Keith Putnam nice report and question. I'll try to fill it out.
There was a surprisingly good mix of questions. The MC was one of the stadium announcers. He did the Patrick [crowd] MULLINS! [MC] Mullliiiiins thing twice when introducing him and again at the end.
F1rst two questions were from the pre-submitted forms.
How do you PV communicate with players during the game. He basically said a lot of shouting and you have to trust they remember what you worked on all week.
Would you use a DP on a defender. Basically sure why not; anyone who can contribute.
Stadium Update. Keith covered it. I would add that JP said there is no specific site they are focusing on right now, but it takes up a lot of his time and they are making progress.
Some idiot asked about PV college lacrosse. Mullins answered because Maryland is in the finals. Whatever.
What was the topic at halftime Saturday. PV said to focus on getting a goal in the first 15 minutes to change the momentum.
Did you make the players do suicide drills because of Saturday, asked as sort of a light joke and came off well. PV said no, they feel bad enough no need for that.
How does our pitch size play into our style of play. Fascinating response I thought. PV said it's not ideal. We want our wide people to be wide and it's hard, but we play on that size pitch in practice and it's no excuse. Stubborn? Realistic? Honest I think and non-evasive.
PM was asked about relationship with legend DPs and what it's like, is it intimidating, is there mentoring, etc. He said he's always felt he belonged wherever he played. He was very excited when we drafted him. DPs mainly lead by example.
Then there was exactly the kind of rambling incoherent speech non-question I didn't want. The MC stopped him half-way through and asked if there was a question and the guy just kept going. The loss was hard and why doesn't POKU play and blah blah why don't you all seem to care like us, but in the end it came out OK. The crowd seemed to appreciate it and it
mostly got it out of the way.
There truly was no question but PV responded anyway, and talked about how the players all had extra family and friends there. There was lots of extra ticket requests. And they were more embarrassed to go home afterwards than anyone. Said he has to acknowledge his mistakes. Talked about how he feels bad Mullins isn't getting the minutes he deserves -- which nobody brought up -- because he works hard and deserves more but he can't fit everyone in as much as he would like.
Next guy said I'm from Latin America and asked how cool is it to have some great latin players on the team, and PV said yeah it's pretty cool.
Another seme-rambling question, not as bad as the first, about how the RB players seemed to care about this game more and we came out flat and what's wrong with our prep.
PV handled it well without repeating himself from a few minutes before. He discussed the travel logistics of the week, not so much as an excuse but about how he's reconsidering his preference to bring all 28 players to both Portland and Toronto. Even though many rested it was too much so he might handle it different in the future. He also said our team didn't control their emotions when things went wrong. He also said "They won but we didn't play."
Question for JP about lack of FO response to Sunday. Mentioned Seattle statement re the 4-0 loss and ticket refund, not because they should give money back but at least say something. JP said the FO met on Sunday, decided to let the team speak to this instead.
Poku question part 2. Keith covered it well.
Ibrahimovich joke question thrown in with the Poku stuff, not sure it was addressed.
Does PV have tactical flexibility midmatch or do you always want to stay with your preferred style of play. I couldn't really tell you how he responded, I think this was a little less substantive than some of his other responses for which I give him credit. Basically I think something about he's still learning and you have to adjust but also stay the course.
Request for reaction to the Italian coach quote about Pirlo and Giovinco. PV was diplomatic, said MLS is much better than Europe realizes but obviously not as good but no reason to automatically keep someone off team.
PM was asked if US players can keep up with Europeans, which was kind of rude, and he basically said what he said before about always feeling he belongs.
PM asked to discuss differences from last year. He mostly just said that things are really good now, and how he appreciated how everyone on the team reacted to what happened Saturday which is a sign of them being on the right page. or something like that.
Next question is I'm from Colombia where football is a passion, so how do we become best team in MLS.
- PV says we need to bring in the right people, which isn't just great players but those who are the right kind of people and right kind of fit.
PM was asked what is his favorite and least favorite drill
- PV jumped in to predict that PM's favorite is finishing if he's honest because that's all the forwards ever want to do
PM said yeah, basically, and talked about how the forwards coach has some different finishing drills he never did before and they're cool. He likes the one where they give him balls in different spots and he has to react. His least favorite is circuit time high intensity fitness. It's necessary but not fun. PV said he remembers hating every workout starting with running which has to be done and it's boring, and seemed to say they try to boring drills more fun but I didn't catch how if he explained.
Final question: What are we doing about the defense. Implication: it sucks. PV stressed that it is a team failure not just the back four and that conceding set pieces, calling out Saturday and Montreal, is a mental failure. Said a lot of our non-set piece conceded goals come not from being outplayed and overrun but silly mistakes.
There were raffles and prizes. I didn't win.
PV made final remarks about the importance of support. JP said something something we're in this together.
Got to meet
Viewfrom226 which was cool, sorry I didn't say goodbye before leaving.
Goodfella's point, a direct and even pointed but politely worded real question delivered with a smile is more likely to get a good response than a harsh rambling statement masquerading as a question. EG, please avoid anything like "we play the wrong people and/or wrong formations and should be doing XYZ, but we're not and we should be doing better, so my question is, what are you going to do about it?" That's not a question and will get eye rolls, not just from them. OTOH, "Have you considered playing [insert your favorite formation or strategy here] at Yankee Stadium to take advantage of the field dimensions" might get a real answer.
