3rd Degree the Podcast #234

[00:00:00] Speaker A: All right, let's knock this mother out. [00:00:02] Speaker B: Yep. [00:00:04] Speaker A: Yeah. OOH. Third degree napa degree. The third degree napa degree napa. [00:00:24] Speaker B: It third degree. The podcast is brought to you by Soccer 90 Dot Shop. Their wide selection of FC dallas US national team. Gear European club gear. They got everything. Jersey, scars, tees. They even got those messy jerseys, if that's your jam. Third degree listeners get 20% off when you use the code third degree at Soccer 90. Com. 20% off. Code third degree soccer 90. Com. Some exclusions do apply. [00:00:54] Speaker A: Well, hello there, FCD Dallas curious fan. Welcome to a playoff edition of Third Degree, the podcast. Episode number two, three 4234. Hi, it's me, Peter, and it's the full trio of your favorite burn talkers. First off, he's back and ready to roll in the playoffs, dan Crook. Howdy, Dan. [00:01:20] Speaker C: All right. [00:01:22] Speaker A: That's all I get is an all right? [00:01:27] Speaker C: Hi, how's it going? [00:01:29] Speaker A: Yeah, genuine as always. I love it. And it's your hero. My hero, everybody's. Hero. Editor, founder, thirddegree net, and the original Buzz Carrick. Come in, Buzz. [00:01:43] Speaker B: Peter, I've decided that every time I get a big head about how we're up on episode 234 235, I just go listen to the kick around. And you guys are at 5870. And I know we're not like, oh. [00:01:55] Speaker A: Man, I think we just did, like, episode 345. We're like 100 ahead of you or something. [00:02:02] Speaker B: Got to be more than that. [00:02:03] Speaker A: We've been doing we've been doing the show since 2014. [00:02:06] Speaker B: I know you guys are a longtimers. [00:02:09] Speaker A: All right, let's see. Here we are, boys. Can you believe it? We survived. We are back to playoff mode as Dallas did the business against the Galaxy. We'll get into the game just here in a little bit, but I want your honest reaction. Dan, you get to go first. OK. Are you ready for this? You gotta be honest engine here. Dan, are you surprised we're in the playoffs? [00:02:36] Speaker C: No. They should have sealed it two games ago. [00:02:39] Speaker A: Okay, but after losing to Colorado, you were not surprised they did the business in La. [00:02:48] Speaker C: No, because La is crap. And Alice has a really good thing about beating absolutely destroying La on the last day of the season, apparently. [00:02:57] Speaker A: OK. All right. Fair. Buzz, are you surprised we're here? [00:03:02] Speaker B: A little. Based on the form over the last couple of months, I thought they would tie that last game at La and that somebody would jump them and they would miss. So I was really surprised more by how they played and how well they played than anything, and I was pleasantly happy about it. But it was a bit of surprise. Yeah, I'm not surprised. From the beginning of the year, we assumed they'd made the playoffs. I'm surprised from their form over the last month and a half that they didn't tie that game, and that would have been probably getting them out. [00:03:30] Speaker A: Well, that leads us into Dallas for La galaxy. One because I think the surprise is why doesn't everybody just play low block against Dallas? [00:03:40] Speaker B: That's a good question. [00:03:41] Speaker A: I just don't get it. You don't have your a team, your roster of guys that you have left over clearly don't appear to have the body language of a bunch of guys that are super excited about playing this game. Why would you come out and play a high line against Dallas? [00:03:58] Speaker B: It's a good question because Dallas obviously really struggles when people do that. [00:04:04] Speaker A: But play a low block against them. [00:04:05] Speaker B: Yeah, don't play a low I mean, or do play a low block. I even had talked a little bit to Coach about that know? He's very aware that they're at their absolute best when the other team has more of the ball or that it's even and the teams want to open. It up and play and that he knows that when teams low block them and they end up with this. Six 7800 passes. That's not good. That's not what this team is really built for and what it does really well, which is not to say that he's anti possession by any means, but he recognizes that it's a deficiency. They know it is. But as I say sometimes to lots of people, look, there's a reason why teams all over the world play low blocks, particularly when you're playing a team that's better than you is because it's really effective. I think what happens in MLS is that there's so much parity that teams, everybody thinks they're pretty good, particularly when you're at home, you think you have a real advantage. And there's a lot of teams that are pretty adamant about we're going to play. It's only the teams that are really poor or obviously poor or obviously, really defensive that say, you know, I'm just going to low block against Dallas. It doesn't happen as much as you would think just because everyone thinks they're better. [00:05:11] Speaker A: It was amazing to watch because it was pretty obvious from the jump that they were setting themselves up for a ball in from behind and it took what, four minutes? And then of course it was Bernie Kamungo because what I need to get back to is our delight at the starting eleven buzz. We were really excited that Nico put out an attacking minded team which really played into LA's hands considering that La was coming out to play themselves. [00:05:37] Speaker B: You know what's funny about that is I need to have a conversation with somebody about where they come up with these shapes. Because when I had a conversation with Coach today about the different lineup from even just the Colorado game to this game, and he said, it's the same lineup, I was like, what are you talking about? He's like, yeah, no, it's the same, it's the same tactics. The important thing to remember is that this coach in particular has this very modern philosophy about occupation of space. And so he talked to me. Like I said, okay, tell me about it, then explain it to me. And he talked about the idea that when they defend, they defend the front group, if you will, because that's what we're talking about here, is they defend back and they play four across with one up high, which is that's pretty normal. We see that all the time. It compresses. When they go forward, they have three wide across the top, and then they have two guys in the know. So that is always the same. It might change a little bit who ends up in those pockets. But he said the tactics against Colorado and Texas versus La were the same. The difference is completely in what the other team does. Colorado played a low block. They played a very narrow low block. So we ended up seeing Alan Velasco go wide to the left, and we also saw Jesus go wide to the right. Both those guys were supposed to be playing, like, as a double ten kind of look, which is exactly what they did against satellite galaxy. They just slightly altered in the sense that Jesus was back as a pure know. And it was I can't even talk Velasco and I think Paxton underneath. So the tactics overall were the so. What I particularly liked in the La game, of course, was that because they were so aggressively, because La was so wide open, maybe in anticipation of La being wide open and the fact that they wanted to get Kamungo on the field allowed them to play areola in the far left position, which is what usually happens. And it put Kamungo on the far right position on the wing, which is a switch foot wing situation, which is a very modern, very attacking philosophy where you're cutting inside. And I think that was actually the biggest thing that really tore La apart was their wings couldn't handle Paul and Kamungo coming in those angles into those holes between their back line. So it's weird to me, in a way, sometimes the way he says that it's the same formation and same tactics, not formation. And I'm standing there looking at it before the game, and I'm like, it does not look the same to me. But apparently to them, in terms of the game execution, it actually is the same, and the same spaces are being occupied, even if it's by slightly different people, if that makes any sense to you. [00:08:04] Speaker A: I was I don't know if you were surprised Kamungo got the oh, yeah, yeah. [00:08:10] Speaker B: This coach, generally speaking, has seemed to believe that if you miss training before the game, if you're not there for three or four days before the game, you're not going to play. But he told me that he had in mind all along that he knew that Bernie was in a really good form and really fit, and he was only traveling from Arizona. It's not like he was really far away and he didn't play a heavy workload. So he said, I knew I was going to start him and he came back and he trained Thursday in Dallas and then they traveled and then he trained Friday and he said he told Bernie on Friday that he was going to start him. So I think that he knew all along that he was going to. None of us knew, of course, because we hadn't seen training with that happening. I assumed like always that a guy was gone. He wouldn't just walk back in, particularly a guy like with an Ariola's gone, he can walk back in. So, yeah, it was super exciting to see him because Bernie, as we all know by now, has got an absolute knack for scoring big goals in big moments and taking advantage of his moments when they come. There's a lot of flaws in his game still. He has a lot to learn still. But you cannot deny that when you get him in a goal scoring opportunity in front of the net, he converts, oh, my God, in great moments like that all the time. And you're willing to live with the other deficiencies because that part is so good. [00:09:24] Speaker A: I don't know, dan, if you had to say you could pick any player on your team on a one on one breakaway with the goalkeeper, is there anybody else that you would pick over Bernie