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We are in uncharted territory
37 Plays5 months ago
With their 2-0 loss to the Whitecaps, the Sounders are officially off to their worst-ever start. They’ve never before failed to win at least two of their first eight games and their six points are now two fewer than the eight they had at this point in 2018.
Their latest loss is probably their worst of the season. Not only was it their first multi-goal loss, but it also showcased some shocking mistakes and even more surprising loss of composure. On top of all that, felt an awful like a must-win game and yet, it was maybe their worst performance of the season.
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Transcript
Introduction and Sponsorship
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.
Sounders' Historic Low
00:00:20
Speaker
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!
Match Breakdown and Tactical Analysis
00:01:12
Speaker
Is that what you young people call twerking?
00:01:28
Speaker
Welcome to another episode of NOS Adietta, sponsored by Full Pull Wines and our subscribers. We're recording on Tuesday, April 23rd, 2024. I am your host, Jeremiah O'Shan. Joining me today is my co-host, Erin Campo and her engineer, Lickett.
00:01:43
Speaker
We are officially in uncharted territory. With our 2-0 loss to the Whitecaps, Sunners are off to their worst ever start. They've never before failed to win at least two of their first eight games, and their six points are now too fewer than the eight they had at this point in 2018.
00:02:00
Speaker
Their latest loss is probably their worst of the season. Not only was it their first by multiple goals, but it also showcased some shocking mistakes and even more surprising loss of composure. On top of all that, it felt an awful like a must win game. It was maybe their worst performance of the season. Aaron, what do we do now? What do we make of this? This is spiraling very, very badly.
00:02:29
Speaker
We talked about this earlier in the season when we still felt pretty confident about their ability to turn it around.
00:02:41
Speaker
The danger of not getting it turned around was that it could spiral. We talked about it after the Montreal game, while Mark and I did, that you had to keep the momentum going. And, you know, you had to hope it wasn't similar to that Dallas game in 2016, where the Sounders put up five out of nowhere. And, you know, I mean, we're not there yet. It's been a while.
00:03:05
Speaker
Two games since then, but it feels like 20, but it's only been two. But yeah, and here we are.
Game Impact: Red Card and Mistakes
00:03:13
Speaker
And I agree, you know, the worst performance of the year. It's a tough, it's a tricky one, right? Because before the Reagan red card,
00:03:24
Speaker
I don't think it was any worse than any other other home games. I wasn't... No, it was playing out like a lot of their home games. Yeah, I wasn't thrilled with how things were going. The first 20 minutes especially were a real test of patience because it was so much of the same stuff. But after the first 20 minutes, they were starting to put together some decent looking moves.
00:03:46
Speaker
their possession was starting to look a little less aimless and Vancouver was doing absolutely nothing. Um, so there were positive signs, you know, but I don't think anybody was thrilled. And then the red card comes and then, you know, two horrible giveaways in the back. Another red card that you alluded to, which is one of the worst red cards I've seen from a Sounders player. Um, a truly, really just disappointing tackle. I was really disgusted by it from Alex and, uh,
00:04:16
Speaker
Yeah, I mean, it's funny, like I try to think about how I would have felt if that a 10 CO shot in like the 90 second or whatever minute had gone in. 94th minute. 94th minute. Easily the best chance of the night down two men. Would I have felt better? I don't know. I would have felt good for Josh, especially after the lineup decisions. Yeah, I've never felt
00:04:43
Speaker
worse about this team than I do right now, I don't think. Even in 2016, because I felt like Ziggy was probably going to be moving on. We knew Ledera was coming in. We knew that a rebuild of sorts was probably on the way.
00:05:05
Speaker
Right now this team is so frustrating because there are so many good pieces here that have played pretty well, especially in defense that, you know, like the next version of the sounders that we have expectations for is probably going to look extremely similar to this one. And at this, like at this time right now, that's kind of a scary prospect because I'm falling out of love with some of these guys. And I hate to say that, but it's just, it sucks, man.
00:05:30
Speaker
Yeah. Yeah. Well, let's, let's break this into a few parts. Uh, let's talk about that first 30 odd minutes where they, they were playing 11 V 11. I did think it was very funny. The white caps, I was reading the white caps recap of the game and they said they were, they were controlling the game up until that point. That's not what was happening, uh, for what it's worth. That was not.
