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Backpost Runners episode 1: Cleated Rivalries
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Mark Kastner and Tim Ostlund-Foss kick off their new podcast Backpost Runners with a discussion of the adversaries and rivalries that make soccer special. The episode features a conversation with Hugo Award winner G. Willow Wilson about villains and why their important, as well as the Guardian's Jeff Reuter diving into MLS's best rivalries and how they shape the league.
G. Willow Wilson can be found on Bluesky and her work on DC's Poison Ivy and Marvel's Black Cat can be found wherever comic books are sold. Jeff Reuter can be found on Bluesky and you can read his writing at the Guardian.
You can follow Mark and Tim on Bluesky at @mkstnr.bsky.social and @timostlundfoss.bsky.social
***
Backpost Runners is a podcast for Sounder at Heart, which has been primarily listener supported since 2023. You can support us by becoming a paid subscriber, learn more here. You can also watch many of their shows on YouTube.
Aside from becoming a Sounder at Heart subscriber, you can also support the show by using this link to purchase the Sounder at Heart physical magazine, IV or checking out our merch table to buy various shirt designs.
“Surf Vibe” audio provided by Hunter Babcook; find them on Instagram.
“Backpost Runners” art provided by Bradley Smith; find them on Instagram.
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Transcript
Introduction of Backpost Runners
00:00:11
Speaker
Welcome to the first ever episode of Backpost Runners. I am one of your hosts, Tim Ostland-Foss, and as we get into the meat of the episode, I'll be joined by my co-host, Mark Kastner. In his absence, I would just like to say, abolish ICE.
Joining Sounder at Heart Network
00:00:25
Speaker
We're excited to join the Sounder at Heart podcast network and hope that we can expand the sorts of coverage we are able to provide at Sounder at Heart by turning the focus away from what's happening on the field week in and week out with this new show.
00:00:37
Speaker
The idea behind Backpost Runners is to create an audio magazine, something like an NPR show for soccer sickos.
Vision of an Audio Magazine
00:00:44
Speaker
We'll be providing some deeply researched examinations and conversations with experts and friends from around the Seattle soccer world and beyond, looking at the culture of and around soccer in the Puget Sound, and hopefully some fun diversions as we go along.
00:00:59
Speaker
The idea is two to three segments. Typically, we're going to shoot for 15 to 30 minutes max per segment.
Thematic Segments on Adversaries
00:01:09
Speaker
Each segment will be its own topic, but the episodes will be grouped thematically. As an example, to get us started, we figured we'd launch with a topic that is always top of mind when we're thinking about our teams.
00:01:24
Speaker
That is, our adversaries. We'll be starting with an ah in-depth conversation about villains with acclaimed author and noted Sounders fan,
Villains in MLS and Sports
00:01:33
Speaker
G. Willow Wilson. After all, who better to discuss what makes a good villain, why they're important, and how MLS villains help us all to appreciate our heroes in Rave Green even more.
00:01:44
Speaker
Then Mark and i are joined by Jeff Reuter of The Guardian to talk about MLS rivalries. We'll discuss which ones have the juice and the hows and whys of their impact on the impending conference realignment coming to the league in 2027.
00:01:57
Speaker
We hope you enjoy this episode and we'll be back soon for another episode focusing on the 2026 World Cup. Now here's the show.
00:02:08
Speaker
We are joined by renowned and award-winning author G. Willow Wilson, ah the creator of Ms. Marvel, the series ah i Get it backwards every time. the hunger and the dusk. Is that correct? yes
Villains Exploiting Weaknesses
00:02:26
Speaker
That's it. Yeah. Fantastic. ah And most relevant to this conversation, currently the writer for Poison Ivy and Black Cat.
00:02:34
Speaker
ah To depending on the context and circumstances, villains or antiheroes, antagonists to some.
00:02:45
Speaker
ah We are. Going to have a conversation about MLS villains, what makes a good one, what really is a villain. Willow, thank you so much for joining us.
00:02:55
Speaker
Thanks so much for having me. Excited to have this conversation. So really, the crux of this conversation depends on how you define what a villain is.
Role of Villains in Storytelling
00:03:08
Speaker
in your In your thinking, when you approach your work, when you consume media, what what is a villain? What makes a good one and how is that different from, yeah like, like I just said, an anti-hero or just an antagonist?
00:03:28
Speaker
You know, that's a really good question. And as I was thinking about how villains relate to conversations about sports specifically, um i thought that the fun thing to think about when we talk about villains in sports is that we're really talking about villains not as some ultimate arbiter of right and wrong, a black and white way of viewing good and evil, um But as someone who propels the storytelling forward, ah you know, when you're writing fiction, you don't necessarily need a villain who is evil all the time. In fact, that can sometimes hamper the story. You you you need them to have some sort of
00:04:10
Speaker
compelling reason for doing what they do, you know, like your Darth Vader's or your Lex Luthor's.
Villains as Challengers in Sports
00:04:15
Speaker
Um, if they're, if they're just bad all the time and they kill kittens for fun, ah the audience never gets invested enough in them to make the story worth continuing.
00:04:27
Speaker
And, you know, similarly in sports, the villains who are the guys that we hate, we usually hate Not because they're bad players, but because they're good at certain things that make doing our job much harder.
00:04:42
Speaker
And that's what makes them fun to hate. It's not that they're you know like bad players or bad people, but because they deploy the dark arts against our team.
00:04:53
Speaker
And they're not supposed to do that because we're the good guys. So you know it's it's fun to think about villains in sports because they are, in a sense, so similar to a villain in sci-fi or in comics.
Creating Compelling Villains
00:05:06
Speaker
From a fiction point of view, um how do you go about creating a villain? Ooh, what a question. ah You know, usually when you're creating a villain, you've created the hero first. So, you know, for example, Batman probably has one of the most famous rogues galleries in all of comics.
00:05:30
Speaker
um It's a rare thing in any kind of story that the villain can hold... a story on their own. But, you know, we all know who the Joker is. ah You know, the Joker's had a couple of of his own movies. We know who the Penguin is. The Penguin has his own series.
00:05:47
Speaker
ah You know, we know who Poison Ivy is. um And so usually you've set up a hero who has certain strengths and certain weaknesses. And what the villain's job then to do is exploit the weaknesses of the hero, ah which is exactly what happens on the pitch in soccer.
00:06:06
Speaker
ah the The guys that we hate or love to hate are the guys who can effectively exploit our weaknesses. And that's what makes them so hateable. ah But, you know, if we're creating a new...
00:06:19
Speaker
villain from scratch, usually what we'll do is sit down and think about, okay, what aspect of the story hasn't been told yet? ah You know, if it's, again, to go back to the Batman example, um you know, his his flaws are sort of that he operates in the shadows as well.
00:06:36
Speaker
ah He himself is kind of an anti-hero. he had everything, was born into luxury and had it all violently taken away. And so he has to, ah you know, sort of operate outside the law in order to... to get it back and right the wrongs that have been done to him. um So the, the antiheroes or the villains that we create as foils have a very similar arc so that on some weird level we can relate to them and that the hero can relate as well um because you're facing similar problems, but one character chooses to use
00:07:16
Speaker
a moral or a rational or, you know, a sympathetic way to solve those
Hero-Villain Dynamics
00:07:21
Speaker
problems. And another character who is the villain chooses the dark arts. ah You know, they, they throw their morality out the window um or, you know, like they, they make choices that we know to be wrong, but their ends or their goals are often the same. And, and sort of that's, that's what holds our interest is, is that we're sort of talking about,
00:07:43
Speaker
solving the same problem in two different ways. One, which is, you know, we hope just merciful, uh, moral in some way that, that tries to be fair. And another one that is not concerned with fairness, not concerned with morality and not concerned with any of that stuff just wants the shortest route to the result that they desire.
00:08:04
Speaker
um and, and, and yeah, it's, I think the best, um, villains are evenly matched with the heroes. So it's never quite clear who's going to win. You know, so for your Superman, you need a Lex Luthor. He's super smart. He's got all this money. He's really ambitious. He's one step ahead.