at this point to assure that you're going to get a goal out of that situation? [00:09:38] Speaker C: No, definitely not. I think just writing notes for the little awards part later on. One thing that stuck out to me was Benny Kamungo was Joint second top scorer. He matched Alan Velasco's goal contributions, goals and assists on just 500 minutes and the two goals in La were just a perfect example. Just break away. He does well. He doesn't make stupid decisions. There was that goal earlier in the season when he went around the keeper. It wasn't know, sometimes Jesus will do that. Cut back to his left, cut back to his right, cut back to his left. Three defenders have got back. Just lash it at somebody's legs and watch it go out for a throw in. Yeah, bernie doesn't do that. He is like that kind of almost like Robbie Fowler type instinctive finisher. [00:10:32] Speaker A: It was super impressive and the fact that it happened so early in the game set a really clear tone that this was not going to be a grind of a game like we've seen for the last, I don't know, half season out of the team. So we'll get into more detail. But the overriding question that I think we got to get to as we move forward into the playoffs is what we saw in a four one win in the Galaxy. When you got it, when we all admit they needed three points, getting one point wasn't going to cut it, et cetera. Et cetera, although maybe in retrospect it would have because Portland lost. Is it an anomaly and can we really count on that moving into the playoffs or do you think we will now go back Buzz, to seeing more of what we had been seeing for the last several weeks, if not months out of the team? [00:11:25] Speaker B: Well, I think as always with this team, it's going to come down to who you play and how they respond and how they want to play. If you look ahead to the possible opponents that they're going to have in their side of the bracket, seattle is actually very similar to teams of Dallas, statistically speaking, but on their field they're going to probably want to come at you pretty good. They're going to want to dominate you mentally and so that'll play into Dallas's hands because Dallas will probably have to sit back and take a lot of punches early. But again, that's Dallas's strength, right? You want to do that. The problem will become is if Seattle gets a lead, of course, and not to get too far ahead of ourselves in this conversation, seattle will then go defensive on you and then you're going to struggle to break them down. If you can get past Seattle and you get LAFC, well, LAFC will want to play. They'll want to open it up. Dallas actually does pretty well against them, generally speaking, because of that. Because La is not going to low block. They're going to come out and go because they're really talented across the board. I'm assuming that Vancouver is not going to get past them. I really don't know much about Vancouver, to be honest, to tell you how they play, other than I feel. It's pretty direct. I believe they usually play a Christmas tree, if I'm not mistaken. But they also want to play. If I remember the games they played against Se Dallas, I don't remember Vancouver low blocking. If you look at RSL in that top half of the bracket, RSL is the team. They smoked three, one because at home the other month ago because they tried to play and didn't want to bunker. Houston doesn't bunker. Houston tries to play too when they have their complete midfield available. You remember the game Dallas had against them a while back, less than a month ago. That was not a bunker game. So really the only team that you can see if Kansas City gets past San Jose, kansas City is not a bunker team. St. Louis is not a bunker team. The only team that really is a bunker team left is San Jose. So you have to be pretty optimistic that you're going to get teams that are going to want to open it up in the playoffs because good teams want to open it up. Usually league, the problem will come is when teams take leads and then you're going to be really struggling because Seattle particular, of course, will go really defensive once they get 10 on you. I can think she had a lot less skulls than Dallas did. They're a better defensive team than Dallas. [00:13:34] Speaker A: All right. We'll do a lot more Seattle Preview here in a second because I think there's some interesting talking points about the similarities between these two teams. But going back to the La Galaxy game, first, there's a note in here, in the famous Crayon red Crayon written hand run sheet is it says, first half was peak Nico ball. What do you mean by that, Buzz? [00:13:58] Speaker B: Yeah, because La wanted to play, dallas executed their tactic as best as we can see it. And what I mean by that is that La had 60% of the possession and FC Dallas only had 40%, which is not ideal if you would ask Coach. That's not perfect. But he does recognize that they play really well when they're in this situation. And as you can see by how good it was, how good their counter, it's not a counterattack. It's transition game. When they turn you over and transition back at you, it's quick transition. It's quick taking advantage of you before you reset. They ended up with 13 shots to four outshooting. La had 60% of the possession, dallas had 13 shots to their four, and six of the Dallas shots were on target. So this is perfect example of very low possession, high chance creation, and very efficient shooting. So this is like the ultimate example of exactly the kind of game Dallas wants to play. And when they're at their very best, they're pretty much unstoppable in this. Now, compare that to the second half. They did not do that. They sat back, they relaxed. They only had two shots on goal. That was not a good example in the second half of what good new goal ball looks like. So that game was a really good example of the kind of play that you get from this team. And if you get the first half play against this team, they can literally beat anybody on any day if they can get a team to open up and let them play like this. So that's what I mean by it's a perfect example of Nico ball. It's as good as it gets. [00:15:32] Speaker A: Dan, any particular thoughts or observations about the game that you wanted to share? [00:15:39] Speaker C: It was fun seeing the guys kind of coming up against Edwin and seeing some typical Edwin play and how everyone reacts to that as far as the game itself. [00:15:55] Speaker A: When you mean Edwin being you mean him being just kind of being his hard nose try to get under people's skin self. [00:16:02] Speaker C: Yeah, exactly. Leaving a foot in, going in a little bit harder to shoulder in the back. Just the way he kind of tries, exactly like you say how he tries to get under player's skin. I think it was fun to see him trying to prove a point a little bit and just giving maybe a little bit of bite to what's an end of season game with one of the teams having nothing to play. [00:16:24] Speaker A: Yeah, I love that about Edwin. [00:16:28] Speaker B: Yeah. Listen, for me, that stuff like the reactions to Edwin is a non starter, like the thing where he injured Bernie, which is not anyone's fault, that's just two guys get tangled up and one of them rolls up the other guy. There's nothing in that at all. The play where he got a yellow card was a foul, certainly, and he got a little pokey in at the ball. I didn't think it was worth a yellow, to be honest with you. I thought it was a nothing play. I mean, it's certainly a foul and certainly if he hits farfan harder and in my mind, more maliciously. But I thought it was a pretty much a normal, I'm a six and you've come into my space with the ball, I'm going to smack you. I mean, it wasn't unreasonable. [00:17:04] Speaker A: Yeah. [00:17:04] Speaker B: So I don't know why people are, generally speaking, upset about Edwin in that scenario. I mean, you saw him before the game. He's all handshakes in love with all his know. There's nothing in that other than like, we're professional players and we're here to play. [00:17:17] Speaker A: That's the game. That's how the game is played. [00:17:19] Speaker B: Yeah. I've seen a hundred times worse than that in training between guys on the same team. It's nothing. [00:17:24] Speaker A: Yeah. [00:17:24] Speaker C: Carlos Correso when he was Daniel Hernandez. [00:17:28] Speaker B: Chad Dearing. Oh, my Lord. [00:17:32] Speaker A: Yeah, that's the good stuff right there. All right, so Bernie was great. And we're going to talk about Bernie's health situation here a little bit. Lara was one. One, we were surprised to see Bernie start, but two, good Lord, the relief to see him actually get into the game and just do what he does, they're so much better. I don't know if he solves all the low block problems, but they just fundamentally are a better team, period. When he's out on the field. [00:18:03] Speaker B: Well, he certainly makes it a lot better on the low block because he's capable of doing a double line break pass. The passes he plays on the ground, like into gaps or just behind the D is so perfectly weighted. They're just gorgeous to watch happen. I was worried, of course, because I saw him step out of training that he might not make it into this game. And then he was in the lineup. I thought, oh, here we go. This will be fun. And even in this game, again, 67 touches led the team. He was like 85% passing but 14 recoveries, which is insane. He had four blocks and three intercepts and he was two for three on tackles. Just playing as a six. The guy is just head and shoulders above everybody else on this team. And it really is remarkable how good he know. [00:18:45] Speaker A: It's funny, the one kind of bad moment in the game when La scored is a pretty funny moment in time to capture the thing that we talk about when players get out of position or ask to play on the opposite side. We always think about Ryan Hollingshead and how great he was on the left, but the minute they put him out on the right, it was