00:05:53
Speaker
I thought if anything, at that point, the sounders had four shots. Whitecaps had one. It was actually a decent look, but it was a 20-yard shot or something like that. I think it forced Frye into a save. But the sounders were getting better looks. They were controlling possession.
00:06:16
Speaker
I didn't think they looked particularly likely to score, but I didn't think Vancouver looked any more likely to score. It to me felt an awful lot like a game that was heading towards 0-0. Maybe Sounders would pull out a late goal and salvage a result there. So it wasn't necessarily an encouraging performance, but it wasn't
00:06:38
Speaker
shaping up to be particularly poor from a universal perspective. But in a sense, maybe zero zero in a way would have maybe been even worse because I think it would have given a false like, I do think if there's a positive to come out of this, maybe this result is sort of a wake up call, a shake you in your seat kind of thing like, we got to do something. Right, right.
00:07:06
Speaker
Yeah, I very much feel that way. And I think that there can be some value in that, you know, because the, okay, you get the win against the Montreal, you look great. And then you go down to Dallas and yeah, you don't do a whole lot in the attack, but Hey, you know, we got a point on the road and Dallas is always a tough place to play.
00:07:23
Speaker
And then you come back here and you do this, you know, against a Cascadia rival, um, against the team that you have to feel like you can be at home or at least compete with at home, you know, and then just to, to lose in such an embarrassing way, um, to just gift them their two goal. I think that that's the thing that's so frustrating is that even after going down a man, it's not like Vancouver was threatening that much. I think that there's a, there's a chance that the Sounders grind out a nil-nil in this game without the really bad giveaways.
Defensive Errors and VAR Controversy
00:07:57
Speaker
Ariaga is gone, so I'm not gonna speak ill of the dead with his, and I know he's just trying to make a play. Yaymars, man, what are you doing? I love Yaymars, great player. And he's put in a horrible position as well by Obed there. Just the kind of mistakes that they cannot be making, right? Because the margins are just way too thin for that, because they're not gonna make up those goals. We know they're not gonna make up those goals.
00:08:16
Speaker
Um, and you know,
00:08:26
Speaker
just really a punch to the solar plex this kind of game just there's nothing else to say yeah about this scene right now well let's move into the next phase of this one the red card itself I live I I didn't see anything frankly like I yeah you can watch if you watch the game on if you watch this at full speed it looks like
00:08:49
Speaker
Absolutely nothing. The replays do show Reagan both shoving and stepping on Gold's calf. I thought a yellow card was a totally appropriate call.
00:09:05
Speaker
If it had been called a red live, I think I would have actually been okay with it, even if I didn't love it. But I think there's a fair argument to be made for it being red. What I don't like is the process that leads to it going to VAR and
00:09:24
Speaker
and ultimately sending off Reagan. I just, first of all, I thought this was funny. I, the way I worded the, maybe I was poor in the way I worded it, but I asked the referee in the post game, I was able to say, I'm the pool reporter. I was able to submit a question. I asked like, what about this foul, this play allowed it to rise to serious foul play.
00:09:48
Speaker
They answered that one, uh, kind of innocuously. And then I said, and why did it take five minutes for this to get reviewed? It was clear and obvious. And they said, well, the first half of the review only took two and a half minutes. And I just thought that was a very like, well, okay. So why did it take two and a half minutes for a clear and obvious to say, you know, like, well, the whole thing ends up taking about five minutes, but the actual, I guess. So if I'm to understand correctly, I apparently.
00:10:15
Speaker
It only has to be clear and obvious for them to send it down. But then once it's in the referee's hand, it's no longer, the clear and obvious thing is no longer at play. I don't know. But either way, I don't, it takes you two and a half minutes to look at something to meet, especially a foul like that. That's not clear and obvious to me. And I just don't, I don't, I think that's a misuse of the system.
00:10:38
Speaker
I was also really disappointed because they kind of sold this, oh, we're going to, you're going to hear of our announcements in the stadium. And they sold it as being, he said after review, he did a foul and now
Missed Opportunities and Team Response
00:10:50
Speaker
he's dejected.
