3rd Degree the Podcast #255

[00:00:00] Speaker A: Um, yeah. [00:00:04] Speaker B: Ooh. Third degree. The third degree nap, I guess. Third degree. The third degree nap, I guess. Third degree nap, I guess. Third degree Nap podcast third degree. The podcast is brought to you by soccer 90 Dot. Explore soccer 90s Dallas burnt collection. The latest sweet throwback gear from Mitchell and Ness. Vintage tees, jackets and hoodies. It's all stuff limited quantity. I'm surprised they have any less. Hurry up and get some of you want some. Remember, too, as a third degree listener, you get 20% off with the code. Third degree in store and online code. Third degree, 20% off. Some exclusions do apply. Third degree. The podcast is also brought to you by the Lindstrom law firm. For Wills trust, probate and business law. Call 469-515-2559 that's 469-515-2559 or visit lindstromlawfirm.com for a free consultation. [00:01:06] Speaker A: Well, hello there, FC Dallas. Curious fan. Welcome to another episode. This one, number 255 of third degree, the podcast. Hi, it's meter. Hi, it's me, Peter. Good grief. If I can't even say my own name. That bodes very poorly for this episode of Third Degree, the podcast. And there he is. He's back. He's returned. He's a surprise guest because I didn't think he was going to be here for this. It's Dan Crook, everybody. [00:01:33] Speaker C: Hi, Meter. How are you? [00:01:35] Speaker A: Meter is very good. Thanks for being here, Dan. I'm glad you're here. [00:01:39] Speaker B: Anytime. [00:01:40] Speaker C: Wait, should it be yard for you? [00:01:45] Speaker B: Meter? Yard. [00:01:47] Speaker A: Oh, okay. [00:01:48] Speaker B: Yeah. [00:01:50] Speaker A: And there he is, your hero. By hero, everybody's hero. Editor found a third degree down that in the original soccer. Buzz Carrick. Come in, Buzz. [00:01:57] Speaker B: Hi, Meter. You're going to do your actioneer bit tonight. [00:02:01] Speaker A: My what? That's right. Yeah, I can do that tonight. All right. It's a rainy night. We're recording right after the US, a game that I completely did not get to watch because I just walked in the door from a dinner meeting, and I see the US has beaten Jamaica by the impressive score of three to one. It sounds like the Yanks beat them up pretty good tonight there, Buzz. [00:02:25] Speaker B: No, that was terrible. They were lucky not to have lost in regulation with that. They stole the tie with that own goal header with, I don't know, 10 seconds left. And then they outplayed Jamaican at extra time. They deserved it based on that part. But the first 90 minutes or so, they did not deserve to advance. Jamaica had a really good plan. Breaking down a low block is hard. [00:02:48] Speaker A: So Greg Burhalter didn't do a lot for the haters out there. Or maybe he did do a lot for the haters. He actually strengthened their case. [00:02:57] Speaker B: Doesn't matter. [00:02:58] Speaker A: No, it's Concacaf. [00:03:00] Speaker B: Yeah, he could do anything and it would strengthen the case for the people that hate him. There's a certain segment of that population that are unreasonable. Now I will say that as I've always said, I'm not a fan of a second cycle for a coach and I think that the current malaise or stagnation of the men's national team is in part because Greg is there again and it's not anti Greg. It's just that this always happens in my opinion when you retain a coach for a second cycle, the team gets stagnant because he's over reliant on the guys he's always had. So I think that's what I see. I'm not one that's going to say that they should fire the guy because he's a horrible coach. I'm not in that camp. But his choices were reasonable, his subs were reasonable and they worked. And I don't have anything to say about it other than how flat the team was because they probably think they're better than Jamaica. [00:03:47] Speaker A: Okay, well that would then take us to our local MLS team, Ep football club, Dallas Buzz, who currently looks worse, the US men's national team or the burn question mark? [00:03:59] Speaker B: Yeah. Los Torres. The burn dude. Yeah. Not FCD Dallas. Not good. Obviously the game in New York because of the tactical change is not going to be super definitive, but there are some things we're talking about in it. It was not a particularly good game, I'm sorry, not New York against Vancouver. I'm a week behind being a home game. That's not great. The tactics kind of worked and kind of didn't. So it was not an optimal problem. But there's two different discussions to be had. One is like not doing well in this particular game and the other is what are the big picture problems that this team is off to its third worst start in its club history. So those are two different factors and neither one of them are good. [00:04:40] Speaker A: Well, let's start with the conversation and the likely point. I think somebody will try to make that. For all the catterwalling and question asking about playing a three man back line, Nico chooses to go with a two center back, four man back line in this particular game, the formation that they have been playing under him up until this season, and you'd go, okay, well, they'll probably look better and play better in that. And yet they gave up more goals in this game than I think they have in any game this season. Please make sense of this. Buzzard. [00:05:13] Speaker B: Well, we talked ahead of time about how the tactical idea was to try to take advantage of the way Vancouver plays, and I talked in my little write up about what that was specifically. But I talked to Nico about today and he was not at all happy, of course, because he's like, that's not who we are. And he told them, that's not who we are. He showed them the goals in meetings and said, this is not who we are. It definitely was a breakdown in the defensive end of failure to get out on crosses, failure to challenge guys going out for the ball, failure to track players. I mean, they had three goals on, three shots on target. So that's a horrible defensive performance and that's not what this team has been for three seasons now or 2.2 seasons. So it's not what anyone's going to expect. And I imagine that this coach, being a defensive first coach will address it pretty aggressively because that was not what you expect from this team. But on the other hand, when you change formations from one game to the next, it can cause disruption. You have guys that maybe weren't your starters at left back, ordinarily not wing back left back or left center back. Usually. That should be far. Fan, not junka Emed is still getting back from being fit. Ibiaga is a year older. There are some signs there and problems that we've been talking about for all winter. So this one game was particularly worse. But it wasn't just this one game that's a problem. There's multiple levels of problems here. [00:06:37] Speaker C: I haven't. It's sitting unread in my inbox still, unfortunately. I just really had the time. [00:06:43] Speaker A: Buzz, have you read it? [00:06:44] Speaker C: I started to skim through it and I was like, damn, that's long. [00:06:48] Speaker A: It's interesting to me. First off, Steve is the best. He's the dean of soccer journalism in Dallas. But I do think it is telling that Steve, four weeks into the season, is already writing articles, kind of stating the reality of where this team is and trying to find the silver lining in all of this. And I think his tactical breakdown of the game the other day made a ton of points and the math of it, he talked about and individual players, this, that and the other, and I thought, man, Steve Davis is spot on. But the thing that I came away from the article, buzz, that I think is the really damning part of it, is that in my mind, the stuff that Steve is pointing out that is wrong with this team shouldn't be stuff wrong with the team in its third year under the same head coach and largely the same roster. And this all feels like stuff that you would expect out of a coach with a brand new manager. [00:07:43] Speaker B: Yeah, he said that today when I talked to him. How it feels like it's season one of a build instead of season three. We talked about it a little know, and some of the reasons are things we've talked about in this podcast, which are the fact that he changed systems, the fact that he's having to develop players, the fact that he had guys that were hurt all through spring, which happened last year with Legit, if you remember, he came out of spring really struggling and this year legit was actually pretty healthy. And so within a game or two he was back, but other guys were not healthy. Tuamasi wasn't healthy. Obviously Paxton wasn't healthy. Yarmini really quickly became unhealthy. Pesus, who's his most important player, probably can't miss most of the spring. So in many ways, you're looking at these first four games almost as like a new preseason. So there are a lot of things going on that make it feel like that. And that's why it does feel like that. And when you change systems in particular, if you haven't necessarily been building the right roster for that system, it can make it even worse. So we've sort of half joked about the idea that are the TD and the coach on the same page with that. Did they know that they were building for a three man back line? Because it sometimes doesn't seem like they do in terms of the bodies. And there are some signs, I think, that they know that that is the case because they're continuing to be active by adding Carl Sante, for example, which is about center back and not six, even though the website and the club said he was misled him as a midfielder and a six, that's not why he was signed. We just talked about that. I talked about that with coach again today. It's about his ability to play center back. And there's some rumors and some talk and some chatter, and certainly we've been talking about another center back, an international caliber, a frontline caliber center back for a long time now. Whether some of those rumors are echoes of what we've been saying, or whether they're real, I don't know. But I think anyone