like a different player. And I'm still not clear. I understand how Emma and Farfan got switched up on that situation, but trying to watch poor Marco have to defend Edwards on the wrong side of the field was, I think, a great example of that. [00:19:20] Speaker B: Well, they came off of a set play. They ended up tracking people that ended up that made them end up on the wrong side of the field. And then because Coach Nico is so conservative about positioning and defensive structure, they never got any pressure relief. They spent like, three or four minutes trying to get the ball out, trying to get the ball out, and nobody up front held it long enough to relieve the pressure and let them switch back. And you're right. Edwards just absolutely shredded farfan. And it's funny if you watch it, because you can see that Farfan's instincts are totally wrong. He wants to go with the wrong leg to try and tackle, and he stops himself and Edwards just walks past him. Now, granted, Edwards is giving Tuamasi troubles, too, all game. That guy's a really good player. But that play was clear as day that there was a problem with Farfin being on the wrong side, having no idea how to play over there and tackle over there and take the guy to the line and use the line to help himself. So I don't blame him for it. It just was an awkward moment. [00:20:13] Speaker C: It's kind of funny. There's actually a really good just watching a replay. There's a really good oh, shit. Moment that he has, and it's right. He kind of checks over his shoulder and takes that one step away from the byline as if he was on the left side going towards it, realizes he's gone the wrong way, and then raheem. Edwards sees that space and drives for it. And then that leads to, like you say, he tries to make the tackle of his left foot away from his body rather than coming across with his right and trying to use his body. [00:20:48] Speaker B: Yeah, it's important to mention that it wasn't a planned switch. Nobody had some crazy idea to make those guys play on the wrong foot. It just came off of a tracking of a set play, and they ended up on the wrong side. [00:20:59] Speaker A: Well, it didn't mean anything, as Dallas obviously ends up winning the game, winning big, getting the playoff spot. In fact, I don't know if based on all of the scenarios we had kind of pondered were possible out of that particular weekend, I think I'm correct in saying this was actually the best case scenario. Because not only did they win the game, get a playoff spot, but they avoided the playoff, the play in games that are taking place tonight. When we record this on Wednesday. [00:21:25] Speaker B: Yeah, they finished with the of the five teams that were for the three spots, they finished the highest of those five teams. So they got as high as they could get on that given day and avoided the play in game and know by the standings, whatever you want to call it, they got the weakest opponent possible. They got the third place opponent, which is LAFC. Instead of getting two Seattle or one I'm sorry, they got two Seattle. Oh, that's why I'm being stupid. I forgot the playing game was below them. I'm dumb. But they didn't get St. Louis and they didn't get the playoff playing game. They got Seattle, which is better than getting the playing game in St. Louis. [00:22:03] Speaker A: The other thing that's interesting about this game is are you guys aware this is the only time all season dallas has scored four goals in a game? [00:22:12] Speaker B: Yeah. [00:22:13] Speaker A: Isn't that crazy? [00:22:14] Speaker C: I'm in since, what, August 2022? [00:22:18] Speaker A: Has it been that long? Really? [00:22:20] Speaker B: Yeah. They're not a particularly prolific scoring team. [00:22:23] Speaker A: No, but I mean, based on everything that we've been talking about and complaining and fretting about for the last two or three months, to score four in the game that you really needed, it kind of your last ditch effort was pretty entertaining. And for all of the other consternation and everything, they are undefeated now in what their last is it nine games? Eight games? Is it, let's see, 123456. Yeah, nine games they haven't lost since they lost against Seattle. I mean, St. Louis back a while ago. [00:22:59] Speaker B: Well, as you point out, I mean, they had the three one game at Salt Lake when Salt Lake wanted to play, and other than that, they played some teams that wanted to open it up, like Columbus and Philly and Houston, but those are all pretty good teams. And then they had San Jose come in and Colorado come in low block. So they really hadn't had a chance to have somebody really not very good defensively, which the Galaxy aren't, want to open it up and play. So it's the first time in a while we've seen them try and basically run it up against somebody. I mean, they did have a four goal game against Inter Miami back in League's Cup, right? [00:23:36] Speaker A: I'm just talking four goals in the league. Yes, I guess they had scored I forgot about the Miami game. [00:23:41] Speaker B: It's funny about that. Look back at when we talked about how great Leagues Cup was, when we talked about they had moved from our eyes, they were playing this formation where Allen was actually playing as an eight, and they went through that thing. They scored two goals against Charlotte, three goals against Nakoxa, two goals against Mazelan four goals against Miami. They were exploding in that time. Then they played Austin and beat them one nothing. Also with that same formation. I don't remember what they did against St. Louis because that was the last 20 minutes thing. Then they tied Atlanta, and then they tied Seattle, and then they beat RSL with Paxton playing that role. You know, they had that really hot run, and then they went away from that idea of what to us looks like. Alan as this free eight vanished for a while, and he was sort of back out on the wing again, playing that high and wide position. And then now that he's come back sort of more inside to looks, I think, in just this one game. Coach says the last three games, but it looks so much better once they don't play a low block. [00:24:41] Speaker A: Hold on a second. I'm just thinking about something because I'm working off as we were commenting before we hit the red button to record this, the ridiculously Maddening MLS website. They won that game against St. Louis. [00:24:55] Speaker C: No, that was the away game. [00:24:58] Speaker A: Where is the St. Louis game in was the St. Louis game was the one from June and that got pushed. That's the 20 game that the 20 wins. [00:25:07] Speaker B: The one against June. That wasn't actually in June half it was in June half. It was later. The one that they lost was at St. Louis. [00:25:15] Speaker A: Okay. [00:25:16] Speaker C: All right. [00:25:16] Speaker A: I wanted to make sure that the website hadn't gotten that goofed up because of the broken up timing of that. [00:25:21] Speaker B: Yeah, we talked about the game in a revenge game. Remember they went up there. It was literally like three weeks after they lost to Dallas. They're going to be mad. [00:25:31] Speaker A: All right, very good. Before we move away from the La game and I have a feeling this is going to come up a lot when we get into our favorite things or kind of quasi awards pause. Once again, just outstanding. [00:25:44] Speaker B: Oh, yeah, he really was. I'm not a believer in that Xg stuff, so those kind of things where they're like they're on their Xg allowed or whatever is like, man, all you got to do is watch the game. And he saves goals that most people would not a couple of times a game. Sometimes when he has five or six saves, there are five or six saves that everybody should make, but almost always there's a couple in there that only 10%, 20% of keepers are going to save. And those saves are massive. [00:26:14] Speaker A: I don't know if you guys picked up on it, but you know you've made a good save when the striker that you saved it from walks up and gives you a high five. And I believe I saw that from did. [00:26:25] Speaker B: Yeah. [00:26:26] Speaker A: During the game. So I think that's you got to feel good about that if you're mr. Paws. [00:26:32] Speaker B: Yeah, there was a couple of those saves he. Made that are not often made in this league, unless you're talking about keepers into the top five, six keepers in the know. I'm not saying that he's the greatest keeper in the world. I'm just saying that he's one of the best keepers in this league, and he won't get any attention at all for the league awards, and that's a shame. [00:26:50] Speaker A: Well, Buzz, I will say in one of the articles about predicting the playoffs, the author of this particular one did mention he's probably the hottest goalkeeper going right now on the nice. [00:27:02] Speaker B: I love seeing that. Yeah, that's good. [00:27:04] Speaker A: Yeah, for sure. All right, Dan, anything else about the La game before we move on that you want to talk about? [00:27:11] Speaker C: No, sir. [00:27:12] Speaker A: Okay, so that takes us up to training before we get into the Seattle game. Buzz, today you were out at the facility. You got to see the guys going. You got to talk to the coach, staffers and all that stuff. What you got for us? [00:27:27] Speaker B: Well, Herbert Indolay showed up. I haven't seen him in a couple of months, so that's good, I guess. [00:27:34] Speaker A: Hey, Herbie. [00:27:35] Speaker B: Yeah? Herbie. Jego Garcia, who's the 17 year old kid from place for North Texas, mostly. He got a first team invite there's. Carl Sante from North Texas got a first team invite who's a six, basically, and he was there to replace Fakundo, who was missing, and we can talk about Fakuno in a second. Nico Montoya, who's the U 17 keeper, he's been in the first team camp all summer. He's probably getting the Carrera I Stone treatment, what you will. He's far away from being ready, but he's the next guy on that line, if you're into that kind of