00:10:51
Speaker
There's no context about the decision. There's no, it's just, this is what we saw. This is what we decided. There's nothing about the thought process. The broadcast doesn't have the discussion because I want to know, I want to know why that arises to the level of red card and all the other times that happens in a game. It's either a foul or a yellow card. Like I want to know what, because I think like that's,
00:11:18
Speaker
My biggest frustration with referees in soccer, especially, I feel like soccer referees are really bad about this, is that people want to understand the rules, right? Like I am willing to accept that I don't understand the rules as well as you do, but you need to tell me what I don't understand, right? You need to tell me what about this is a red card, whereas this identical play is not.
00:11:43
Speaker
and why, like you said, why it takes you five minutes to determine that it's a red card. Like if he had come out and said something like, the combination of the shove and where on his leg he made contact,
00:12:00
Speaker
those combined elements and that he wasn't really, the distance from the ball, like there was a lot of ways they could have explained this. I think that would have been perfectly justified, which I guess is my way of saying, I don't hate the call. I just hate the process that leads to the call and I want more insight into the decision because the way that they did it, I felt like just failed on multiple levels. And that was more my frustration.
00:12:29
Speaker
Uh, and I guess to some degree, I, I, I'm also a little frustrated with Jackson, even though it's the kind of challenge a center back is making all the time, which is just basically following the forward to midfield and, and sort of like not allowing them to comfortably check to the ball. He is a little sloppy there, uh, which, you know, I would like him to be better than.
00:12:58
Speaker
He uses more force than is probably necessary to neutralize Ryan Gold. Ryan Gold is a very tiny young man and Jackson Reagan is not. So yeah, I think that's fair. I hate the call. Personally, I think it's a terrible call. Like I said, I am willing to accept that I'm wrong about that, but you got to tell me.
00:13:16
Speaker
Yeah, you got to point out what it is about that call that you know that makes it a red card and and I think also it's just the bait and switch of being like Oh, yeah, we're gonna start explaining these calls now and then just citing the rule right? Yeah, that's that's sort of the call but that's the same frustration I have with the whole
00:13:33
Speaker
pool reporter process, which is we get to ask them questions and then they used to get to recite the rule book back to us. And it's like, man, what are we doing here? If we're going to have this process, let's have some insight because you're just wasting everyone's time. And it's just frustrating to me on a personal level. But all right, so then let's get through the next 20 odd minutes where they're
00:14:00
Speaker
actually playing pretty even like the Sounders did not look like they were getting run over even after going down to man. They had a great chance to take the lead actually on a on a free kick that came right before halftime, where Albert Rusnak or Christian Rodin gets fouled right outside the penalty box.
00:14:22
Speaker
Albert Rosenach takes the free kick, finds Jordan Morris open at the back post, and Morris does not make good contact, hits his header wide. Huge missed opportunity there. Yeah. It was interesting because I actually felt pretty heartened by the response to going down. I thought that the Sounders were actually playing reasonably well in the immediate aftermath, at least.
00:14:53
Speaker
I think more threatening than they had prior to the red card. They looked like they had a little more aggression in them. I really liked the formation change, the tactical shift after the red card. I thought that that was a good call. I thought removing Raul was the right call. I was pretty encouraged.
00:15:14
Speaker
I know Stefan Fry spoke about this. Uh, I can't remember if it was after the game or if it was, uh, training this week, but you know, he said he was frustrated that he felt like, okay, we're in a bad situation because of the red card, but we have this opportunity now to use this as a catalyst and after the game. Yeah. And it felt like maybe they were going to do that. You know, it felt like they were maybe headed in that direction and it's the hope that kills you, I guess. I don't know.
00:15:41
Speaker
Yeah. Yeah. And then so immediately out of halftime, they, they looked like they actually were, were playing okay. Soccer. Uh, it looked like they were maybe going to be able to manage this game. And then, so this is one you, you mentioned this before, uh, Obed, Obed Vargas gets the ball near the top of the penalty area. He has a square pass to play to.
