same or very similar constraints that Craig Weibel is. And if they are, i don't know if that will, that the next GM is going to do as good of a job finding players that have a ah cultural fit. And I think there's a reality that sometimes we have,
Speaker: overlooked in Seattle is that the Sounders for as, as frustrating as it is to see that the Sounders aren't in MLS cup every year and that they haven't been in MLS cup since 2020, which is, uh, I believe one year shy of their record for the longest drought without MLS cup. If they don't go to MLS cup this year,
Speaker: Actually, if they don't go to MLS Cup, it will be the longest drought that they've had of not winning. And then if they don't go next year, that would tie the that would tie the record for the longest they've gone without going. ah And so that's frustrating. And I get it. But there's there's also a reality that the Sounders during Weibel's tenure have the fifth most points.
Speaker: They have the fifth best goal difference. They have the fifth best expected points. And all but three teams, I believe, have but they have as many or more trophies than all but three teams in the league in that time. and yes, it's only one trophy, and that doesn't feel like enough if you're the Sounders.
Speaker: But the reality is that MLS is a... a very parody driven league. And there's not a lot of teams that have won more than one trophy. In fact, there's only three of them that have won more than one trophy over the last, let's see, 23, 24, 25, 26 over the last four seasons.
Speaker: So, you know, that that is kind of what it is. i don't think the Sounders have been nearly as bad as, as a lot of people have made it out to be. and And that's even with the Sounders being relatively bad this year, they this is like, they still are right there among the the best teams in the league.
Speaker: So hopefully that that gets to it. I think ultimately I'm leaning towards voting to retain Craig Weibel.
Speaker: I think that he has done admirable given the budget constraints that he's been under, but he could be better. And I, and i also think that sending a message to ownership is a, is a perfectly viable thing for voters to do. If that's what voters want to do is they want to send a message just to ownership.
Speaker: This is a huge tool that they have to do that. And I don't blame anyone for wanting to send a message to ownership. I just think that people need to be realistic about what might actually change, uh,
Speaker: But that's not, you know, I don't think voters have to always be totally rational. And I think the reality is that Craig Weibel is probably going end up being retained, even if he doesn't win the vote, because there's such a high bar to meet. And just as a reminder, ah they need to have two thirds of the voting ah the votes have to go against Weibel and 40% of the ah season ticket base has to vote in the election.
Speaker: Those are both pretty high bars to clear. I really doubt that either one of them are going to get cleared, let alone both of them. And so Weibel is probably getting retained. So I my i guess my ah my message is that you can probably feel free to, if you want to, vote Weibel out as a message to ownership. And there's a decent chance that yeah he's still going to not get voted out. And I don't know if that's a good thing or a bad thing.
Speaker: But I guess that's what I would say is to, ah if you want to send a message, i don't I don't really begrudge anyone for wanting to send that message. All right, moving into the next one. MCB says, I think Areola, Jovlich, and Morris are a championship caliber starting attack in their current form.
Speaker: Do you agree? And look, I think you got to throw Rusnak into that mix in order to really make it a championship caliber attack. But assuming Rusnak is there, i I think that there's a champion. Okay, I guess we need to...
Speaker: are we Like, do I think that those, that quartet is going to lead centers to MLS cup this year? If they're firing on all cylinders,
Speaker: I don't think I would bet on that, but I do think that's a contender. I'm really intrigued by what we're seeing from Areola over the last few weeks. I've been intrigued by what we've seen from Jordan Morris over the last few weeks. And I think there's potential that they could all get to a point where they are championship caliber.
Speaker: ah And I am, I would not be freaked out about them rolling that lineup back next year as the main part of their attack.
Speaker: ah if they stayed healthy, but can we guarantee that they're going to stay healthy? Probably not. um I guess that's where we get into this whole debate. Hopefully the Sounders have some, at least one or two big moves planned in the off season. Cause I, I don't feel comfortable putting that much faith in that group of players, I guess is maybe the way of, of putting it.
Speaker: All right, this one's from Josh. If you had to give a letter grade so far to MLS capitalizing on the World Cup in America, where would you put it? Since the World Cup break, the flagship and MLS teams haven't played their best soccer.
Speaker: A huge number of teams sold players became worse and are now out of sorts and not playing their best soccer either. It's starting to feel like the sprint season is a crapshoot whether any given team will take it seriously.
Speaker: So now we're looking at perhaps a year of mediocre soccer as the we'll take it from here promise. I agree. I think the we'll take it from here promise has fallen flat.
Speaker: I think it was ill-conceived. I don't think there was a plan to capitalize on it. And I think everyone at and MLS should probably feel bad about that. All that said, we've also gotten Kevin Sullivan, who is pretty clearly emerged as the next great hope of American soccer.