out there could look at this team and say that if you're going to play the way you want to play. It's not built right, it's missing some pieces and it maybe is going to get worse based on some stuff we're going to talk about later today. [00:09:44] Speaker A: Oh, joy. It is a weird thing because you're a team that is coming off a season last year that struggled offensively but was one of the most solid teams defensively in the league, and yet this season they're an absolute mess defensively and you're essentially playing with the exact same group of defenders minus Martinez. [00:10:12] Speaker B: Yeah, but that's what we've talked about a little bit is that Farfein's been hurt, Ema's been hurt. They're trying to play with Sam Jovka as one of their primary center backs. Ibiaga and Safari were healthy, but they haven't had their first choice central midfield combo. They haven't had a pure six available in every game like this last game. They went with sort of a more of a double six eight combo kind of look and didn't really have like Fraser in there and maybe it was noticeably different. And even when they have Fraser in there, I don't think he was your first choice six either. I think, you know, there's a definite lack of cohesion. [00:10:48] Speaker A: So this is an injury issue. [00:10:50] Speaker B: It's not just injuries, it's partially injuries. It's also partially the new system when you're trying to change things as much as they are and then you don't change them enough or don't have enough bodies in spring healthy to train it enough and practice it enough that you're dialed in on it and you're having to develop players. It all compiles. We're kind of running a loop here in a sense that one thing leads to another and it all builds. And Dan, I know you've seen enough of this game to know that when you try and change systems, sometimes it doesn't go the way you want it to go. [00:11:26] Speaker C: It's hard. You get those teething problems and getting those this far into a coach and cycle just seems to exacerbate every issue. [00:11:35] Speaker A: So here's the weird part, Buzz. I was lucky enough to get to attend the game and sit in the stands, first time I've seen the team live and in person this year. And it was weird because it was nice to see them play in the formation that they had whatever level of success they had last year. But there is something just fundamentally different about this team and it feels a whole lot about attitude and mentality. This is going to sound very fannish, but it just doesn't feel like anybody's out there playing for the badge or the shirt very much. And what's really disconcerting, because after the game, I was reading the club's post game notes and interview quotes and stuff like that, and I feel like every weekend when they have a result like this, which seems to be more times than not than lately. Am I wrong, Dan, that almost inevitably somebody brings up attitude and mentality and being. Not being up for the game from the start, all those things. It just seems like, how in the world can you guys not be ready to do this? [00:12:52] Speaker B: Yeah, it's a little hard because Nico. [00:12:55] Speaker C: Has his buzzword of the season and last year it was mentality. It was that winning mentality, which we obviously haven't seen a ton of. [00:13:04] Speaker A: Complacency. That was his other thing. [00:13:07] Speaker C: Yeah. So the interesting thing I noticed, like Nikosi Tafaro said it, there wasn't anyone external to the team that actually went in the locker room after the game. People attended the press conference. It was kind of a bit of a downer. Everybody left. It was only the team in the locker room. So those player quotes about mentality came from FC Dallas staff. [00:13:31] Speaker A: You mean no media went to the locker room after the game? [00:13:35] Speaker C: No, there was only a couple of us there only to begin with. [00:13:37] Speaker A: Oh, okay. Buzz, I don't get it. I don't understand. And I don't know if this is a reflection of Nico and kind of his even killed attitude. The only kind of emotion I happened to notice on the game Saturday night was when Jesus clearly was in this kind of new Jesus mode that he goes into, where he just looks frustrated all the time. And he was having a rather animated, one sided conversation with Nico at the bench. [00:14:06] Speaker B: Yeah, there's a lot of stuff going on with Jesus there. Again, it's a trickle down effect. When you look at, on paper, I looked at his numbers in the game and I thought, well, it's no wonder he's mad because he's back there in the midfield and he's doing playing as a ten and he's passing in a good clip and he's got all these progressive passes and he's creating shot opportunities and he's getting balls into the final third. And I thought to myself, that was a pretty good performance. And so no wonder he's upset. When guys aren't converting, they're not doing this. And that's why I was asking coach about, does it bother you when he's demonstrative he's over there on the sideline talking to you. He's over there back there playing a six. So I thought he had a pretty good game with all these numbers that he was trying to do the right thing and it wasn't going to help. And coach said he had a terrible game because he's not supposed to be doing all those things. He's supposed to be the second striker and his XG was zero. Now, you guys know I hate the xg stat, but the one way you can use it appropriately is like if you're a striker and your XG is zero, that means you're not in the right position to put yourself in the position to score goals. Jesus is doing, and he means well by it, he's doing all these things because he thinks that nobody else can do them. He doesn't have any faith that his teammates can do that, make those passes and complete those connections. Probably with the Yara Mindy out, with Paxton out, he might be right about that. I mean, legit's played fairly well, but he's not the same as other two players. You're talking about Yaramindi, a guy with 14 years in the La Liga who's just short of playing with the golden era of spanish kind of players like Zabi and Messi. He's just under those guys. An ability and way to read the game. So he's talking about Jesus has a terrible game because he's not doing anything that he's supposed to be doing, that he's in there for. So there's a double sided issue there with Jesus. He looks good. He's better than everybody else except that none of that is what he's in there know? And so there's definitely a disconnect with a young player. And I said to coach, I was like, how do you reach a guy like that? Is he receptive to your message? And he said, well, he needs to be. We show him these things and we talk about these things and he has to trust his teammates. We're going to keep working on him, trying to get him to be in the right positions and doing the right things, and hopefully as a group we can get that better and hopefully he'll be where he's supposed to be. And so he has as much responsibility as anybody to play the way that we want him to play and to play the way we need him to play in this shape. So it's a conundrum and it's tough. And I would say, and coach didn't mention this but I would say it's very difficult for coach because he can't exactly bench. You know, you need ownership support, probably, certainly TD support if you're going to bench the guy. And I think even no matter how mad you are at him, he's so much more talented than most of your team, you can't afford to bench him no matter what. [00:17:00] Speaker A: Who the hell else are you going to put on the field? [00:17:02] Speaker B: That's the thing, Ansa. I mean, it doesn't work. Like there's no other answer than he's playing every game, right? So it's like it's going to have to be man management. And if people are like, how come he doesn't do anything about. Well, he tries. He really does. I mean, we talk about it, I've talked about it with coach on multiple occasions, that this is not what you want out of a young player, that you want him to be a leader by his body language and how he carries himself and not be waving his arms in the air and not be playing him back as a six or whatever, do the job you're supposed to be doing. And granted, he probably would be doing the job he's supposed to do more. If, again, you had certain players that were missing and not to beat a dead horse. But Paxton is a million dollar player missing. Alan's a $1.5 million player missing. Yara Mindy is probably up there close to a million dollar player. Even at his age. He used to be probably a lot more than that, right? Farfan, who's a half a mil player in a normal starter, is missing. Giovanni, are you 22 initiative guys missing? So, like, some of your best guys are missing and so Jesus is overdoing it, trying to carry the team, and that makes him miss. And you might as well not have had him out there, frankly, the way he's playing. [00:18:03] Speaker A: Yeah. I read your breakout article and the thing that you just mentioned about the stats and how on paper he appeared to have a really good game. And I thought this is the greatest piece of evidence as to why I'm not a big stats guy, because I watched that game and I came away from the game going, Jesus was maddening and frustrating to watch as a fan because he was. I mean, I'm not the tactician you are, but even I could tell he wasn't in places he was supposed to be. And I was frustrated with the fact that he was so frustrated with his teammates. Every time somebody would make a bad decision or a turnover, he'd start flapping his arms almost immediately, every time then would turn the ball over himself. [00:18:46] Speaker B: I remember last year we had this stat at the end of the year and I think it's applicable in this game. There's this stat from last season where if Jesus had more than 40 passes, on paper it sounds really cool because he has 60 shot creating actions. The XG is pretty decent for the team, but in those games where Jesus had more than 40 passes, scouts was zero, four and six for only six points. [00:19:09] Speaker A: Great. [00:19:09] Speaker B: And he had one goal. In the games where he has under 40 pass attempts, they were ten, three and six for 33 points. And the point is that if Jesus is back in midfield playing as a ten, which he's not, then the team stinks. When he's up front where you get far less touches because you're playing up there as a high striker. They're so much better when he's doing the job he's supposed to do. His good touches are when he's in the box and either his movement or Moose's movement or whatever has created a little chaos. And maybe he slid off into that little pocket and the ball comes in there and he goes, dink goal. Those are the touches for Jesus that you want. Those little moments in there are the passes that you want. Him back in midfield is a know and he's partially doing it because he looks behind him and there's nobody back there that he thinks is capable of doing it. And so he keeps coming further back and he's not getting the ball. He's going further back and further back and further back looking for the ball and it's a mess. [00:20:02] Speaker A: Yeah. [00:20:02] Speaker B: So it underlines how important you are. Mindy is going to be for this team, which is crazy because of how old he is and how much you got to manage him or how passionate would have been if he's not hurt, too. [00:20:14] Speaker A: Yeah. And you've talked on the podcast several times about your observation that Musa and Jesus have no chemistry or connectivity or they're not gelling at all, not by and that man, that was so on display Saturday night against Vancouver, which does take us to Musa, which is, man, the curse of scoring in your first game for FC Dallas strikes again as the poor guy had, I don't know, four really good opportunities in this game, the last of which was the most obvious one, and he just choked it, Christian Coleman style. And being a Dallas fan and being in this situation multiple times, buzz, you know that the immediate concern is please don't let this get in this kid's head and hope he just forgets it and shows up and just tries again next. [00:21:06] Speaker B: You know, honestly, he had eight shots. That's not too off the mark for what you want from him. The problem was that he only got two of them on target. So eight shots on 39 touches is fine. You would like it to be a little bit more perhaps? [00:21:20] Speaker A: Yeah. But four clear opportunities that a $10 million striker should score at least three of those. [00:21:28] Speaker B: I would agree with you. Again, I hate the stat, but if you look at the XG, it was only a. .6 so those chances are not as clean as you would like. But I agree with you. I thought he could have had three, but I'm not worried about that yet. You are talking about what, his third game? That doesn't concern me. Jesus is not where he should be in comparison. They're not quite clicking yet. I'm not big time worried about. I'm only small worried about that one. That's one. I think that over time it's different. It's not like we watch him play and we're like, this guy sucks. He has no idea where to. [00:22:00] Speaker C: No, no. [00:22:00] Speaker B: That kid knows how to play. He's put himself in the right spots. I think his body shape is good, his layoff is good. He's maybe not quite on the same page with everybody yet, and that's fine. Dante silly on the left in this particular game was playing as a winger. Dante's not a noted like. It was remarkable when he actually had a key pass. It was like a big moment. Like, oh my God, Dante just set somebody know. And then Paul on the other side is not playing so great. If it's Bernie up there. Bernie's not really a combiner. Jesus has gone walk know. So given all those things, I'm not too concerned about with time, I think it's going to be fine. That's a short term problem that solves itself. I think that's very different than some of the long term problems that this team has. [00:22:46] Speaker A: What I would say about this game in particular was the disappointment with Musa is that he had the opportunities to rescue the game for this team and failed. But yes, he is the least of this team's problems because it is riddled with problems all over the rest of the field. Whether they are injury related or actual players on the field related. There are many of them. And since you and I have prattled on quite a bit, I would love to hear from the english sensibilities of one Dan Crook. As to his overview of Dallas after four games this season. [00:23:20] Speaker C: Oh, that's a bit grim. They say it's a work in progress, particularly up front, particularly this past game, it seemed like Musa was dropping into positions you'd want Jesus to be in to try and link up with Musa. He had a couple of nice takedowns, runs between the lines with the ball. Jesus. Incredibly frustrating. Yeah. It seems like Yara Mendy really is the key to this entire thing. First goal, great example. Both midfielders get caught upfield. There is a 35 yard gap to the center backs, which Vancouver just attack. There is definitely some issues with defensive structure, organization. The second and third goals, both times it was a free kick from far out. Spread the ball around, wait till FC Dallas try and break up the line, ping the ball in and you've got a free. It's hopefully this international break would be useful to bring players back and to work on a few things. They only had Liam Frazier go and, well, he's in town. [00:24:39] Speaker B: Yeah. [00:24:40] Speaker A: Best international call up ever. You don't have to leave. [00:24:45] Speaker B: He's training. [00:24:46] Speaker C: He's changing in the same locker room to go train on the same field he was last week. [00:24:51] Speaker A: Yeah, for sure. Okay. It obviously doesn't feel great right now, and it is just four games into the season. And we all know, and part of our jobs here is to remind people that MLS, unlike many other leagues, is one where you can kind of goof off for the first part of the season and rescue yourselves and find your feet and all that. But based on what we've seen so far, Nico's plan on how he wants to roll this team out, the roster, construction, the numerous injury situations that we've already discussed, buzz, and just kind of the confusing nature as to what Nico's trying to pull off in general, is, I think all of that kind of puts a dark cloud over the season. And everybody's like, yeah, we've seen this before. We know how this season ends. But then there's more awful and terrible news. I understand. [00:25:48] Speaker B: Yeah. So there's nothing official yet on Paxton, and that's because he has one more meeting to go to, one more doctor, second opinion meeting to go to. So there's nothing official yet about a timeline or a prognosis or a judgment or, like a plan. But what I will say about that, and here's where we're going to get speculative, is that if you're being shut down by your team and then you're going out to get multiple opinions and meetings and thought processes about what you're going to do, that means you didn't just spray your ankle, right? [00:26:30] Speaker A: Yeah. It's not a spring knee. [00:26:32] Speaker B: This is not a discussion of like, oh, should I lay out two weeks or three? No, this is a discussion with doctors who have different kinds of expertises in perhaps different areas or higher profile or more than just a team ortho guy. This is a much more concerning conversation. We know nothing officially about what's going on with Paxton, but when you have this long of a situation with this many multiple meetings, and as they said, there's one more to go, and they expect, they said by Friday, they don't mean tomorrow when people will be getting this podcast, they mean the next Friday. But when you have this level of conversation, then, as we've said before, the level of concern is massively ramped up. And you, me, Peter and Dan also, we've all heard the behind the scenes stuff and some connections that they're telling us, yeah, this is not looking good. So you begin to wonder, how long are we talking about? Is this a season ending thing? It's much more likely it's a season ender than it is like just a month based on this level of concern. So I think at some point we'll have to have a much bigger macro conversation about Paxton. But the short term conversation is you really were planning on needing him, right? He was probably going to be one of your two midfield starters with Yara, Mindy particular because of Yarmini's age and because Paxton, you have to treat him like he's 34 already anyway. Neither one of those guys was going to start every game. There was going to be a level of rotation, but you were going to need one or the other of them probably almost every single game. So if Paxon really is going to be out, does that create a new problem that you have to now try and find a solution for? And don't anybody point at Carl Sante and the fact that he was listed as a midfielder, that that's the solution for Paxton. It's not. And that's about centerback. If Paxon really is done for the year, that underlines, again the fact that you didn't clear Allen's salary, so now you'll be looking at $2.5 million basically in salary. They'll be out for the bogo, if not all the year, and that's a significant problem. If they're both in what should be your starting midfield, probably. So it's not good in terms of what we believe is happening officially. Nothing is known. Level of. You and I, Peter, have been around this enough and I'm sure Dan has, too, that we recognize the level of concern here is making us be concerned, and that's a problem. [00:28:56] Speaker A: Well, I think part of it is that we're talking about a player that is from and grew up in this area. We all know people who are connected to Pax. The winds are blowing in a manner that, I will put it this way. If there is an outcome where he returns this season, I think that's a miracle turn of events. Based on everything we have been hearing through all different kinds of channels, and without getting too grim about it, if in fact it is a season ending injury, we begin to start having