thing. Legit. Sebastian Legit. Took 100% part in training, all the way front to back. Looks 100% fine to me. If he makes it to this weekend with no setback, I'm assuming he'll be available for selection in the first game against Seattle. And if not the first game, absolutely the second game. So that's a real added benefit because it gives you some ability to maybe change things up when you're going from road to home and that kind of thing and give yourself some different kind of looks. Missing from training, again, I mentioned, is Fakundo Quinon. So it turns out that he has been hurt, but he is no longer hurt, and he was not there because he went home to get his green card it, which is amazing. So apparently he's been working on it, and he got that approval, so he went home, like you have to do, and then you go and you have an interview, and then you wait a week, and then they call you back and you pick it up and you come back. So they let him go at this exact time right now. He probably was still coming off his injury when they let him leave to go get it. So hopefully he'll be back. I have no idea when okay, hold on. [00:29:08] Speaker A: Wait a second. That sounds like ridiculously poor timing. [00:29:12] Speaker B: It does. Other than he was hurt, but I think it says something about where he is in the rotation that they're like, yeah, sure, go get it. [00:29:19] Speaker C: In fairness, those appointments are very hard to come by, so that really would affect his status for 2024. [00:29:29] Speaker B: Yeah. Once they give you the meeting, you can't not go to the meeting. Or I think it causes you problems in terms of getting it, but his. [00:29:38] Speaker C: Likelihood of playing for FC Dallas as a domestic player versus national, too. [00:29:42] Speaker B: Yeah, very different. Very different. So when he'll be back? I have no idea. Because you know how those if you've been around long enough, you know those green card things? Sometimes it's a day or two, sometimes it's a week or two, but that's. [00:29:56] Speaker A: Where he so all right, so hold on. Let me just put this let me pressure test this. [00:30:00] Speaker B: Yeah. [00:30:01] Speaker A: If they didn't have Elara, if he didn't exist in this roster and this was going on in the middle and the playoffs were starting and the La galaxy game was going on, are you telling me Pakundo is going to get his green card? [00:30:16] Speaker B: I don't know. I didn't ask that. That's a good question. [00:30:21] Speaker C: What paxton six. [00:30:24] Speaker B: When Fakundo was hurt, we saw a Paxton Fraser combo. So it's not unthinkable in the deciding. [00:30:33] Speaker A: Game of the season that you got to win. [00:30:35] Speaker B: I don't know. It is what it is. Is Fukundo that much better than Frazier? [00:30:40] Speaker A: Yes. [00:30:41] Speaker B: Okay. [00:30:42] Speaker A: I think so. [00:30:43] Speaker B: I mean, he's better, but I don't know. He's that much mean? Look, it's impossible to say. I didn't ask, and I don't know. [00:30:49] Speaker A: I know. It just seems weird to me that the idea that a key player, a guy that's been a key player all season goes off to get his green card on the most important part of. [00:31:00] Speaker B: The season, I mean, it's super weird timing, but I think it's okay. [00:31:03] Speaker A: I don't think they yeah, no, hey, they made it in, but now we don't know if he's available for the Seattle game. [00:31:08] Speaker B: No, we don't. We don't. He'll be back when he's back. Coach said he is 100% healthy now, so when he does come back, he'll be available. But he was injured like, a week, year and a half ago. [00:31:18] Speaker A: We all do realize if he was Eastern European and not South American, we'd never see him. [00:31:24] Speaker B: You know, we'll get into offseason stuff when we get to the season, but it certainly affects so all right. Why is important. [00:31:31] Speaker A: Okay, so Bernie is okay, bernie status. [00:31:35] Speaker B: I asked the question about is Bernie as a young guy, does he need to learn to fight through that and stay in there? Coach said, well, sort of, except that if he would have stayed in, he thanks, Coach. That Bernie probably wouldn't be available for the next game. That because he took himself out, he's now fine like that. If he would have run on it, it might have swollen up on know. So Bernie was on the side doing very basic stuff but coach said they fully expect him to play in the next game and they think he will play in the next game because he took himself out of this game. So that also worked. You know, if they hadn't already been winning by a couple of goals, would he have fought to stay on? They might have told him to stay on, possibly. But it actually has worked out in their favor apparently. [00:32:18] Speaker A: Yeah. I found that whole incident with the trainer when he went down to be very weird, like that whole scene looked really weird to me. Like odd. Like something weird was going on there and I'm not saying anything nefarious. It was just that the trainer seemed convinced that Bernie was just fine and should get back out. There was tapping his head like, hey, it's a mental thing. Stamping his foot. And then Bernie, of course, immediately comes off. And I thought and then we had this exchange about know, it's just a young guy learning to like he's on a hat trick in the biggest game and he's playing balls out. Why would he come off unless he's really hurt? [00:32:57] Speaker B: Yeah, well, I think that conversation looked to me like and I agree with you that the trainer was trying to sell him. You're not actually hurt. It hurts, but you're not hurt. And there's a difference. But coach is probably right that if you play on it, it does swell up and then maybe you fly back and it swells up again and so maybe the next game you're questionable, he said, but now he's going to be fine. He was over there kicking the ball, running around, doing rehabby type stuff. They were just being precautionary with him. So we'll see. Good to go. I mean, it should be no problem as far as we know. Obviously the setbacks can happen. You never know. But coach says he's fine. [00:33:30] Speaker A: Man, could you imagine if he had hit a hat trick in that game? The rocket ride of his story would. [00:33:36] Speaker B: Take it's already pretty rockety, dude. I mean, people are pretty hyped about. [00:33:39] Speaker A: This kid and the I just but I think he's on the verge of it becoming an even bigger national type story. Like a larger scale national story. It's such a good story. [00:33:50] Speaker B: This is going to be like Ryan's accident where every time anyone says Ryan's name, they tell about the accident. This is going to be like that every time Kamino ever does anything for the next decade we're going to be like, oh, did you know that he was a Tanzanian refugee from oh, my. [00:34:02] Speaker A: God, dude really played soccer with plastic bags. [00:34:05] Speaker B: Yeah. It's an amazing story but a decade from now we're going to be like, dude, come on, we know this story. Everybody knows the story. [00:34:15] Speaker A: Very funny. Yeah. All right. Anything else out from training before we actually get into the game? [00:34:20] Speaker B: Well, there was one more very important player missing. [00:34:23] Speaker A: Oh, no. [00:34:25] Speaker B: Yeah. Mr. Asir yaramindi was missing. So I was know Grumpy over there mad like, this is going to suck. But I talked to coach about it and he said that here's the deal and I'm only telling you because he was missing, otherwise I wouldn't care if he'd been there. Apparently they've figured out with him and he did say, by the way, that he's by far our best player. He said they have figured out with him that like Maro Diaz, he's peak performance when they make him take games off and they make him go do recovery stuff inside, not games, sorry, practice off. So he said that Yara's mad about it. It pisses him off because he wants to be out there training. But they make him do recovery stuff extra because he's 34 years old and his performance is more peak when he does, when they make him do it. So it's kind of fascinating that he's not hurt. It's just old man stuff where they're just being they're doing extra kind of I mean, I don't know what who knows? Oxygen this and massaging that, hyperbaric chamber, whatever in a glass case. Don't nobody touch break for know something ice bath. [00:35:36] Speaker C: They're threatening them with a cattle. [00:35:39] Speaker B: Just the comparison with Maro Diaz was funny because Maro Diaz never wanted to train ever. And was always missing all the time with oh, I'm hurt. I'm this, I'm that, and then would play great. But here are mindy's like mad that they won't let him train every single day and the coach said he's the first one in, first last one out every time and super dedicated and really takes care of himself. But he's like, he's 34, man. We got to protect him from himself. So we take care of him, make him take days off. So like paddock they do with Paxton probably, or they should. [00:36:09] Speaker A: Okay, so here we go once again, Dallas gets how many years in a row has Dallas played Seattle in the playoffs? [00:36:17] Speaker B: They've met them eight times. That I think I read in the playoffs. I didn't go count. I know that they haven't beaten them since 2019 in Seattle. Is the last time that they beat Seattle up there? [00:36:29] Speaker A: That was a good night. [00:36:30] Speaker B: That was when Lucci was in charge. Thomas Roberts, by the way, started that game, you may not remember. [00:36:35] Speaker A: Holy crap. Are you serious? [00:36:37] Speaker B: Yeah, he did. I went and looked it up. Thomas Roberts started that game. FC Dallas'outshot Seattle 14 to five but only had one shot on target and both of Seattle's goals were own goals. Seattle scored three goals in that game, two against themselves. [00:36:51] Speaker A: Wow. [00:36:51] Speaker B: That was the last time Dallas won in Seattle. It