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Sounders FC - San Jose Quakes preview
85 Plays1 year ago
Jamon Moore of Quakes Epicenter and The Aftershock joins the podcast to share some insight on the San Jose Earthquakes, a team that is off to an even worse start than the Sounders.
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Transcript
Introduction and Sponsor Mention
00:00:00
Speaker
Hey, this is Christian Roldan. And Jordan Morris from the Seattle Sounders Football Club. And you're listening to NOS Arietes. 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 Sounders 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.
00:00:28
Speaker
A.O. Shen! Let's go! What a save by Fry! The Seattle Sounders have done it! MLS Cup win! Here come three years through the middle to crown it the vehicle! And now they truly can't stop the celebrations. It's the Sounders' MLS Cup! Niko Liddo leaves out!
00:01:12
Speaker
Is that what you young people call twerking?
00:01:28
Speaker
Welcome back to another episode of NOS Adietes, sponsored by Fullpool Wines.
Game Overview with Jamon Moore
00:01:33
Speaker
Joining me today to help preview the Sounds of the Earthquakes game, the game against the Sounds of the Earthquakes on Saturday, is Jamon Moore of Quake's Epicenter and the Aftershock. Welcome to the show, Jamon. Hey, Jeremiah. Yeah. I think I've been here, what, once or twice before, so... At least once. Maybe more. I was going to say two or three times, maybe. Well, I've had you on the Aftershock.
00:01:54
Speaker
So we've kind of gone both directions. I'm not sure how many both directions we've done so far, but I appreciate the invite.
00:02:00
Speaker
Well, yeah, and in case people have forgotten, maybe this is information you don't want disclosed, but Jamon is a Pacific, or a Puget Sound, a resident of the greater Seattle area. I am, I did. I moved up here three years ago, toward the, you know, during the pandemic, I guess, still maybe toward the end of the worst of it. And, you know, you're able to buy a house up here. Let me just put it that way.
00:02:26
Speaker
Yeah, it's it's a surreal thing sometimes for people in Seattle to realize that there are in fact more expensive places to move from. It is true and I move from there.
00:02:37
Speaker
Yeah, exactly.
Sounders and Earthquakes' Winless Start
00:02:38
Speaker
Well, thank you for doing this. The sounders and earthquakes come into this game both windless, both desperately seeking a win. The quakes have gone 0 and 4, which actually puts the sounder's struggles in maybe a slightly different light. The sounders are, of course, 0, 1, and 2, although it does feel a little bit like 0 and 3.
00:03:00
Speaker
uh what's going on with the quakes this you know i i i don't know how much i thought there was going to be a uh a bounce back year but there was there did seem to be some momentum built on the blue chickens all this first year
00:03:14
Speaker
Yeah, I think, like, that momentum over the course of the season did stall a bit. Now, you know, the Quakes had success against the Sounders. And, uh... Yes, they did. You know, both games, really. And I think, uh, you know, that might color it a little bit differently in the eyes of Sounders fans. It does seem like the Quakes in weird years have had, you know, the Sounders number. But, you know, that's worked both ways over the years. And, uh, and we'll talk about the Heritage Cup, but the Quakes are holding it right now.
00:03:43
Speaker
And for the most part, it did look like, you know, there was a great foundation to build on. The defense got mostly addressed. The Matias Almeida-isms kind of got, you know, out of the way that people were playing by default.
00:04:00
Speaker
And it started to look like a functional defense again. And then Christian Espinoza in the attack had his best career year, I believe 14 goals and just about as many assists.
Pellegrino's Role in Quakes' Attack
00:04:14
Speaker
And it was a very big year for him, earned him a new DP level contract, higher than he was paid before. And it seemed prime to come into this year, in fact, picked up a new attacking threat, Malpela Greeno,
00:04:29
Speaker
the norway golden boot uh winner the last two seasons and about uh you know had uh over 40 goals the last couple years yeah his numbers are like vipa numbers they're insane they're insane and his goals are just as good so if you want to enjoy
00:04:46
Speaker
A highlight reel of a player you've probably never heard from, literally go look up Amal Pellegrino's goals from last year. And it's a feast for the eyes. There's some beautiful goals in there. The problem is, I think he's a little bit too Wondo-like in some ways, and they haven't really figured out how to integrate him into the attack. He's not a player that's just going to take you on and put the ball in the back of the net quickly.
