Home - 08/20 New England

[Seth]

But it seems like it's a different story when Alex gets trashed shortly after seemingly leaving the club. Genuine question - why is that?

Why is that? It's because she's a woman in public. She dresses up for her sideline interviews and gets criticized. But if she wore an NYCFC jersey, Levis, and no makeup she'd get criticized just as much if not more. And nobody ever seems to care about Joe Tolleson's outfit for some reason.

This sort of thing happens to women all the time. It's not normal, and it's not "just how things are in our culture." And speaking as a man I'm sure I don't even know the half of it.

In an effort to avoid the thousand word essay I'll just say that men, if you don't want have your entire character judged based on the shoes you chose to wear to the match then perhaps women don't want to be judged that way either. And now lather/rinse/repeat with everything in your entire life you might think of saying to or about a woman.

And heck, maybe don't even say anything and just listen instead. Who knows what might happen?

 

[Midas Mulligan]

Gonna hope you meant Wallace and not Mata.

Revs defense isn't great though, and with the way Villa is playing right now, I like our chances.

We tied them in May with a midfield of Maxi, Mikey and TMac. Having Herrera is an upgrade.

Revs also haven't won a game on the road all year. It would be very disappointing to give them their first

I fixed it. You were right that I meant Wallace. Although, I'd still take Mata on one leg over what we'll likely see.

 

[Midas Mulligan]

And heck, maybe don't even say anything and just listen instead. Who knows what might happen?

Horrible idea. I think even Sensi-Seth you would be very disappointed at how utterly vapid the whole charade is.

 

[Midas Mulligan]

This was a bad point well put. Reason being, in all of your examples, the action that denotes really "giving a shit" are well within your abilities. In assuming that the things that people expect out of Pirlo are within his abilities, and that he is not delivering upon these expectations, you are falsely concluding that he doesn't "give a shit".

FWIW, I think that people's expectations are generally out of line with what constitutes successful performance in his role, but to elaborate upon that would be to flog the proverbial dead horse.

I think he's capable of not hiding behind the wall. And I'd like to see him at least try do more than briskly walk occasionally. I know it's not his thing, but just sell me that you're trying to run.

Then again, No Sweat doesn't run either, and he doesn't have quite the same resume, to say the least

 

[mgarbowski]

I think he came here to get paid to live in NYC and soccer concerns were secondary. He fought and held out when he signed to get a guaranteed third year. He got it. He isn't playing. And he's happy. Fuck him. He doesn't care. Villa cares. Maxi cares. Maybe not as much as Villa, but he cares. FFS Frank showed more caring at least while he was here than Pirlo does. If Frank was benched he would have been pissed. Pirlo is getting paid to lounge around NYC and be available should he be called upon and he's happy about it.

 

[Christopher Jee]

I think he came here to get paid to live in NYC and soccer concerns were secondary. He fought and held out when he signed to get a guaranteed third year. He got it. He isn't playing. And he's happy. Fuck him. He doesn't care. Villa cares. Maxi cares. Maybe not as much as Villa, but he cares. FFS Frank showed more caring at least while he was here than Pirlo does. If Frank was benched he would have been pissed. Pirlo is getting paid to lounge around NYC and be available should he be called upon and he's happy about it.

I don't really see how being pissed would actually ameliorate the situation besides providing good optics for people who take that as a signifier of caring. If anything, it would make things worse from a squad harmony perspective.

Personally I think it's possible to care, try as hard as possible, and yet be calm and sanguine about not being in the starting 11.

Besides, he got a slightly less exuberant hairdo. Nothing says "I mean business" like a business haircut, right? :joy:

 

[SoupInNYC]

Maybe not as much as Villa, but he cares.

I'm not gonna get into the debate on whether or not Pirlo cares. But there isn't one player in this league that cares as much as Villa.

I always try to avoid hyperboles, but I honestly think David Villa is the most competitive person I've ever witnessed play in any sport, ever.

 

[mgarbowski]

I don't really see how being pissed would actually ameliorate the situation besides providing good optics for people who take that as a signifier of caring. If anything, it would make things worse from a squad harmony perspective.

Personally I think it's possible to care, try as hard as possible, and yet be calm and sanguine about not being in the starting 11.

Besides, he got a slightly less exuberant hairdo. Nothing says "I mean business" like a business haircut, right? :joy:

I'm generally very sympathetic to low key passion and intensity. It's tends to be my own mode, among other things. I see no signs of it from him. I could be wrong.

