MLS - September 28 - Red Bulls (Away)

[FootyLovin]

View attachment 13535

Love this. Favorite things:

• Ilenic the only player who didn't get on the field who still worked up a sweat worthy of taking off his shirt.
• Santi in streetwear, a total hipster, rocking his glasses and checkered sweater.
• Reflecting on history. Maxi arrived 9 months after the red wedding, probably feels a lot of the history from games being spicy in the years after.
• Sands signed 15 months after the wedding, must have been in the academy during the wedding and felt it as part of the organization.
• And then there's ... Medhi. Player for our first 2 seasons. Was not in the 18, but was a player on the team during the event.
• I wonder if those 3 guys make this rivalry more real for us than for NJ. I don't know their team well enough (and don't care enough to research it), but I can't think of any of their players going back very far.

ETA: Nealis is the second longest tenured player there going back to 2019. The longest started with NJ in 2012. But in 2015-2016, doing his impression of Picasso's blue period, Ryan Meara wore no red.

ETA2: Thank you to ChatGPT for making that so easy to uncover. Won't be long before the robots take over.

ETA3: OMG, OMG, OMG. Where’s Waldo Cushing?

 

[Gotham Gator]

https://twitter.com/x/status/1840201627677941826

 

[CCMore]

ETA3: OMG, OMG, OMG. Where’s Waldo Cushing?

Found his shiny head lol

 

[CCMore]

Wiebe called this game the “Blue Beat Down” and I’m really not opposed.

 

[canchon]

Wiebe called this game the “Blue Beat Down” and I’m really not opposed.

watching the wrap up now - some good analysis of beating the press and NYCFC out red bulling the Red Bulls today. Two other things:

-BWP did give all credit to NYCFC and said they were thoroughly the better team.

-Mijatovic came up and the subtitles listed him as “But Cry Me Out Too”

 

[moogoo]

i'm wondering if anybody got a good clip of gray's celly? it was hilarious and i need to see it again!

 

[moogoo]

hahah YES!!!!

https://twitter.com/x/status/1840501923859853684

 

[moogoo]

Shwafta

 

[Joe_Cos]

https://twitter.com/x/status/1840437327073628661

 

[Gotham Gator]

Found this nice breakdown in the terrific Outfield article on the game.

https://twitter.com/x/status/1840187814488486323

 

[moogoo]

Found this nice breakdown in the terrific Outfield article on the game.

https://twitter.com/x/status/1840187814488486323

Doyle linked to this in his weekly writeup too.

with maxi, martinez, and wolf, our front line of press is very good. I think it's a big reason why cushing isn't giving ojeda and fernandez more time. their pressing awareness just isn't as good and recently, it's been a big part of our tactics to press high. kinda funny considering when cushing took over and for much of last year, he withdrew our line of confrontation back instead of pressing high. I'd be curious why he made that change - whether it was him acknowledging it needed to or if he finally got the players he needed to do the high press he actually wanted in the first place.

 

[gbservis]

Doyle linked to this in his weekly writeup too.

with maxi, martinez, and wolf, our front line of press is very good. I think it's a big reason why cushing isn't giving ojeda and fernandez more time. their pressing awareness just isn't as good and recently, it's been a big part of our tactics to press high. kinda funny considering when cushing took over and for much of last year, he withdrew our line of confrontation back instead of pressing high. I'd be curious why he made that change - whether it was him acknowledging it needed to or if he finally got the players he needed to do the high press he actually wanted in the first place.

I was just writing something similar. This level of coordination in both the press and on offense is driving the gap between the experienced attackers who are getting time and those on the outside looking in. My question is why aren't the young guys developing these types of skills? Do they need more time? Is Cushing not effective at teaching them? Did Lee pick the wrong players?

On the press issue, I think Cushing mostly dropped it for personnel issues. You can't press like that with Magno, the team wanted him to be the guy post-Taty Taty so Nick didn't have an option. I'm not sure it's much deeper than that. The team needs to decide if pressing is our style or not because we thrive when we run the press but Lee keeps spending big money on players that don't fit the approach, first with Magno and now with Jovan.

 

[SoupInNYC]

This was my favorite "name" for Saturday's match.

https://twitter.com/x/status/1840201098587447619

 

[Shwafta]

I just watched the highlights back - I completely forgot about Martinez's absolutely BEAUTIFUL first touch to bring the ball down in the 11th minute (shown in the highlights video) - almost a goal there, and wow was it a clean one. Love to see that!

 

[gbservis]

I just watched the highlights back - I completely forgot about Martinez's absolutely BEAUTIFUL first touch to bring the ball down in the 11th minute (shown in the highlights video) - almost a goal there, and wow was it a clean one. Love to see that!

Martinez hit the crossbar later in the game right before we went off too. He easily could have had 4, amazing night for him.

 

[Gotham Gator]

I just watched the highlights back - I completely forgot about Martinez's absolutely BEAUTIFUL first touch to bring the ball down in the 11th minute (shown in the highlights video) - almost a goal there, and wow was it a clean one. Love to see that!