00:05:12
Speaker
Uh, he's a player who you're going to forget about is going to find that space in the box and he's going to punish you for leaving that space available. And that just hasn't been what the Quakes have been able to do because Espinoza is really their only chance creator and they really have not had anyone through the middle. Uh, and so losing Cade Cowell.
00:05:33
Speaker
Um, who is at least a threat, if not a real danger. Um, you know, but, but teams had to pay attention to him. Now it's kind of like, besides Christian Espinosa, who do you have to pay attention to? Because without service, Jeremy above us, he isn't, isn't that player, you know, Jackson, you will not that player. Um, Jack skein, as much as I love him so far has not really been that player. And you know, they're the quakes just don't really have that kind of central threat right now.
Quakes' Defensive and Midfield Challenges
00:06:01
Speaker
Yeah, the you know, I want to focus a little bit on Pellegrino since he was he's the the most notable addition. You know you alluded to this, but.
00:06:10
Speaker
you may have actually understated it. He had almost 50 goals combined the last few seasons. And that's exactly yet another 25 goal season a couple of few years ago. This is a guy who's just putting up absolutely crazy numbers in Norway. But it's, you know, he's 30. He's 33, I guess, right? Yeah, so he he bloomed late. He has another similarity with Wondo is
00:06:34
Speaker
Is Wondo came on kind of late you know after post college and even a you know a few years in the Reserve League and then kind of came out of nowhere and Pellegrino very similar thing he started really kind of blooming as a player when he was 30 so he doesn't have a lot of miles on him.
00:06:51
Speaker
Um, he wasn't logging heavy minutes before then. And, uh, but he, you know, uh, if, if anyone goes like, well, it's Norway. Yeah. But he was also scoring goals in Europa league. Um, you know, almost for fun. Um, so he does score in big games and on the European stage. And, you know, it's not just in games against, uh, you know, uh, inferior Norway, Norwegian, I guess opponents. Um, he has shown it on the bigger stage.
00:07:21
Speaker
Yeah. Uh, you know, I'm, I'm looking at up now and you're, you're right. I mean, he's got, he had, he had eight goals in, in, uh, in Europe, in European competitions last year. He had, uh, he had five goals in European competitions the year before that. So, you know, he, he's.
00:07:39
Speaker
He's putting up numbers, and he's a player who plays kind of all over the field a little bit, although I guess mostly on the left wing. And on paper, it seems like the attack has the pieces that you'd want. You've got Pellegrino on the left, you've got Bobasi in the middle, and you've got Christian Espinoza in the middle.
00:08:02
Speaker
And I guess maybe there's not a playmaker really in that group, but that, you know, you would think you put the, you get those players on the field together and maybe better, you'd expect better results than three goals through four games.
00:08:17
Speaker
Yeah, well, I mean, I think you can say the same for the Sounders attack, you know, last year. Oh, I'm sorry. We'll get into that too. Yeah, yeah, yeah. But sometimes, like, the players are the right players, but for some reason, it's not coming together. And, you know, that's kind of where the Quakes find themselves this year, which is a place where the Sounders found themselves last year, right? You've got these players that you know are capable. They've proven it many times before, but something is just not quite clicking. And, you know, that's where it's at right now.
Quakes' Line-up Changes During International Break
00:08:46
Speaker
And so defensively, I think is probably where though this team looked like it, like you alluded to, it seemed like they were, they're trending in the right direction. Daniel, the goalkeeper was one of the best shot stoppers in the league last year by, uh, by.
00:09:01
Speaker
I guess the metric is what goals to or minus expecting goals on target. That's right. I think the top performer in the league last year. He was on a per game basis because he was out about a thousand minutes due to injury earlier in the season and he played the rest of the way. I think the last 20 games of the season or so and for those 20 games, he was the top performer in the league and on a per game basis. He was as well.
00:09:26
Speaker
Um, you know, Berkey, uh, had, you know, very good numbers as well, but he did it for a full season and, uh, you know, hence why he's the goalkeeper of the year. And then, but Rodriguez was a player who had a lot of, you know, defensive metrics look very good.
