My favorite moment of the match came when Shep Messing was heaping praise on Sasha Klestjian while Red Bulls were losing 1-0 to a team playing without two of its DPs and Giovinco only having only come on. Missing then noted that Landon Donovan had tipped Klestjian as MLS MVP during a recent interview. ?. Seconds later, Giovinco rips through the Red Bulls, scores a wonder goal and wins the match for TFC. What was that Shep?
Giovinco is a good reminder of how far the US has to go in developing players. Landon Donovan never had a season like Giovinco is having, and Donovan was generally on good teams when the league was not as strong. He’s also another reminder (and there are a lot of them around the world) that you don’t need to be a superhuman specimen to play soccer at the highest levels. What a coup for MLS to have him now.
That’s true. The reasonable question is whether JK is making the most of the pool he has, not whether he’s done enough to develop young talent to the international level yet. They are a bit related of course. No one would be raving about Jordan Morris’ potential if JK had not plucked him from Stanford to play for the senior team.
right, that’s why i’m pretty impartial to whether JK is fired. in the grand scheme it’s not gonna make too much of a difference who’s coaching, the PLAYERS have to be getter at the end of the day
Still trying to justify Klinsmann as a good coach (and Altidore when you can) I see
Sebastian Giovinco was a bench player struggling playing time with Juventus when Greg Vanney found him. He’s even been loaned out a couple of times but Vanney didn’t go off playing time stats or past accomplishments (like Henry or Gerrad or Lampard), he went off the players ability, bestowed absolute trust in him (A bench player for Junventus), handed him the keys to the TFC attack and paid top dollar for it. He was able to pick out a diamond in the ruff, spot talent even on the bench……something a real coach does. The result….. a call up to the Italian National team, the best player currently in MLS and TFC making the playoffs (all accomplished with one good HIDDEN signing in 2015). Instead of finding or trying something new Klinsmann is rearranging set players and confusing the picture even more….no change, no growth.
Please just get off the Klinsmann / Altidore train at the next stop
It would be nice if we could develop even a few workmanlike players like James Milner who doesn’t set the world on fire but was good enough to play for Man City.
When the U-23’s played in England earlier this year, just about every player on the English team was getting significant minutes in the EPL. They have a young kid Ross Barkley who is a starter at Everton and just scored for the national team vs. Lithuania I think and he’s something like only 20. He’s one of their best looking striker to come along since Rooney is how it looks.
+1. I would say in this sense maybe we aren’t so far off. Milner, by most all accounts, is a sensational athlete who might very well have had a career in track & field if not soccer, and consistently places top in pretty much every fitness metric his side is tested in. And given he has played in some very expensive sides, that’s a pretty high standard.
However, we have had a few guys who offer this sort of versatility and reliability. Guys like Cameron and Bedoya do not exactly excite people when they see their names in the XI, but pretty much everyone would agree that they are valuable guys to have in the 23. They can play multiple positions and (at least most of the time) they understand their role in the gameplan, be it as a regular, a spot-starter, a sub, or simply injury cover. They may not be joining Barcelona anytime soon, but they are valuable assets.
I agree. We have a bunch of ok players who would do very well on a really good team, but they can’t make an ok team really good. We just don’t have the real world class difference makers at any position (except perhaps goaltender). And with perhaps the exception of that one year when Dempsey was lighting up the EPL with Fulham, we haven’t except in goal.
Barkley is a MF
But what if we develop a James Milner type and then England goes out and develops a Steve Cherunolo type player to counter, and they have to square off in a Cup game, our James Milner type player will surely get run off the pitch in the first half….
I heard that he flew back from Rome yesterday. Texted the coach saying he wanted to play.
Landed – went straight to the stadium. Vanney joked and said you ready for 90? stren faced, Giovinco said yea, lets go! Put him in the second half……
If only all our national team players had that dedication. I heard a couple of stories recently about other players who did that, but usually without as much success. One was Mark Hughes, now manager at Stoke, who was playing in Germany at the time. He said he was dead tired, but got lucky and scored but wasn’t really that good in the game. It doesn’t happen very often and this underscores just how incredible Giovinco is.