00:08:24
Speaker
ah And so we don't know in any given conflict who's going to win.
Matching Heroes and Villains
00:08:28
Speaker
And if the bad guy does win, we're not that mad because it's a good character. And I think that's what makes the best villains is that,
00:08:37
Speaker
We root against them, but we're also kind of glad they're there. You know, we're glad to fight them and not somebody else. So what you're saying is for every Ozzy Alonzo, you need a Diego Chara. That's exactly right. That's it.
00:08:51
Speaker
It is interesting. Just the more I thought about this topic, getting ready for the episode, coming more to the idea that maybe because is...
00:09:04
Speaker
soccer is Increasingly so, and you know, an entertainment
00:09:15
Speaker
content is not the right term, but it is Much more akin to. wrestling than it is necessarily to like a superhero series that the villains are maybe not so much villains as they are heels that it's all broadly the same guys it's just that they're doing it to the guys that you like uh and in that way maybe it's also not totally dissimilar from like an eighties teen movie where the villain is, they might do some things that you don't like, but really it's that they stand between the
00:09:58
Speaker
protagonist and their end goals. And so, you know, we're going to do the time honored tradition of all fandoms and remember some guys in a little bit, but some of them are not necessarily, there are definitely practitioners of the dark arts on this list, but some of them are just guys who are good and play for not the sounders. It makes them villains. And in the same way, yeah, Paul Rothrock and Christian Roldan and Ozzy Alonzo, two non-Sounders fan bases, are the villains when they take the field against whatever unfortunate team those fans might support.
00:10:37
Speaker
um Like Sporting Kansas City.
Antagonists in Sports and Drama
00:10:41
Speaker
Well, this is another another topic that I think is worth exploring in this, in the...
00:10:49
Speaker
You know, the the purpose of an antagonist or an antihero in a story is to create tension and force the hero to overcome adversity and roadblocks in pursuit of their goals.
00:11:04
Speaker
And that keeps you engaged and it makes it more broadly appealing and similarly. especially a league like MLS that wants to increase its followership and its viewership.
00:11:18
Speaker
You need that tension and antagonism between teams week in and week out, because it's not enough to just have the diehard fans of each team. You need neutrals and you need something that they can sink their teeth into. And so you have teams that are villains. And sometimes it's just that,
00:11:37
Speaker
It's LAFC or the Galaxy or Miami, and they have resources that other teams might not either don't have or are not bringing to bear. Or it's Sporting Kansas City, a team of professional wrestling enthusiasts or, you know, Minnesota United playing Haram ball as people have...
00:12:02
Speaker
taken to referring to it. ah Hearing someone ask Brian Schmetzer about Haram Ball remains one of the funniest things I have ever encountered in my life, by the way.
00:12:16
Speaker
I don't think I listened to that press conference. I'm going to go back and look at it now. It was
00:12:23
Speaker
someone asking a question who was not familiar with the
00:12:30
Speaker
background of the phrase. And so was, oh it wasn't Brian that got asked. It was Albert Resnack got asked about Haram ball, but the pronunciation of Haram ball was odd. And i don't think Resnack is online enough to have encountered that.
00:12:49
Speaker
the wild um in the wild so or he was just very confused but poor albert but it is sort of you know a team approaching the game in a way that is very steeped in the dark arts and contrary to how most people believe that the game should be played or how they enjoy watching it and so you have these teams that become adversaries as well um Just broadly making
Sports as Narrative Structures
00:13:21
Speaker
making the entire league more exciting and fun to watch. It really gives you something to tune into when the Sounders aren't playing.
00:13:30
Speaker
Yeah, I think without those rivalries, um, you you don't have storylines. And one of the most interesting things to me coming into soccer kind of cold, you know, not really being a sports person much before that was that broadcasters and sports journalists will talk about storylines using that word. I was like, Oh my God, they're they're talking about it like fiction.
00:13:54
Speaker
Uh, and that was really fascinating to me. And it's for all the reasons that you just said, um, you know, like there are not just a couple of evenly matched teams. You're not playing against the computer. You know, it's, it's not like, uh, uh, you know, or you're on trail or, you know, computer chess or something where it's a faceless opponent who's just running some algorithms and spitting out the strategy that's most likely to win. It's human personalities and, you know, it's, it's different ways of approaching the game. ah and,
00:14:30
Speaker
you sometimes encounter either players or entire teams whose players philosophy about soccer is so different that it drives you nuts. You know, like the Jose Mourinho's where you want to play this high pressing, you know, fast, tiki-taka type of ball.
00:14:48
Speaker
And this other team is just bunkering in and being like, we'll let you kick the ball around for 45 minutes. That's totally fine. And, you know, you're sitting up there and you can see that this is a very effective strategy to deploy against a team like that.
00:15:00
Speaker
But it's boring as hell and it's frustrating. And you're like, oh, my God, why won't you people just play ball the way I think you should play ball? And, um you know, and that's what gives us the drama ah is is having personalities and dynamism and, you know, like people you kind of love to hate because.
00:15:21
Speaker
They've got your number, you know, like they know what strategy you're going to deploy and they know exactly how they're going to counter it. And a lot of the time it works. And then you're like, God, I hate those guys. And you don't hate them because they're evil. You hate them because they're winning.
00:15:34
Speaker
And yeah, it just, and it creates storylines exactly like you would have in fiction, which is awesome. I think we would be remissed if we, we didn't have a a moment in this conversation of, of at least some level of self-reflection about the club that we support and its place in MLS culture as a, you know, the, the new pretty boys on the block 15 years ago coming in, winning the open cup right away, almost winning four of those in a row.
00:16:08
Speaker
um, And then, you know, infamously chanting, you don't like us and we don't care. Also winning an m MOS cup without taking a shot on goal, you know, just kind of like the Sounders have a very villainous role in MOS lore. And I'm just curious what you think about that.
00:16:29
Speaker
I, you know, I, I really didn't appreciate how ah hated, i'm just going to use the word hated. The Sounders are in so many other quarters of MLS until I'd been watching MLS for about maybe a season and a half. I'm like, wow, they they really do kind of hate us out there. Why do they hate us so much? um I think...
00:16:54
Speaker
You know, one of the things that I love about this club, and I say this with no irony whatsoever, is that we are very high on our own supply. You need that. You really do need that. ah You know, and and it reminds me in a lot of ways of diehard comic book fans who...
00:17:11
Speaker
love a certain character or a certain set of characters, uh, and they've been following them for years and they're super invested and it almost doesn't matter what those characters do.
00:17:24
Speaker
They're, they're just in it. They're in it to win it. Uh, you know, they love these people. They're insufferable online. And you're like, my God, you guys need therapy. Um, and you know, we're kind of those guys. We, we need the therapy. Um,
00:17:39
Speaker
Because, you know, and I think it's not unwarranted. um you know, we we talk a lot about the culture of the Sounders, um about, you know, built, not bought, all of this stuff.
00:17:52
Speaker
We're very proud of it. um we have very We have a lot of moral clarity about our ideals, um which to us is is part of what makes following this team and supporting this team so fun is because it it really does feel like a unified fan base, like, like we're all kind of on the same page and, uh, not just about the football itself, but about who we are as people, what we represent in terms of our city in this region. Um, and that I can imagine if you're outside of it is it it really is. I mean, insufferable is a good word. You're like, Oh my God, will you guys shut up about how wonderful you are and how great this club is? Um, so I can see why it is annoying.
00:18:38
Speaker
if you're not us. But, um you know, that's, ah again, that's that's storytelling. you you need... You need people and you need clubs and personalities and people all across that sort of quadrant of lawful good, chaotic good, lawful evil, neutral evil, all of this stuff.