00:09:41
Speaker
He is. He is a very interesting player. In some ways, reminiscent of a player that you've picked up from the earthquakes, you know, Nathan or Nathan, if you prefer, in the Portuguese way of saying it, he's, you know, a can be an aggressive player, he likes to attack forward, likes to find that progressive pass.
00:10:03
Speaker
Um, and sometimes you might be watching a game and going like he's really the quarterback right now out there. Um, he is, he's not afraid to get forward, which explains the pickup of Bruno Costa because, or sorry, Bruno Wilson, because he's exactly the opposite, um, player and, uh, which is good for the quakes. And, uh, but, uh, but Rodriguez.
00:10:25
Speaker
You know, was the top 10 player in interceptions and tackles and progressive passes for center backs. Like he was, he was in the leaders among pretty much any statistical center back category you can think of last year. I actually, I think I actually had him on my, my best 11.
00:10:45
Speaker
No, you know, which I realized was maybe a hard little hard to defend. And if I really, I don't think I ever put my heart into it, but I was looking at his numbers and I was just kind of blown away at how, you know, it was a player that no one talks about. And yet he really, his, his, his performance, at least statistically was sort of off the charts.
00:11:04
Speaker
But what's been going on this, you know, they've given up multiple goals or the Quicks have given up multiple goals in every game. I think you said in our kind of pre-show meeting, the Galaxy game was the only one where they really got played off the pitch, I believe, right? But yet they have given up, you know, nine goals, multiple goals in every game.
00:11:24
Speaker
But the XG stats aren't too bad, but just all of a sudden not going the right way. Breakdowns. I mean, I think like, you know, if you were in a press conference with Lucci, you probably would say, you know, hey, you know, overly, you know, probably look solid for most of the game. But those key moments, those breakdowns in certain situations are what led to
00:11:51
Speaker
you know, the loss tonight, right? And that's really been the story in three of the four games. It's, you know, giving up set piece goals and not even like, you know, the kind where you just got outmatched and such, but like these kind of like ball bounces around and the guys at the top of the box has happened twice, right? And just the ball finds its way through traffic. That's happened twice already. They did get picked apart on counterattacks in three of the games.
00:12:21
Speaker
Um, where, uh, you know, teams just push numbers forward, you know, five, five numbers forward in a transition. And, you know, the quakes were, were scrambling and they were able to, you know, find a player in the center of the box to just put in the easy one. There's been a couple that, you know, you could probably argue Danielle could have done a bit better on from short range though, from like, you know, six or seven yards away where he kind of gets underneath the arm and sports into the goal type stuff. So that's happened a couple of times. So.
00:12:51
Speaker
Part luck, but also part, like, I think they're still figuring out how to integrate these new players, particularly on the defensive side. Vitor Costa is a new left-back because they didn't make a resigning in that position. And, you know, with Carlos Ocapo out right now for an injury,
00:13:12
Speaker
You know, he's been forced into service and has to play a full 90. So he's kind of figuring it out, although I think he's getting there. He seems pretty defensively solid. And Bruno Wilson, who I mentioned before, along with with Rodriguez there, Bruno is from from top division in Portugal.
00:13:31
Speaker
Um, very calm, cerebral type player understands the angles, understands, you know, how to recover and be in the positions that others aren't. But then when it gets frenetic, you know, he also at times seems to lack the energy that, that sometimes defensive need to have an MLS in order to recover. And so he looks sometimes a little bit slow to react to the ball.
00:13:53
Speaker
I think that's just him trying to be calm in the situation, but it doesn't always look good. I think the combination of him and Rodriguez with the new left back, I think they've got to find their way. There's been a lot of pressure, I'd say a lot of heat actually coming from the fan base.
00:14:13
Speaker
on, you know, the central midfield. You've got some quality players in the central midfield, but they just haven't performed well. They haven't done a good job holding on to the ball. They haven't done a good job shutting down the counter-attacks. And Carlos Correzzo, you know, is a DP player who's played in the Bundesliga, right? And he played for Lucci previously at FC Dallas. And
00:14:36
Speaker
You know he just has not looked DP caliber almost at any point over the last couple years. And he doesn't generate those high counting stats. He's not a he's going to take the ball off you very often kind of player. He's the kind who's going to direct you out of zone 14 and out to the wings and you know he's OK with that. But you know at that times you know he looks also a bit lethargic and you know that's he's been a focal point of criticism in the early season from quakes fans.