This guy is riveting right now. Every second he plays is must-see TV for MLS fans. Even when he isn’t scoring (a rarity these days) he is still incredible to watch. Reminds me of Zola in his best days at Chelsea, though not exactly the same type of player.
In which case Toronto made the deal of a lifetime.
To be fair to acquire his services TFC pays him more gross ($7 million) than anyone in the Serie A gets net (after taxes etc). They have paid a lot of money for this (and Jozy and Bradley and Gomez) but have got their first playoff spot ever.
What is that celebration of his? Is he writing himself a check?
Man, he’s COOKIN! (Harden has been doing that for a couple years now in the NBA, after he hits a three).
Look, i’m a RBNY fan, and that goal made ME cheer! Props to the greatest player in MLS history, in his current form (not saying he’s better overall than Henry, Beckham, etc).
“stirring the pot” actually came from bay area rapper Lil B; in a slang gesture/dance reference to cooking drugs. Harden then made it even more popular though many rappers and dancers had already been mimicking it in videos, etc; Harden only cemented it in pop culture.
Even more recently, the Toronto Blue Jays have used it in their playoff run somewhat changing it from a drug reference to merely ‘stirring the pot’ as in ‘change’; finally being a good team after many years of poor play. TFC obviously can rally behind the same meaning and thats why Seba is doing it; to bond the city of Toronto around their sports teams’ recent success.
He remembered he was Italian and realized he had to do something with his hands if he wants to keep getting called up to the Italian national team.
I think he’s either telling the fans to write their Congressmen to have a holiday created in his honor or, perhaps, he is telling them to write in that goal on the ballot for GOTY.
Dose of reality for you: Jozy has never scored in a World Cup (injury and performance), and his 2 goals in many Gold Cups were against Canada and Guadeloupe. He has scored 8 goals in qualifiers, a lesser standard of game, against teams like Jamaica, Panama, Honduras, ES, Cuba, and TnT. Of them, one of those teams made the last World Cup and some didn’t make the Hex. Around when people start to notice this he scores some friendly goals and people get amnesia.
I see your point but at a certain level it is the classic internet practitioner’s tactic of denying the need for change despite lack of performance and placing the onus on the other person to name the replacement. I thought that was JK’s job.
I like strike rate as a metric for forwards. For the calendar year, Jozy has 4 goals in 743 minutes, 180 mins/ goal (every 2 games basically). Dempsey has 9/823, 92 mins/goal. Morris, 1G/183 mins. Wood, 3 G/183 mins, 61 mins/goal. Wondo, 1G, 220 mins. AJ, 2G/619 mins, 309 mins/goal. Agudelo, 1G/71 mins.
Jozy similarly averaged a goal every 200 minutes in 2014. It’s not an aberration.
Based on the stats you’d probably pick Dempsey and Wood. In tactical reality, what keeps Jozy out there is not production or big game effectiveness but the fact he is the default big target 9, even though he doesn’t have the hold up game to justify it.
Sorry, the game of “well who else” doesn’t favor Jozy by the numbers.
You can’t make a Bugatti out of a Ford Taurus.
However, it would be nice if he could at least play as well as Gomez. Seriously, why don’t we just call that guy in? He’s not young anymore but we are freaking threadbare, and at least you can always count on Herc for an outstanding effort.
MVP of the year. Newcomer of the year. GOTY. The goal on its own is GOTY. To then factor in the magnitude of how important that goal is historically is crazy.
My favorite moment of the match came when Shep Messing was heaping praise on Sasha Klestjian while Red Bulls were losing 1-0 to a team playing without two of its DPs and Giovinco only having only come on. Missing then noted that Landon Donovan had tipped Klestjian as MLS MVP during a recent interview. ?. Seconds later, Giovinco rips through the Red Bulls, scores a wonder goal and wins the match for TFC. What was that Shep?