00:18:56
Speaker
um And we're sort of, i think, way, way up in the, ah well, actually, no, some people might disagree, but you know i would I would put the Sounders quite firmly in the in the lawful good sort of category, which to everybody else is annoying as hell. But you know like that's that's Superman. that's That's sort of the Boy Scout.
00:19:17
Speaker
I think it's annoying to them because they know we're right. I think you're right. Yeah. I mean, that's let's tell ourselves that let's go with that. That sounds good. mean, not to get too into other soccer cultures and whatnot, but being a Liverpool fan feels very similar in the sense of like,
00:19:36
Speaker
there is a There is a moral clarity there, and there's there's history behind that and and stuff. And that's for, let's say, the Liverpool podcast I start some other time. But...
00:19:48
Speaker
it's Like, i' I'm sure just I actually I don't know which English club you support, but I'm sure hearing that. Wolves. We're we're we're going to get relegated in record time. It's it's just so sad. won't talk about the Wolves. I was going to say maybe even you just hearing me say that about Liverpool, you had the same kind of grading.
00:20:09
Speaker
ah heartburn that maybe other, other MLS, um, supporters have when we talk about this. Do seem also, you know, likewise quite high on their own supply, but you know, in the case of Liverpool also, you know, like, I don't know that it's unwarranted.
00:20:24
Speaker
Um, I don't, I don't mind them. I don't mind them so much because, you know, Liverpool fans, are dedicated. They're dedicated. ah And, you know, there's certain other clubs, that don't want to piss anybody off, um that seem kind of put together in a hurry with with a lot of money from dubious sources.
00:20:43
Speaker
ah And, you know, there will always be bandwagoners who jump on when people start doing really well. And it just seems very artificial and plastic. And Liverpool is not one of those. So i don't I don't mind that as much as I mind certain other clubs. Let's put it that way.
00:21:00
Speaker
I do yeah, go ahead, Tim. sorry just Well, this is a total aside, but I, as you two were talking, was struck with a bolt of lightning in the realization that Wilfred Nancy should not come back to MLS. He should coach wolves when they go to the championship. I would be so hyped for that. I would buy whatever ridiculous cable add on. I have to buy to watch the championship ah because that would be incredible. That would be incredible. Yeah.
00:21:25
Speaker
Yeah, and it's, it's, but again, you know, like this is also part of storytelling when there's a falling out or, you know, like you, you live long enough to see yourself become the villain. ah That was Wolves with Nuno Espiritu Santo, who is a genius, genius coach. And then, so to let him go and then go into this free fall is in itself. Yeah.
00:21:49
Speaker
a a very good bit of storytelling, even if it is extraordinarily painful to watch as a fan. Because that's, you know, that's Bafo. That's getting your comeuppance.
00:22:00
Speaker
Yes. All of Sunderland Till I Die is made better by how Sunderland is doing. oh my God. Yes. That is. So me and um another comic book fan,
00:22:12
Speaker
ah writer, we're talking about Sunderland Till I Die because
Robbie Keane: Quintessential Villain
00:22:17
Speaker
not not having anything to do with sports, but because it is so difficult to tell a compelling story about failure.
00:22:25
Speaker
That's one of the hardest things to do in in in storytelling. And they did it in Sunderland Till I Die. You know, like you see this club collapsing, but I'd watch three more seasons. In fact, I hope that they're now making, you know, the season of resurrection where everything comes good and, you know, the light dawns and we're back on top. So, yeah, it it really is incredible how much sports...
00:22:50
Speaker
ah lends itself to those classic three act structures, you know, villains, heroes, you fail, ah you know, like you have to learn these difficult lessons, but then you pull yourself up, you learn the lessons and like everything comes around again. And you're like, yeah, maybe the reason we love sports so much is because that happens on a regular basis. Whereas in real life, it often feels like the bad guys win pretty consistently.
00:23:17
Speaker
um Speaking of Speaking of bad guys that win consistently, speaking of stories that happen in three acts in terms of biting people, um I think we should start with our ah remembering some guys segment talking about maybe the maybe the villain that is the most recent to to Sounders, um Sounders lore, and that's Luis Suarez.
00:23:45
Speaker
um What makes him an interesting villain to you? Well, the funny thing about Luis Suarez is that, you know, unless you are longtime diehard fan of the teams he happens to have played for, everybody hates that guy. And maybe even some of the fans of the teams that he's been on also hate that guy.
00:24:07
Speaker
um he is he's He's kind of a natural irritant You know, like he he's one of these dudes who is really good at what he does, but was not born to be a hero.
00:24:22
Speaker
He just takes to the villain role so well. um And, you know, like it's it's also unfortunate that he chooses to deploy his most striking physical characteristic in that particular way. I mean, like if you have these quite beautiful, but prominent shiny chompers, I would think that the last thing you would want to be known for is biting a bunch of people. Like I would think that you would choose something else. Like maybe you'd break some ankles, you know, and maybe you'd do dirty tackles or fouls, but no, the man bites people. Yeah. I Luis Suarez is, you know, as I was contemplating this question, one of the defining characteristics that I came to in what makes a villain is the idea of a pursuit of power or success at all costs, ah regardless of the repercussions.
00:25:24
Speaker
And he like, that going hand in hand with the the, limits that you have to push yourself to not only become a professional soccer player, but to become broadly one of the five, 10 best strikers that's played the modern game, like to reach that absolute pinnacle of performance and accomplishment for like the, uh,
00:25:55
Speaker
the constant tension you have to be under the limits that you have to push yourself to that. Even just, I know if I am having to push myself to accomplish the normal mundane things that i need to accomplish, if i go beyond a certain threshold,
00:26:18
Speaker
my barrier in emotional regulation is much thinner and you start to see how committing a red card handball offense to deny a goal in the World Cup seems like the obvious choice.
00:26:37
Speaker
Not that it becomes justifiable, but you can see how a 20-year-old kid disrespecting you and your teammates results in a literal fight at Lumen Field where you spit on 60-plus-year-old retired cop. Like, it is... That was wild. To see that in person, i was like, I can't believe...
00:27:06
Speaker
i'm watching I mean, he just like it's like seeing Alex Luther in the flesh. You're like, oh my God, he's doing the thing. He's doing the thing he's famous for. I can't believe this is really happening. I had been posting for like a year about how I wanted you know Miami to go to the playoffs because that was the place where we were most likely to see a, in all caps, true Luis Suarez moment.
00:27:29
Speaker
And so to finally see it happen in the flesh, being up in the press box where everyone is on their computer reviewing fan videos like it's the Zaprooter film was a a true delight. um You know, going a little bit.
00:27:50
Speaker
back in the MLS villainy archives, but still relatively modern. um You know, as I was coming up with a list of players, the Galaxy certainly have had a fair number ah and two very different in so many ways, but both different.
00:28:16
Speaker
I think equally villainous characters, ah Robbie Keane and Zlatan Ibrahimovic ah really stand out.
00:28:27
Speaker
um I know Keane's time was before you started following, correct? but Yeah, you guys would would have more more of specific beef with him. Yeah.
00:28:39
Speaker
I mean, that man is a tiny somersaulting nightmare, but one of the like prime examples that stands in my mind is I think it was a playoff game between the Sounders and the Galaxy and he Adam Johansson, the Sounders right back, was like tracking him just inside the box. Robbie Keane was like on the left wing near the end line.
00:29:06
Speaker
Adam Johansson is just inside the box and is in like a running motion. And Keane intentionally picks out Johansson's dangling hand and just flicks the ball up into it to win a penalty.
00:29:21
Speaker
um A, like... Wow. Immaculate practitioner of the dark arts and a true villain. um i I am curious if there are any particular villains that have stood out to you or resonated in any particular way since you have started following. um I mean, I have to say that the first time i felt like,
00:29:50
Speaker
like real genuine on-site hatred for someone who had no direct relevance to my own life was when Timbala chokeslammed Christian Roldan.
