No Fan Alone Colorado Rapids Podcast

Being a fan is very hard work. This week that involved hanging up the Class VI scarves for another season and shredding the playoff ticket vouchers, ..again. I’m very sorry about having to do that, but not to the point where I’m giving up on attending Rapids games. But some fans are giving up, according to comments attached to Jeff Plush’s open letter to fans. They want to support a winning team, and won’t be supporting the Rapids next year. That’s their choice. To me, it seems more like cheering for a set of jerseys, rather than for the guys on a team. As if it doesn’t matter who is playing, as long as the set of jerseys is winning. I think that happens in Europe a lot these days, with check-book rosters.

Cheering for goals and wins is great. There hasn’t been a lot of that recently. In fact, the biggest cheers at the Bulldog on Saturday night were for our very own Tina, who appeared on TV briefly before the game, with the Rocky Mountain Cup trophy. According to Plush, work has already begun to create more cheering opportunities for next season for those of us who will be back, because we support the Rapids even when they’re down and out. It’s good that the Rapids created that blog venue to address fans’ frustration, and allow people to vent and offer their opinions about what needs to change. The team looked “off” during games for several weeks, and I can’t decide if it was collective lack of harmony, lack of a viable plan, or too much pressure to win. Playing just to win isn’t the same as playing good strategic soccer which creates good opportunities to put the ball in the net, which results in wins. I hope you see the difference. The team isn’t lacking for talent or motivation or effort. So it’s something else. Sports psychology anyone?

Out of curiosity I checked websites for other MLS teams that didn’t make the playoffs. I didn’t see any other similar open letters apologizing to fans. Do other teams feel less inclined to engage with fans? If so, why?

Ooopsie: SoccerByIves has an article on “Which MLS coach is the next to go?”. I don’t know if you pay much attention to this site, but my take is that they ignore the Rapids and go out of their way to diss any Rapids player who does anything worthwhile, such as for example Conor Casey. So the credibility score has always been low. Now it’s gone less-then-zero. The poll on this article lists 5 MLS coaches, out of the 7 teams not in the playoffs. Gary Smith is not on the list. Actually he is on the list, but he’s described as “Gary Clark”. I’m not making this up. So yes, let’s all vote for “Gary Clark” to be the next to go. Whoever he is, clearly his team didn’t amount to much.

Congrats to Omar Cummings, our Player of the Year, and Matt Pickens, Defensive Player of the Year. Despite being out with an injury for weeks, Matt impressed Class VI and C-Firm voters. Despite a disappointing scoring/assist drought over the past few weeks, Omar beat out Casey and Kimura for POTY honors. Smith named him as one of the most improved Rapids players in a recent interview. Our Grand Poo Bah, Mark, is trying to arrange proper presentation of trophies during the MLS Cup viewing party, and hopefully we can put that on the site for all to see.

The team will continue practicing into November. During the off season, I hope to report occasionally on team and player news as it becomes available. There might even be an occasional poll, and I promise to get peoples’ names correct, unlike Ives. So for fans who aren’t just in it for winning, stay tuned.