But in the words of my favorite fictional character, "Behavior is truth." I've expected this from the beginning. There's an aging world class player under contract being let go by his team for $0, and who holds out in extended negotiations with his new team not over money, but demanding an extra year of the contract. That told me he likely knew he was done, that after 1.5 more years everyone would know it, and he knew there was no way he'd ever get a third year on his contract unless he got it in advance. Nothing that has happened since has given me reason to doubt those initial expectations. He bought into this from the beginning. Pirlo is a classic MLS 1.__ [whatever] failure DP who came to experience living in America and get paid for it, knowing he was done. Any residual benefit of the doubt I held disappeared with hiding behind the wall on a free kick. That is not the action of any player who cares if he sees his name on a lineup card ever again.

Almost 3 full years in and we have had 3 DPs play in only 39% of our games.
We had 0 or 1 DP play in more than a full quarter of the team's games.

NYCFC has paid it's DPs collectively about $42.8 million and that level of active participation is pathetic. Minnesota's decision seems smart by comparison. At least it's cost efficient.

So Fuck Pirlo.
Fuck Frank for staying in Manchester and putting the club in the desperate position so they caved into Pirlo for 2017.
Fuck Soriano for giving into Frank and Man City's demands for that.
Fuck Man City.
Fuck Man City.
Fuck Man City.
Fuck Man City.
Fuck Man City.

And fuck Frank and worthless fucking Pirlo again for good measure.

MLS has 22 teams with 66 DP slots. I know at least 3 are unused, let's figure about 60. NYC has the best one. But if you open the list to all MLS players, can anyone say that Pirlo should even make a current top 100 MLS player list? Top 200? Hell, I'm not sure Maxi makes top 50.

I'm rambling, so I'll stop here, but we have a weirdly structured damn team. It's Villa, then some real quality young unknowns we mostly get through scouting, which is the one thing CFG delivered, and then just a ton of crap, some of it way too expensive. It's astounding we're in second place overall, with an actual shot at Supporter Shield, with Villa and no other stars. Thing is, I fear we're the Riley/Van Gundy Knicks. Ewing never had that second star to put them over the top, and Villa never has either. If he does it, this will be a bigger legacy than what he did in Spain, even though most won't realize it.

 

[Christopher Jee]

I'm generally very sympathetic to low key passion and intensity.
But in the words of my favorite fictional character, "Behavior is truth." I've expected this from the beginning. There's an aging world class player under contract being let go by his team for $0, and who holds out in extended negotiations with his new team not over money, but demanding an extra year of the contract. That told me he likely knew he was done, that after 1.5 more years everyone would know it, and he knew there was no way he'd ever get a third year on his contract unless he got it in advance.

"Behavior is truth" as a saying has some simplistic allure. However, behavior is interpreted, and many possible truths can be explained by the same behavior in the absence of all of the context. You essentially have a system of equations with more unknowns than equations, so you can't solve for the value of intent. For example, with the contract dispute that you describe above, I think you'd see the same behavior from a player whether they know they are done or not. In other words, it's possible that Pirlo thought he was good for an extra year. However, since you don't rate his performance, you're conveniently assuming that he thought he was only worth 1.5 years.

Any residual benefit of the doubt I held disappeared with hiding behind the wall on a free kick. That is not the action of any player who cares if he sees his name on a lineup card ever again.

I think this "hiding behind the free kick" thing is completely overblown:

.

The free kick is clearly going over the right (far side from Pirlo) side of the wall. I think he makes a move to push the wall that way or even just go that way himself. If he'd stayed put and jumped on the spot, it would have done nothing except provide the kind of optics that people interpret as "giving a shit". When we say he's "hiding", we're inserting things we simply don't know into the narrative.

I'm not saying we can't have opinions and we can't speculate. But I think it's only fair to allow that we know some small collection of facts and are insinuating everything else in order to post-justify the opinions we're predisposed to.

Now for the parts of your post I would have repped if it weren't for all the rest

I'm generally very sympathetic to low key passion and intensity. It's tends to be my own mode, among other things. I see no signs of it from him. I could be wrong.
...
I'm rambling, so I'll stop here, but we have a weirdly structured damn team. It's Villa, then some real quality young unknowns we mostly get through scouting, which is the one thing CFG delivered, and then just a ton of crap, some of it way too expensive. It's astounding we're in second place overall, with an actual shot at Supporter Shield, with Villa and no other stars. Thing is, I fear we're the Riley/Gundy Knicks. Ewing never had that second star to put them over the top, and Villa never has either. If he does it, this will be a bigger legacy than what he did in Spain, even though most won't realize it.