00:30:02
Speaker
And, you know, his head was inches from the, you know, the the crossbar. Is it, is it a crossbar when it's on the ground anyway from the crossbar of the goal? And I was like, my God, you know like two inches to the other side. And like, that's, that's a head wound, you know, like that's that you could have killed him.
00:30:23
Speaker
And I mean, I was on my feet freaking out and being like, I can't flipping believe this. You just, you literally choked slammed a player um And, you know, of course at the time, and and this is another way that I think we tell ourselves our own stories in our heads at the time.
00:30:41
Speaker
I did not notice or care that Christian was in fact encroaching on the goalie. Like, like when I, when, when I calmed down and I rewatched, I was like, yeah, he should not have been there. Um, but oh my God, i was like, I was incensed.
00:30:55
Speaker
I was really incensed. I was like, how, how in a professional setting do you do that to a person? And then the reaction um, the fans of, you know, the club of professional wrestling enthusiasts and MLS and, you know, actual professional wrestlers on Twitter. i was like, I was, I mean, you know, if if Tim Malia and Sporting Kansas City are in fact cursed, I was one of the people doing the cursing because, oh my God, yeah i
00:31:27
Speaker
I was so mad. And, um you know, I think it's one of those things where, It really doesn't matter what the turnover is at that team after that. It doesn't matter who comes in and who goes out.
00:31:39
Speaker
um You just always have this feeling going forward that those are the bad guys. Those are the guys on ship. SKC have been the bad guys for a long time. That's fair. Jimmy Nielsen.
00:31:53
Speaker
Benny Failhaber, Johnny Russell, Dom Dwyer. Oh, Johnny Russell. Roger Espinosa. Johnny Russell is one of those guys who I think if he was a sounder, we would love him. That's one of those sort of, you know, depends on your perspective ones where it's like, we hate him, but if he was a sounder, you know, we'd all be getting his shirts.
00:32:13
Speaker
i I feel, I feel that way. I feel that way. I mean, we had Clint Dempsey. So. Yes. Yep. Yep. Absolutely. and Yeah. Speaking of, of, you know, is he a hero or is he a villain? Depending on your perspective, Clint Dempsey is probably a you could write a whole thesis on how he's perceived by the people who he plays for versus, you know, the people who support the teams he plays against.
00:32:39
Speaker
I'm curious at this point in the conversation to kind of go back to the first question I asked you about like creating a villain. villains aren't necessarily just people who do bad things.
Villain Perception and Redemption
00:32:52
Speaker
There's, there's motive and context and stuff behind it. And I'm curious about kind of what creates a sports villain. And i think there's,
00:33:04
Speaker
There's a situation in kind of Sounders lore that i believe was before your time. The the Brian Mullen tackle on Steve Zacalani. Oh, that was before my time and I'm glad because i mean everybody who saw that sounds legitimately like they have PTSD. um Yes, I was at the game and it was terrifying. However, i don't think...
00:33:31
Speaker
I'm really impressed. And that was, that was early on in my fandom. I was just really impressed how Sounders fans in general handled that situation with a lot of glass and respect. And, you know, Brian Mullen, his life changed in that moment too, not just Steve Zappawani's. Absolutely.
00:33:49
Speaker
um I don't, I don't want to try to twist any words here. I don't think Brian Mullen is a villain, but I'm curious just about that maybe we dichotomy between like,
00:34:01
Speaker
players that are able to do bad things in moments, whether on purpose or on accident, like a situation like that, versus Luis Suarez, who is just always going to the next bad thing that he does. And I'm curious like what you think of that. you bring up something interesting. Not everybody who does something bad in a story is a villain.
00:34:25
Speaker
ah you know There's plenty of drama in... ah ordinary people or people who are even trying to be good, who are making an effort to be one of the good guys, ah either screw up or there's you know sort of some sort of misunderstanding, some sort of ah you know wires get crossed, messages are not received.
00:34:46
Speaker
um And that is the difference between, i think, a story about a villain and a tragedy. A tragedy is when we don't mean for something bad to happen and it happens anyway.
00:34:59
Speaker
ah You know, like you, the, the good guy goes or or the, even the antihero goes to, you know, like avenge his dead partner or whatever. And he accidentally shoots the bad guy's girlfriend instead of the bad guy. You know, like there's stuff like that all the time. And that's sometimes, know,
00:35:17
Speaker
more powerful than somebody who's just, you know, shithousing and, and we know wants to do something bad and, and succeeds in doing something bad. Um, so, you know, like it's, it's good to hear, especially when it's, when it's your fandom, whether it's of a fictional hero or or a real life sports team,
00:35:38
Speaker
that people can tell the difference, you know, like that there's a difference between someone who is out to hurt a guy, like one would argue Malia was doing with Christian Roldan versus the,
00:35:50
Speaker
a mistimed tackle or a bad angle, or the field was slick or the sun was in your eyes and you're like, Oh my God, what have I done? And now you have to live with the guilt of having done this terrible thing that you didn't mean to do.
00:36:05
Speaker
So, you know, to me, that's, that's just a very different kind of story. You know, like that's, that's a tragedy and, and, uh, and you're right, you know, both players lives changed in that moment. And, um,
00:36:19
Speaker
I wouldn't want to be either one of them in that scenario. I think we, with the Brian Mullen, Steve Zakawani incident, and we were just talking about Malia, the, the real difference in those moments is how the individuals chose to respond and react to the incident where I think realistically both moments are a player caught in the heat of the moment,
00:36:50
Speaker
reacting outside of their you know usual behavior. Brian Mullen mistimes a tackle. It's a bad tackle. It's a retaliatory tackle.
00:37:04
Speaker
it causes a horrifying injury. And he
00:37:12
Speaker
like took steps to make amends. Tamelea He and his entire team and then the league reveled in this moment. You know, SKC later in the season celebrated a Johnny Russell goal with a chokeslam goal celebration. Like they reveled in this.
00:37:39
Speaker
Heel moment. um And I think it is.
00:37:46
Speaker
particularly as a team who has been often is seen as the villains and oftentimes for good reason that you get to choose whether you are the hero or villain character.
00:38:00
Speaker
really based on how you, um, how you respond. A hundred percent, hundred percent, because the way that you respond shows how you are processing what happened on an ethical level.
00:38:15
Speaker
Uh, you know, because you have a choice. you can be like, Oh my God, I can't believe that happened. I'm so sorry. Oh, you know, like this is going to haunt me. Or you could be like, I'm going to dance on your grave. I'm going to do like a mocking choke slam celebration. ah You know, I'm going to do hilarious Twitter posts and all that kind of stuff. So, you know, like that, that's where the temperature check is really, ah is, is, is in the response. And because that shows everybody around you, you know, what, what your thinking is.
00:38:46
Speaker
not just the action itself, but what did you mean to do? And even if you didn't mean it, how are you interpreting your own actions? And, you know, sometimes that's what defines a hero versus a villain. You know, not that a hero never does anything bad, but how does the hero respond when he or she has done something bad, ah you know, either either by accident or by tragedy or or fate?
00:39:12
Speaker
So yeah, that was Yes. Well, I think the three of us probably could keep talking about this forever, just about, but I think this is a good place to call it. Willow, thank you so much for joining us. Hopefully, you know, the next year involves our heroes conquering all of the villains that they face.
00:39:37
Speaker
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00:39:50
Speaker
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00:40:03
Speaker
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00:40:19
Speaker
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00:40:30
Speaker
Howdy folks, I'm Mark with Backpost Runners, joined here with Tim. also from Backpost Runners. But more importantly, we're joined by the Guardians, Jeff Reuter, to talk to us about and MLS rivalries. Jeff, first and foremost, congratulations on your new position.
00:40:52
Speaker
And second, thanks for joining us. ah Of course, you're welcome, I guess is what they teach you. and It's always seems so abrasive to you're welcome, someone right? Like it's like a yeah, you better be thankful. um That one falls off the etiquette queue. But thank you for the congratulations all the same.
