Quote Originally Posted by OgtheDim View Post
The only team in our league arguably better then us these last 5 seasons has been Seattle. Unlike Europe, money does not guarantee success (see ATL & LAFC) - nor does it make up for bad coaching (see LAG the last 5 years).

BTW, the "their salary is more then others therefore they should be great" idea is a canard. We have ALWAYS been near the top in salary. