Backpass: The Secret Sauce
HTHL spoke to Kellyn Acosta for one simple reason. He's the key to everything this season.
I can’t be the first writer ever to use the metaphor of comparing fine food to a sports team, but hey, when it fits, it fits.
You know when you taste something, and you know it’s not *quite* right, but you can’t quite explain why? It’s missing something, but you can’t really explain it. You know when a soup or a lasagna or a favorite dish that your grandma made is juuuust right, and you know when it isn’t. Sometimes it’s just off. You don’t know why - it just is.
That’s the Rapids without an in-form Kellyn Acosta. And in 2018 and 2019, the Rapids DP midfielder was something-less-than full strength, and thus the Rapids underperformed.
In 2020, Acosta had a good year, and the Rapids had a good year. Ergo, Acosta is the missing ingredient. The shaved truffle in your risotto. The secret sauce on your Big Mac. Add fresh Acosta to the soup, and it just tastes better.
For Kellyn Acosta, the answer to why he was so good in 2020 as opposed to previous seasons in burgundy simply lay within - hard work, fitness, confidence.
“I think it was seeing results from all the work I put in behind the scenes. It didn’t happen by accident. I’ve been with trainers - I’ve been eating well. And also being comfortable and confident. And I was really enjoying it.”
Those things were certainly missing in 2018 and 2019, but there’s certainly no shortage of other possibly contributing causes to Acosta’s on-field struggles in those MLS seasons.
Acosta was on-record with Jeff Rueter of The Athletic this week as saying the main reason for his struggles was the lingering effect of the groin surgery had in February 2018, the season he came over to Colorado from FC Dallas - his strength and fitness didn’t fully rebound after hurrying back to the field. But that season, he was also shipped from Dallas to Colorado after a lackluster stretch for the Hoops in which the team experienced a team-wide dip in performance after winning the double [US Open Cup, Supporters Shield] in 2016. That team-wide dip included Acosta, who just didn’t chop it up like he had previously. In 2017 Dallas had a losing record and finished 7th, missing the playoffs. In 2018 things improved, but the ascendency of young homegrown midfielders Paxton Pomykal and Brandon Servania led Dallas’ front office to conclude that Acosta was expendable - ‘out with the old.’ Acosta was 23 years old at the time of the trade.
When Acosta arrived in Colorado in July of 2018, he joined a Rapids side that was struggling mightily in every conceivable way. They had compiled a 4-5-11 (WDL) record to that point and had been knocked out of Open Cup by USL Nashville team. Moreover the locker room and the personnel situation at the club was a hot mess.
Head coach Anthony Hudson, who arrived to start the 2018 season, had brought in with him a few guys he really wanted - Kip Colvey, Deklan Wynne, Tommy Smith, and Danny Wilson - among whom only Smith was showing well. Other players the FO had added, like Joe Mason and Nana Boateng and Yannick Boli were being paid very well to play very poorly. Little-used Stefan Aigner apparently developed a beef with his gaffer over playing time and literally stormed out training in mid-April; by June the team dumped him altogether.1 One of the teams DP players, Tim Howard, was moving swiftly towards retirement, and the other, Shkëlzen Gashi, spent much of the year hurt2. Marlon Hairston, an attacking winger, was made a fullback, then benched altogether. Ditto Dillon Serna. The starting striker was Jack McBean, a lovely individual who probably should never have been made a starting MLS striker for anyone. All of that added up to a bottom-table team, and on a losing team like that, nobody in the locker room can feel truly happy, including Acosta.3
While it would be hard to say that Acosta specifically struggled due to Anthony Hudson, it would be fair to say that everybody struggled under Anthony Hudson, and so one can add ‘the manager’ as one of the other many reasons why Kellyn Acosta did not flourish in his first two years in Commerce City.
Taking all that in context with the expected adjustment issues to a new team, the high altitude, and possible lingering injury recovery, and you can understand why Acosta’s 2018 year wasn’t so good. In 2019 the Rapids went through three different coaches. After starting the season with Hudson, AH was fired when the team went winless in the first 9 matches of the season. The Rapids then let Connor Casey play interim coach before ultimately bringing on Robin Fraser. The team spent the year in transition.
The impact of all that on Acosta was evident. The numbers paint the picture of a Kellyn Acosta that was unimpressive - perhaps even a drag on overall team performance - in his first two seasons in Colorado, finishing with a -1.16 Overall g+ in 2018 and a second-to-worst amongst all MLS midfielders -2.29 in 2019. Here’s a dataviz that I re-appropriated from the season preview I wrote for American Soccer Analysis:
Negative numbers are bad. Stripey lines are bad. And both the eye test and the advanced metrics will tell you that Kellyn Acosta in 2018 and 2019 was bad.
In 2020, he had a much better year. In addition to the aforementioned health, fitness, and mentality reasons, Kellyn is clicking better with his coach, Robin Fraser.
“I’ve played with a lot of different coaches over the years. And some of the coaches I’ve played with, I didn’t play with a whole lot of structure - I was able to do what I wanted, when I wanted. But nowadays the game has evolved. With Robin’s system it is crucial that everyone is tactically oriented. (Because of that), you can find ways to break down teams and to move forward.”
“He’s helped me gain confidence. He’s had a great influence on me.”