00:41:08
Speaker
It does fit nicely into a very like British idea of politeness. So I think that's appropriate. I guess. Right. It's like the comfort it's also like a I don't want this little moment of satisfaction to end. Right. And so I'm going to make it linger for two more sentences before you can change topics, um which we're doing really well on this episode already. So ah hijacking your podcast for etiquette lessons. That's what I'm here for personally. Hey, that's very British of you. So there we go. The Guardian, I guess. so Yeah. Yeah. So um if you're not familiar with Jeff and his work, Jeff has been covering
00:41:46
Speaker
American soccer for a decade plus. Is that accurate to say? and Yeah, it is. And has ah had previous stops that we don't have to name them, but na you know nationwide publications that you are probably very familiar with as a listener.
00:42:04
Speaker
We wanted to have Jeff on the show today because I think, um one, Jeff is a close friend of mine, but two, I think he has a very interesting perspective in terms of where and MLS rivalries are at right now as you know we enter the 2026 MLS season. I had to write that down because ah the year doesn't feel real.
00:42:26
Speaker
And for whatever reason, something about this season just feels off. And I think part of the reason why it feels off is, We're about a year and a half away from the biggest shift that MLS has ever done in terms of their shifting their schedule around. And part of that shift is some conference realignment. And so what I wanted to do to start this conversation was just open it up and ask you an open-ended question in terms of What do you think of the coming conference alignment? And more importantly, what does that mean for games and fans of teams that just exist in this liminal space of there's a season that's going to happen, there's going to be a smaller season that happens after that?
00:43:16
Speaker
Yeah, it's um it's an interesting time for them to pull it off, which is a very Midwestern way of saying I don't quite get it, um because what you're looking at with the calendar change and and a lot of this has been driven by sporting rationale. The idea being that Major League Soccer can be a more relevant competitor in the global transfer market. Get better players at more opportune times of their contracts, have these negotiations when it's not, for example, you're selling your best player in the summer to a team in Europe who's in their offseason, but you're in the middle of your you know push for a supporter shield or an Open Cup or MLS Cup. And now suddenly you're trying to picture life without your star. player right this has been untenable for a lot of different players and teams over the years and so the idea is that you need to make this change the timing of it is suspect though because right now what you have as you've alluded to is one more year of this normal look but it's going to be very different because of the world cup in north america and then there's going to be the sprint season at the start of 2027 so i think that
00:44:18
Speaker
I maybe didn't appreciate that 25 was probably the final, like normal first version of MLS schedule season um that we will get. And from here on, it's just going to feel like a period of transition. Now, what does that mean for fans of their teams? You know, from from what I can tell, I think they'll just keep showing up. I think that some fans have been excited that more of their summer weekends will be open to do things.
00:44:43
Speaker
different things than watch MLS every single weekend. I think that there are also others who will say, you know, actually having the entire season run parallel to the school year is not going to be good for their consumption of Major League Soccer. Right. And that's fair, too. And I think that both sides of that um will will continue to sort of voice their opinions on it. But I don't know. I mean, it's just like it's a very...
00:45:06
Speaker
transitional sort of period for MLS, but I will admit, I think I've lost sight of where they're trying to park this bus at this point. It's just kind of still in motion. And so a lot of this is wait and see. And um I think that for MLS, the one benefit is so many of their fans are team specific, right? Like it's very rare to find that sicko who is like, I could tell you the starting left back on all 30 MLS teams are all 15 teams in the conference that my team plays in even. Right. And so in that sense, it doesn't really matter when you hold the games, because what's going to matter is for a Seattle fan, when do we play Portland? When do we play competitive rivals like LAFC in the galaxy? When do we play Vancouver? These sorts of things.
00:45:50
Speaker
And that's just looking at a schedule. That's not necessarily what month did that fall in. And so um I think a lot of that is still to be determined whether or not it's better for the fan experience um as they change the calendar.
00:46:08
Speaker
I. Yeah. Go ahead, Tim. Sorry. Just additionally, from a transfer perspective, I think. Part of the hope is in being able to attract higher level talent and less frequently lose your top level talent in the middle of the season. If you are a team who's going out and picking up players out of Europe, often it's either you pick them up in the summer in the middle of your season and they end up oftentimes with sort of a lost half of a season where they don't
00:46:41
Speaker
acclimate because they're in preseason until the last few weeks, or you pick them up in the winter and now you have a person who has likely at the end of that season been going nonstop for 18 plus months. And, you know, aligning in that way hopefully allows players to transition into the league a little bit more smoothly. um Just...
00:47:08
Speaker
a little a little added piece of that. And I think that makes it better for the fan, by the way, is just like when the signing comes in, if if they need six months to figure out, OK, so how does the kid get to school?
00:47:22
Speaker
Where is the school? Where's the training ground? Why am I driving on the left side of this vehicle? Whatever the case may be like yeah i mean like of course they're not going to be performing at their best right and so like i think more fans want to see something closer to what we saw with sun hyung min in lafc or thomas muller uh to degree with vancouver now granted both of them hadn't played nearly as much as they had for most of their careers in their final year with tottenham and by munich respectfully uh but Yeah, I think you're right. I think being able to get players at a better time is going to help because, ah you know, part of the preseason is you look at the schedule and you say, OK, look, this is load management stuff, right? At the beginning of the season, we're trying to get everyone ramped up. We're going to do some more rotation and figure it out. The first 10 games don't really affect whether or not you're able to make the playoffs. Just ask 2023 Sporting Kansas City, who got three points in 10 games and still won a first round series in the playoffs, right? Like you don't need to worry about those so much. What you do need to worry about new signings
00:48:17
Speaker
is this game in April at Providence Park. That's the first time where you're really going to have that sort of check in where the fans are saying, like, are you do you have the sauce? Are you going to add something to this team? Do you fit into the culture of this? Are you helping raise the floor of our performances? So even when we're in these ugly cagey games that the Sounders and Timbers have gotten themselves into for the better part of half a decade now, um are you going to change that? Are you going to elevate what that experience looks like? and And so like for the, for the central thrust of the episode, like that is relevant, like the ability to actually project how these players will fit into the rivalries, um how, how,
00:48:57
Speaker
you're suddenly you paid so much money in the transfer fee and the salary that you may be expecting them to be one of your two or three best players. But if they're gassed because they've been going for 18 months in a row or the other side, if you think of someone like Sergio Reguillon, who signed with Inter Miami this offseason, well, he hasn't played since like May.
00:49:16
Speaker
And even then he was like the fourth string left back on Tottenham as they won the Europa League. He was barely playing games. And so for him, it's eight months where they do need this time to be able to ramp him back up. Right. So you'll avoid a lot of these situations. It'll be, um you know, like I still have my issues just in terms of like MLS Cup being played in the spring, I think feels very different than MLS Cup being played in December just for aura purposes and just sort of like the whatever. But yeah.
00:49:42
Speaker
Just generally, I think it is a direction the league wanted to go into. It's interesting, again, Midwestern term, that the Players Association has not yet authenticated the calendar switch. I saw that reported by Jeff Carlisle of yeah ESPN um you know on the day we're recording this, that ah you know the Players Union has not yet said, sure, let's change the schedule. And so...
00:50:03
Speaker
you know we'll we'll see i'm sure that at that point though that's posturing and that's saying okay our players are generally on board but what's in it for us and and is it image rights getting a little boost to that is it going to be ah compensation salary cap what have you but that's not why we're here today i don't think i mean maybe we'll have an episode in the future about salary cap stuff, but it's not interesting to me right now. ah What is interesting to me, and I'm very curious what your opinion of the situation is, is at least, you know, I am i'm one Sounders fan that has a perspective, although i i know that this perspective is... is
00:50:46
Speaker
permeating throughout the fan base. And that is the Cascadia rivalries with Portland and Vancouver have become stale in general, mostly due to the fact that there's just been a lot of games.