00:16:04
Speaker
Ariaga if he wants it and Ariaga has a ton of room to run into if that's what he does but instead he plays it back to Yeymar now I will I'll defend that I'll say Obed didn't make the best choice but I didn't think he put Yeymar in a particularly bad situation there's not a ton of pressure on Yeymar Yeymar if like to me what he's essentially doing is playing it back to Yeymar with the idea that Yeymar is probably just gonna boot it out
00:16:34
Speaker
Uh, there's no reason to get cute here. And instead. Yeah. More tries to play a pass, which I can't tell you, like maybe he's playing it to Obed, but apparently Joe Paulo is like a, uh, like a, uh, a line farther up. And so maybe he's looking to him either way. It gets picked off right at the top of the penalty area. Uh, it gets played over to Ron gold who, who blast it past, uh, fry, who does get a hand to it, but.
00:17:02
Speaker
I don't know. I don't think that's a very, you know, it's, it's scored as something like a 0.5 0 XG on target. Like that's, that's not a savable shot. Really.
Roldan's Red Card and Team Frustrations
00:17:13
Speaker
Uh, I don't blame fry for not making that save, but when I'm apportioning blame, I put that mostly on the veteran center back rather than the young midfielder who, who just, you know, he plays a ball back. It's not an aggressive, it's not the best class, but it's game or was not under any pressure.
00:17:32
Speaker
It's a pass that Yaymar should be able to recover from. It's not a hospital ball. And I know I called out Virgis because it's not the best pass to make there. I always want to try to be holistic about it, but you're absolutely right that if you're a portioning blame for this one, I think 80% of it has to go to Yaymar. He's not the safest passer in the world, but this is uncharacteristic for him even. In this situation especially,
00:18:01
Speaker
yet there's just no there's no there's no reason to play that ball like it's you don't have to I don't know what we're doing here right and and then they so I don't know the game kind of calms down at that point for a little bit it's not again not like Vancouver was throwing waves of pressure at the Sounders or anything like that but I feel like what happened here was
00:18:27
Speaker
Ariaga was able to dribble a guy. And then he sort of got in his head that he could just do this. And he tries to dribble. He tries to dribble one defender and then attempts to nutmeg Brian white at the top of his penalty area. White does not get nutmeg and just kind of walks in on goal. Again, what are we doing here? Like, what is the possible thought process there?
00:18:56
Speaker
It's crazy, man. I mean, I think you're right that he probably says, Oh, work once. I think he probably wants to move away where he can play. He wants to show off. He wants to make a good play. Yeah. Look on his face when he's chasing.
00:19:09
Speaker
the play is pretty heartbreaking. Like if you go back and watch the play, you can tell he knows how bad he messed up. And I just don't know. I would say that that's a mistake that is probably more characteristic of Ariaga than Yemarz was of Yemarz. Because he's had a few perplexing decision
00:19:34
Speaker
making moments in his sounders career as much as I do like him as a as I did like him as a player with the sounders. But that one has got to take the cake man because I still think at one nil.
00:19:45
Speaker
10 v 11. The Sounders have a chance in this game. Yeah. Even though they always. Yeah, absolutely. They hadn't. They definitely dipped when Vancouver scored, but they weren't that much worse than they are with 11 guys. You know, like this game wasn't it wasn't out of reach yet. Right. And there's a million ways you get back into this game. Yeah. And it's.
00:20:12
Speaker
Yeah. And it's just, this is a team that I think people were nervous about playing coming in and 99.9% of the time the Sounders were not under any pressure. We're not being threatened by Vancouver. And you just give them two goals.
00:20:30
Speaker
Yeah, it's just and how how much different are the emotions for this team? The vibes just in general in the fan base if the Sounders go down a man and win this game 1-0, right? Yeah, what a boost that is right? Yeah, absolutely And then of course after almost immediately after they give up the goal Alex rolled on just comes in and just abs, you know, I think you can argue he was Attempting to play the ball, but it's
00:21:00
Speaker
It's a sloppy, ugly, nasty tackle. And you can just see as soon as, as soon as he sees the ref reaching, he's just walking off the field, which, you know, I guess maybe you give him some credit for that. Uh, I don't know, but it's, it's a horrible tackle and I think he's going to be lucky not to get suspended. If he does, he may get suspended. If he doesn't get suspended, I think he's, he looks out a little bit.