conversations about, is Paxton at a point in his career where he has to start making other harder decisions long term and so forth? But we'll save that until we know things officially. The thing that freaks me out about this buzz is related to the fact that if, in fact, let's just talk hypothetically, Paxton has done for the year, right? Right now we're talking about a situation where you've lost one of the two other players that you were planning on using in a rotation, as you just said. But now that puts even more weight and emphasis on the fact that Alara Mendy is a 34 year old guy, and now you've lost a significant chunk of depth in your midfield. And what happens, God forbid, if Alara Mendy pulls a hamstring and is out four weeks or something worse or whatever it mean, you could just see the thing spiral really quickly. And so the question is, and trying to be helpful about this, if the hunts were of the mind to do something, is there something they can do financially to help bring in a new, there's, could they go Miami and save the day? [00:30:52] Speaker B: It depends how much money they've got. Know, what do you, if they've, if they have some Tam and gam kind of laying around, could they season end. [00:31:03] Speaker A: Paxton and save his salary and all of that? [00:31:05] Speaker B: So the key thing with the season, injured player thing is you have to 100% say they can't come back. And this is why the club didn't do that without Velasquez, because they anticipate that he'll be back in August or September or something like that. And so they didn't want to do that. Now, if Paxton really is out for the year, then you can put him on the seasoning list, no problem, because then you'll know for sure he's out for the year. You can get his roster spot back, which in this case is just a senior spot. There's no DP or anything, but what you can get from him is you can get salary replacement up to basically what he makes. So it'll be prorated slightly, I assume, for the fact that the season has already started, but you can still get a pretty nice player, relatively speaking, if you go ahead and do that. And then, of course, on top of that, if you actually have to sign someone, you'll be looking at some sort of Tamar gam money that you'll need to actually pay to get them. So you're more than likely, depending on how much you have available, how much you think you might need for somebody else, then you might. [00:32:02] Speaker A: Why do you need Tamar Gam? Because you're trading within the league. [00:32:05] Speaker B: No, I'm not talking about a trade. I'm talking about just signing a player. If you trade within the league, there's not a trade within the league because you're putting him off the roster, basically. [00:32:12] Speaker A: So if they go and find some guy playing for Lennox in Argentina and they want to sign him, why do they need Tam and Gam for that? [00:32:20] Speaker B: If he has a transfer fee, they. [00:32:22] Speaker A: Can'T just pay the transfer fee. [00:32:24] Speaker B: No, that's not how MLS works. [00:32:27] Speaker A: Wait, I thought Tam or Gam was to help pay down the. It's also for that salary for that. [00:32:32] Speaker B: It's also for that, but it's also for the transfer fee. It's like if a player costs. When you pay the transfer fee of a player, the transfer fee goes onto the salary budget for the player. And so you need the Tam and the gam to reduce that number down. And you know how they talk about they signed a player from so and so with targeted allocation money. That's how you sign players, is you use that money. So, like, if you want to pay a million dollars for a player, you need to have the Tam and gam available to pay for the part of their salary cap. Sorry, the part of their sale price, their buy price, that will be on the cap for the year. [00:33:09] Speaker A: Okay. [00:33:09] Speaker C: Otherwise you get 18 year old Fabian Castillo as a DP. [00:33:14] Speaker B: Yeah, that's exactly right. Fabian Castillo, they used the one per season exemption on Fabian Castillo, where they had his entire buy price, which was about $850,000 went out to his single one season salary. So for one season, he was a young DP, even though his base salary was only $185,000. [00:33:30] Speaker A: It's slowly putting me to sleep. [00:33:31] Speaker B: Yeah, I know. This is why the rules are freaking stupid. What matters is like if. But Paxton is not a DP, right? So whatever. You have like 900 grand of his salary to get with a salary budget to use on a player. So if that player costs less than $900,000 in salary, then you have a little bit of a room for salary cap for a buy in that cap. If not, you need some more tam and gam. So Tamagam is also for reducing a salary cap. Look, it's stupid. What you need to know is that, yes, there's money available potentially to replace Paxton. It's easier on a free player. So if he is done for the year now, this is all new conversation. If he's not, if you can wait till the summer and get a guy who's available for free, it's a lot easier than if you do it now. So those are the complications. How much money do they have laying around to buy a player? Do they still need something else? Do you have to pay a transfer fee? It's incredibly complicated and obviously incredibly stupid because no one's going to care about the minutiae, all that stuff. Just can we or can't we? So it's going to depend greatly on what kind of situation they have and what they want to do. And it's not likely that FC Dallas is going to go out and sign a big priced player to replace Paxton if he is done for the year, because then you have to worry about next year. And it was different when we were talking about a DP player like Velasco. Part of the value of putting him on season ending IR would have been the DP spot that you would have opened up. But Paxton doesn't have one of those, right. And Paxton, in fact, is the player that's above the DP number that you have to buy down. So that's another part of any replacing him is that you'll need the money to buy him down. So whatever their salary is now under the DP mark. Again, stupid rules. But people wonder why you can't just go do these things. And this is know intermiami does them because they cut guys and they get rid of them and they just can, dudes, they don't try and save guys and have them think about future seasons. So they could be incredibly ruthless. They probably use the buyout on Jesus cementes. Probably. We don't know for sure, but they probably did. But if they didn't, they could use that on Paxton if you want to be ruthless. Or you could put them on IR for the end of the year and then do the buyout on him next year. I'm just saying there's possible ways to if you want to be a jerk about it, but I don't think anyone wants to. Shit can Paxton out of the. [00:35:55] Speaker A: It's a, it's a curious situation because they've got a coach. Mean, I think he's on his last year under the contract, but with an option year on his part or something. I don't know if I remember. My point being is that Nico is in a weird situation because now know dealing with this roster issue where he's lost two critical players in his third year on the deal and he's probably banging on what's his face's door going, dude, you got to help me out here. Yeah, Zanata, there's got to be something else that I'm sure Dan and Clark are like, we gave you $10 million and he went out and spent it on one dude. How much more do you guys want me to do? But you're four games into the season and I don't want to be doom and gloom guy, but we've been doing this for almost 30 years. We kind of know how this thing feels and it feels like something that could very quickly spin out of control, especially when you're four games into the season and the players already don't look all that interested to begin with. [00:37:00] Speaker B: Yeah, I think that they'll sit and wait for an official ruling on Palmergal before they do anything. But that's in terms of activity. Your TD and his new assistant TD should be proactively thinking about such things all the time. If they're doing their jobs correctly, they should have, in the back of their minds or even on a piece of paper have a list of like, okay, what happens if we lose pax in a year or many for the season, what do we do? They should have a list of names. They should have a list of names. What happens if 15 million comes in for hey, Susan, he's gone. They should have a list of names. What happens if we're down a center back for the year? They should have a list of names. What happens if chip pause gets hurt? Do we bring back Carrera? Do we let him stay there? We go get somebody else. They should know the answers to these questions. So we talk about them because it's fun. Not fun, but fun to conjecture. Like what are they going to do? But in the same principle, you're right. If you got the center of this team, if you take out Velasco, Pomacol and Ira Mendy, which is effectively what's know, this team will be screwed over the long course of the season. You just cannot be any good if you have no heart or core to your midfield of talent. If you're left with just workmen like players. This is a league of parity, right? Everyone's got pretty solid rosters throughout this league. It's the special players and we've said this a million times that make a difference. And if you've taken out all the special players in central midfield and you're left with just workmen like defenders, which is what they have, and workmen like central midfielders which is what they have, then your two other special players, Musa and Jesus, are not going to get the ball. And we all know what happens when that happens. So then it won't matter what the coach does. [00:38:42] Speaker C: It's probably a good time to say that psychology today is a really good resource if you need a therapist. [00:38:54] Speaker A: Wow, crazy. So why don't you run? I know you've talked a lot about talking to Nico today. Anything else about that conversation? What is your read on his vibe at this point? [00:39:09] Speaker B: Well, I will say that I did specifically ask