was February 2019. [00:36:56] Speaker C: I guess we kind of just have to get in a good thomas Roberts. [00:37:00] Speaker A: Thomas Roberts. [00:37:01] Speaker B: That was the beginning of 2019 when they had those injuries, and Thomas started like six of eight or something. If you remember. I was next. I remember was but yeah, Thomas started that day. That was the last time they won in Seattle, was with Thomas Roberts. There you go. [00:37:15] Speaker A: Wow. [00:37:15] Speaker B: Yeah. [00:37:16] Speaker A: Okay, so the hot soccer Twitter thing going around the last couple of days is people trying to compare the 2014 to the 2023 US. Men's National Team because of the Josie comment, which is all very funny. Should we do that with the 2019 and 2023 FC Dallas starting eleven? [00:37:36] Speaker B: Okay, so I have it somewhere. Where did it go? All right, so to play this game, here's the lineup for FC Dallas on that day. [00:37:45] Speaker A: So this isn't a playoff game. This is the last time they won in Seattle, period. [00:37:50] Speaker B: So, yeah. Starting at the nine is Bodgie, Dominic Bodgie. Left wing is Jesus Ferreira. [00:37:56] Speaker A: And they won this game. [00:37:57] Speaker B: They won the game. Right wing is Michael Barrios. [00:38:01] Speaker A: Okay. [00:38:02] Speaker B: Starting in the midfield at the six is Grezzo. [00:38:05] Speaker A: Yeah. [00:38:06] Speaker B: At the eight is Acosta, and at the free eight is Thomas Roberts, back four is left back Johnny Nelson. [00:38:15] Speaker A: Oh, yeah. [00:38:16] Speaker B: Center back is Brasson and Hedges, and right back is Ryan Hollingshead. [00:38:23] Speaker C: If you add in the car thing, that is a totally fully injured back line. [00:38:30] Speaker B: Yeah. So Reynolds, Cannon, and Jacqui Hayes came off the bench for Dallas. Reynolds replaced Jesus Freyer and played left wing. Jacobi Hayes replaced Thomas Roberts to play like a double six kind of look, I'm sure and Reggie came on for Barrios and probably dropped they probably dropped into like a six man back line or something. But they won that game two one with two own goals from was it Jimmy and goal. [00:38:56] Speaker C: If there were any weird betting patterns around this game. [00:39:01] Speaker B: No. The guests who was in goal? Jesse Gonzalez was in goal. [00:39:07] Speaker A: Oh, wow. [00:39:08] Speaker B: According to FB ref, I assume they're correct. Yeah. [00:39:12] Speaker A: Okay. We seriously need to compare those rosters between 2019 and 2023 because that's a salty roster. That's a salty lineup knowing what we know these days, right? [00:39:24] Speaker B: Yeah. [00:39:26] Speaker A: I mean, poor Lucci, he's a rookie coach at this point. [00:39:29] Speaker B: I mean, that's not a terrible mean. [00:39:32] Speaker A: That's a great mean. Other than Bodgie in the middle. [00:39:36] Speaker B: Yeah. I mean, Johnny Nelson probably know over ryan Hogstead was probably a rotational, got. [00:39:41] Speaker A: Grezo at the six. [00:39:42] Speaker B: Buzz ryan was at right back instead of left back. Grezo at six. I mean, there's a lot to like about that lineup. [00:39:49] Speaker A: Okay. If you put that lineup against the 2023 lineup, who wins 2023? Okay. [00:39:58] Speaker B: Yeah. [00:39:58] Speaker A: Is it a one one draw? [00:40:00] Speaker B: Well, if you want to go position by position, jesus now at nine is better than Baji at nine, then okay. Right. Last game, Ariola on the wing then now is better than Ferrer. Then at the wing, barrios to Bernie, if you want to talk about the last game we watched, barrios versus Bernie. I don't know Barrios overall, but Bernie's a better goalscorer. Right. [00:40:22] Speaker C: Thomas is obviously going to be yeah. [00:40:25] Speaker B: Thomas versus Alan. I'll take Allen? Of course. Even though I love Thomas. Grezzo over Iara at six. I mean, they're completely different players. That's a tough call. I might actually take Iara. I'll take Paxton over Brian Acosta, though. Farfan over. [00:40:41] Speaker C: Yeah. [00:40:42] Speaker B: Nicosi over brassan. Yeah. IBI. Hedges. No, I'll take Hedges right back. I'll take Ryan at right back versus EMA. I mean, Ryan left back. No, but Ryan right back. I might take EMA and Jesse on his heyday versus Pause. I'll take, you know, it's about nine to three, maybe. Yeah. [00:41:05] Speaker A: Okay. [00:41:05] Speaker B: Or two. Maybe eight to three. [00:41:09] Speaker A: We should do that more often. We should compare rosters dating back in time. Like do like an old 96, 97 roster or 99 roster. [00:41:19] Speaker C: US. 1950 World Cup roster. Joe Gacians versus Jesus Ferreira. [00:41:28] Speaker A: Joe Gacians versus Christian Polisic. Excellent stuff. All right, so here we go into Seattle, the first game and this is so Dallas's luck. They have to play their first game on the road in Seattle on a night that all the other pro teams in Dallas minus the Cowboys are playing, including is it game two of the World Series. [00:41:52] Speaker B: Game one is Friday. So I don't know in game oh. [00:41:55] Speaker A: Maybe it's game three. That's right, it's game three of the World Series. It's the game in Arizona. So I think it is. Yeah. So the Rangers play, the Mavericks have a game, the Stars have a game and Dallas is they're all on TV at the same time. [00:42:10] Speaker B: Yeah. [00:42:12] Speaker A: Crazy. [00:42:13] Speaker B: Well, this will get interesting is the idea of the games aren't super tight, so you don't really need to rotate for health or not health man management. You don't really need to do that. But you might think about like, okay, if I'm going to Seattle on know, does that affect what I'm thinking? Do I want to go more defensive because Seattle is going to come out flying or do I really have to go after this game and get this first one? Because if I have to go, if we lose there and then win at home, the game three is going to be really difficult. Like if I'm going to win, I need to win this one. Is that kind of your thinking? So that's where it gets really interesting. There's a lot of places you don't have a lot of choice know, while Sam Junka is great with enough space between the games, it's Farfen every game. Right. It's Nikosi. [00:43:03] Speaker A: Every game. [00:43:03] Speaker B: It's Ibiagi. Every game. It's Pause every game because of injuries. It's tuamasi every game. You know Jesus is going to start every game at forward. Right. You assume at this point Paul and Bernie are going to be the wings of velasco almost certainly is going to be in that one hole on the left hole. So then it really gets down to question of a combination of Paxton, Iara mendy, does Fakundo come back? Do you have Frazier in there? Do you have Legit as a factor? So I'm going to say that you want to make a good first impression. So you're going to start with Paxton and Yara Mendy on the road. This first game, I know it's on turf, but you do your best if you're having a good game or if you're getting blown out, either one. Then you take those guys out and you bring in Fraser, you bring in whatever, it doesn't matter if you're getting blown out but you bring in Legit late in the game if he's cleared and if you're winning. And that way when you come back home and you've just run Paxton like 80 minutes or something on turf, you can let him have a game off and then you can go Yaramindi Legit at home maybe and have that variety in there. The guys that are the most susceptible to injury, which are Yaramindi and Paxton, even though Paxton is young, you now have a body in Legit who can help you there. Maybe you're not ready to start him, but maybe you can get him 2030 minutes in a couple of games. That's really where you have your real decisions to make, I think. I don't think that OBrion versus Kamungo at this point is a choice. It goes back to when before Bernie got hurt where it was Bernie all the way above Obrian. I think it's back to that already and that lets you go. Bernie right, Paul left, which keeps Velasco back in the midfield. And so a lot of these decisions are pretty actually made for know you really just have a couple of calls to make in the middle based on turf and what you think is your best scenario to win. Obviously you want to feel your very best team you can when you come back home because you have to win that home game, obviously. [00:45:01] Speaker A: So let's just set the table for everybody to make sure everybody's on the same page. Since MLS has once again janked up the playoffs, it is a best of three, which means the third game is an as needed situation. It is not aggregate goal either. It is you either win or you lose. If you get to the end of the game and the game is tied, it goes directly to penalty kicks. [00:45:24] Speaker B: Yep, that's exactly right. [00:45:25] Speaker A: In this round. It goes to extra time in the next round. So you could be getting blown out in Seattle on game one and that doesn't change anything. You just got to win game two. It doesn't matter if you win one nothing or ten nothing. [00:45:38] Speaker B: Yeah, if you're out of a couple of goals, take out everybody that matters, put in a bunch of kids and get blown out, who cares? Other than maybe it hurting your psyche a little bit and you want to compete, that would be the thing to consider. But as you say, there's no aggregate goal, so it doesn't matter. Then you protect the players you need for the home game. The second game, I think you want to try and play this first game pretty aggressively because you want to maintain your form you brought out of La. And the fact you haven't lost in like a month and a half. You want to maintain that and you want to not get blown out of the building in the very first game. But you also want to make sure that you're absolutely 100% with your very best players when you come home. And that's the battle. And that's where you have to think about those couple of guys. And that's where man management will come in as the game goes along. Seattle, I think, will come out