00:21:26
Speaker
Yeah, I think that's a clear violent conduct penalty. Um, it's, it's the kind of tackle that I just never, ever, ever want to see a Sounders player make. Um, it's, it might be, I mean, it's, I don't remember the last time that they had a tackle that bad. Like I'm thinking back to the red cards that they've gotten. Uh, and none of them are coming to mind as being like that.
00:21:51
Speaker
If an opposition player makes that tackle on a sounder, I hate them for the rest of their career. That's one bad, I don't want to say bad break, but one bad break, one plant foot away from being a career ending injury. And I don't think that
00:22:12
Speaker
I just don't think there's an excuse for it. I think it's, I understand that you're frustrated with the way the team is playing, with the way you're playing, with the way the game has gone. Maybe you feel are done by the first red card. The season's gone. Sure. I get all of that, but come on, man. You can't, you can't do that.
00:22:34
Speaker
I just, I don't, even if he doesn't get to suspended, which I find it hard to believe, I don't see how you can, obviously he has to start against Philly, but I don't see how he can, he can start. Like, I feel like he has to lose his starting job for that. I just don't think that you can play the way he has played this season. He's been, look, New Who is the scapegoat for a lot of the team's offensive struggles and I, and I get it. I think New Who is a very below par.
00:23:01
Speaker
left back, but Nuhu being bad in the attack at left back is sort of baked into the Sounders game plans and their tactics.
00:23:11
Speaker
Alex being this bad is not, he has been at a new level of, of an offensive contributor this season. And that combined with just making a tackle like this, making a decision like this, when I think ideally this is a guy that's a leader on your team, you know? And, you know, he's an international, he's a veteran. Um, he's been on the team for, for a long time. He's, he has an inspiring story, all that stuff, right? But it's just inexcusable. It's, it's really, really disappointing.
00:23:42
Speaker
Yeah, so he had never gotten a straight red card before during his professional career. His only previous red card was a second yellow way back in 2022. So just a really uncharacteristic, dumb decision. You know, he's apparently, he might talk to the press this week. I'll be interested to see what he has to say, but I'm with you. I'm inclined, like if this,
00:24:14
Speaker
I'm inclined to believe that you lose your starting job at least for some period. And maybe in that sense, maybe a suspension wouldn't be the worst thing in the world because it forces that. But I was really disappointed. I was really disappointed in the performance.
Lineup Criticism and Team Dynamics
00:24:32
Speaker
I was really disappointed in the sounder's response to each different, you know,
00:24:42
Speaker
obstacle that was put in their way. They, they just failed at every, at every stop on this one. And it, and it, and it does, you know, it's, it's kind of shook me, uh, because I, I really do have some belief in the talent on this team. I, I believe in the leadership qualities of the team. I, I think there's a lot of good people here, but this performance was just.
00:25:07
Speaker
not anywhere close to good enough holistically. And I think what's really frustrating is it seems like we're at a point where anytime there's... It's not like the team falls apart anytime something bad happens.
00:25:24
Speaker
But we're just so far beyond the point where we think they're going to have a actively positive response to when bad things happen. Like when they go down a man, it feels like, all right, well, you know, I hope we can pull out a tie here instead of, no, well, you know, they're at home.
00:25:43
Speaker
Big deal. You go down a man at home, you should be able to get a, like that should be the expectation. And yet, you know, twice this year, they've, they've gotten red cards at home and twice this year they've dropped points from the position they were already in. That's not good. That's not anywhere close to good enough. This team just has to be responding to adversity better than they are. And I mean, and if they don't, I guess there's going to be,
00:26:13
Speaker
inevitably some big changes, like there has to be. They can't just keep plodding along the way that they are. No, they can't. I don't think that, obviously, the makeup game and just the nature of the fixture congestion means that there have to be changes. But man, I really would like to think that even if they weren't having their hands forced, that there would be some pretty significant changes. My hope is that
00:26:42
Speaker
in these games where they have to change that they take like if they, if there are good performances there, that that means something. Yeah. You know, um, like one of my biggest frustrations in 2022 was, you know, they went on the road, they beat Toronto FC with a basically fully rotated lineup. And then most of those guys got back on the field.