00:51:04
Speaker
um And it just is just kind of feeling like there's not... It's just not what it was 10 years ago or eight years ago. you know so like I think maybe the height of the rivalry is that playoff series on where where it goes to to the penalty shootout at Lumen Field on a Thursday night during a car show. like that That has a lot of mystique. And basically, ever since then, we've just been kind of...
00:51:37
Speaker
lame like they've just been really boring games the sounders basically never win at home anymore when they play the games and it's just kind of boring i'm curious about your perspective on cascadia from an outsider's perspective but also
Staleness of Cascadia Rivalry
00:51:56
Speaker
sounders fans don't get the opportunity to really kind of delve into other other rivalries so Is there another premier rivalry in MLS? So first question, obviously, your thoughts on Cascadia. Second question as a follow-up, what's kind of taken its throne, so to speak?
00:52:14
Speaker
Yeah. and I like the framing of that too, because I think that it is worth starting by saying it wasn't just localized attention that made it feel like Cascadia, specifically talking Seattle and Portland, obviously. Yeah.
00:52:28
Speaker
was the preeminent sort of rivalry in Major League Soccer of the 2010s. I'll go ahead and give them the decade. That's great. They get the 2010s. And you can see it because it was the emergence of MLS's fan culture and the idea that each of these teams would have their own identities that was led by supporters. You would have these elaborate TIFO. And then, of course, that became problematic because the TIFO then were the thing that the league was using for the marketing without, ah you know, actually really acknowledging the fact that that's fan made and not just like part of MLS stadiums that's built in with the concrete. Right. um You also have very good players. You have a stretch where from 2015 to 2020, check my math, every single Western Conference MLS Cup
00:53:11
Speaker
21. It was through 21, right? It was like a seven year stretch where it was either going to be Seattle or Portland making it into MLS Cup pretty much. And so that has fallen off. I will say, and I'm not just saying this because I recognize the affinity of both of y'all.
00:53:25
Speaker
It takes two to tango. And the Portland Timbers have not been operating with the same level of ambition or competitiveness as since probably 2021 they were in as they were in the twenty ten s There has been a major difference under the fact that they're still owned by Merritt Paulson and that there are changing politics in the um MLS landscape around Merritt Paulson. To say nothing of Gavin Wilkinson, who was you know such a sporting figure um or a key figure in the sporting department.
00:53:55
Speaker
He wasn't sporting necessarily in the adjective sense ah for the Timbers. And then you look at Savarese leaving and then you have a very different sort of approach to coaching, if you can call it that, from Phil Neville, right, who openly admits that he doesn't really feel like it's the job of a coach to really coach all the time.
00:54:10
Speaker
Right. And so it's been a very different sort of feel to it, where Portland has been one of the most inconsistent teams in Major League Soccer in the 2020s, in the sense where they are as likely to put up a 4-1 win as they are to lose by seven at home. Right. So.
00:54:27
Speaker
you know You get to these games then where the two teams face off. And for Portland, that is where they show, no, we still have the culture. We still have Soccer City. um We still want to be one of the forerunners of the Western Conference. And so we are going to put everything we have into that game. For Seattle, we can't mess this one up.
00:54:45
Speaker
We know that for the 2020s, we have been a more competitive team than the Timbers. So we need to be able to show up and we need to stop them at whatever they're going to be trying to pull. And it just creates this sort of cagey, almost dull. um It doesn't help that lately both teams are having to wear secondary jerseys either. You know, and and part of it is color contrast, right? Like green and green is not great on the eyes if you're trying to pick it apart. But one of them in green and the other one having to wear something else, sometimes that's like a badge of honor. When you think of like a Manchester United versus Liverpool rivalry where both teams wear red, if you're having to force them into their greens, you have the advantage. You're the red team on the field, right? And sometimes these things matter, especially to fans more than players, obviously, unless you really don't recognize who you're passing to unless you're wearing your primary shirt. Uh,
00:55:33
Speaker
When you look at what's changed in the 2020s, MLS has expanded so much that I think that the league has had a lot of opportunity for more organic rivalries.
00:55:45
Speaker
And in the past, and maybe this is better for a a separate topic, but in the past, they would really push rivalry week. And the idea was that every team will find you a rival. Minnesota United, welcome to Major League Soccer. I'm based in Minnesota, right? And I remember that they were really trying to force Sporting Kansas City as a rival for Minnesota United. It just didn't work because there wasn't...
00:56:08
Speaker
reason. There wasn't like that sort of classic game that then, you know, the rematch was going to have heightened stakes and thereafter could carry on. They weren't even really competing at the same point of the table because Minnesota's rise to being competitive, sort of, you know, perfectly intersected ships in the night with Peter Vermees sort of falling off with Sporting Kansas City around 2019, 2020. you get to...
00:56:30
Speaker
the league at a whole right now, the best rivalry as hell is real. Like if you're just going to like try to get some general soccer fan to watch major league soccer and you just had to pick one matchup and that you are like 99% confident this isn't going to backfire and you're going to get a good atmosphere. You're going to get a good game.
Cincinnati vs Columbus Rivalry
00:56:49
Speaker
ah Tensions will be like palpable from watching at home. You would show them Cincinnati versus Columbus at either of their stadia. It helps that they both play in very good modern soccer specific stadiums It helps that they have very disparate identities in the sense where they can always be wearing their primary kits against each other. So you're just used to it looking a certain way. It helps that they're winning trophies this decade. Cincinnati, just the Shield so far. Columbus, just the Cup so far. But they're they're contending for more, right? And so I think that is what you look at.
00:57:23
Speaker
and And so what's different from that? to Cascadia. i mean, some of this just it's new and and people just like something that is new. if if if If you're watching at a national level, if you're just like a neutral who it's rivalry week again, because rivalry week shows up three times a year still or two times a year.
00:57:45
Speaker
i have to watch, the you know, if if you're saying I have to watch one game, I think people are switching over to the Ohio rivalry rather than the Northwest. Yeah. and And some of that, I think you laid it out really well.
00:57:57
Speaker
I think some of that is just tense matchups. And at a certain point, people know what to expect. do you think it has anything to do with the the Apple TV of it all? Like all the games are on at the same time? And for the most part, the Seattle game is going to be on at 1030 Eastern.
00:58:14
Speaker
eastern tune it doesn't, it doesn't help. It doesn't help any team on that side. Like I think El Tropicco is going to be the one that people are wondering why I didn't pick that. Right. And I think that sometimes El Tropicco is, uh, it's a different sort of sideshow in its own way. I think that is a game that doesn't resemble soccer, uh, more consistently than any other matchup I see where there's just weird stuff and it's entertaining. You'll get Zlatan, you know, just kind of doing like side volleys on his debut from 70 yards out and scoring or whatever. Right. Like,
00:58:45
Speaker
it's a great spectacle, but it's also been so feast or famine where the galaxy have been competitive for like two years of LAFC's history, pretty much 23 and 24 when Ricky Pooge was healthy. So it does make it tricky when the teams are at an imbalance to go back to the Seattle and Portland sort of comparison of this decade. Apple TV also look, it's not,
00:59:12
Speaker
It's not a hot take to say right now they have they're not interested in pairs of teams facing each other. They're interested in one team. Right. And so much of their interest in part of this is the global audience. Right. And they they do actually like serve ah a properly global audience over 100 nations of subscribers. um Obviously not the entire nation, but ah people across the world want to watch Lionel Messi.
00:59:36
Speaker
It makes sense. They might want to watch Sung Hyun Min too. They might want to watch Thomas Muller, a handful of other players, but they're really glomming on to Miami. And it'll be interesting to see if that continues now that the Suarez and Busquets and Alba, um you know, won't be that sort of like it's Barcelona a decade ago and you miss the 2010s. So watch your favorite team from the 2010s. Right. But right now it is hard for another team.
00:59:59
Speaker
that isn't wearing hair in pink to get a word in edgewise right now in their broadcasts. it's It's very difficult for matchups outside of the Eastern time zone to really get much of the focus because they are building their pregame shows around the first set of kickoffs. And so then they're trying to kind of fit a 15 minute preview of the late you know Pacific time zone kickoffs.