00:15:07
Speaker
And so he's actually going to be, neither team is missing a ton of players for this international week. The Sounders actually are going to get out without missing any players international. The, but Greuso is probably the most, is, is the most notable player to be missing from the quakes. You're also going to be without, uh, Useni Buddha. Is that right? That's correct. Yeah.
00:15:30
Speaker
who's a reserve player, he only has 48 minutes so far. But what do they do with Gruesel? Yeah, great question. So I see them going one of two ways. So first off, one of the unheralded pickups, but I think is a very good one, in the offseason was Alfredo Morales from NYCFC. NYCFC media that I talk to, they all love him. They say, look, he's not going to be able to give you much more than 2,000 minutes, and that would be a good number for him.
00:16:00
Speaker
But what he does give you will be high quality minutes. And I think we've seen that. He's come in off the bench. And when he's come in, he's kind of taking control of directing the offense. And he seems active off the ball and looks like a pretty good ball winner. So I see him potentially coming in and just starting as a lone six.
00:16:20
Speaker
I also see the opportunity to maybe look at Jackson Yule and dropping him a bit deeper and putting on a couple of attackers ahead in order to try to do more on the attack, particularly being at home. So I could see any one of those things happening. I could see a double pivot with Morales and Yule. They have played double pivot a couple of times, you know, this season so far. So it could happen. Yeah, it looks like they they've been kind of going between playing a 4-3-3 and a 4-2-3-1.
00:16:49
Speaker
I would say that's right. And usually that's whether Morales is on the pitch or not. So if Morales comes on, it's not always for Garezzo. They sometimes like to go double pivots. They can push the wingers up higher and just kind of like control the game out of that part of the pitch. And also with Rodriguez pushing forward at times with the ball. So that's given them some dangerous looks, but it hasn't been enough, obviously, to win game check.
Earthquakes and The Town FC Partnership
00:17:22
Speaker
So one of the other pieces of news that come out of the quakes in the last week or so was this agreement that they made with the MLS Next Pro level where the town FC, which is, I don't know, how would you explain the town FC and sort of, you know, it's an interesting
00:17:46
Speaker
Evolution of what kind of the Sounders started when they moved to Tacoma, where they moved their second team to Tacoma for a brief period, and they've kept the Tacoma Defiance name, but what's going on with that?
00:17:59
Speaker
Yeah, I would say the Town of Sea kind of came in looking for the opportunity around, you know, U.S.L. and Nisa and trying to find their niche and find out where they can be in the Bay Area. It was started by a former original owner of the Oakland Roots, who's no longer with the Roots. And, you know, he wanted to still have a club in the area and saw there's more opportunity in the East Bay than either the Quakes or the Roots were taking advantage of.
00:18:26
Speaker
It's a really fertile area for player development, particularly Latino players. A lot of really good players come out of that area and end up being successful in NCAA or even higher. So he wanted to try to create something out there.
00:18:46
Speaker
conversations with the quakes ultimately led to the quakes going like, well, what if we had a model where you kind of ran the club side of things that we supplied the talent, because with PayPal Park now also hosting an NWSL team, you know, in Bay FC, there really wasn't a place in the Bay Area that could kind of handle, you know, quakes too, and what they needed.
00:19:13
Speaker
for quakes too so i think it was a marriage of somewhat convenience i think uh you know the town sc was kind of looking for a um a league that they could fit into and quakes had a need of a place they needed to play and and probably some overhead that you know they were taking on with uh with the mlx next pro that
00:19:37
Speaker
you know, they could probably do without and would rather invest into other areas. So I think it's a marriage of convenience. We'll see how long it lasts. Yeah, so they're going out to Moraga, which is sort of where it's where St. Mary's College is. That's right. But it's it's it's East Bay, but it's it's on the other side of the of the mountain range, right? Yeah, that's that's fair. So, you know, I didn't I have not gone that way too much myself, maybe a couple of times for you soccer games, but
00:20:06
Speaker
It's about an hour out of Oakland. Now, a lot of people would criticize and say that the town is a reference to Oakland. The town FC has said it's more of a reference to the East Bay community rather than specifically Oakland. I guess you could land on either one of the sides of that fence if you wanted to argue the semantics of it. But I think it is notable that their CEO is the former
00:20:36
Speaker
you know, roots owner. And there's been plenty of conspiracy theories are out there, as you well know, and you and I've had this conversation a bit in terms of, you know, John Fisher, the Oakland Coliseum situation, the A's going over to Las Vegas, what does that mean for the quakes? What does that mean for the roots? Because they want access to the Coliseum site and now the town of sea with their relationship with the
00:21:03
Speaker
now looks like, oh, maybe, you know, they're going to be a little underhanded here in terms of how the Coliseum deals with the roots. Turns out that's at least not the case. There's a couple other shoes still to drop in terms of the purchase of the Raiders training facility and some of the other Coliseum business. So we'll see how all that shakes out. But for now, it looks like the roots just got approved to take over the Coliseum, right?