blazing, trying to get up early and then sit back so Dallas can weather the first 15 or 20 minutes. Then they'll probably get a chance to get some of those transition opportunities and maybe get some good chances on goal. And if you can get a goal, they'll want to do that thing that they do, which is they'll want to compress the game down to the first 60, 65 minutes, not let Seattle do anything. You take your chances when you can, and then if you get there and it's zero zero, you try and start to open up a little bit and see if you can get one, that's the way you want to do it. And this team's built to do that, so that's the way you do it. [00:46:59] Speaker A: Can we just take a minute to kind of at least observe the fact that in many ways, the way Seattle has been playing this season and the way Dallas have been playing this season is not dissimilar to each other? Seattle has the exact same amount of goals scored and only given up five less goals than Dallas has. Seattle is a defensive minded this is a defensive minded version of Seattle. This isn't going to be like the same thing that we've seen. They've really struggled to score goals this season. [00:47:32] Speaker B: They have some of their star players have fallen off. But I think that's why they'll want to try and get up early so that then they can be defensive and sit back and take it easy and not be too aggressive and you know that they're going to come back down here, which we'll have time to do another podcast before that game happens. But you know, they'll come here and they'll low block the hell out of it, just like Dallas will do to them up there. [00:47:52] Speaker A: Yeah, well, it's interesting. Mean like Dallas. I think I'm correct in saying they've got a kind of veteran young up and coming duo at centerback. [00:48:02] Speaker B: I don't know enough about their center backs to be able to tell you, but I know that Morris is not getting it done like he was and Rudy's is not quite getting it done like he was. And Joe Powell is getting a little older and they've had some injury. You know, these teams are very similar, you're right in that Seattle doesn't really open it up. They play pretty compact, they don't low block it, but they play like a pretty know, mid sort of block instead and make you really try and break them down. And this might be a game where you might see a chance for, believe it or not, either a Kamungo to get behind jesus likes to get behind those kinds of plays. Where Dallas is really good at might be available to mean if you look at the games this season, they tied twice and then Seattle won the third one, which is up in Seattle, but they tied down here and then they tied in Seattle. So these teams are close. They're very, very similar. Even the game down here was one. Nothing in Seattle's favor. Again, super tight game this is going to be. All three of these games are going to be zeros or ones, probably across the board. [00:49:04] Speaker A: Do you think it'll go three games? [00:49:07] Speaker B: I think it's a good chance, yeah, I really do. Because Dallas at home is pretty good. They've only lost a couple of games at home in forever, and they're pretty good at PKS. Pause is pretty good at stopping PKS and Dallas is pretty good at taking PKS. They got a bunch of guys that have converted them. They'll keep games on tight, they'll go on the road, they'll kill the game, they'll keep it, give themselves a chance. Given how both these teams are very similar defensive and low scoring, these games are going to be very low scoring games. You might even see three PK games, possibly. [00:49:43] Speaker C: On the subject of that, you mentioned low scoring and the teams being pretty similar goals for and against. I was just looking up the sort of scores that Seattle have had. They've actually been shut out twelve times this season. If you're going to go low scoring, Dallas has been shut out six times. If you're going to have like a one nil game, that does favor Dallas. [00:50:10] Speaker B: To a degree, yeah. If you look at the average shots per game, seattle is at 12.6 and Dallas is at ten. But then shots on goal is 3.8 to 3.4. So they're only minuscule better at shots, volume of shots, but not necessarily better at actual scoring. These teams are remarkably similar. San Jose, seattle has a few more corners per game on average, but the duels is pretty much the same. The tackles is pretty much the same, clearances are pretty much the same. They're very, very similar teams. Seattle is considered better because they converted more of it into points in the know, but I'd bet you if you went and dug into their injury list it wouldn't be anywhere near what Dallas's was. So I think you're looking at teams that are basically incredibly evenly matched and play a very similar style game. [00:50:57] Speaker A: Well, I mean at the end of the day the difference between the two teams is what is I mean yeah, that's mean. And that's just indicative of how tight the Western Conference in general was over the course of the season. Just side note, sidebar real quick, can we all just agree the decision to restructure the playoff system in this best of three is the dumbest idea. I know why they did it. I know because Apple wanted more games. But this is a beating. To have to go through this, stop. [00:51:32] Speaker B: Changing it is the worst part. It's like you'd never have any idea what you're going to get. [00:51:36] Speaker A: I know, but even if you're going to change it, this is a stupid change. No aggregate goal is going to turn into I mean we all know that what's going to happen with the last 30 minutes of game one. If a team is losing three one they're just going to mail it in. [00:51:54] Speaker B: Yeah. I have this theory that someone on the competition committee loves kicks from the spot and I am afraid the answer is that it's Clark Hunt because you remember who was against Portland that they had that 20 round PK that was so exciting. And then there was the Walker Zimmerman one which was at Seattle, wasn't it? That one was against Seattle. [00:52:13] Speaker C: That was down here. [00:52:14] Speaker B: It was down here. It was versus Seattle, wasn't it? Anyway, the point being is that someone up there and it might be Clark Hunt loves the idea of these kicks right after the game ends rather than ties. Because we saw it in MLS next, we saw it in League's Cup. Now we're seeing it in the playoffs on the other side of the coin. Thousands of teams built to win games on the road. This particular team is and win games against teams that are better than you. Even though I don't think Seattle is better than know the biggest advantage Seattle has is the fact that it is so friggin hard to win in Seattle for Dallas, the long travel, which is probably why they're going up there so early the turf, all those things add up. And having that third game be in Seattle is really what gives them all the advantage that they need. Otherwise this is basically a wash. If they played at home and away it'd be dead even. [00:53:01] Speaker A: It's just stupid. It's such a bad idea for a structure. [00:53:05] Speaker B: It's just weird to go best of three and then go back to one. [00:53:07] Speaker C: After that and they just got the playoffs sorted out to the right format finally after all these years to then go, all right, we're going to piss around with it. Again. [00:53:20] Speaker B: Yeah, it's so frustrating. [00:53:23] Speaker A: It is very frustrating. Now, after this, it goes back to a normal one off game, extra time, and then penalty kicks for the rest of it after this round. But this next two weeks or ten days or whatever it is, is going to be a beating of probably not very exciting soccer and a lot of penalty kicks. I think it's pretty easy to predict. [00:53:44] Speaker B: Yeah, well, I don't know, man. That Charlotte New York game was something else, man. Five two. [00:53:49] Speaker A: Yeah, but it was a one off game. [00:53:51] Speaker B: Yeah, well, that's single initiation. People go for it. You're right. The best of three is going to be like the old best of three where everybody plays defensive, but then after that, everyone will open it up because you got to win every game. It'll be fun. [00:54:02] Speaker C: That part will be everyone's already falling asleep by then. [00:54:05] Speaker B: Yeah, right. Everyone's tuned point. This first round may be trash. We'll see. [00:54:11] Speaker A: All right, anything else about the Seattle game? Well, I want to move on and talk about the rest of the playoffs, but anything in terms of getting prepared for the Seattle game that we need to get into. [00:54:22] Speaker B: I think I just want to reiterate that because there's enough time between games, right. You go on Monday, Saturday, that's plenty of time to have everybody rested. So any changes you see in the lineup are going to be, in my opinion, purely tactical. There's no rotation at this point. Right. It's just like, how do I win the series best? How do I win this game best? So if you see shifts, if you see something that's not what you think is the best eleven, if you're sitting there at home watching it, try and think about why that changes happen, because for a reason, it won't be just random. [00:54:54] Speaker A: Okay, so if Paxton starts game one but doesn't start game two, you're telling me that's a tactical thing and not a protect Paxton thing? [00:55:00] Speaker B: No, it'd be 100% be tactical. [00:55:02] Speaker A: Okay. [00:55:02] Speaker B: Yeah, it would be because you feel like legit is better if that's who goes in for him, because there's plenty of time if you rest Paxton from game one to game two, that's not going to be because I'm worried about Paxton getting injured. That's just going to be because I think there's a man matchup that's better. Because if you thought Paxton couldn't go 90, then you could just sub him early twice because you got five subs. It's not a problem. It's not that if they change the lineup, it'll be a