him about Palmer calls mental state and he said, know a couple of weeks ago he was in a dark place, but he said he's much better now and I think that the meetings he's having and the people he's talking to are making him feel better about things. So that was nice to hear. And then he was obviously about the sternness I've ever heard about. When we were talking about the goals that they let in against Vancouver and how that is not their was very. We talked a lot today about getting back to what they are, which means that you're going to probably see it doubling down on some defensive cohesion and effort, which is probably fine given that the way your team is built, the way you need to play, the way this team plays best is when they do that. So there's nothing wrong with that. Outside of that, I think you can tell that everyone's still trying to figure out what they're going to do. They worked a lot on both sort of defensive sets in training today. I think coach is not convinced what the best way forward is anymore. Before he was very convinced that the three in the back was going to be the answer for most of the season and I think now he's not. Which is funny that it went bad when he tried a four and now he's less convinced that the three is the answer. I think he probably hoped that he had that four in the back of his pocket this whole time. And he could always go back to it. And now he's worried about that. So now he makes him worried about the three. And so it's just weird to be in a place with this particular coach. The defensive resiliency is what's making him a little nervous. But the attitude training was good. I thought it was pretty positive. It wasn't super dark and gloomy, which is what I was kind of expecting it might be, but I don't think that they've given up. When you talk to people around the building, people still around that place still really think very highly of Nico as a coach, whether it's teammates or whether it's people around the team or in the front office or whatever, there's not a lot of people that are like, there's not any that are like, man, this coach sucks. We need to get a new coach eventually. You hear that when guys have to break down, you'll hear grumbling around the club. It's not like that at all yet. And we've talked before and it's pretty clear the history of this club that the hunts aren't panic decision makers. So it's not like they're going to pull the trigger next week on a new coach. It's like they're going to let guys go wait into the season and probably give them all the way through the second window before they were going to do anything crazy. They never make changes early. They always make changes late when they've bait them. And usually when something really embarrassing goes south and there's lots of time left. [00:41:30] Speaker C: For something embarrassing to go south. [00:41:33] Speaker B: Yeah, I mean, if this thing craters and you're in big trouble. But there are some concerns and some of those concerns can be addressed quickly and easily. Some of them can't. There's some other injuries that are going to get better here soon. We should probably talk about some of them and there's some that should. Since we talked about the gloom of packs, maybe we should talk about the positivity of some of the other ones. [00:41:56] Speaker A: Okay, go ahead. [00:41:57] Speaker B: Well, they're expecting if the current progress of Yara Mindy and Logan Farrington holds, then they both will rejoin training Monday, Tuesday of next week and will be available for the next game. So that's a positive prognosis. That's good. Logan was running around on the side and looked pretty fine to me. Giovanni Jesus was outside running with Logan. I'd seen him jogging before, but today he was like running, running, which is really good. Obviously the real test is when he gets to get to cutting. But I asked coach and he said that he'll be back in May or June 1 of those two, so that's really relevant. Speaking right around the he mentioned, I mentioned Alan and he said that that's still August or September, so don't. Despite the videos the club keeps putting out. Sometimes I feel like they do those more for Al than for anybody else. [00:42:49] Speaker A: Man, I saw that video and the scar on his knee looks so fresh. That's all natural and everything, but that's definitely not the scar of a guy about to come back and start playing soccer anytime soon. [00:43:05] Speaker B: Yeah, until you start pounding on it and cutting on it is the real don't. There can be all kinds of things that can happen in the last second that can delay these things. There's nothing magic about it. By the time but Giovanni Jesus was within shouting distance of him being back, so that's good. And then getting our mini back next week will be the biggest one. Obviously that's the piece that's really killing him because the connectivity to the front line is he's a transcendent, special player. Without him, it's just not anywhere near as good. So those are relatively positive. But the same things hold like if the defense continues to go to pieces, I think that'll be obviously a really bad sign. And I honestly think it's mental. And part of that mental is that guys have not been healthy and playing together, but that's still mental. I think it'll solve itself because that's what this coach preaches is that defensive responsibility. So I'm not real worried about that particular showing. If that trend continues, it'll be a then you know that the front line, a lot of it's just going to know. Jesus troubles, I think, really do stem from not having a midfield behind know Dan, where are you at all that. [00:44:16] Speaker C: Sarah still looking up a therapist? [00:44:21] Speaker A: Well, I guess what I wanted to know is my observation from being at the game is that Nico is. I think he's arguably the most even keeled manager this club has ever had. I don't think I saw him express one iota of emotion that entire game against Vancouver. Now maybe part of that is that the team was in such a bad state so early in the game, giving up those two goals the way they did. He just was like, I can't gin this up. But I do begin to wonder how much of this team overall in the way that they tend to perform as a squad. How much do either one of you think is reflective of him in just his kind of even keeled nature. [00:45:11] Speaker C: Danny, thoughts on actually he presents very even mean from everything I hear. He's not that in the locker room. It's just that very european mentality of the locker room is the sacred space. That's where stuff comes out. Everything else is all like say your p's and Q's. The thing I found odd actually, in the press conference after the game, he said he felt the team deserved to get something out of the game. [00:45:45] Speaker A: What? [00:45:45] Speaker C: I'm not sure they even deserve to get the goal. [00:45:48] Speaker A: Yeah, they were terrible Saturday night. That's the worst performance I've seen out of a Dallas team in person because I feel like I can much better judge a club by watching them in person than I've seen in quite some time. I was really disappointed in what I. [00:46:03] Speaker C: Saw and it was a one through eleven bad performance. Pars didn't pull out the amazing saves we know he can. Tafari was completely asleep on the first goal. Ibiaga is still doing star jumps on the third goal. Fullbacks, their missed crosses all day midfield went adrift. We talked about like they were 35 yards up from the defense going forward, they were nowhere to be seen. Jesus dropping back Legit and Ariola, arguably the two best players performance wise. Meester obviously missed a couple of was just that. They deserved absolutely nothing from that game. And if everyone's going to shit the bed collectively and then pick themselves up, great. [00:46:52] Speaker B: I think that the defensive breakdowns when I talked about him with that, with him today, was about the most heated I've ever seen him get. He had some real emotion in his eyes and expression about that. I think that's the thing that made him mad. I think the thing about feeling like he could have gotten something has to do with putting themselves in, getting the shots. When they had twelve shots at Vancouver, six, Vancouver had very little goal scoring opportunity except for the three shots they put on target, which all three went in. So if the cohesion is there defensively, that normally is, that game might be one nothing. None of those three goals really should have happened. Yeah, of course the goals changed the game, but it's like last year, twelve shots, it would have been fine because this team shoots at a very high efficiency. Let rate when Jesus is in the box, they would have gotten multiple goals off those twelve shots. But this year they're not doing that. So some of that I think he's right about. Is it like, look, yes, we have to go back and find who we were and who we are. And once we do that, then we can start talking about the offense again. So I'm expecting sort of a week. [00:47:58] Speaker A: Of wait, but hold on, wait. When he says, we got to go back and find out who we were, who we are, what does that mean? Because you don't want to be who you were last season. [00:48:08] Speaker B: No. Yes, he does. He wants to go back to who he was the last two seasons, when they had one of the best defenses in the league. Find that again, and then to build on, you can at least stop bleeding and stop bleeding points and start getting being in games, and then you start worrying about. And then once you find that, then Jesus won't be doing what he's doing, and you'll give Jesus and Musa a chance to get on the same page, and you'll get guys healthy again, and you'll be. [00:48:35] Speaker A: Then why did you change the formation, Mr. Manager, if you want to be like you were last season? [00:48:40] Speaker B: Well, because he didn't think that the defense would go to shit like it has or in this particular game that it did. I think that there were some growing pains in the early games related to guys trying to learn new positions and guys not