00:21:30
Speaker
That's right, the roots gotta prove to be able to use the Coliseum site. I believe they're going to build a a pitch out there. I don't think they're going to use the full Coliseum. I could have understood that wrong. I don't spend a lot of time like that's a big big stadium for a USL team.
00:21:46
Speaker
Correct. I think what they're really looking for is to be able to build a 5,000 seat stadium or so on the site. I'm not sure exactly how that's all going to work and I don't spend a lot of time following the routes myself, but I've heard that they're more interested in the land than they are the Coliseum site.
00:22:08
Speaker
Yeah. And so this is obviously far afield of what we're meant to talk about here, but you mentioned the A's are moving. The A's are a team near and dear to my heart. I grew up an A's fan. They are intending to move to Vegas. I'll believe it when I see it, when they actually play a game there. But is there a concern that the quakes may be, like how stable are the quakes in San Jose right now?
Potential Move to Las Vegas
00:22:34
Speaker
Well so keep in mind the quakes just purchased or were able to lease the land I should say from Santa Clara County in the fairgrounds site to be able to build a facility. So the movement within the club like if you ask the club it's like no we're not moving right.
00:22:52
Speaker
We've got deep roots here. We're staying. There's no conversation about moving to Vegas. If you ask the league, the league would say, we can separate John Fisher, the A's owner from John Fisher, the Quakes owner,
00:23:10
Speaker
It's not a package deal in terms of the Las Vegas. That's been denied by the league. You could say, well, why would they be investing in more land in the Bay Area? Why would Fisher be looking at the Raiders training facility? Why would they be making these deals with Santa Clara County and all these things and making these affiliations with the town FC and potentially helping them
00:23:36
Speaker
build a small stadium somewhere and things like that. And all these investments that are going on, I know Fisher doesn't invest in players, but he does like his land. He is a real estate guy. And you could argue that he built PayPal Park, not just so much for the for the quakes and for the stadium, but for the land all around it as well, which he's profited very handsomely from. So
00:23:59
Speaker
He is a real estate guy and it's normal to expect him to make moves that are going to be the good for gaining more real estate in the Bay Area because we all know it appreciates very rapidly.
00:24:14
Speaker
You mentioned this, I may as well ask.
New Training Facility Plans
00:24:17
Speaker
The last I saw, the Quakes had agreed to build essentially a state-of-the-art training facility out at the Santa Clara County Fairgrounds, which I don't know how much our listeners care, but that's sort of in south San Jose-ish, south, maybe east, I don't know what we would call that. Yeah, south San Jose-ish. It's probably 20 minutes from PayPal, if that, maybe 15 on a good day.
00:24:43
Speaker
But how have those plans progressed as a team that just opened our own training facility? Yeah, I've been following your progress as well with interest because it kind of mirrors a bit in some ways. The Quake Zone attempts to be able to get land, but obviously took much longer. This land was owned by the Santa Clara
00:25:06
Speaker
County through the fairgrounds. Um, they had to go through the the santa clara county board of supervisors And it's not just a simple like oh this land is available. Please do something with it type situation You would think it could be because there is not the necessities out there that you need to do to like have land and our and
00:25:28
Speaker
You know you know bring in you know parking and and you know everything that would be necessary by a facility not only that major league cricket. Is looking to build a stadium out on this land so this land has been in.