tactical choice to play more defensive or less defensive or more attacking or less attacking or stifle the game, or this this coach will swap. You'll see things like it only happened a couple of times, but depending on who they played, one time they flipped Paxton from he usually plays on the right because he shoots left foot and he's a lefty right. So this one game, they flipped him and they put Paxton on the left because they wanted him to play curling balls that died right behind the defense. Because this particular team played a really high line. So this coach is that kind of nuance we're like. So if you see a change from game one to game two, it'll be it for a tactical reason and not a fitness reason. Unless somebody gets hurt, of course, that's different, but barring injuries, that's what will be happening. [00:56:10] Speaker A: All right, Buzz, I'm going to put you on the spot. How's this going to play out? [00:56:15] Speaker B: I think they tie this game one one and go to PKS. [00:56:21] Speaker A: What about the series? [00:56:22] Speaker B: Oh, the series. Unfortunately, Seattle is going to win the Series. The home field advantage of being in Seattle twice is too much to overcome. [00:56:30] Speaker A: Dan, I know you're not a big predictor. Would you like to predict? [00:56:36] Speaker C: Yeah, I'm going to say Seattle and hope to be proven wrong. [00:56:42] Speaker B: Yeah, I'm cheering for something else than that, but I just think that the home field advantage in this league is too much. We all know it's really high. We all know that Dallas has hardly ever won in Seattle. Ever. Maybe once or twice. Ever. [00:56:56] Speaker A: So disappointed in you. [00:56:59] Speaker C: Schmetzer's a good coach in these situations. He's taken them to MLS Cup. [00:57:04] Speaker B: So many Seattle's built for this. [00:57:06] Speaker A: All right, you both poopy headed haters. I'm picking Dallas in three, and all three games will go to PKS. [00:57:12] Speaker B: Oh, yeah. You're going to win the PK in Seattle. [00:57:14] Speaker A: Yeah. [00:57:15] Speaker C: There will be so many heart attacks. [00:57:21] Speaker A: Do you want to predict the rest of the bracket? We could just do it real quick. La. Vancouver. [00:57:29] Speaker B: La. [00:57:30] Speaker A: Okay. Houston. Salt Lake. [00:57:33] Speaker B: Houston. They're good. [00:57:34] Speaker A: All right, so right now, as we are recording hold on, let me look. It is still nil nil in Kansas City. So one of those two teams, san Jose or Kansas City versus St. Louis. [00:57:47] Speaker B: Well, though either one of them will lose to St. Louis. [00:57:50] Speaker C: If it's Kansas City, I have them beat in St. Louis. [00:57:54] Speaker A: Really? Okay. All right. We know Red Bull beat up on minty today. Five two. So Cincinnati, Red Bull, Cincinnati, Philly, New England, Philly. The crew versus the union. I mean united. Atlanta. Yeah. [00:58:14] Speaker B: I'll stay with Columbus also. It's very chalk. [00:58:16] Speaker A: Okay. And Oscar versus Nashville Puppy. [00:58:21] Speaker B: I'll take Oscar, too. Yeah. [00:58:22] Speaker A: Okay. [00:58:23] Speaker B: Very chalk this year. [00:58:24] Speaker A: Yeah, I like it. Okay. I'm very excited to get out of this best of three system and get into the meat of the tournament, but yeah, there you go. All right, let's see. And then the next thing we wanted awards. Yeah, we wanted to kind of do. [00:58:41] Speaker C: You wanted to do the whole way through? [00:58:44] Speaker A: No, just let's start here and then we'll see how it plays out from there. Unless you guys want to go all the way through. [00:58:49] Speaker C: Can I give you my dodgy prediction? [00:58:51] Speaker A: Yes. [00:58:52] Speaker C: Of course Poppy is winning MLS Cup. [00:58:55] Speaker B: Oh, God, I'd be there for that. Yeah, I'd be all in on that. [00:58:59] Speaker C: They would have home advantage over anyone in MLS in the west. Sorry. So on the day, he was terrible at two legged games because he'd always go defensive and then try and win the second one and get turned over in the first. But in a one off game, that's your guy. [00:59:19] Speaker B: Which big money team is going to pay him the most money at the end of the year to get him. [00:59:22] Speaker C: To coach Man United? Obviously. [00:59:24] Speaker B: Well, no, I'm assuming it's an MLS team. [00:59:27] Speaker A: God damn it. That would be awesome. [00:59:33] Speaker B: If I had to bet, I wouldn't be shocked to see him in La. Coach in the galaxy. [00:59:37] Speaker C: Yeah, I mean, someone mentioned San Diego the other day and I was I mean, you know, he was at Cholos. A lot of money to spend that time to develop the academy. That's a hotbed of youth soccer. That's kind of the stuff he likes. [00:59:50] Speaker B: It's the chill in an area that. [00:59:51] Speaker C: He'S been. [00:59:56] Speaker B: That'S a good one, too. Wouldn't shock me at all. [00:59:58] Speaker A: Wow. [00:59:59] Speaker B: I love your pick, Dan. I'm with you. I'm sticking with FC Cincinnati, but I love your pick. [01:00:05] Speaker A: Dig it. I do like it. That would be great. Okay. So we wanted to kind of quickly just kind of do end of the season rewards award stuff. [01:00:14] Speaker B: Yeah. As we always do end of the regular season. [01:00:17] Speaker C: I like the idea of vendorless season rewards. Here's a $5 Starbucks gift card. [01:00:22] Speaker A: Well done. All right. Our 1st $5 Starbucks gift card for MVP goes to who? Dan. [01:00:33] Speaker C: I'm torn, but I'm going to say Martin pause. [01:00:37] Speaker A: Buzz. [01:00:39] Speaker B: Wow. I also am saying Martin Paws. [01:00:41] Speaker A: Make it a hat trick. Hat trick. Yes. Martin Paws. [01:00:48] Speaker B: Wow. I didn't think you guys were going to do that. [01:00:50] Speaker C: I thought you were going to go for Jesus. [01:00:52] Speaker B: No. Martin Paws, man. [01:00:54] Speaker A: Jesus. [01:00:54] Speaker B: Jesus got cold. [01:00:56] Speaker A: Yeah, he did. But let's be refrigerator on us. [01:00:59] Speaker C: Well, he did, but they just won the first game that he didn't score in. He's only one game that he has scored in. They've lost. He's still like, head and shoulders above everyone on the outfield, but pars 16 games, he conceded fewer than the Xg. He top five in just about every stat category in MLS. I mean, the guy's just incredible. [01:01:25] Speaker B: I thought you were switching your vote for a second there. The way you were talking. [01:01:28] Speaker C: No, just saying it's one A, one. [01:01:32] Speaker A: B. I have a feeling, looking at the three other categories, we're going to hat trick the rest of this. Pretty straightforward. [01:01:38] Speaker B: Maybe not. [01:01:39] Speaker A: Well, Defender of the Year is obvious. It's got to be Tafari, right? [01:01:43] Speaker B: Yeah. Because I gave MP deposit. I'm going Tafari for Defender of the Year. [01:01:48] Speaker A: Okay. [01:01:48] Speaker B: Because the goalie could be Defender of the Year if you want. [01:01:50] Speaker A: True. Okay. [01:01:51] Speaker C: We could do the FC Dallas team awards definition that year that Reggie wasn't eligible for Defender of the Year, but Victor AOA was. I'm going to say Jesus Ferreira for. [01:02:04] Speaker B: Defender of the Year. [01:02:04] Speaker C: Yeah. Defender of the Year. [01:02:06] Speaker B: He's a great outside back. [01:02:09] Speaker A: And then we also have written down young player and newcomer. That's the same person, isn't it? [01:02:14] Speaker B: Not necessarily. [01:02:15] Speaker A: Well, I know not necessarily, but I think for the purposes of voting this particular year, it has to be Bernie for both of those things. [01:02:22] Speaker B: I don't have Bernie for either one of those things. [01:02:24] Speaker C: I don't. [01:02:25] Speaker A: Really? [01:02:26] Speaker B: Yeah. [01:02:27] Speaker A: Wow. Okay, Dan. [01:02:28] Speaker B: Go ahead. You go first. [01:02:29] Speaker C: Okay, so mine is Alan because he's for which one? [01:02:33] Speaker A: Young player. [01:02:34] Speaker C: Young player because he's not a newcomer. The reason I wouldn't say Bernie is because he only had 500 minutes. My young player of the year has to play the bulk of the minutes. [01:02:48] Speaker A: Okay, fair. I had thought of it that way. [01:02:50] Speaker B: My young player of the year is Jesus Ferreira because he's only 22. [01:02:53] Speaker A: Oh, good grief. Now you're cheating. [01:02:55] Speaker B: Why is that cheating? [01:02:56] Speaker A: He's 22 because in FC Dallas years, he's like, 37. [01:03:02] Speaker B: No one put a disclaimer on the front of this thing. [01:03:05] Speaker C: I'm sticking with Jesus qualify for 22 under 22. So he's ancient. [01:03:09] Speaker B: That's not the same as not being available for a young player. 