being healthy and guys learning a new know. There was this defensive collapse like we saw against Vancouver, and so that's what he means by like, look, we got to shake that off, figure out what were wrong there and get that right really quickly, and then we can go back to trying to figure out how to get Fort more offensively in this other shape or not. And maybe he'll give up on it. [00:49:11] Speaker C: But it was funny because in changing the shape, it was prioritizing the attack. He'd said that the change was to try and get in and around the Vancouver back three just by focusing on the offense, he's kind of lost the defense, which is a little concerning because, like you say, that's the identity. That's the thing. Know, Dan Hunt talks, you know, defense is there. We just need to worry about scoring goals. Yeah, you've lost your foundation. I've known a ton of coaches down the year who they build their team, center backs out. They can always win or work their game one nil. [00:49:55] Speaker B: Yeah. In regard to the tactics, specifically against Vancouver, going back to the back four with three wingers up front, I asked him about that execution, and he said that the opportunities they did create, most of them came from that tactical tweak, that Ariola and Dante Seeley were two of the most creative players in the sense of creating opportunities. Like when they looked into the metrics and that kind of so, like, that tactic worked like they expected offensively, but it was the defensive collapse that ruined this know, so that's what he means by we got to go back to what we were. It was this defensive stability, and then we can go back to talking about the offense. And look, when you had Aramindi, you got those 24 shots in the first game, right? So it's a different world when you got the pieces that you're supposed to have. Granted, I don't think it's not going to be the end all, be all having that guy back, but it's going to be massive. And if Paxton would have been back eventually, that would have been a big part. And maybe we can cross our fingers. It still will be someday. I'm just not optimistic about it in terms of this season, but we'll see. So legit has played pretty well. Can he fill that Paxton role in midfield? Perhaps. And if Dante Cele continues to progress. He looked pretty dangerous last game. He started passing the ball a little bit, which is really nice to see. Paul wasn't flashy, but the numbers were there for him. If Musa buries two of those shots, what are we talking about then? We'd only be talking about the defense being a problem. We wouldn't be talking about the offense being a problem. [00:51:19] Speaker A: Well, I disagree. I think what we'd be talking about is, thank God Dan and Clark spent $10 million on a nine finally. [00:51:25] Speaker B: Okay, fair, right? [00:51:27] Speaker A: Because the rest of the game wasn't very good. I mean, they were having troubles connecting passes from midfield to forward. The final pass into the final third was terrible all game. And I think there are a lot of things. I mean, look, this may be me falling back into stereotypes, but my pessimism over this season is built on a lot of things. And what I'm confused by is how we went from a team last season that was boring to this season where the team's just bad. And that's not the progression that I think everybody was kind of anticipating for this season, especially after the owners went out and spent all the money they did to sign a nine like that. And I think a lot of the concern is that, yeah, absolutely, some of this stuff isn't the manager's fault. There's a lot of injury issues, but I don't know how it's easier to look at this and go, I don't know how this gets better based on all, everything we have as kind of sitting out on the table in front of us right now. [00:52:26] Speaker B: Yeah, well, I honestly think that the cohesion that will come from continuing to play. Those. If you really are committed to this shape, there's two ways back. One is to abandon the three, four, three completely, go back to what got you there last year and then just wait for people to get healthy and hope that they can refine their defensive form and that Musa works. The other is to continue forward with this formation, have everybody figure it out in terms of playing together in it long enough, get everybody healthy again part and then see if it actually does fix your give you more offensive production. Last year they averaged, I'm looking at FE ref right now, FCD Dallas averaged ten shots on goal a game and this season, not even counting the game that they had 24 the last three games, it's been an average of twelve. So effectively they're basically the same team they were last year when it's not there, right, except the defense isn't quite as good. I'm talking about the offense. The offense is effectively the same when he's not there. When he is there, it's significantly better. So some of that is the formation and some of that is just people trying to do more things and attack in a better way. I'm not too worried about it on a macro level because there are these small things that are going to be short term fixable injuries and the cohesion of playing a new shape. The long term problems of I have some couple of long term injuries that are not going to be fixed anytime soon and I might be short of center back know and now I may be short of know. Those are the things that are concerning about the long term. Some of the things are not. I'm not too concerned about the tactical shape or the know short term injuries of eR, Mendy and Farrington and people like that. [00:54:18] Speaker A: All right, so you mentioned earlier they signed Carlos Sante, the haitian center back, not midfielder. [00:54:25] Speaker B: No matter what they tell you, he's centerback now, right? [00:54:30] Speaker A: Why don't you give everybody just kind of an overview and sense of him and how much you think he'll actually help or how quickly he can be able to help. [00:54:38] Speaker B: Well, I think he'll actually help because at the end, after I was done asking him all my questions, coach was like, how about that game at centerback from Carl yesterday? Not whatever that was. Talking about the North Texas game. I was know he Carl Sante has been a six. He's a six for Haiti and he's been a six mostly for North Texas last year. I've never been convinced that he would make it to MLS as a six. I don't think he's an MLS six. Last year they started trying him at center back and he's about 6ft tall or six one somewhere in that neck of the woods. So not prototype perfect, but still plenty of height. Lanky, he's strong, he can defend really well because he has a six, he can do the job and he's played really well in my viewing of him at North Texas. And then this spring they had him in Se Dallas camp and they took him to Spain and he played six, almost. Sorry, not six. He played center back 80% of the time. He was with Essie Dallas in the spring and played really, really well. I think that's when they started working on getting him added as a piece and it just took a while because he is from Haiti and so everything is complicated with Haiti. When you're talking about signings and contracts and visas and if you know anything about politics, you'll understand why that's the case. He does not have a green card, that's all part of it. But he was signed to be a centerback at the first team. Now if you need somebody for 15 minutes at a six to go out there and smash some people and be physical and be really defensive, then he can fill that role for you at this level. But is he going to be the starting six for this club? For. No, he's, if he's going to make it this level, is going to be a center back. So I rate him ahead of Corsia already. I think with some experience that he would be really quickly. In my opinion, he'll be ahead of Omar because of his range and athleticism and relative pace over those distances and ability to cover ground. So I think that he has a lot of capabilities that will work in both as a two man center back or a three man center back. Now today, is he going to start in front of Ibiaga or Tafari? No, obviously not. [00:56:45] Speaker A: And certainly still not the center back signing. We had all kind of dreamt of or assumed they were going to do it in the offseason. [00:56:52] Speaker B: He's relatively experienced because he's had something south of 20 cats with Haiti, but he's played in some gold cups, I think, and stuff like that. So he would have been called it this week if they had a visa situation was sorted out, but it wasn't. He's not the frontline international prime of career center back that I've been saying. We've been needing for a year and a half now to pair with Tafare as your two main guys. He's not that guy. I still think that guy's out there. And I'm hoping that they're actually going to realize that I was right, not that they shouldn't have already. And I'm not the only one that's been saying this, by the way. Lots of people have been saying this clue. Steve Davis, who works for the club, people like Matt Doyle have been talking about it. It's clear as day to everybody that that's what you need because it'd be August 32, so hopefully they're going to do it. We'll see. But he's not that guy. He's just a depth piece of good roster piece. Carl, Sunday. [00:57:47] Speaker A: Okay. [00:57:47] Speaker B: And so that center back, for me, that center back problem is like, that's the major problem with your defense and why it's slipped a little bit of age and injury and not having that cope, especially when you went three in the back. I love Sam Junka, but if he's your 34 game starter at center back, you have a problem, right? [00:58:03] Speaker A: Yeah. No, I completely agree. All right. The team does not have a game this weekend. Obviously, they don't play again until the 30th when they get to go down to Austin and play Broccoli, who are also having the season. I think we all assumed they were going to have. [00:58:20] Speaker C: That'll be a terrible game, wouldn't it? [00:58:22] Speaker A: Boy, that will be an