00:25:43
Speaker
has been an interesting topic of discussion for a long time as to what's the best way to be able to develop and utilize this land. And the county not just had to approve allowing the earthquakes to lease the land, but the county itself has to put in a very significant investment to build out the infrastructure so that the land can actually even be used. And so that's really where the hangups were at. They finally got past all of those hangups. They were able to
00:26:12
Speaker
um, you know, announce, you know, at the site that, uh, that, uh, it was being, the land was going to be developed. The first step right now is you're getting through kind of the permitting and the design process and finalizing exactly how the, everything's going to work in terms of the facility and the parking layouts and the field layouts and things like that. But there are fields also, you know, for public land here.
00:26:38
Speaker
that are also promised and so they're sorting out the exact layouts and things like that and then they expect to break ground I believe by next year with the intention of the site being fully operational for the World Cup so that it could be used not just by the earthquakes but by teams that are playing at Levi's Stadium in the World Cup. They want to have it as an available training ground as well for the World Cup.
00:27:05
Speaker
So real quick, I just wanted to, a couple other things
Field Condition Improvements at PayPal Park
00:27:09
Speaker
I wanted to hit on. One of them, we talked a little bit about the grass at PayPal Park has been sort of an infamous place, at least for the sounders. The sounders have, I think had four or five significant injuries at PayPal.
00:27:24
Speaker
But it sounds like the grass is in better condition these days than it has been sometimes in the past. Is that accurate? Yeah, that's accurate. So a couple of things that they discovered after building on this particular site is that the water table was much higher than other land in the area and the type of land, for instance, on which Levi Stadium is built.
00:27:45
Speaker
You may recall that stadium when it went up at first, too. I don't know if you watch much NFL, but the 49ers first year that you know that that pitch was absolutely trashed. It did not hold up, right? And so the earthquakes.
00:28:00
Speaker
also was going through the same problems at the same time. They've been consulting back and forth with the 49ers as to what the composition of this pitch needs to be, and also dealing with a very high water table that would hold in water during games. Not just water the pitch down, but now imagine almost like standing water in some cases. Then as the air cools in the Bay Area, you know how it is at night, it goes from pretty warm to pretty cool and it can happen very fast.
00:28:30
Speaker
you know that caused a lot of problems with slippage you know on the turf and and you know no shortage of injuries for both the earthquakes and opponents right and so uh more recent years they've come up with a better solution and they're replacing the pitch on an annual basis and so we have not seen definitely not as much as we've seen in the past the type of slippage that we used to see out there from players
00:28:56
Speaker
There's a little bit more the first game of the year where it was colder, but the last game I didn't really notice any slipping at all. And so it looks like the new pitch is kind of taking shape for the season and should work pretty well. It doesn't look perfect in all areas or some some blight spots that they're trying to sort out. But in terms of it being a playable pitch, it looks much better or plays much better than we've seen in previous years.
00:29:21
Speaker
So one of the other topics I always tend to, I feel like we go in and out of actually discussing the Heritage Cup, but it is a rivalry that, well, it's funny.
Heritage Cup History and Trophy Mystery
00:29:34
Speaker
We got an email, I actually got an email today about the Heritage Cup, and it was sort of this reminder that unlike other
00:29:41
Speaker
rivalry cups. This is not so much a rivalry cup as it is a celebration of these teams shared past. And, and so it's, it's, it's funny because I, at least Sounders fans, and I don't know, I don't get the sense that quakes fans think of the heritage cup either. Like they, they probably consider the Sounders a rival of some sort, but I don't know that the physical cup itself is
00:30:07
Speaker
It certainly doesn't have the same lore as the Cascadia Cup or some of these other Darby's that are around MLS. But there's a funny story in this one. The Heritage Cup at some point was actually lost like for several years. No one knew where it was and it wasn't being transferred.
00:30:26
Speaker
It wasn't being traded between the two teams. And so there was some confusion as to where it was, who had it last. I guess at some point they lost a, what's the, maybe it was during COVID. I don't know exactly when it was lost, but somehow it was unclear who had it last and.
00:30:47
Speaker
There's an unsubstantiated at this point rumor as to where it was actually found. And so maybe we don't want to get into it too much, but it was found. We I've seen a photo of it. It's been updated with the the quakes winning the the Heritage Cup last year. I don't know. Why don't you? What is the story you heard? I don't want to I don't want to.