00:27:05
Speaker
And it was like they just completely abandoned this, you know, like that game meant nothing, aside from the points that they picked up. And I just hope that if there are similar performances this year, that they mean something, that they, like, it's starting to become, like, I've resisted this, I've kind of pushed back against this idea that Brian has his guys and, you know, he just kind of sticks with them.
00:27:32
Speaker
But the last couple of years, it's getting harder and harder to ignore that it's sort of like once you become a starter in Brian's mind, that it's really hard, that it's your job to lose. And it's your job to lose almost exclusively through effort, not through performance. Yeah. And knowing that he has identified this as a shortcoming that he has in the past, and that it's still a problem is just like, is really frustrating. And
00:28:03
Speaker
Yeah, I, um, I, I think that when I saw that lineup against Vancouver, I was trying so hard not to be negative because I really wanted to win that game. I really, really wanted that to be the game when they turned around and then when they came out and they played the way they did the first 15, 20 minutes just.
00:28:24
Speaker
You know, mindless possession around the back, passing around the back for 30 seconds, 10, 15 passes. And then, okay, we're going to try to go down field, but it's going to be a low percentage long ball into touch. I just, how can that be the plan? How can that be the way you want to start out these games? What were the lineup decisions that you were most bothered by in that game?
00:28:46
Speaker
I think that starting Nuhu and Alex again is a problem because you have to have one of your full backs attacking. I know that tactically they really only want one of their full backs involved in the attack.
00:29:02
Speaker
But neither one of those guys have been getting it done in that regard. I think Raul starting centrally again, you know, I feel like you had to start him against Montreal. You had to start him against Dallas, sorry, because of the way you played against Montreal. Although, I mean, in hindsight,
00:29:19
Speaker
I'm not convinced he actually played that well against Montreal. He had a deflected goal and a penalty, but I get that you feel like you have to start him because he scored twice in a game and he was invisible against Dallas. Leotu has not played since he came back. Yeah, that's a weird one.
00:29:39
Speaker
And so, yeah, I think just change something, show that you understand that what you're doing has not worked. Right. And we need to tweak something. And they didn't do that. And that that was just, you know, if it turned out well, if things had clicked, I would have been happy to say, you know, I had some trepidation about the lineup, but in the end, it worked out OK. And Brian was right. Right. But
00:30:06
Speaker
You know, hindsight's 20-20, but we have a lot of hindsight with this team playing that way this season to feel pretty comfortable making those judgments ahead of time now, I think. Yeah. Yep. Yep. Yep. Yeah. I don't want to make it sound like I think Cody Baker is somehow the key to their offense, but it is defying a certain amount of
00:30:35
Speaker
logic that here's a guy who was on the field for all five of your goals and he can't get meaningful minutes now. Yeah. It's very bizarre. And also, also was on the field for the first sounders goal from the run of play of the year and set up the first sounders from the run of play this year. That's a fair point. A fair point. Every run of the goal is scored. Yeah.
00:30:59
Speaker
He's been on the field for it. He set up a couple of them, I think. I'm with you. I think that he's going to regress if he gets meaningful minutes. He's not going to be the catalyst. He's not the difference, but he's almost become an avatar of
00:31:18
Speaker
Yeah. Understanding what's wrong with this team, right? Like you can't keep doing this. Here's a guy that gives you something different. I mean, at this point, like I'm honestly, I would be fine with moving back to three at the back, right? And playing with wing backs again, changing something that drastic, but I'll take anything at this point.
00:31:40
Speaker
Yeah, just yeah, no, I hear you. Well, I think we're going to call this a segment. I want to come back, do a quick bit on Javier Arriaga got traded on Tuesday morning, talk about the ramifications of that a little bit.
Javier Ariaga Trade Discussion
00:31:55
Speaker
And yeah, and then we'll get out of here. But you're listening to no study at all.
00:32:09
Speaker
Welcome back to Nos Arietes. So there was one big piece of news that came out on Tuesday. Javier Ariaga has been traded to the New England Revolution. Essentially, it's a salary dump. The Sounders are getting a 2025 international roster spot, which they can potentially flip, I suppose. They already had two open international roster spots, so they probably don't need that spot.
