Welcome to the Wednesday Q&A series, where we focus on one particular topic – today's being the MLS Cup prospects of the Seattle Sounders – and ask you to react, share, and discuss in the comments section. However, feel free to ask about anything game-related (MLS, USL, NASL, USMNT, CanMNT, etc.) over the next several hours.
For the second straight season, the Seattle Sounders have looked -- for a time -- like the best team in MLS. Back in 2015 that run of form came during the months of April and May, as the Obafemi Martins/Clint Dempsey frontline duo propelled the club to a 7-2-1 record across 10 games and to the top of the league.
It didn't last. Dempsey, Brad Evans and Marco Pappa left for international duty, came back six weeks later and were never quite the same. Martins was alternately injured/less involved than he should have been. The same could be said of Ozzie Alonso, who had his worst year as a pro. The position of left back was a constant sore spot. Generating chances out of central midfield was an exercise in futility. The ability to string long passing sequences together in order to dominate the pace of the game and where it was played disappeared.
Mid-season additions provided only minimal help. The Sounders limped into the playoffs, found only a fraction of what they'd shown in spring, and were mean-mugged out of the playoffs by Walker Zimmerman:
Seattle, who can clinch a playoff spot tonight with a win over Houston (10:30 pm ET; MLS LIVE), are staring at a faintly similar set of circumstances. Their run of peak form was shorter -- four games as opposed to 10, starting on the last day of July -- but the soccer they played during those three weeks, during which Dempsey was paired with Jordan Morris up top and Nicolas Lodeiro was given free rein to cut in from the right side of midfield, is the best sustained stretch anybody's put together in the league this year. And obviously Dempsey's health status means we won't see it again in 2016.
More to the point: We won't see what that group of attackers can do with the new backline. Seattle transitioned out of that run with a three-game winless streak, but enter this evening's contest on a four-game winning streak.
That streak has been driven by the defense as mid-summer's attacking juggernaut has disappeared. Chad Marshall was just voted Player of the Month; Tyron Mears has sipped from the fountain of youth; Joevin Jones has been more "good Joevin Jones" than "bad Joevin Jones"; Alonso is back to looking and playing like a Best XI candidate.
At the center of it all has been Panamanian CB Roman Torres -- one of last year's arrivals who's only now gotten on the field, thanks to an untimely ruptured ACL. He hasn't been perfect since his arrival (LA ripped him up for the first half hour of what eventually became a 4-2 Sounders win), but they've gone 4-0-1 in his five starts, and have allowed just four goals in that span.
Let's put it in italics: The Lodeiro/Dempsey/Morris attacking group never got a chance to share the field with a Torres/Marshall backline.
If they had, I think I'd call them the favorites, and that "what coulda been..." has to leave Sounders fans' heads spinning.
As it is, even if Seattle clinch this evening and become the first team in the league to post a five-game winning streak this season, I'll have a ton of questions.
Ok folks, thanks for keeping me company!