awful, awful game. And I don't know. [00:58:27] Speaker B: Get well game, maybe. [00:58:29] Speaker A: Well, maybe it's the slump buster. [00:58:32] Speaker B: Yeah. So to me, get well game. [00:58:34] Speaker A: Yeah. [00:58:35] Speaker B: Let's do get help. [00:58:37] Speaker A: Yeah, for sure. I don't know. Trying to think what else I wanted to mention. [00:58:43] Speaker B: All right. [00:58:43] Speaker A: So, as I mentioned, I got to go to the game, and I got to sit with Buzz and his lovely wife Amy, and we got to sit in some really nice seats down in section 106. [00:58:54] Speaker B: Yeah. [00:58:55] Speaker A: Knifes. [00:58:56] Speaker B: That's fun. [00:58:57] Speaker A: Highfalutin. [00:58:58] Speaker B: Yeah. [00:58:58] Speaker A: And I took my friend Lars, who was in town. And by the way, Buzz, Lars wanted to do this episode of the podcast and talk about his experience, but he. [00:59:09] Speaker B: Had stone cold ghosted us, man. [00:59:11] Speaker A: Just, he's in LA and he saw some friends and his plans changed. Want to, first off, I wanted to thank you for coming and driving over and doing the radio show on Saturday. Lars was tremendously impressed by you, by the way. He was really impressed, and I kind of gave him some background and he thought that was really cool and it was funny. And the nicest thing Lars said about the entire experience, other than really enjoying the hall of Fame, which we did get to go into. Great. I should mention in a second, I got to explain that whole thing because that's a crazy story. You'll never guess what his favorite part of the entire experience Saturday night was. [01:00:01] Speaker C: Monster taco. [01:00:03] Speaker B: No. [01:00:05] Speaker A: We did not consume any food or beverage at the stadium. [01:00:09] Speaker B: Well, what was it? [01:00:10] Speaker A: It was the stage. [01:00:12] Speaker B: Oh, really? [01:00:13] Speaker A: So Lars puts it this way. He goes, Peter, you know how you're really into soccer kits and all the detail and stuff like that? I've been to more stadiums than I can count, and I'm really into unique stadium design elements, and I've never seen that kind of stage set up before. That's really quirky and weird. And that was his favorite thing. He kept talking about how unique and weird it was because it's unlike anything he'd ever seen before. He did not have much to say about the team. [01:00:41] Speaker B: It was not a good performance for him to watch. [01:00:43] Speaker A: Yeah, that's not exactly the game I was hoping to show off to my internationally renowned football journalist friend who was in town. I did not get lucky on that, but Lars and I were lucky enough to go to the hall of Fame. Now, I'm going to admit, somewhat embarrassingly, this is the first time I had officially been inside the soccer hall of Fame. Believe it or not only officially. I think I had taken two steps into it at one point because it was open at something I don't remember. But I have not gone and really experienced the US Soccer hall of Fame. And part of my frustration was that I thought about I should take Laura's to the US Soccer hall of Fame. I was under the impression it is not open on game days. That is incorrect. It is open earlier in the day on game days. [01:01:40] Speaker B: Right. [01:01:40] Speaker A: And if you are a season ticket holder, you can make a reservation. [01:01:48] Speaker B: To. [01:01:48] Speaker A: Kind of get a reservation to go in leading up until kickoff, from the time the gates open until kickoff. Apparently I did not know that. And that's something you can organize with people at the hall of Fame, I am told. I hope I am telling that correctly. My apologies to Nancy if I am repeating this incorrectly, and I will ask her to contact me so that I can correct it the next time. But I believe the actual deal is that the hall of Fame is open on game days earlier, prior to gates opening. After the gates opening, it's by invitation or reservation only through somebody who is a season ticket holder. I think I'm saying that correctly, and that makes far more sense than the ridiculousness that I thought was the fact that it wasn't open on game day because I was really frustrated that I was going to drive all the way to Frisco, and I couldn't take Lars to the US Soccer hall of Fame. But once we got in there, dude, how cool is all that stuff? [01:02:41] Speaker B: That's great. [01:02:42] Speaker A: So much cool stuff in there to look at. Lars was really impressed by all of it, and I was glad I had that experience. [01:02:51] Speaker B: Yeah. If it was me, I would get rid of all the computer integrated fun stuff that they have for the kids, which, of course, the kids love, but I would get rid of that crap. I would just go more displays, because for me, the displays are the amazing thing. The historic jerseys, the trophies and the boots and all the cool, amazing crap. [01:03:09] Speaker A: The jersey stuff in there is just like nirvana for kit knuckleheads like us. [01:03:15] Speaker B: And they have things like a World cup medal from, like, 1930, and they have a cap from, like, the. I mean, it's just crazy. Like, they actually used to hand out caps for real. That's why they're called people. They have trophies from championships, they have balls from World cup winning this, that. It's just incredible stuff. [01:03:36] Speaker A: They've got that amazing Colorado caribou tasseled brown stripper jersey. God, that is awesome. [01:03:43] Speaker B: Even, like, the cool wall of current champions is like, these are the current champions of all the leagues in the United States in cups. And there's like, whatever there are six or seven of, like, that's like, just everything in there is great, except for me and the current stuff. [01:03:57] Speaker C: But it'd be good if they restructured that, just down, not got rid of all of it. But there's a significant portion of know, a significant part of the real estate that's kind of taken up by mean. My favorite thing, honestly, is that little club that has the US Open cup and the World Cups in all the installations in the floor, because you've got the actual ball. That Landon Donovan scored the goal at the 2010 World cup, was it Algeria? Yeah, it's got the fellow that scored the goal to qualify him for the 1990 World cup. Was it color jury shot heard around. [01:04:38] Speaker B: The world, we call it, even though nobody cared about us. [01:04:40] Speaker C: I think Carly Lloyd's World cup final hat trick jersey might be in it. There's just some crazy things in that, in floor installation that you could easily walk by and miss. [01:04:51] Speaker A: Yeah, it is cool. And so I'm glad I got to do it. And Lars was tremendously impressed by it, and he was by and large impressed with the stadium and all the stuff, and it was a good time. We had a really good time. I always enjoy watching a burn game with my friend Buzz. [01:05:11] Speaker B: Oh, yeah. It was a pleasure. Always is. [01:05:14] Speaker A: Okay, well, I'm sorry. [01:05:16] Speaker B: Two things. [01:05:17] Speaker A: Okay. Are they good things? [01:05:18] Speaker B: Yes, they're good things. One is a shout out to 400 and SC, which knocked off Austin SC two in their open first run game. That was a really fun game. So many players in that team that I've heard of. Or either they're ex scallows guys or they're indoor guys like Vic Moore or like brand Padilla, who's still a player of so much potential, which just blown his knee out like 1800 times. Guys that play indoor futsaw at a really high level or play for the psychics, just Sunday beer leagues. [01:05:50] Speaker A: Like that Kyle Beckett guy. [01:05:52] Speaker B: Yeah. When I was out of practice today, one of the digital media dudes, like, man, I played against that guy in a men's game. It's just super cool to see them knock off Austin FCD two 40. At this point, they've replaced NTX Riatos, in my mind, as the best semi pro or amateur, whatever they are, team in town. [01:06:11] Speaker A: And Michelle is still the manager. [01:06:13] Speaker B: Michelle is still their manager. If he doesn't get a look the next time North Texas needs a coach, I don't know what to tell the guy because he's doing phenomenal things there. And as an assistant with, you know, he. They've won a UPSL national championship within the last couple of years. They win their league all the time. Now they're advancing into the open cup and knocking know MLS next pro teams. So hopefully they'll bid to host the game. That'd be cool if they get the next one, but we'll see what happens with them. But anyway, shout out to them that that team did well. And then when I realized it was Brandon Padilla that scored one of the PKs to win, I was like, you've got to be kidding me. That guy, he was a former FC Dallas Academy player. That was, I think, like one year behind Paxton, maybe. And he was a world beater at that time. Like national player of the year. [01:07:00] Speaker C: He was the one, I think, that scored the goal against Real Madrid in that huge Ga cup. [01:07:07] Speaker A: That's. [01:07:08] Speaker B: That sounds right. And he went to Maryland, I think it was, and then blew out his knee twice and was there for like seven years. But still, every once in a while. [01:07:17] Speaker A: Would like, got his PhD. [01:07:18] Speaker B: Yeah. Every once in a while he would pop up with this banger of like a 30 yard blast of a goal and he was again looking really good. So I was watching him in this game. I was like, dude, if North Texas call, we should call him right now, because at one point, he was honestly a world beater for the academy, and the guy needs an opportunity probably if he still wants to do it. He may have been hurt so many times, he no longer does. I don't want to speak for the guy, but when I saw his name, I saw him play. I was like, grab him quick and see. Bring him in practice and see what it looks like. See what's there with that knee and see how he would hold up. But anyway, super cool to see them win that game and hopefully good things for them in the next round. [01:07:52] Speaker A: What was