For a moment I thought you were talking about the first touch on the fourth goal, which was divine. Put the ball right where he wanted to hit it.

 

[Shwafta]

For a moment I thought you were talking about the first touch on the fourth goal, which was divine. Put the ball right where he wanted to hit it.

The fact there are multiple moments like this shows you how good of a game it was for him. So sad he didn't get that hattrick!!

Worth noting that he's overperforming, but as Doyle puts it:

Alonso Martínez is now up to 14 goals on the season, in a touch over 1250 minutes. He’s overperforming his underlying numbers by a lot, but even if he was only chugging along at his exactly npxG underlyings, he’d still be in the 97th percentile among forwards – ahead of Luis Suárez and Christian Benteke, or goal machines like Dejan Joveljic, Chicho Arango and Cucho Hernández.

 

[SoupInNYC]

The fact there are multiple moments like this shows you how good of a game it was for him. So sad he didn't get that hattrick!!

Worth noting that he's overperforming, but as Doyle puts it:

Yeah, his overperformance isn't really a concern because he's still generating so many chances.

Even if he performs exactly at his xG, he's scoring 0.54 goals every 90. Only Taty Castellanos, David Villa, and Monsef Bakrar (last year) has generated a higher xG/90 (min 500 minutes).

This also reminds me of one of fans' favorite players, Ismael Tajouri-Shradi and there was often questions as to why he didn't play more. He is perhaps the best finisher in NYCFC history. His total G-xG is 12.82 and second on the list is David Villa at 9.5.

While Tajouri-Shradi was an excellent finisher, he only generated 2.36 shots per 90 (12th best in NYCFC history) and 0.25 xG per 90 (19th best in NYCFC history).

We all see the amazing goals and celebrate those (as we should), but its harder to take specific note of all the times he doesn't get the ball and shoot because he's not getting himself in good spaces. And that is the skill that is more indicative of a striker scoring goals rather than how good of a finisher (which can also come into play as in Bakrar's case).

 

[ZYanksRule]

Yeah, his overperformance isn't really a concern because he's still generating so many chances.

Even if he performs exactly at his xG, he's scoring 0.54 goals every 90. Only Taty Castellanos, David Villa, and Monsef Bakrar (last year) has generated a higher xG/90 (min 500 minutes).

This also reminds me of one of fans' favorite players, Ismael Tajouri-Shradi and there was often questions as to why he didn't play more. He is perhaps the best finisher in NYCFC history. His total G-xG is 12.82 and second on the list is David Villa at 9.5.

While Tajouri-Shradi was an excellent finisher, he only generated 2.36 shots per 90 (12th best in NYCFC history) and 0.25 xG per 90 (19th best in NYCFC history).

We all see the amazing goals and celebrate those (as we should), but its harder to take specific note of all the times he doesn't get the ball and shoot because he's not getting himself in good spaces. And that is the skill that is more indicative of a striker scoring goals rather than how good of a finisher (which can also come into play as in Bakrar's case).

I still remember he once had something like 9 goals on 12 SOG or something insane. Tajouri-Shradi scored every time he hit the frame.

 

[mgarbowski]

Yeah, his overperformance isn't really a concern because he's still generating so many chances.

Even if he performs exactly at his xG, he's scoring 0.54 goals every 90. Only Taty Castellanos, David Villa, and Monsef Bakrar (last year) has generated a higher xG/90 (min 500 minutes).

This also reminds me of one of fans' favorite players, Ismael Tajouri-Shradi and there was often questions as to why he didn't play more. He is perhaps the best finisher in NYCFC history. His total G-xG is 12.82 and second on the list is David Villa at 9.5.

While Tajouri-Shradi was an excellent finisher, he only generated 2.36 shots per 90 (12th best in NYCFC history) and 0.25 xG per 90 (19th best in NYCFC history).

We all see the amazing goals and celebrate those (as we should), but its harder to take specific note of all the times he doesn't get the ball and shoot because he's not getting himself in good spaces. And that is the skill that is more indicative of a striker scoring goals rather than how good of a finisher (which can also come into play as in Bakrar's case).

Here's a couple of ASA filters for context. First, best per game G-xG seasons in NYCFC history, minimum 1400 minutes:


It confirms what everyone has been saying. Shradi was a super finisher but so so at generating quality chances for himself. Alonso is currently significantly ahead of Heber's magical 2019 season for G-xG, and slightly ahead on xG. Villa's best G-xG season is pedestrian byy comparison, but he generated 0.62 xG all time at NYCFC. Taty is next at 0.58, then Martinez 0.56, Bakrar 0.55 and Heber 0.46. If Bakrar can ever start hitting net at any reasonable rate we'll have something special in him and Martinez.
Now, MLS 2024 G-xG per game leaders:

Martinez, then Messi, then Suarez. Lol. Keep it up Alonso and you'll become an all-time great. Also he'll go somewhere else fast.
Be careful what you wish for lest the monkey's paw curl.