Speaker: And from a so from a purely practical perspective, I do think that MLS has done a good job of taking it from here because they've been able to elevate some of these young talents who are wowing everyone with the U.S. national team right now.
Speaker: But if I was going to give it a letter grade, maybe a C minus, maybe maybe a D plus. I mean, it's not been good. It's been really bad, I would say. And and the Sounders are sort of poster childs for that. I don't know that there's any team other than Philadelphia who have really taken that mantle and been able to do much with it.
Speaker: All right, I believe we're closing it out on another question from Colin Lamont. And he says, can you comment on what you expect to change in MLS and with Sounders in a year's time when the new CBA, any changes by the new MLS commissioner and a new calendar are all in place?
Speaker: Big question. And i think what my expectation is, is, you know, I'm just taking cues from what I've been reading, but it seems like there is a growing sense that MLS will do something that is a much more free-formed salary cap, salary floor type of situation.
Speaker: So salary floor, I would imagine, is somewhere in the $12 to $15 million range, a salary cap that's in the $25 to $35 million dollar range, and The way I would imagine that working is that everything that's on the floor is what's paid for by MLS.
Speaker: And everything above that is essentially paid out of the owner's pockets. Now, that potentially leaves the Sounders in a pretty precarious situation. And I would imagine even in that, and also in that situation, I suspect that GAM will essentially be off cap money that is paid for through league funds, essentially.
Speaker: ah And so teams can can buy GAM, I guess, to trade it essentially. And it'll be interesting to see how that all works. But i don't think GAM is going to go away.
Speaker: But I do think that you can see how the Sounders are potentially in a situation where it gets a little dicey, because if there is a 12 million dollar floor and a 35 million dollar ceiling,
Speaker: You're talking about $20-odd million dollars of discretionary spending that the Sounders could ah fall behind on. And I think that's a that's a gap where you're going to start seeing real differences in how teams perform based on how much money they're spending. Right now, you don't see that gap, except for maybe at the top level where there is sort of this growing sense you need to spend a certain amount to compete for trophies.
Speaker: or at least to compete for MLS cup, but that regular season performances, oftentimes that stuff is not as important. And I think when you get spending gaps that are that big, you might see some of those, those fissures growing and being more apparent.
Speaker: ah I also think that, in the new CBA things like free agency are probably going to even be ah more, ah more free. I think that the NWSL has really been a pioneer in American sports in terms of getting rid of the college draft. I wouldn't be totally shocked if they they got rid of the college draft or at least ah put more caps on how long a team can retain the rights for a player.
Speaker: ah You know, there's a player right now, Zach Ramsey at UW who was drafted by the Whitecaps. They essentially control his MLS rights for two years, or they can as long as they make him a MLS offer.
Speaker: And he might choose but to go back to school, but should he have to choose back to go back to school if he didn't want to? just to could he Should he be allowed to pick the team that he goes to? Should he be allowed to maybe Maybe MLS teams can only retain a player's rights for one year.
Speaker: So there's all kinds of things like that, that I think that might change in a new CBA. I do think that there's going to be big changes. I think that the league knows that they have to loosen some of the spending rules that there's too There's too many rules or too many buckets around ah spending.
Speaker: Whereas I think if you just have one big bucket, you can still control spending and it shouldn't get out of control. I think the league is probably going to move in that direction. i would imagine the players would want that as well.
Speaker: and ah And then we'll see. it Hopefully the sounders can continue continue continue to compete under those circumstances. Well, that's all I have, I believe, as far as questions. I wanted to say thank you to everyone who has sent those in.
Speaker: i We are, the Sounders are obviously playing, sporting Kansas City on Thursday. That's going to be a huge game that I think is going to go a long way towards ah determining how, whether the Sounders are eyeing a, like how high they can go or ah just to get into the playoffs. If they win this game, I think all of a sudden finishing as high as sixth becomes quite realistic, frankly. and And then depending on how they do against New England and Dallas in the upcoming road trip will probably determine how much of a contender they really are.
Speaker: So exciting time right now. Nice to have something like excitement after the the months of of horrible soccer we watched. But that is, I guess, one of the the both the sad, thing like the the embarrassing, but also exciting things about MLS is that you can go through months of not winning games and still be ah considered to be in contention.
Speaker: All right. Well, I should probably get out of here. i am Jeremiah Shan. This is No Sadietes, which is part of the Sounder Heart Podcast Network, as well as the Soccer Wise Media Collective. And yeah, we'll get out of here.
Speaker: Remember, you'll never get here.
Speaker: Let's go at Sounders.
