Backpass: Prelude to Catastrophe?
The 'Pids hit a late season slump. Should we brace for a crash landing to the 2024 season?
In this season with so many highs, I sure do wish I could ‘end on a good note’ article for you all. But boy have the past four weeks been rough – culminating in Saturday’s decision day ‘L’ to lowly Austin FC.
This team hasn’t had a good match since exactly one month from today, September 21, 2024, when they beat Toronto FC, one of the leagues most rudderless teams. Since then, they’ve lost four straight.
Matt Pollard and I have generally provided a ‘don’t panic’ attitude towards the teams troubles over the past couple weeks on the podcast. Each week we’ve calmly explained ‘yes, but we were missing Cole Bassett,’ or ‘yes, but the LA Galaxy are a fantastic football club so yeah we were gonna lose.’ These would be rational excuses from cool headed gentlemen.
Whelp, that all ended against Austin.
The problem with losing to Austin is two-fold. First, Austin are (were) an 11-9-14 (WTL) team whose 3 goals Saturday vaulted them from dead-last in MLS in scoring to third-to-last, and they scored those goals in a meaningless match that was effectively an audition for most of these players for scouts in other leagues as the front office inevitably will jettison most of them in a winter rebuild. They couldn’t beat a below-average team in an unimportant game: how are they going to beat one of the league’s best teams in a pair of must-win games?
Second, the loss demonstrated that the Rapids have some gaping flaws in the team that have only become exposed at the end of the season. When Cole Bassett is injured, they really miss his ability to cover ground in both offense and defense. His ability to run for days opens up a lot of options in possession - you have to cover him as he breaks lines, and even if you don’t deliver that ball to him, the defense’s need to shift opens up another option somewhere else. In defense, he’ll run down the ball carrier or shoot into a gap and cut off a pass, making everyone elses job easier. Without Bassett, Connor Ronan and Djordje Mihailovic and Ollie Larraz have all been slightly less effective. Bassett played in each of the Rapids first 30 games of the season, and they averaged 1.67 Goals Against per game. Over these past four Bassett-less matches, they’ve conceded 2.50 GApG.
FBref’s stats chart doesn’t give him a lot of love in terms of his defensive percentiles like tackles/interceptions (45th percentile) and clearances (21st pct).
However, I think his ability to be in marking space makes the defense better. And his progressive passing and progressive carries numbers means he is exceptional and moving the ball into the final third, which makes the team’s possession more meaningful. Simply put, every yard you drive the ball forward successfully is another yard your opponent needs to gain in the other direction in the effort to get closer to your goal. Without Bassett, the Rapids aren’t holding the ball as well or putting it into dangerous areas, and the other teams are capitalizing. In other words, the depth is lacking; or perhaps, nobody can replace what Cole Bassett does for us.
There’s another gaping problem that has been exposed for these Rapids over the past four to eight games, and that is the defense, which collapsed in epic fashion in the final six minutes against Austin. With a 2-1 lead from the 76th minute onward, Colorado should have been able to possess, dump, and defend their way to all three points. Instead, we got this:
and this:
In both goals, the midfielders are marking space, while the forwards (Kevin Cabral, Darren Yapi, Kimani Stewart-Banes) are playing semi-relaxed. They are waiting to spring back into attack, rather than putting in a 100% effort towards defense.1
In both goals, Reggie Cannon is waaaay up high, and ultimately gets eliminated by passes rather quickly.
In both goals, Andreas Maxso is caught with his pants down. And Sam Vines isn’t helping (although, as the last man on the left, I think he’s mostly where' he’s supposed to be. Same with Keegan Rosenberry, who on the second goal is the only man marking the ball carrier after Cannon gets eliminated.)
On the third and final goal, Adam Beaudry should have done better. Beaudry faced 5 shots on target and saved only 2; the Post-Shot Expected Goals in this game for Beaudry was 2.3. Against the actual 3 goals conceded, that’s rully rully bad.
The Rapids were missing Zach Steffen, and Cole Bassett, and Djordje Mihailovic in this game, and they have been without star centerback Moïse Bombito since his move to OGC Nice back in August. I mention that last piece because this game was one in which they could really have used him. Without all these top-flight guys, Colorado looks wholly and completely unprepared to face LA Galaxy in the first round of the playoffs later this week.
What are you saying, Rabbi?
I’m saying ‘hey guys, it’s been a good run.’ Sure, that’s extremely pessimistic and a bit bold, and perhaps traitorous. I’m a Colorado Rapids, so I guess maybe I’m supposed to be all in for the Rapids. However, in truth, I think our goose is cooked.
If Bassett, and Mihailovic, and Steffen are all health and ready to go; I STILL think our defense won’t be ready to contend with the elite level attack of the LA Galaxy. Riqui Puig (POOOO-gyuh) and Gabriel Pec and Joseph Paintsil are absolutely S-tier elites in this league, and I think these guys will stop at nothing to reach MLS Cup vs either Columbus Crew or Inter Miami.
We needed to win on decision day, not just because we needed momentum into the playoffs, but because a win would have delivered the Rapids into 6th place for a 3-6 matchup against Real Salt Lake (note: a tie would still have left us in 7th). Instead, Colorado plays LA on successive Fridays; in Carson on October 26 and in Commerce City on November 1.2 Now we’re fodder under the wheels of a mighty machine.
Could we pull the upset? I mean, sure, it’s possible. LA lost on decision day to Houston. Lightning strikes twice; clocks are wrong; yada yada blind squirrels, yada yada nuts.
But I’m not optimistic. It’s been a good year. There have been some high points. We should be really grateful. And I have said before that we weren’t going to do it this year. Don’t hate me, but mentally, I’m planning for how this team goes about getting the pieces together to win the 2025 MLS Cup. I hope I’m wrong.
This is kind of normal - attackers/forwards need to be prepared to act as outlet receivers on turnovers, and that keeps your opponents defenders from getting too involved in the attack because you can ‘keep them honest.’ By the way, I love that ‘keep ‘em honest’ phrase. So good in sports.
I don’t understand the week-apart thing? Doing a three-game series that spread out is really strange to me. Even if it goes to all seven games, the World Series will likely be done before the Rapids-Galaxy playoff series is. That’s dumb. The first and second rounds should REALLY be two-legged aggregate affairs, but if they aren’t going to be, then they should be Saturday-Wednesday-Sunday or Thursday-Sunday-Wednesday affairs. This may be a collective bargaining agreement thing, but it’s stupid and I don’t like it.