01:00:24
Speaker
Right after doing a recap of the East and while they're concluding the Central and the Mountain Time Zone game. So like there just isn't time to really build up a lot of those Western Conference kickoffs. So, yeah, I suppose that there I would say that some of this does come down to Apple TV and the way that they've generated it, where it is just.
01:00:43
Speaker
constant and it is concurrent it's overlapping and it's really difficult to pick up individual games ah from the pile that they've sort of
Sounders vs Timbers Rivalry Fatigue
01:00:54
Speaker
assembled on Saturday nights lately The Apple TV aspect is obviously relevant for like neutrals and a more macro view of things. But looking ahead a little bit to the conference realignment that is going to be happening with the calendar switch, it has ah focused a lot on the regional rivalries, which is not the only kind of rivalry you have. I mean, the Sounders have a
01:01:23
Speaker
a long-standing rivalry with Sporting Kansas City. There is, to less of an extent, one with ah RSL. like Rivalries are not strictly based on your closest proximate neighbor.
01:01:40
Speaker
But... Mark had mentioned earlier, some of what caused the staleness in the Sounders-Timbers rivalry is that they just played each other so much. And some of that is a product of the way Open Cup is structured and that...
01:01:58
Speaker
you are regionally grouped there. And so for a long time, it was the two MLS meetings a season, plus you were for sure gonna play each other in Open Cup. And then maybe in the playoffs, you would meet. Looking back since the Timbers entered MLS, the two teams have played each other just twice in a season, three times.
01:02:23
Speaker
One of those was the first season. The other two were in 2022 and this season, every other season, it is three plus times. Some of those it's as many as five,
01:02:36
Speaker
I have to imagine that has played a factor in some of the other like regional rivalries. do you like Do you have a sense that it just has kind of become, even in those individual fan bases, a little bit tired of, God, we're going to have see, you know, with the Northeast teams, are New England and D.C. going to have to play again?
01:03:00
Speaker
Yeah, yeah, I think that there is some fatigue there. And I think that you look at you know, the changing format of the Open Cup. This isn't a benefit, but this is just a change.
01:03:13
Speaker
You have fewer first teams competing in this tournament. So there's even a chance, like, for example, I think last year, New York City entered its next pro team. So even if the bracket had given them the Red Bulls, well, OK, it's not really like you can't. The rules make it so you can't loan down Alonzo Martinez and Matt Freeze and nine other of your starters to your next pro team. Like the idea is if you're fielding a next pro team, it's a next pro team, right? And it should be reflective of your next pro roster and your schedule. But you look at, you know, some of those other regional ones, I think over time, the big one that was sort of highlighted was the Northeast Southeast split of Philadelphia and D.C.,
01:03:52
Speaker
which was another rivalry that MLS sort of tried to manufacture, especially after New York City FC debuted in 2015, because the Red Bulls had generally been seen as DC's primary rival, right? Going back to Metro Stars days. And so splitting them into different conferences geographically is correct. I think it is also...
01:04:12
Speaker
The reaction I tended to see from fans on both sides, Union fans, United fans, was that, yeah, it was not really a rivalry anymore. And and I think that DC United fans would probably admit they haven't really played well enough to deserve a rival in a sense of like a competitive rivalry. these games matter and this is a trophy and thrown right i think that you would also throw in copa tejas as a really good example where you have three teams in texas and yes there's san antonio fc and in the past there was a team in austin in the usl and other usl teams in texas that haven't stuck around in oklahoma but they will play each other over and over and over again in these competitions if you get to kyle california these teams will play each other rocky mountain cup i think is overplayed a little bit right now with colorado and rsl
01:04:56
Speaker
Um, that's just the reality of how the schedule works and how regionalized the draw is. The reality is a regionalized draw it doesn't really benefit MLS teams so much as the lower division team. So you do need to have it for the open cup. But when you get into things like the leagues cup, when you get into things like,
01:05:12
Speaker
um you know, whatever they're going to do with the sprint season schedule, I would imagine it will be very tailored towards regionalized games and the idea of trying to build some of these groups out so that people have familiarity. That's what I would do, at least, is I would try to make sure that, for example, you have the one hodgepodge division that has teams from the East and the West, and it's Minnesota, St. Louis, Kansas City, Chicago, Cincinnati, Columbus. It's a fun six pack of teams.
01:05:37
Speaker
But there's not a lot of interaction right now between Minnesota, St. Louis, Kansas City and the Eastern group, which generally has performed a little bit better over the last few years, except for Chicago. So it's a good opportunity to sort of build up those synapses, make it feel sort of real, more real. um and And you can sort of.
01:05:57
Speaker
project a little easier, like Kansas city and St. Louis, there'll be rivals because they already are Cincinnati and Columbus best rivalry in the league right now. So Minnesota and Chicago, well, at least they're in like the same division in every other American sport. So there is like a, these cities are used to being rival ish.
01:06:15
Speaker
And so maybe this is an opportunity to be proper rivals. That's one that I would look at from this new alignment as like, um, um, almost ready made. And then you have your, okay, who is Nashville's biggest rivalry? Actually, is it Atlanta? Is it Miami who they keep face planting against, but they've been trying to go against? Is it Charlotte? Is it Orlando? Is it, you know like there's, there's a lot of potential there. So there is excitement because I think at this point,
01:06:38
Speaker
The age of MLS tailing tailoring its own rivalries has had to go for a while. And now we're finally able to figure out what are the new ones that aren't just so glaringly obvious and the ones that are going to be maybe more intriguing as you're like, OK, I've watched a lot of Hell is Real. I've watched a lot of Rocky Mountain Cup, Cascadia, whatever. El Trophico.
01:06:59
Speaker
Let's see what else is out there. Nashville's biggest rival is Nashville versus me remembering they exist. at thats That's totally, totally fair.
01:07:12
Speaker
I've got one last like big open-ended question, and then we can end with a very specific one that I have. But i'm I'm curious about this concept of Bourne rivalries. So for instance, I would say...
01:07:28
Speaker
Historically speaking, the Sounders versus the Galaxy is a born rivalry because of the stakes at which they've met in various competitions and whatnot. So everybody you know famously remembers the 2014 season where the Sounders beat the Galaxy on the final day of the season, which also happened to be my wedding day, hey to win the Sportage Shield. A few weeks later, the Galaxy come up to an icy cold Seattle and ping one off the post to win on aggregate. Or I think even back then it was away goals, right?
01:08:06
Speaker
And he um advance and then they go on to win MLS Cup. another Bourne rivalry, or at least i I don't even necessarily think it's a rivalry, but something that is special to the sound Sounders fans and even Toronto fans is obviously Seattle versus Toronto.
01:08:22
Speaker
They've met in three MLS cups. So I'm curious if there are any interesting Bourne rivalries across MLS right now that we're we're unaware of. And then I have a very secret question after that.
01:08:36
Speaker
Exciting. And I didn't get the questions ahead of time, so they've all been secret questions. So If you're branding this as such, it's even more exciting for me personally. I think there's been a few in recent years, especially when you're looking at since crowds have been able to return from, let's say, 2022 onward, um where you can kind of start to see the the competition of MLS and its various...
01:08:57
Speaker
subsidiary competition that the teams play in um have have really fostered better matchups. I think that Nashville and Miami, for example, they debut together. This is like another one of those where it's kind of born rivalries, but it also is kind of manufactured expansion siblings.
01:09:12
Speaker
We saw so many of these from especially like 2011 onward, right? When you think of ah Vancouver and Portland joining together, Minnesota and Atlanta, New York City and Orlando, Nashville dominated Miami.
01:09:26
Speaker
until Messi signed. And then from that league's cup final in 2023, which was the first trophy in the first tournament Messi played in that Miami won. Uh, They just cannot get close to Miami. Nashville has been so far behind. Now, they've made some really exciting moves. They made one of the best moves of the offseason so far by signing Christian Espinosa on a free agent contract after San Jose missed the deadline to pick up his option for 26, which costs Chris Lisa's job pretty obviously based on the press releases released by San Jose. But
01:10:00
Speaker
I think that's very much to Nashville's benefit. And I think that if they can win a meaningful game, I'm not necessarily talking about like week 12 or whenever they play each other um in the regular season, but if they can win a playoff series, a playoff matchup and open cup semifinal, whatever the case may be, that could do wonders.
01:10:16
Speaker
Um, for, for that rivalry to feel more tangible. Maybe, um, I, I would also throw in Vancouver and LAFC who played one of the best games of the post season, um, last year. Uh, when, when you look at that penalty kick shootout coming on the back of LAFC, knocking Vancouver out of the first round in each of the previous two post seasons, um,
01:10:37
Speaker
You know, I think that there's actually something meaningful and tangible there. And now, yes, you have Son and Mueller and who knows how long the shelf life is on like trying to build these around players. And that's always been an issue of MLS is like, oh, we have these star players that we brought in. So we're trying to kind of coast on the legacy of their previous clubs and their previous stops in their career internationally, whatever. um And that doesn't always carry weight in the same way. I will say from The outside but regionally inside, i definitely have seen more of this sort of animosity brewing between the Sounders and the Loons um in recent years, sort of culminating in a ah you know three game ending in an instant classic sort of ah first round. And the hard part is these matchups are coming in the first round. and Minnesota hasn't done anything to meaningly unseat Seattle as probably the best team of the last 10 years in the Western Conference, right? they They lost the conference final against the Sounders, and that would be something you would say is necessary to to have that effect. But um you you do see that with some of the tone, um not just the coaches' press conferences, but you know fans um you know interacting with each other on social. And we'll see how that changes now that Eric Ramsey is probably...
01:11:48
Speaker
you know If he's going to keep up with that ideology, West Brom is a club that was made for that ah ideology. It just feels like it's a Tony Poulos club. Is Daryl DK still there? Yeah, yeah know there's a few of them. And yeah I think that skewed a little Western. But I think that we have started to see with more of these competitions being clear in the hierarchy of the Leagues Cup maybe isn't as big of a deal as the league was trying to push it to be in 2023. And so those results don't really play into this as well. But the playoffs ultimately. are kind of where these sorts of things are are really crystallized.
Evolution of MLS Rivalries
01:12:21
Speaker
And I think you've gotten some really good examples in recent years.
01:12:24
Speaker
It is interesting that you brought up the Sounders loons because that was my secret question. And i was going to frame it around the concept of one-way rivalries because that, again, from my one perspective as a Sounders fan, feels very one-way. There's a lot of animosity coming from St. Paul, Minnesota West, but there's a lot of,
01:12:52
Speaker
I don't even know who you are coming back East from Seattle, Washington, or what's the Don Draper line. I don't think about you. I don't even think about you. Yeah. don't think about you at all.
01:13:04
Speaker
Yeah. So I was curious. I mean, you kind of already spoke about it and you know, you, you obviously live in Minnesota. So have a certain perspective. I also, at the time, like I lived in Minnesota for four years. So I i understand a little bit, but,
01:13:22
Speaker
Just quickly, I'm not sure if there are any other one-way rivalries that you are aware of currently, but that feels like maybe the the chief of among them. It's certainly a prominent one. um And this is where I'm going to kick it to the research that was done by Elliot McKinley in 2024 for American Soccer Analysis. friend of mine did a simple two-question survey that was filled out by you know four figures of MLS fans. It was number one.
01:13:52
Speaker
Who is your team? Number two, who do you consider to be your biggest rival? And just an excellent concept, right? Because you you ended up with this like delightful flowchart where it was like, Minnesota generally said Kansas City, but Kansas City only said St. Louis, right? Okay, well...
01:14:08
Speaker
As we alluded to earlier, that rivalry was kind of dead. Vancouver said that Seattle was their biggest rival, but Seattle did not reciprocate that. So, okay, what does that mean? San Diego, before they'd even played a game, was like LAFC. And LAFC was like, I genuinely forgot San Diego got an MLS team until you start playing games, right? The other one-way rivalries, you know the Revs and the Union, the Revs see the Union as such. DC sees the Red Bulls as such. um the The one that really has confounded me and And I think that this is I wonder how much of this is just like regionally. I've never lived in the southeast.
01:14:44
Speaker
I don't know if you could tell by the anything about me that I've never lived in the southeast, but i've I've had a lot of fun in a lot of cities in the southeast. And I can't really figure out who Charlotte is like sizing up every single year. And it feels like Charlotte, and there's a running joke that Matt Doyle has been doing in his sub stack for over a year now, where Charlotte gets a different team name every single installment because Charlotte FC, it's just, there, there isn't much of an identity around them. You don't really know who their rivals are. There aren't, I mean, frankly, they're playing in a stadium where it's not going to enhance the soccer experience. whether it's on the field with the quality of that turf or lack thereof, or it is the atmosphere of the Panther Stadium. Neither of these.
01:15:34
Speaker
are really helping internally. But again, it's one of those where it's like it's east and it's kind of southeast. And I think geographically you would say so as such, but it's not as southeast as Atlanta or Orlando or Miami. And so those clubs are kind of focused on each other. Nashville, I've spoken about maybe too much in this episode. And and I just don't really know where that leaves Charlotte.
01:15:59
Speaker
Elliott's research found that Charlotte sees Atlanta as a rivalry and nobody sees them as a rival. And that may be tracks. And there are at least three teams, three teams. Yeah. Orlando, which granted also sees Miami as such. Um,
01:16:18
Speaker
but Orlando, Charlotte, Nashville, all look at Atlanta that way. And Atlanta only looks at Orlando. So it's just kind of interesting. You see those teams that come in and just generally feel Atlanta kind of was the galaxy after the galaxy fell off in the sense that that was the, the super team, the invoke team, the team that everyone was kind of looking at be like, yeah, I want to do what Tata Martino did in 2018 to the point that Atlanta is literally trying to do what Tata Martino did in 2018 and 2026 with a much older Miguel Almiron and, um,
01:16:45
Speaker
You know, one of the worst transfer fees paid for a striker in MLS history with Emmanuel Lottiloth on 22 million. So it'll be very interesting to see. But um I just I guess to put a bow on it, it's just it gets frustrating.
01:17:01
Speaker
when those rivalries aren't crystallized, because I think sometimes rivalry should seem obvious, right? Like you should just be able to tell as soon as the whistle blows because the crowd is so engaged. It's like, yeah, okay, they're, they're really up for it this time or in the days and weeks leading up to it, you can pull together like a a fantastic highlight package where no matter how many times you've watched these clips, uh, you're going to watch it back because it's how you you want to watch the Sounders beat the Timbers, right? It's just, there's something in your brain that you just, you react positively and you watch these clips over and over and over again. And I think a lot of teams right now will feel they don't have that opponent.
01:17:37
Speaker
You know, I would say that if you're being generous, I think you're still have less than half of the 30 team league that is fully confident in who its primary rival is.
01:17:51
Speaker
right I think it's it's truly five to seven, like crystallized rivalries. So will the schedule change help enable that? Probably not. Will the the conference realignment change it?
01:18:02
Speaker
I think so. I think that's where you're you're kind of just going to have to cordon off and you're in big groups of six and you've got to come up in three groups of two from there. and Everybody do-si-do, right? Like it's just you're going to have to eventually figure out who and it might be the best of what's left around, but the alignment at least guides us to where some of these will be. And and that's maybe an exciting evolution for MLS.
01:18:31
Speaker
I think that's a great place to end it. It'll be exciting to watch how these rivalries change and grow over this season and the next several.
01:18:42
Speaker
ah This has been Back Post Runners. I am and will continue to be Tim. I've been joined by Mark and our illustrious guest, Jeff Reuter. We will see you all next time.