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Juan Carlos Osorio left MLS 16 months ago having endured the worst run in league history. More than a year, and one Colombian League championship later, Osorio looks set to return to MLS again.
ESPNLosAngeles.com is reporting that Chivas USA is set to hire Osorio as the team's newest head coach. The report cited multiple unnamed sources, including a team official.
Osorio will be coaching his third MLS team in four years. He became Chicago Fire head coach in 2007, helping turn the Fire from a cellar dweller into a playoff team that reached the Eastern Conference final. He left the Fire to become New York Red Bulls head coach in 2008, and overcame a mediocre regular season to guide the team to its first MLS Cup Final appearance, a 3-1 loss to the Columbus Crew.
Things went badly for Osorio in 2009, when the Red Bulls fell apart and endured one of the worst seasons in league history. Osorio stepped down late in 2009. He eventually resurfaced in Colombia, where he recently led Once Caldas to the Colombian League Championship.
What do you think of this development? Think Osorio can turn Chivas USA around? See him struggling like he did in 2009 with New York?
Share your thoughts below.
One of his biggest problem was his foreign player acquisitions, he signed some real duds and the other players were newbies without a lot of experience.
I think he will do better this time around.
Damn. How anyone hire such a horrible coach is beyond me. I guess the fans will be treated to see Jimmy Conrad as a midfielder, Mykel Gallindo will be a defender and perhaps you’ll see some stellar signings.
HAHAHAHAHA!!
I’m legitimately excited to see how many mediocre South American players he brings in and how many different lineups he can field.
Tinker – man Pt Dos!
Interestingly, Bob Bradley coached Chicago, NY, Chivas & then the Nats.
Osorio coached Chicago, NY and now Chivas …in the same order. Is the USMNT next for JCO? A 5-4-1 at the 2014 World Cup? Landon Donovan at left back? Tim Ream at forward?
Will spiral notebooks sales go through the roof? Will America become a well-dressed soccer country?
The excitement is building!!!!
The professor is on his way!!!!
This just in…spiral notebook sales climb!!!!
He seriously said that? Wow, did he say why?
If he can leverage his time in Colombia to bring in talented players, then Chivas will have made a good decision. In my mind that’s the key element to this hire.
He’s not been the most popular coach amongst the Once Caldas fans (for his tactics/style), but you can’t argue with the result, a fourth Colombian league championship. I hadn’t been going to many games in the past year, but he got the team winning, and exciting to watch, again. Chivas will be stoked if he can convince Dayro Moreno to come with him. Those of us in Manizales won’t be quite as excited…
Feliz Navidad, Chivas!
Osorio is the gift that keeps on giving (victories to the rest of the league).
Color me less than impressed…
Thank You Chivas!
Signed,
Every other team in MLS
My heart goes out to Chivas. There was a time they actually played good football.& were fun to watch. JCO will NOT have JPA from the Red Bulls to help him..and what he did with the NYRB was a disater period! Not only did he OVERTHINK everything ,messed with everyone’s game but when a player performed well he rewarded him by either moving him or dropping him? He was a total joke .. Did you evers see his note taking during a game.He also purchased the best bums from So America that were a total flop and all have now left NYRB.. coincedence..? I think not
Eric Wynalda said it best Players play..ref’s intervene and coaches screw things up..JCO is therefore a great coach..NOT!
Well, now we all know who’s going to finish last overall now next season!
Conway wasn’t injured.
He was suspended for being a dumbass and not talking to his trainers or team physicians.
Popular MLS Coaches:
Bruce Arena: 3 teams
Sigi Schmid: 3 teams
Bod Bradley: 3 teams
Juan Osorio… 3 teams? He’s ahead of Zambrano now…
And if you notice, that year the team just happens to improve when they get Blanco… so I would suggest it wasn’t Osorio’s coaching that improved them, but having a great DP.
Great, level-headed response. Much better than “Worst coach of all time!!1!” or “this guy sucks more than a hooker vacuuming” etc.
That’s the whole key – “learn from experience”. I think JoeW above pretty well nails it, too.
I think JCO is an extremely intelligent coach and a terrific tactician. With Chicago you could argue that he was the best coach in the league. (Didn’t say you’d win the argument, just that you could make it.) If he gets some players he can communicate with, which may be a matter of temperament more than anything else, he could be very good again.
JCO is a smart guy who did well in Chicago and the first season in NY, then he made a mess of the Red Bulls.
If he learns from the experience, he can be a very good coach. If he does what he did in NY, it will be another disaster.
Can’t say I like the hiring, but it’s not like great coaches are dangling in front of the trees.
We’re just hoping for the best. Maybe third time is a charm?
Oh well, we’ll just wait and see.
Be kind, fellas.