00:32:36
Speaker
It's not for this year anyway, but then they also potentially get up to $75,000 in 2025 GAM. If Ariaga is still on the roster with the revs next year. Uh, but the big, the big prize I suppose is just simply clearing Ariaga's salary off their books. Looks like he was probably due to make somewhere in the $800,000 range this year. And this combined gives the sounders probably about a million dollars of flexibility to go out and make some summer moves.
00:33:06
Speaker
I suppose if they're good about it, they could potentially make two summer moves. They could make a U22 signing who would only count $200,000 against the cap, maybe even less than that because it's mid-season. And then they could sign like a TAM level type player as well.
00:33:23
Speaker
Those could potentially change, you know, they could give them the sounders a boost, but it should be noted. There's only going to be like eight games left when the summer transfer window, or that's not quite right. I think there's going to be about 12 games left when the summer transfer window opens, but you know, the season could be cooked by then.
Trade Strategy and Future Prospects
00:33:42
Speaker
Yeah, it could. I don't know. What do you make of this move? Do you, do you like it? Do you, do you feel like it was?
00:33:54
Speaker
I like that they made the move. They had to make the move. If you get through this window and he is still on the team, that is a dramatic failure. As it stands, it's only kind of a failure.
00:34:14
Speaker
We may or may not have talked about this in an episode we may or may not have already recorded, but I think that the actual ramifications of making the move now versus not picking up as option are probably not that significant. I don't know that they would have made a move in this window even if they hadn't had them on the roster from the start.
00:34:39
Speaker
But I think that it betrays maybe a certain level of naivety or just a pretty dramatic misreading of the market that they thought there was obviously thought there was going to be much more of a trade market for them than there ended up being. It was very obvious to every team in the league that the Sounders had to move him. And I think most teams were just willing to wait until they were absolutely desperate to give up as little as they possibly
00:35:08
Speaker
And, you know, ultimately he's off roster. It's over and done with, um, and I, and I liked Ariaga as a player. Uh, and, you know, I think, yeah, I was convinced he could be a defensive player of the year type player, uh, if he, you know, but.
00:35:27
Speaker
Never quite lived up to his potential, I don't think. But I mean, I think at their best, he and Yeymar were a decent, a good pairing. I think if the sounders don't end up with Regan and Regan doesn't, I think outperform all of everyone's expectations and end up being the pretty clear starter.
00:35:50
Speaker
I think Ariaga is probably still a starter on this team. I don't think the Sounders would have felt the need to go out and replace him. I think the signing was a good one. He contributed to some good Sounders teams.
00:36:06
Speaker
I think the way that his exit was handled was not great. But I think that that's more about the process that led to it rather than the actual outcome of it. Because unless the caveat there is they could have moved him for actual assets last year and decided to hold out because they felt like they could get more for him.
00:36:26
Speaker
I don't know if that's realistic or not. I know that there were rumors of that, but we were also supposed to be selling new to PSG, you know, like five years ago. So who knows whether or not those rumors are valid. I don't know how much the sounders were ever offered. I always kind of got the impression that they were constantly getting low balled or what they felt were low ball offers for Ariaga. I don't doubt that they were offered
00:36:51
Speaker
more than what they got for him, which was on the high side, probably the equivalent of $300,000 Gamm. Like, I can't imagine they were getting offered much less than that. But yeah, I think they miscalculated the market for him. You know, one of our Senator Hart colleagues, Andrew Pearson, has sort of likened this to a fantasy football
00:37:20
Speaker
player who drafts five quarterbacks and figures someone I'm I cornered the market on quarterback so so their teams are gonna have to come to me to to to get quarterbacks and then no one wants to deal with you
00:37:34
Speaker
Right. And that's the situation the Sounders were in, which was, yeah, I mean, Ariaga is probably better than some of these other guys that we can get on the open market, but we don't have to pay, you know, a million in game to get them. And it wasn't like the Sounders were showcasing, like, I don't know what the play was. Like they, they weren't
00:37:54
Speaker
showcasing him, you know, they weren't putting him in the shop window. So I don't know, like, I'm not quite sure, you know, he wasn't getting runs of games with Ecuador. So I don't know the calculation where they thought his value was going to increase just by other teams getting desperate. Seems like a poor process, frankly.