Giovinco is a good reminder of how far the US has to go in developing players. Landon Donovan never had a season like Giovinco is having, and Donovan was generally on good teams when the league was not as strong. He’s also another reminder (and there are a lot of them around the world) that you don’t need to be a superhuman specimen to play soccer at the highest levels. What a coup for MLS to have him now.
+1
also, no coach can significantly upgrade a countries’ talent to that level in four years…
That’s true. The reasonable question is whether JK is making the most of the pool he has, not whether he’s done enough to develop young talent to the international level yet. They are a bit related of course. No one would be raving about Jordan Morris’ potential if JK had not plucked him from Stanford to play for the senior team.
right, that’s why i’m pretty impartial to whether JK is fired. in the grand scheme it’s not gonna make too much of a difference who’s coaching, the PLAYERS have to be getter at the end of the day
Still trying to justify Klinsmann as a good coach (and Altidore when you can) I see
Sebastian Giovinco was a bench player struggling playing time with Juventus when Greg Vanney found him. He’s even been loaned out a couple of times but Vanney didn’t go off playing time stats or past accomplishments (like Henry or Gerrad or Lampard), he went off the players ability, bestowed absolute trust in him (A bench player for Junventus), handed him the keys to the TFC attack and paid top dollar for it. He was able to pick out a diamond in the ruff, spot talent even on the bench……something a real coach does. The result….. a call up to the Italian National team, the best player currently in MLS and TFC making the playoffs (all accomplished with one good HIDDEN signing in 2015). Instead of finding or trying something new Klinsmann is rearranging set players and confusing the picture even more….no change, no growth.
Please just get off the Klinsmann / Altidore train at the next stop
It would be nice if we could develop even a few workmanlike players like James Milner who doesn’t set the world on fire but was good enough to play for Man City.
When the U-23’s played in England earlier this year, just about every player on the English team was getting significant minutes in the EPL. They have a young kid Ross Barkley who is a starter at Everton and just scored for the national team vs. Lithuania I think and he’s something like only 20. He’s one of their best looking striker to come along since Rooney is how it looks.
+1. I would say in this sense maybe we aren’t so far off. Milner, by most all accounts, is a sensational athlete who might very well have had a career in track & field if not soccer, and consistently places top in pretty much every fitness metric his side is tested in. And given he has played in some very expensive sides, that’s a pretty high standard.
However, we have had a few guys who offer this sort of versatility and reliability. Guys like Cameron and Bedoya do not exactly excite people when they see their names in the XI, but pretty much everyone would agree that they are valuable guys to have in the 23. They can play multiple positions and (at least most of the time) they understand their role in the gameplan, be it as a regular, a spot-starter, a sub, or simply injury cover. They may not be joining Barcelona anytime soon, but they are valuable assets.
I agree. We have a bunch of ok players who would do very well on a really good team, but they can’t make an ok team really good. We just don’t have the real world class difference makers at any position (except perhaps goaltender). And with perhaps the exception of that one year when Dempsey was lighting up the EPL with Fulham, we haven’t except in goal.
Barkley is a MF
But what if we develop a James Milner type and then England goes out and develops a Steve Cherunolo type player to counter, and they have to square off in a Cup game, our James Milner type player will surely get run off the pitch in the first half….
I heard that he flew back from Rome yesterday. Texted the coach saying he wanted to play.
Landed – went straight to the stadium. Vanney joked and said you ready for 90? stren faced, Giovinco said yea, lets go! Put him in the second half……
That is crazy!
If only all our national team players had that dedication. I heard a couple of stories recently about other players who did that, but usually without as much success. One was Mark Hughes, now manager at Stoke, who was playing in Germany at the time. He said he was dead tired, but got lucky and scored but wasn’t really that good in the game. It doesn’t happen very often and this underscores just how incredible Giovinco is.
This is the reason he’s the highest paid player in the team.