00:31:08
Speaker
Presented as if I like and like with a caveat that we understand that this is still unsubstantiated Yeah, so the quakes and missing trophies are something that have gone together for a little bit of time I don't know if you've ever heard this but the no 12 supporters shield
00:31:25
Speaker
you know, is rumored to be at some ultra supporters house on their mantle or something like that. So that the original no longer, you know, well, okay, so that's funny. So I didn't realize that stories get confused and conflated of like, where might this be? And some the supporters were blamed. But wait, are we talking about the Heritage Cup? Are we talking about the shield? Like there's, there's some interesting stuff around this. The last
00:31:55
Speaker
thing that I had really heard was like it was handed to some staffer from Seattle in a hurry as they were like running to a team bus or something like that. I don't even think the staffer appreciator knew what the trophy was. And it was all done in some sort of hurry and somewhere in transit.
00:32:15
Speaker
the trophy got misplaced. That was the way it was kind of said to me as a story that I seem to live on the most in terms of what was repeated. Game of Chinese telephone here, whatever the case is, I don't know. I don't know if it's lost in that, if it was true or it was not, but that's the way it was presented. All of a sudden, this trophy is misplaced. No one has any idea where it's at. Maybe it's at some supporters house.
00:32:45
Speaker
maybe it broke or who knows what and just no one wants to own up to it. But yeah, we ended up in this weird situation where no one quite knew where it was at, but it was assumed that the sounders had it. I think it turned out that in the move to the new facility, it turned out that the sounders did have it and didn't know that they had it, but it was discovered in the process of moving.
00:33:12
Speaker
Yeah, I think that's a good way of putting it. And that all sounds entirely plausible to me. I know the sounders themselves have sort of like, look, this is not our thing. And my understanding is sort of what happened is there was maybe a discussion, like the sounders were given it and the sounders were like, well, this is this should be going to the ECS and ECS says, this is not this is not our thing. We don't want the responsibility for this. And so the responsibility for it was a little
00:33:41
Speaker
Unclear. In any case, it's been found. It is quite a thing to behold. If you haven't seen the actual Heritage Cup, I just tweeted out a picture of it that shows that it's been updated. So that means that it must have been found. And it's got this kind of remarkable
00:34:01
Speaker
cup at the top that is made to look like the nasl ball in honor of the uh the shared nasl history between these two teams and then under that it gets a little it gets a little silly there's there's a like a drawing with a world in it that i don't quite understand and and then there's just you know it's it's a it's like a wood stand with the
00:34:25
Speaker
the names of the winners going down, which is fine. But it's apparently a really heavy and a really expensive trophy. It is, and it is actually very heavy. And it's so expensive that Soccer Silicon Valley, who is the group that originally commissioned the trophy to be built and paid for it from their funds, they did not want to pay for another, that it was prohibitively expensive to replace.
00:34:53
Speaker
for a group of their size. And Soccer Silicon Valley is a key group in a lot of ways in the Bay Area in terms of soccer history. They are a linchpin group among the earthquakes teams that have come into the city and back out of the city again. But they've always been present in terms of being a driving force of trying to bring
00:35:16
Speaker
you know soccer to the area and they wanted something to kind of represent that heritage of nasl and the club's history and you know the trophy was commissioned why the sounders were necessarily picked other than they shared you know the nasl heritage and you know the the first year being 1974
00:35:36
Speaker
Um, I don't know. I don't, you know, I don't know why the sounders and not, not Vancouver who also shares some somewhere here. My, my understanding was that this is one of those things where, you know, the, the quakes, Louise, the way I was told.
00:35:52
Speaker
is that the Quakes approached the Sounders in 2009 and sort of like presented this idea. And it was sort of this bigger idea that it's like, oh, this will be something that's played among all the nasl as teams with a soccer heritage come into MLS will all sort of like share in this thing.
00:36:10
Speaker
And so my understanding is like the timbers were offered entry into this competition, the Whitecaps were offered entry. Montreal, I guess, was also another team that was tried to kind of brought into this. And all of them for one reason or another, just weren't interested in participating.
00:36:27
Speaker
And, you know, Sidi Schmidt was the coach of the Sounders, obviously went at their launch and he was, he had sort of like a personal connection to the, not necessarily either one of these teams, but to the heritage, to the idea of, of.