Fair play for calling out things that CFG has done well. I agree that Villa is carrying this team and that our money hasn't been spent as well as it might have been, or as well as other teams have spent their money. But trashing players and projecting that they don't give a shit is way too far, IMO.

 

[Midas Mulligan]

I'm generally very sympathetic to low key passion and intensity. It's tends to be my own mode, among other things. I see no signs of it from him. I could be wrong.

But in the words of my favorite fictional character, "Behavior is truth." I've expected this from the beginning. There's an aging world class player under contract being let go by his team for $0, and who holds out in extended negotiations with his new team not over money, but demanding an extra year of the contract. That told me he likely knew he was done, that after 1.5 more years everyone would know it, and he knew there was no way he'd ever get a third year on his contract unless he got it in advance. Nothing that has happened since has given me reason to doubt those initial expectations. He bought into this from the beginning. Pirlo is a classic MLS 1.__ [whatever] failure DP who came to experience living in America and get paid for it, knowing he was done. Any residual benefit of the doubt I held disappeared with hiding behind the wall on a free kick. That is not the action of any player who cares if he sees his name on a lineup card ever again.

Almost 3 full years in and we have had 3 DPs play in only 39% of our games.
We had 0 or 1 DP play in more than a full quarter of the team's games.

NYCFC has paid it's DPs collectively about $42.8 million and that level of active participation is pathetic. Minnesota's decision seems smart by comparison. At least it's cost efficient.

So Fuck Pirlo.
Fuck Frank for staying in Manchester and putting the club in the desperate position so they caved into Pirlo for 2017.
Fuck Soriano for giving into Frank and Man City's demands for that.
Fuck Man City.
Fuck Man City.
Fuck Man City.
Fuck Man City.
Fuck Man City.

And fuck Frank and worthless fucking Pirlo again for good measure.

MLS has 22 teams with 66 DP slots. I know at least 3 are unused, let's figure about 60. NYC has the best one. But if you open the list to all MLS players, can anyone say that Pirlo should even make a current top 100 MLS player list? Top 200? Hell, I'm not sure Maxi makes top 50.

I'm rambling, so I'll stop here, but we have a weirdly structured damn team. It's Villa, then some real quality young unknowns we mostly get through scouting, which is the one thing CFG delivered, and then just a ton of crap, some of it way too expensive. It's astounding we're in second place overall, with an actual shot at Supporter Shield, with Villa and no other stars. Thing is, I fear we're the Riley/Van Gundy Knicks. Ewing never had that second star to put them over the top, and Villa never has either. If he does it, this will be a bigger legacy than what he did in Spain, even though most won't realize it.

Repped for vehemence. I don't even care if I agree with it all. I just enjoyed reading it.

 

[Midas Mulligan]

"Behavior is truth" as a saying has some simplistic allure. However, behavior is interpreted, and many possible truths can be explained by the same behavior in the absence of all of the context. You essentially have a system of equations with more unknowns than equations, so you can't solve for the value of intent. For example, with the contract dispute that you describe above, I think you'd see the same behavior from a player whether they know they are done or not. In other words, it's possible that Pirlo thought he was good for an extra year. However, since you don't rate his performance, you're conveniently assuming that he thought he was only worth 1.5 years.

I think this "hiding behind the free kick" thing is completely overblown:

.

The free kick is clearly going over the right (far side from Pirlo) side of the wall. I think he makes a move to push the wall that way or even just go that way himself. If he'd stayed put and jumped on the spot, it would have done nothing except provide the kind of optics that people interpret as "giving a shit". When we say he's "hiding", we're inserting things we simply don't know into the narrative.

I'm not saying we can't have opinions and we can't speculate. But I think it's only fair to allow that we know some small collection of facts and are insinuating everything else in order to post-justify the opinions we're predisposed to.

Now for the parts of your post I would have repped if it weren't for all the rest

Fair play for calling out things that CFG has done well. I agree that Villa is carrying this team and that our money hasn't been spent as well as it might have been, or as well as other teams have spent their money. But trashing players and projecting that they don't give a shit is way too far, IMO.

I like that you're an obstinate fuck who passes off your inane bullshit as critical thinking when you not once ever cave to anyone else's point.

Since we're licking each other's popsicles and all.

(ETA: In case it's not clear, what I'm doing here is satire based upon the fact that you are as dug in as anyone else is about anything else. And I'm fine with that. But you have to also realize that it's psychologically violent.)

 

[Lasker]

What if the real Pirlo defenders are the ones who cling to the assumption that mere change in attitude would make him useful again?

 

[Ulrich]

What if the real Pirlo defenders are the ones who cling to the assumption that mere change in attitude would make him useful again?