00:38:17
Speaker
Yeah, I think so. I think that that's my biggest frustration with it because it's a very much a closed market type of approach where, hey, there's only, you know,
00:38:32
Speaker
two starting quality cornerbacks on the market. So if you want a cornerback, you got to come to the Atlanta Falcons, right? Right. There's a lot of centerbacks out there in the world that you can go sign. You don't have to trade for them. You can just go sign them. And I think you're right, too, that if teams are looking for a marginal upgrade at centerback, or they just need to fill a spot with a body,
00:38:59
Speaker
even if he's the best guy available, if he costs three times as many assets as the next guy that you can sign, that's 80% as good. I mean, yeah, you're probably going to go for the guy that's 80% as good and try to upgrade later when the timing is better. I was going to say, the thing that I think
00:39:18
Speaker
makes it
00:39:38
Speaker
the players were making relatively small wages. And so in the case of Romney, I guess they re-signed him at Tam and that seems to be like the center back situation at New England seems to be quite a mess. They have a lot of high paid center backs who are not performing up to the level that they want. But this is not, that's not our problem.
00:40:01
Speaker
The situation, but my point is that for $750,000, if you're, if you're paying a player, $750, $800,000, you can, you can go out into the open market and find some decent players without having to give up a bunch of gam. And that was sort of the miscalculation that the sounders made. I think I, I, I do think on some level they, they were presenting it as if no, no, no, no. We actually want our Yaga and.
00:40:28
Speaker
We're willing to, the reason we're, we're resigning him is because we want him, but that always felt like sort of posturing. Cause if that was really true, you don't go out and you don't sign Nathan. Yes, absolutely. And whether you want him or not, he's on the bench. So like, like, right. Like he was an insurance policy. Like the idea was that he was an insurance policy and it's a little ironic that as soon as that insurance policy was going to be useful.
00:40:58
Speaker
with Reagan being out, they literally cheated him like immediately. So I think that pretty clearly exposes the sounders were in a position where they just realized that if they, this was their chance to trade Ariaga and the nightmare scenario was they don't trade them. They have to hold on to them and they can't get rid of them during the summer transfer window. And now you don't have any assets to go out and try to make a signing, which
00:41:28
Speaker
Even if it's can't salvage yours, I don't, I don't think, like my expectation is that a summer signing is not designed. Might not be in a position to salvage their season. They, you know, if they don't get that player signed the day the window opens, they will only be eligible for eight league games and then potentially leagues cup. I think they have to just completely be looking at this player as a getting a headstart on prepping for 2025 and.
00:41:58
Speaker
It would be pretty disappointing if they used assets this summer to sign a player who doesn't have real upside for 25.
00:42:08
Speaker
Yeah, I totally agree. I think that if you are going to make a signing to save your season, it's got to be a marquee DP signing and moving Ariana doesn't pave the way for that. But it's still like you don't have that many windows. You've got two windows a year to make your team better. And so the focus has to be, this is a guy that we are comfortable paying a tan level salary to be on our team for two or three years. It's got to be a player that you're comfortable committing to.
00:42:37
Speaker
for the next iteration of the team rather than right now, which I think anybody will be happy with a player that improves the team even a little bit at this point. I don't think anybody's necessarily going to be complaining that, hey, this money that used to pay area is now paying a guy who is useful rather than just sitting on the bench.
00:43:03
Speaker
Yep. All right. Well, that's probably a good place to end it. Uh, thank you so much to our sponsor full pool wines. Thank you to sounder heart subscribers for making this all possible. Uh, if you want to get involved with sounder heart membership, start as low as $3 a month or $25 a year. And anyone that wants to support this, it's greatly appreciated.
00:43:28
Speaker
Uh, I am Jeremiah Shan signing off for Aaron Campo and Lickett. This is no study at this. Remember, you'll never yell at hello.
00:44:13
Speaker
We love you. Let's win another one!