00:36:43
Speaker
North American soccer not just being a thing that started with MLS and then he had a real appreciation for the history. And so he was apparently like a big supporter of the idea of doing this thing and he like he liked the idea and he liked the story and
00:36:59
Speaker
And so that's sort of like, my understanding is even like the sounders signed some sort of like actual agreement to say like, no, we're gonna participate in this thing. So it was actually an agreement between like the sounders and Soccer Silicon Valley, I think, or at least some people within the sounders and Soccer Silicon Valley. But yeah, I mean, Soccer Silicon Valley is an interesting group because this is what
00:37:25
Speaker
support was in MLS prior to sort of the rise of the formal supporters groups. And if you don't, people don't remember, like before Toronto FC sort of brought like a European style support, that wasn't really a thing. You know, I know there was, you know, the Quakes had the CASBAW
00:37:48
Speaker
or the clash, I guess, maybe technically, or no, it was probably the quakes that had the... Actually, I don't know the history of the Kasbah. What is the history of the Kasbah? I think I did start with the clash. I could be wrong. I'm not up on my supporters' history.
00:38:01
Speaker
But in any case, Soccer Silicon Valley is sort of like a throwback group within MLS in that it wasn't like European style supporters. It was more like organizers and soccer moms and soccer dads and people who just really wanted to have a soccer team.
00:38:20
Speaker
I would say it's safe to say that I'm not sure if soccer would be in San Jose today. I'm sure the growth of MLS would have hit the Bay Area at some point, but it wouldn't have had the history and the heritage that it does have. I think there are definitely people, particularly the Soccer Silicon Valley people, who they view this as a way of honoring
00:38:46
Speaker
the players from the past who have shared 50-year history between these two originals in effect, right? And an opportunity to be able to celebrate it. So I agree. That's the way it's been pitched to me. It's not intended to be like a support or rivalry cup like other trophies are in the league. This one is more intended to be a let's utilize this as a way of
00:39:12
Speaker
celebrating the history and now specifically in the 50th year anniversary of these two franchises.
00:39:20
Speaker
Yeah, and I've had some fun with the idea of the Heritage Cup. I think everyone that covers these two teams has probably had some fun with it. I mean, there are elements of it that feel very, you know, of a previous era, of its time kind of thing. But there is an underlying message that I think is worth talking about and that is these teams shared.
00:39:43
Speaker
Heritage and these scenes shared history and like you said it's the 50th anniversary both teams are celebrating the 50th anniversary the quakes are even using throwback kits that. Have the old sounds earthquakes logo would like from the nsl are they gonna be wearing i would imagine they're gonna wear them this week.
00:40:02
Speaker
I believe that it was intended to be in for these 50th anniversary games that they would be wearing them. I'm not sure if that's the case this weekend or just going to be on the road. They have already worn it a couple times for home games. I'm not sure, you know, how if they're going to continue that for this weekend or not.
00:40:20
Speaker
Yeah, I mean, in any case, it's kind of a fun thing to talk about. And as we get more information about this, hopefully I'll be able to share it a little bit more because I do think it's kind of a fun story and it's easy to sort of dismiss, but it's an important part of these teams' histories. And if you are like me and you feel like there's a legitimate
00:40:39
Speaker
line that draws the sounders and to a degree the quakes all the way back to 1974, it's worth talking about that line and that shared history and whether or not the cup itself is important is maybe a little beside the point. But it's, I think, a good time to kind of remember that these teams do have some shared past and it's relevant to where they are now.
00:41:05
Speaker
Yeah, absolutely. So all right. Well, you know, Jeremiah, do you need to to take off here? Repair is supposed to be showing up any second at the house. And so but it's always great to talk to you, always great to come on the show and and to hit on a variety of topics today and our shared history of the Bay Area now and also Puget Sound means that we've got extra stuff to talk about whenever we get together.
00:41:33
Speaker
Yeah, absolutely, Jaymon. Well, thank you. Once again, make sure to check them out at Quakes Epicenter, as well as Aftershock, which is their post-game show that is a pretty impressive post-game show, frankly. Thank you. And this is No Study Yet This. I'm Jeremiah Shan, and we will catch you next time.
00:42:28
Speaker
We love you. Let's win another one!