22 years old, man. He'll be 23 in December. It's getting out of the wire. [01:03:16] Speaker A: I swear I've known Jesus longer than I've known members of my own family. There's no way of the year. [01:03:22] Speaker B: Yeah, he is. [01:03:23] Speaker A: Okay. All right. [01:03:24] Speaker B: Definitely not newcomer. [01:03:25] Speaker A: It's your stupid podcast. You run it out. [01:03:28] Speaker B: Who's your young player of the year? [01:03:30] Speaker A: I had Bernie. I just thought, yeah, kid comes in, he used to play soccer with a bag, a bunch of plastic bags. [01:03:37] Speaker B: That's a good story. [01:03:38] Speaker A: Did you know that he was a refugee? [01:03:40] Speaker B: I had no idea. [01:03:41] Speaker A: Yeah, I know, it's crazy story. [01:03:42] Speaker B: The one part about that story I learned from the podcast was that he'd never even been on grass until he came here, which is amazing to me. I was like that's. Wow. [01:03:51] Speaker A: Grew up playing soccer on shards of glass. Not grass, but glass. All right, so how are you defining newcomer? [01:04:00] Speaker B: Okay, you want to hear my newcomer first? [01:04:02] Speaker A: Well, now that I think about it, I think it's obvious who your newcomer is. [01:04:05] Speaker B: It's us here. Er mendy. [01:04:07] Speaker A: Yeah. Okay. [01:04:09] Speaker B: Who got here like a month and a month. [01:04:10] Speaker A: Yeah. Yeah. [01:04:12] Speaker B: That's pretty much the newest player on the team. [01:04:15] Speaker A: Okay. Yeah, fair enough. Dan, who's your newcomer of the year? [01:04:19] Speaker C: So I'm going to differ from Buzz a little just because he's so new. I'm actually going to say sebastian ibiaga. I think he was top five in MLS with 149 clearances for the team. Third in interceptions, third in blocks, first in aerial jewels, second in touches, fourth in minutes. You had that Matt Hedges size hole to fill, and it may be square peg round hole, but it's pretty well filled. [01:04:54] Speaker A: All right, well, congratulations to all of our award winners. I hope they don't spend their $5 gift cards at Starbucks too quickly, I guess there's no actual gift card. There is no actual gift cards. [01:05:11] Speaker C: There is a discount code to soccer 90. [01:05:14] Speaker B: Yeah. You get a 20% discount at soccer 90. [01:05:17] Speaker A: Yeah. [01:05:18] Speaker B: Is what you get. [01:05:19] Speaker C: Yes, but some exclusions may apply. [01:05:22] Speaker B: We might be late enough for the season that they're not that many exclusions left. [01:05:25] Speaker A: All right, we'll have more end of season awards after the actual season is over, right? [01:05:30] Speaker B: No, that's it. We always do regular season. [01:05:32] Speaker A: Oh, I thought we did something after playoffs if they were in the playoffs, too. [01:05:35] Speaker B: No, the playoffs is what makes it you have to do regular season because not everybody has playoffs and some playoffs. You go one game versus like, five games. [01:05:43] Speaker A: All right, we don't get to vote on best off field drama. [01:05:47] Speaker B: If you want to add some categories right now, I'm in. Let's go. What do you got? [01:05:50] Speaker A: Well, I hadn't thought of them yet. I just feel like there should be more than just those four. [01:05:55] Speaker B: There's only four I could remember. I couldn't remember any other categories than that. [01:05:59] Speaker A: By the way, Buzz, I do have to say out of the La game, if there was a disappointment, it was that in scoring the four goals that they scored, that meant that they did not hit that statistical oddity that you brought up the other day that we were going to add to the list. [01:06:15] Speaker B: Yeah, I thought of that when it was happening. [01:06:17] Speaker A: That was a bummer question about that. [01:06:19] Speaker C: Was that just FCD Dallas or was that MLS in general? [01:06:22] Speaker B: MLS in general, because will you repeat. [01:06:26] Speaker A: It, please, buzz, for those who maybe not have listened to last week's podcast. [01:06:30] Speaker B: I did not make this stat up. It came from MLS. The Dallas was at the time they had scored, it was 36 and 37. I can't remember which one was which. Goals allowed and goals four. And since the league expanded to a 34 game season, which was back in 2011, no team in that stamp period, not counting the 2020 shortened season, of course, no team had ever had both goals for and goals against under 39 in the same season. [01:07:01] Speaker C: It was under 39. Yeah, I thought it was under 40. [01:07:05] Speaker B: No, under 30 to 39. [01:07:07] Speaker C: New York Red Bulls came in at 36 and 39. Nashville came in at 39 and 32. [01:07:13] Speaker B: There are other teams that have been close, but Dallas would have been the first team to have both under 39, and that would have been a monumental. [01:07:19] Speaker A: Achievement to be and a fantastic addition to the list. [01:07:22] Speaker B: Yeah, it would have been phenomenal. And then they went out and blew La out of the water and broke the well. [01:07:30] Speaker A: All right. [01:07:31] Speaker B: They obviously listened to podcasts and said, you know what? Screw you. We're going to break that. [01:07:35] Speaker C: They do say screw you a lot. [01:07:38] Speaker A: Or La did, one of the two. [01:07:40] Speaker B: I mean, I'm sure there are people at SA Dallas that listen to the podcast. If a player listens to that, I would be really shocked. There's no way a player listens to our podcast. [01:07:49] Speaker C: When you played sports, did you not listen to music and stuff that kind of pissed you off and got you in the mood before a game? [01:07:56] Speaker B: Sure, but not podcast. [01:08:00] Speaker C: There you go. They just listen to you and they're like, all right, I'm ready to break someone's leg now. [01:08:04] Speaker A: There were no podcasts back then. [01:08:06] Speaker B: I'm going to tell a real funny story. My brother in high school played defensive end on the high school football team, and he would listen to a song that would get him fired up and pissed off. It was wishing well by Terrence Trent Darby. I don't know why. [01:08:20] Speaker C: Too young to understand that. [01:08:21] Speaker B: Yeah, I don't know. Peter will get it. I have no idea why, but that song used to make him mad. Something about it. [01:08:27] Speaker A: I'm a big Terrence Chant Darby fan, and there's not a single one of his songs that I would describe as pregame fire up music. [01:08:35] Speaker B: I thought it was weird back then, but he said, yeah, it gets me going. I'm like, okay. I mean, there you go. [01:08:45] Speaker C: Give me 30 seconds to listen to it. [01:08:51] Speaker B: Yeah. Of course, my brother doesn't listen to this podcast, so he'll never know I audited him. But it's funny to me. [01:08:58] Speaker A: I'd hate to find out what your brother listens to to get in the sexy oh, I don't know. [01:09:03] Speaker B: He's got four kids something. [01:09:05] Speaker A: Probably Metallica. [01:09:06] Speaker B: Yeah. [01:09:08] Speaker A: All right. Well, here we go, guys. We are now into the playoffs once again. The guys, they pulled it off. They got it done. Good for them. [01:09:17] Speaker C: Here we go. [01:09:20] Speaker A: Is Dan back there listening to wishing well? [01:09:25] Speaker B: Wishing well. Kiss and tell. [01:09:27] Speaker A: That's right. [01:09:28] Speaker B: Yeah. [01:09:29] Speaker A: There may be terrible. I don't know if you listen to that too long, Dan, you may end up with a crook, baby. Pretty quick. Dan. [01:09:37] Speaker B: After this, go listen to Buffalo Stance by Nina Cherry. [01:09:41] Speaker C: I mean, I know who. [01:09:45] Speaker B: I mean. Yeah. Who doesn't know who that is? [01:09:47] Speaker A: Wait a second. Are you telling me, Dan, you didn't know who Darren's Trent Darby is? [01:09:52] Speaker C: No. How would I? [01:09:53] Speaker B: Well, because you know who Nina Cherry is. [01:09:56] Speaker C: Maybe it's like maybe it's a foreign thing. I don't know. Apparently, he's from England. [01:10:03] Speaker A: He's the English prince. [01:10:04] Speaker B: Yeah, he was huge. [01:10:07] Speaker A: Terrence trent Darby is awesome. And then, of course, he kind of went off the rails and changed his name and has been battling the record companies for the last 15 years and tried to get his records reissued in his new current. I think it's Muslim or Arabic or something name or whatever. [01:10:23] Speaker B: But, yeah, that's why he's the English Prince, because he's got the name change thing. [01:10:28] Speaker C: I was nine months old at the height of his career. [01:10:32] Speaker A: Okay, this podcast is podcast is definitely over. All right, well, thank you for ruining my evening, Dan. It's always great to you. Yeah. And Buzz, thank you for all your enthusiasm and going out and covering the team and all that stuff. [01:10:51] Speaker B: Oh, you're welcome. Yeah, training was fun today, I'll give you that. [01:10:54] Speaker A: I'm going to go take my Geratol and go to bed. [01:11:00] Speaker B: Say hello to the corgis for us. [01:11:02] Speaker A: I will say hello to the corgis. Absolutely. And they say hello back to you, too, Buzz, by the way. All right, so Monday night, amongst all the other Dallas sports stuff, dallas versus Seattle, I think the game's at 08:00, I believe that's correct. [01:11:18] Speaker B: From memory. That's correct. [01:11:20] Speaker A: Yeah. 08:00. Yeah, 08:00. There's two games on Monday, the Orlando Nashville games at six and the Dallas games at 08:00. The second game is on Saturday, the fourth here at Frisco. [01:11:32] Speaker B: Also 08:00. [01:11:33] Speaker A: Also 08:00. And then if they need a third game, that game falls on Friday the 10th at 09:00 and would be a 09:00 start from Lumen Field. So we'll see if we get that far or not. [01:11:47] Speaker B: Third degree, the podcast has been brought to you by Soccer 90 Dot Shop. Their awesome selection of FC. Dallas Gear, national Team Gear club Gear. I was just in there today, man. They got all kinds of amazing stuff, way more than I can afford. Everything you might want. Jersey, tees scarves. If you're a third degree listener, you get 20% off at Soccer 90 Dot when you use the code third degree at checkout. Soccer 90. Com. Third degree code 20% off. Some exclusions do apply. [01:12:13] Speaker A: All right, boys, thank you very much. Look forward to having so are we going to record? Yeah, we'll record between the first and second games. [01:12:20] Speaker B: Yeah. [01:12:21] Speaker A: All right. [01:12:21] Speaker B: Next Wednesday should be fine. [01:12:23] Speaker A: Yeah, very good. I love it. All right. Playoffs are here. Dig it. And thank you. FC Dallas. Curious fan. We will speak to you hopefully with some good news on another episode next week of Third Degree, the Podcast. [01:12:37] Speaker B: Thomas Roberts. Thomas Robbins. Thomas Roberts. Thomas Roberts. Thomas Robbins. Wow. [01:12:41] Speaker A: Third degree. The third degree, never podcast. Third degree, the third degree, never podcast. Third degree nap, I guess. Third degree, greedy green, if I can't.