Is that a change in attitude to care about playing time or to be self-aware and retire? Because the only way he's useful at this point is to retire.

 

[Midas Mulligan]

What if the real Pirlo defenders are the ones who cling to the assumption that mere change in attitude would make him useful again?

Who are those people? Identify yourselves for public shaming.

 

[Lasker]

Who are those people? Identify yourselves for public shaming.

My bad, I missed your 5%/95% post on the precious page. Your two more recent posts made it appear you thought it would make a difference. 5% is generous imo. I think he's just past it. It's not really knowable.

Being unflappable and laid back makes you look extra good when you're good, but it makes you look extra bad when you're bad. Mix kind of had the same thing going.

 

[Davo15]

I hope Pirlo goes down as the worst DP in our history because if we ever get someone worse that'll be a cock up of epic proportions and mean we didn't learn from our mistakes. I'd like another Villa as impossible as that almost is but I'd take 3 maxi's over one Pirlo any day.

We do seem to be a glass is half empty crowd on here. Maybe that's just sports fans in general. As a Bills fan and a Man City fan since a decade before the sheikh I'd like to think I understand that and that I'm perceptive to my own teams' short comings. I also know we have suspensions and injuries . I know New England have a shiny new toy in Nemeth, BUT we are at home, We have the second most points in the league. They have the second lowest in the east. There's a 14 point gap between us! We have nearly a double win to loss ration (if we win tomorrow it will be exactly that) yet it feels like by forum pregame prognosticating it would be at least the reverse of that if not worse. Come on guys, We're good enough, We're smart enough and dogone it...OK people still don't like us but you get the point.

 

[gbservis]

I hope Pirlo goes down as the worst DP in our history because if we ever get someone worse that'll be a cock up of epic proportions and mean we didn't learn from our mistakes. I'd like another Villa as impossible as that almost is but I'd take 3 maxi's over one Pirlo any day.

We do seem to be a glass is half empty crowd on here. Maybe that's just sports fans in general. As a Bills fan and a Man City fan since a decade before the sheikh I'd like to think I understand that and that I'm perceptive to my own teams' short comings. I also know we have suspensions and injuries . I know New England have a shiny new toy in Nemeth, BUT we are at home, We have the second most points in the league. They have the second lowest in the east. There's a 14 point gap between us! We have nearly a double win to loss ration (if we win tomorrow it will be exactly that) yet it feels like by forum pregame prognosticating it would be at least the reverse of that if not worse. Come on guys, We're good enough, We're smart enough and dogone it...OK people still don't like us but you get the point.

Regardless of how terrible he's been this season I don't understand how it's remotely possible for Pirlo to go down as the worst DP ever after Lampard. I agree with everyone this year has been terrible for but in his 2.5 years with the team he's made 56 MLS appearances (22.4 per year) to date and he led the team in assists last year. If you count when Lampard signed, said he was so excited to come and started occupying a DP slot he was here for 2 years and made 29 (14.5 per year) MLS appearances. If you want to talk about caring about a commitment to the team it's no contest. Pirlo came when he promised and gave what he could. Lampard on the other hand had so little respect for the club, the league and the promises he made that he backed out of his commitment to sit on the bench of city for 4 extra months. Anyone that thinks Frank when presented with the option to stay on with city couldn't have said no thanks I want to live up to my word and be with NYCFC from the start as I said I would is lying to themselves. If you see it otherwise you either don't value people's word, or you see the world through some seriously tinted City or Chelsea glasses. Pirlo could take a nap on the bench for the rest of the season and still get credit for caring more than fat frank who couldn't be bothered to show up when he promised because he got an offer to ride the bench in the only league he cares about.

 

[Tom in Fairfield CT]

Why can't they both be the worst DPs in history?

 

[Seth]

One of the possibilities that nobody's mentioned is that Vieira sat Pirlo down earlier in the season and had "the talk." No, not that one. I mean the one where Vieira, one star to another, says, "you've been a world-class player your whole career but we have a system here that doesn't favor your style and we also have a lot of good young players who *do* fit our style. Stay for the season until your contract is up, playing from time to time just so we can see a few more passes of beauty, and then perhaps retire with grace and that Pirlo style the whole world loves when the season's over."

I dunno, too super-sunshine-y?

 

[ktdNYCFC]

This game has become super important after the rest of this weekend's results. Both teams hot on our heels (RB/CHI) lost. A chance to put some distance between us and them while staying within arm's reach of Toronto. We win today and it's nearly a two-horse race for 1st in the East and the shield.

Here's to two early goals and no 80+ minute fingernail biting.