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<Time out> Launch of the Highliners Supporters Group
HTHL friends, we have long been grateful to our listeners and readers for being a part of the family of Colorado Rapids supporters - and, I might add, the smartest and most well-informed supporters. Matt and I <love> doing this podcast. We eat, breathe, and sleep Rapids. And ain’t neither of us gettin’ rich on it or planning to quit our day jobs. We are citizen-soccer-journalists extraordinaire: we like straddling that line between supporter and writer and podcaster and guy-that-has-a-day-job. But we also have to occasionally defray the costs of this love called soccer. Podcast hosting ain’t free. Gas and parking ain’t free. And also, we wouldn’t mind you slipping a few bucks in our tip jar as we busk on the street corner.
So we’re offering the opportunity to sign up to be an official Highliner - to be a part of our ethereal supporters group - by becoming a subscriber to the HTHL substack.
Subscribers get a few extra benefits - one more piece of written content per month, plus a mention and thanks in an upcoming HTHL Backpass. “Founding subscribers” get a free t-shit or mug (fear not, we will also sell the t-shirt and the mug to non subscribers. But mostly, the benefit of subscribing is supporting us by buying us a metaphorical pint at the pub - because you appreciate our writing and reporting on the Rapids.
If you can’t subscribe, no worries. The HTHL substack will still give you 3 to 4 free articles a month. We’re only stashing one article a month behind the paywall.
So if you feel you can become an HTHL supporter and official Highliner (or even a Founding Member!) click subscribe now - at the free level (to get this article delivered right to your inbox) for $5 a month, or $42 for the year. And… thanks.
<Time In> Back to the show!
Acosta was, by all accounts, much better for the Rapids in 2020. He looked confident and comfortable and fit. In defense he could regularly be relied upon to close down runners or cover the gaps when another player like Sam Vines or Jack Price would bomb into the final third. In attack, his passing was solid, and his dribbling and receiving in particular were very good. Again, chart and numbers c/o Eliot McKinley and the fellas at ASA:
Positive numbers and solid color blocks are good!
His goalscoring and ability to get into dangerous spots this past season in particular was quite good: although his overall tally of 2 goals on the year don’t look all that impressive at first glance, the advanced metrics show that he recorded a 0.25 xG per 904, placing him in the 95th percentile among MLS midfielders. Robin Fraser has created an offense in which the forwards and the midfielders are all dangerous in attack - and Acosta is one of the most dangerous of all. His pass percentage - 85.6% - and progressive pass numbers are slightly above average, but its his ability to get open and then settle the ball with his first touch that make him so dangerous. He does all that while not giving away much, defensively. His tackles in 2020 were a roughly-league-average 2.24 per 90, and while a simpleton might say ‘he should be better defensively!’, it’s damn near impossible to be one of the best receiving, best shooting, and best *defending* players on a team all at the same time. To wit:
“Listen, I can be the best deep-lying regista in the game and the best looking man in Manhattan. But I ain’t gonna defend, too.” - Andrea Pirlo, probably.
In other words, yes, we want Acosta to do all the things in the 100th percentile. But what we saw in 2020 was him doing so many things, so well, we will absolutely take it.
…
Acosta is motivated by his coach and his teammates to succeed this year. And in addition, he’s motivated by another goal, too.
“I’m only getting older at this point. I’m not as young as I once was. Each and every practice I want to go out there and be the best player on the pitch, and use that to perform on the weekend. Hopefully, I play well enough to have some suitors overseas because that’s been my dream. As a kid, I always dreamt of playing in Europe.”5
In short, he’s got to do it again, and even better, for the Rapids to succeed in 2021. These three years have very much demonstrated that Acosta is the team’s drink stirrer, special sauce, and canary in the coal mine. Sure, it’s sexy to talk about Vines and Cole Bassett, and it’s exciting to post a Younes Namli tekkers moment on social,
but in truth, as goes Kellyn Acosta, so shall go the Rapids in 2021.
…
Pimpin’ pimpin’
If you were hoping to get a full on ‘season preview Backpass’ from me this week - yes! That exists! Only I wrote it for American Soccer Analysis and it dropped on Monday. You can catch it here, on the ASA website. They also previewed every single one of the 27 teams in MLS, and every preview is chock full of brilliance. And bad puns. But mostly brilliance. Do yourself a favor and read up before this week’s games, or perhaps get yourself a crash course in the Rapids Western Conference opponents, or maybe just read up on their foes this coming Saturday afternoon, FC Dallas.
Also, I can not endorse our podcast this past week - XI questions on the Rapids between split evenly between me and Matt Pollard, with an amazing interview of Matt Doyle in the middle breaking down everything Rapidsy. The perfect thing to listen to as you do the Saturday chores before settling in for the Rapids Season Opener on ESPN+.
Colorado Rapids soccer is finally back people. Rejoice. (and subscribe).
To continue my food metaphor, one might argue that Aigner was the spoiled milk you add to the béchamel sauce which ultimately ruins your entire gourmet mac and cheese dinner.
According to multiple sources inside the organization, it would be fair to write this as “hurt”.
If you were around in 2018 as a Rapids supporter and this paragraph triggered you to experience a PTSD response, I deeply apologize.
Technically this is npxGp90 - non-penalty Expected Goals per 90 - but man is that unwieldy.
For the record, Kellyn Acosta is 25 years old, and he was lamenting to me, a 44 year old with creaky knees and a significantly receded hairline, the cruel passage of time. Argh (lol).