This guy is riveting right now. Every second he plays is must-see TV for MLS fans. Even when he isn’t scoring (a rarity these days) he is still incredible to watch. Reminds me of Zola in his best days at Chelsea, though not exactly the same type of player.
I’m not sure how MLS can afford to keep him. I can’t imagine that other teams with real money aren’t seeing what he’s doing.
the guy is worth the price of admission….and he seems like a stellar person.
5 year deal, set price. There might be transfer inquiries but he has a long term contract.
In which case Toronto made the deal of a lifetime.
To be fair to acquire his services TFC pays him more gross ($7 million) than anyone in the Serie A gets net (after taxes etc). They have paid a lot of money for this (and Jozy and Bradley and Gomez) but have got their first playoff spot ever.
What is that celebration of his? Is he writing himself a check?
Man, he’s COOKIN! (Harden has been doing that for a couple years now in the NBA, after he hits a three).
Look, i’m a RBNY fan, and that goal made ME cheer! Props to the greatest player in MLS history, in his current form (not saying he’s better overall than Henry, Beckham, etc).
“stirring the pot” actually came from bay area rapper Lil B; in a slang gesture/dance reference to cooking drugs. Harden then made it even more popular though many rappers and dancers had already been mimicking it in videos, etc; Harden only cemented it in pop culture.
Even more recently, the Toronto Blue Jays have used it in their playoff run somewhat changing it from a drug reference to merely ‘stirring the pot’ as in ‘change’; finally being a good team after many years of poor play. TFC obviously can rally behind the same meaning and thats why Seba is doing it; to bond the city of Toronto around their sports teams’ recent success.
He remembered he was Italian and realized he had to do something with his hands if he wants to keep getting called up to the Italian national team.
infinite lol
I think he’s either telling the fans to write their Congressmen to have a holiday created in his honor or, perhaps, he is telling them to write in that goal on the ballot for GOTY.
+1
Correction, if you watch his interview it was loosely translated as celebrating the fact that you could write them in for the playoffs.
Attention Altidore: That is how a striker plays
Great point, but how do we fix the problem? Bobby Wood?
Dose of reality for you: Jozy has never scored in a World Cup (injury and performance), and his 2 goals in many Gold Cups were against Canada and Guadeloupe. He has scored 8 goals in qualifiers, a lesser standard of game, against teams like Jamaica, Panama, Honduras, ES, Cuba, and TnT. Of them, one of those teams made the last World Cup and some didn’t make the Hex. Around when people start to notice this he scores some friendly goals and people get amnesia.
I see your point but at a certain level it is the classic internet practitioner’s tactic of denying the need for change despite lack of performance and placing the onus on the other person to name the replacement. I thought that was JK’s job.
I like strike rate as a metric for forwards. For the calendar year, Jozy has 4 goals in 743 minutes, 180 mins/ goal (every 2 games basically). Dempsey has 9/823, 92 mins/goal. Morris, 1G/183 mins. Wood, 3 G/183 mins, 61 mins/goal. Wondo, 1G, 220 mins. AJ, 2G/619 mins, 309 mins/goal. Agudelo, 1G/71 mins.
Jozy similarly averaged a goal every 200 minutes in 2014. It’s not an aberration.
Based on the stats you’d probably pick Dempsey and Wood. In tactical reality, what keeps Jozy out there is not production or big game effectiveness but the fact he is the default big target 9, even though he doesn’t have the hold up game to justify it.
Sorry, the game of “well who else” doesn’t favor Jozy by the numbers.
You can’t make a Bugatti out of a Ford Taurus.
However, it would be nice if he could at least play as well as Gomez. Seriously, why don’t we just call that guy in? He’s not young anymore but we are freaking threadbare, and at least you can always count on Herc for an outstanding effort.
MVP of the year. Newcomer of the year. GOTY. The goal on its own is GOTY. To then factor in the magnitude of how important that goal is historically is crazy.
Hard to argue with anything you say. Maybe the all time best to play in MLS.
Terrible defending poor league.