He meant during that specific season, I’m pretty sure, which was pretty terrible until he came in. I don’t think you can credit him fully with the turnaround. but there was a difference. …..And then he and his wife left for greener pastures in NY.
This.
Loss #1 as Chivas coach….Sporting KC! 🙂
Danny Cepero lead Red Bull to their first MLS Cup appearance, not the great “professor”. The team was falling apart until Cepero came out of no where for the injured Jon Conway.
+1 Amen brother. Add college sports to that too!
The team had a losing record. Dane Richards then played HUGE matches so get a tie and win against the Dynamo. They were then outplayed by RSL who kept hitting the post. And they were in the final. I don’t mean to poo-poo the accomplishment. But they basically got hot and lucky for 3 games. Other teams have done that (LAG?). But it’s not an accomplishment that proves you’re a great coach or a really strong team. And that result (the MLS Cup Final) encouraged management to bring him back the next year where they were the worst team in MLS.
What went wrong for the NURB that year?
1. He decided to get the fastest team in MLS. He acquired speed (Oduro, Kandje, the other kid from Crystal Palace-MD, Jeremy Hall) without any regard to how they’d play together.
2. He moved people around into different roles and functions constantly. Take Kandje–he’s a striker, no, he’s a winger–wait, he’s an outside mid! He believed it was the players responsibilities to get and understand the scheme. Jeremy Hall played either 3 or 4 positions that year with a range of different roles (get forward, stay back, play wide, pinch in) with each of them. He unintentionally messed with player’s heads. As a result, he had a team that was disorganized, had to think too much (rather than just play), wasn’t especially skilled or smart (as the French would say “excellent speed of foot, no speed of technique, no speed of thought) and found ways to beat itself. Players would leave NYRB (like Oduro) and go to a side where they were used intelligently in a specific role and suddenly blossom. That year showed the downside to JCO–his desire to over-think stuff.
I like Juan Carlos, but the coaching merry-go-round in soccer and all of pro sports is comical. Rafa out at Liverpool, out at Inter, back to Liverpool? Preki here, Arena there, etc, etc.
that was not his team.
This is just a stepping stone for JCO to manage the USMNT. Heh heh, sorry, I don’t think I’ll ever be able to get over when he said that’s what he wanted to do a few years back. That being said, would he do worse than start Findley and Clark? Who knows?
Vasquez was a fool who played to tie not to win. Granted our roster sucked to say the least. Vazquez played 4-5-1 with Justin Braun on the right mid ’nuff said.
As a Chivas USA supporter I say meh, good thing is he just won a championship. Depends on the players we get but so far so good picking Conrad and stealing Bowen.
+1
He’ll be great for The Goats and great for MLS. But who does he have to work with, and how long will it take to get the existing players to adopt his system? Hopefully they don’t expect a miracle in 4 months like they did with Vasquez.
Is this December fools day?!?! WTF?!?!
Didn’t he lead NY to its first and only MLS Cup Final? I think he’ll do well with Chivas and I hope he brings some strikers with him from Once caldas or colombia. The colombians have been good to the league so far.
As a Fire fan, I’m still somewhat bitter for his leaving, but he is a good coach. His teams are very well organized defensively, but do not play the most attractive soccer.
As for what went wrong with NYRB, I have no clue – its like everything he touched in that ’09 season went to crap.
He should be able to turn Chivas USA around, they won’t surrender many goals – but don’t expect a exciting Latin style.
So the year before Osorio joined the Fire, they made the Eastern Conference Semifinal, and won the Open Cup. In fact, they’ve never had consecutive years not making the playoffs. Not exactly cellar dwellers…
Wow–I’m not sure this is such a great decision. I’d have to review the Chivas roster but JCO is a master tactician who is often-times too smart for his own good. He moves players around constantly with tactical decisions that look brilliant on paper but mess with player’s heads, confuse roles, have them thinking too much on the field. If he had a team with Beckham, Donovan, Marques, Henry, and veteran players than I think he’d do fine. But if young guys…they tend to get the “deer staring in the headlights” look.
Ultimately, I think their real issues are with acquiring talent (funny, prior to start of the franchise, everyone was crying foul believing that their would be a pipeline to the MFL club that would “loan” players like Bravo for artificially low salaries and defeat the cap when it’s been the reverse that has happened–this club has been a red-headed stepchild with not a lot of loving from the parents). Unless JCO shows he can take a talent-thin roster and win with that, I think it’s going to be a long year for Chivas. Granted, he’ll probably show up with a bargain or two from Colombia. Still….not so sure this is a wise fit.
Stats say hes pretty okay, not bad
HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAAAAHAAAAHAAAAAA
have fun Chicas.
God help Chivas… this guy has never been a success in MLS. Why bring him back???
He’s a bum and will jump ship the first chance he gets.