your other thing? [01:07:53] Speaker B: The other thing is that you won't believe this, Peter. I got an email from somebody in media relations from the league office in New York, and this week, I had a conference call with a media guy from New York from the league to see how our season was going. How can we help you? How's your coverage? Do you have any concerns, like a legit Zoom call for, like, 25 minutes with a guy, just you and a guy, just me. And he set it up. He said, we want to make sure that you're getting everything you need for your coverage. So how cool is that, right? What list did I get on that? I got this call that I was like, this is awesome. [01:08:33] Speaker C: That's the same list that people are getting their credentials pulled from. Sorry. [01:08:37] Speaker B: Yeah, it could be. I raised that as a concern, by the way. I said, I don't know any details, but I explained to him why from my position. It's a concern, but let's not air that out here. It was just super cool that I gave him one or two little things like, oh, here's the thing that helped me. This could help me. And he was even asking about academy coverage next pro. Like, the whole thing. And they knew who I am and what we do collectively. [01:08:58] Speaker A: Martin, hope they know who you are. Well, still been around longer than all of them combined. [01:09:04] Speaker B: Yeah, right. Well, still, it was pretty cool. I mean, it's nice to have them not just ignore know. So that was nice. I just wanted to give them credit for that. For the first time ever that they've. The commissioner is who I am, and the VP of marketing knows, Dan Quartermunch knows who I am. But it's like they've always just kind of left us over in a corner by ourselves, and so to have them actively reach out and maybe they're doing this to other media people, too, I have no idea. But to me, it was super cool, and I just thought it was worth expressing that it was ICE. [01:09:35] Speaker A: It only took him 29 years to learn media relations 101. [01:09:39] Speaker B: The world's changing. Anyway, that was cool. And he even offered like, the sun's. [01:09:45] Speaker A: Going to disappear in the middle of the day. Next. [01:09:48] Speaker B: He's like, if you want to get any of the Apple TV guys on to talk about this or that or whatever, I was like, this is great. Next time I have a need of body, I'm going to call Weebie up, get him in oil. [01:09:59] Speaker A: Unbelievable. [01:10:00] Speaker B: Yeah, it was cool, man. [01:10:01] Speaker A: That's crazy, man. It was a good week for you because the other thing is that you were the apple of all local DFW high school male soccer players eyes. Because the third degree version of Dave Campbell's Texas football players list came out this week. [01:10:18] Speaker B: Man, I struggled putting that list together because there's a couple groups that are know because I'm so concerned with the FC Dallas and the pathway to the pros, for know, for FC Dallas in this organization, even like the other teams, I'm only really aware of the top couple of guys in any given. Really big, powerful, and, like, when I started getting into some of those age groups, I was like, man, I don't know any of these teams or these names. So I had to reach out to a couple of people. I was checking with this list and that list to compile some stuff, and I managed to find some guys, and a couple of them are fascinating people. So it's a fun list if you haven't read it and you care about stories from kids in Texas, and there's even one or two of them that I was like, wow, really? That guy's just. [01:11:03] Speaker A: I get entertained because I have been told on more than one occasion when that comes out that literally, the players, the high school kids, all talk about it like they're excited to see it because Buzz has mentioned them personally or somebody they know. Well, that's, you know, for those listening to the pod that don't know what Dave Campbell's Texas football monthly players list like, it's the thing if you're into high school football. Um, and so the fact that buzz has kind of built his own version of that, I think is really sweet. I think it's really cool. [01:11:35] Speaker B: Some of the interesting things on that list is that I've explained about the homegrown territory change, right? That Dallas can now tag a certain number of players. I think it's nine from outside of their academy as if they were in the academy. So some of the names that people have told me or that I'm guessing are tags are in that you can. You can peruse it with an eye and if you're informed and maybe you. [01:11:58] Speaker A: Could spot some of them, well, I'm going to put you on the spot and let's give a bonus win for one of these kids that is on the list. If there was one kid on the list that you should tell everybody should keep an eye out for, which one is it? [01:12:13] Speaker B: Well, it's actually a kid that I've only very recently become aware of and he plays for BVB here in town. Dortmund's a regional affiliate or whatever. It's a pretty loose affiliate. His name is Samuel Seda or Seda s e d e h. I think he must be brazilian american because he puts little brazilian flags on all of his social media stuff. But he already has somewhere in the neck of like 21,000 followers on Instagram or something and I was reading a little blurb about him and he's already scored something like 250 goals or something. His academy, what age group is he? He's a U 15 and he's been in some US national team ID camps and I came across. I had never really heard of him a lot until very recently. And so I watched some YouTube videos of the dude and he is electric. [01:13:07] Speaker A: What position is he? [01:13:08] Speaker B: He's either a nine or more often a wing. The tape I'm looking at, he's a wing, plays on the left wing, which could either be switch foot or I don't know which footed he is, but he just blasts past people and just rips it. So that was a new find for me and a fascinating player. And what I will say about a lot of these players that may or may not be tagged by FC Dallas or playing an exceptional level for some of these clubs that aren't MLS next clubs, it's like there are guys that have come through these ECNL clubs and you're not playing against the highest level of play. You know what I mean? You don't challenge yourself at the highest level you can get to. And some of them have to do with teams they grew up with or coaches they really know. There's some really tough decisions being made by some of these kids that have pro potential about who they're going to play with and what their pathway is going to be. And you can succeed at the pathway outside of MLS next. It is possible, it does happen, but there's tough calls that have to be made. And I don't know what to tell them, honestly. But if you want a single name, that's a new one for me that I had not really become aware of until very recently, like within the last month or so. [01:14:12] Speaker A: What is it again? [01:14:14] Speaker B: Samuel Seta. S e e n h. I believe he's a brazilian American. I don't know how brazilian. [01:14:19] Speaker A: Are they in Dallas cup? [01:14:20] Speaker B: Yes, they're in the U 15s. Yeah. Place for BVB International, which is the Dortmund. It's a licensed Dortmund academy. It's not like an official. It's the same clause that was Liverpool licensed before, and now they switch to. [01:14:33] Speaker A: BVB because it was less expensive. [01:14:35] Speaker B: Is that why? I don't know, but he's pretty mean. Anyone on that list is interesting. Try them all. But that's a guy that I only recently found out about that I was pretty excited of when I watched his tape on. [01:14:49] Speaker A: Hmm, excellent. Well, that's good stuff. Go check out Buzz's list. And because Dallas cup is literally right around the corner, probably by the time you're listening to this episode, it will be starting. And it's the best time of year here in the Dallas fort worth area. And there's lots of good soccer to be watched. [01:15:08] Speaker B: Each of the academy teams. I also gave you three, four, five guys that are really high on my list per age know, and none of them are, of course, definitive. They do change over, but like, in any given age group, at any given moment, I have four or five, six guys that are my top guys. I'm watching, and they're all listed in there. [01:15:24] Speaker A: You're a legend, Buzz Carrick. [01:15:26] Speaker B: Well, in my own mind, perhaps. [01:15:29] Speaker A: All right, well, we killed way more time than I ever possibly imagined we could after that crappy game last week, but glad we got it done. Anything else before we shut up shop for this evening? I will take that as a no no. [01:15:44] Speaker B: Third degree. The podcast has been brought to you by Soccer 90 Dot. Explore the sweet New Michelin Ness Limited edition, limited quantity Dallas burn throwback jackets, hoodies, and tees. That stuff is sweet. It's beautiful, honestly. Hurry. If you're a third degree listener, you get 20% off with code. Third degree in store and online. Check out and get the great savings. Both locations enter code third degreesoccer.com. Some exclusions may apply. Third degree. The podcast has also been brought to you by the Lindstrom law firm. For Wills trust, probate and business law. Call 469-515-2559 that's 469-515-2559 or visit lindstromlawfirm.com for a free consultation. [01:16:25] Speaker A: All right, Dan, glad you're back. [01:16:28] Speaker C: Have a good evening. [01:16:31] Speaker A: You have a good evening, too, sir. And buzz, have a good Dallas cup, sir. [01:16:37] Speaker B: Thanks, man. I will. I'm very excited. And thank you for being here to. [01:16:39] Speaker A: Hold this all together for us any old time. And thank you, FC Dallas. Curious fan. Well, we'll talk next week. Good news is it won't be about a loss, and we'll do that again on another episode of third degree, the podcast. [01:16:55] Speaker B: I forgot to whisper. Bollocks. Third degree, the third degree, never podcast. Third degree, the third degree, pocket, never get 30 degree, never.