Decision Day for the 2022 MLS season has come and gone, and the field has been officially reduced to 14 teams moving onto the Audi MLS Cup Playoffs. Perhaps sooner than some expected, the final few teams to miss the playoffs have been confirmed and it’s all focus ahead on the offseason.
Here, we'll be covering three questions for every team moving forward. Think of it as an exit interview, if you will. Matt Doyle, as always, has you covered on his preeminent season-in-review for each club (Columbus version). Read that, too.
He has gifs. It’s tough to beat gifs.
Another disappointing Decision Day came and went for the Columbus Crew. Needing just a point to qualify for the playoffs, they took a 1-0 lead at Orlando City SC into halftime.
Just as had been the case for the season, their lead slowly became a deficit in the second half and it was Orlando celebrating a 2-1 win, leaving the Crew to ponder what went wrong.
They wasted no time in answering a major question, less than 24 hours after their season officially ended, by parting ways with head coach Caleb Porter. What else?
When club president and general manager Tim Bezbatchenko took over in 2019, he was appointed in conjunction with Caleb Porter. Whether there were discussions previously or not, Bezbatchenko hasn’t had his own coaching search during his time running the Crew.
The last time he appointed a head coach was in 2014, naming Greg Vanney the head coach of Toronto FC. That worked out quite well.
Which direction will this search go?
One keyphrase that seems to emanate from each press conference about these coaching searches is “MLS experience”. You often get that for teams that are in a full rebuild, ones looking to reset their culture as well. All three of FC Cincinnati, Houston Dynamo FC and the San Jose Earthquakes spoke of that being a key requirement in their recent coaching searches.
Columbus are not at that stage. They mostly need a new voice to lead the group and get the most out of a roster with plenty of high-level talent. Will that be someone from within the league’s ecosystem or a candidate from abroad with no previous MLS experience?
“Our coaching search is going to be a wide search,” Bezbatchenko told media on Tuesday. “We want to follow a clear process, establish criteria for the position and be disciplined in that criteria and the evaluation. We want to make sure that we look at all layers domestically, not just in MLS with present and past coaches but possibly in other layers of the US soccer structure and Canadian soccer for that matter. We'll look internationally. We've already received a number of CVs and interest in the last 24 hours.”
All options are on the table.
“We'd obviously plan and want to have our coach in place for the beginning of preseason even though it is the earliest preseason we've had in MLS history,” Bezbatchenko said. “From there, ideally by December although whether or not that's December 1 or mid-December we won't know. Some of it will be determined by when we can speak to certain candidates, whether or not we are looking to talk to coaches who are still playing. That all factors in. I would say by December we're hoping to have it finalized, but as we all know these things are unpredictable.”
Part of me thinks Lucas Zelarayan could be in for a Hany Mukhtar-esque season if deployed as a second striker next to Cucho Hernandez, either in a 3-5-2 with a more traditional chance creator underneath or in a 4-4-2 with more freedom.
The Armenian international had a strong year with 10g/12a in 2,320 minutes, but let’s see what a new system will do for him.
Unless there’s a big surprise over the next month in terms of a job opening up, I’d find it hard for there to be a more attractive MLS job vacancy this winter.
Columbus have two potential superstars in this league under contract for the foreseeable future. Cucho is 23 years old, just entering his prime, and was signed for around $10.5 million from Watford. Zelarayan is a proven, elite player in MLS, already won MLS Cup MVP and only turned 30 in the summer. Both are signed to long-term contracts.
Absent even any further context, that alone could sway candidates. Ownership has spent big in recent years. In addition to Cucho’s club-record fee, Zelarayan was signed for around $7 million. This is all after paying a premium for Bezbatchenko and Porter, two of the more high-profile candidates for their roles in 2019. There’s a brand-new stadium and a new training facility, too.
That’s as strong a starting point both structurally and on the current roster as possible.
Whoever takes over will need to finetune the attack, one which never seemed quite right despite having two of the most talented attackers in the league, and immediately solve the bad habit of throwing away results.
The Crew dropped 24 points from winning positions in 2022, including 11 points dropped from winning positions after the 90th minute. If they hung onto all their leads after the 90th minute, they would have finished third in the Eastern Conference.
“To drop 21 points in the last 15 minutes of matches, and then I think it's 11 points in stoppage time, is extremely bizarre,” Bezbatchenko said. “It is strange. Because it is unusual, we need to reflect upon why that happened. And while we had to make a coaching change, it's not just the coach that bears responsibility for that. You need to talk to the players, myself included, what can we do to make sure that we have the right people on the field that can see out games.”
Changing the coaching staff is a start – it’s the group leading that culture. Sometimes fresh faces are all you need and it’s much easier to replace a head coach than sign 11 new players. But there’s no guarantee a coaching change alone will solve that problem.
The Crew have a bunch of question marks on the roster this offseason, with Derrick Etienne Jr. out of contract and stalwarts Jonathan Mensah, Pedro Santos and Artur all in option years.
Etienne has easily been the club’s most productive winger, even as they went out numerous times over the last few years to add more options (Kevin Molino, Alexandru Matan, Yaw Yeboah). Mensah is the club captain and still a very good defender, while Santos has made a seamless transition to left back and Artur started 20 games in the midfield.
Will all be back? This is the best chance the club will have to create flexibility in the roster. All three DP spots are set with Cucho, Zelarayan and Darlington Nagbe, while Matan (currently out on loan) holds the lone U22 Initiative slot.
Expect a majority of the group to stay the same, but there’ll certainly be necessary changes to enhance the group. They’ll need to create some flexibility for that to happen.
A couple more thoughts:
- Columbus Crew 2 won the inaugural MLS NEXT Pro championship. Mo Farsi and Jacen Russell-Rowe have already graduated into the first team. Who else will join them?
- What role will Farsi and Russell-Rowe play in the first team next year?
- Will Aidan Morris win the starting role next year?
- Will there be a defensive reshuffle for 2023?
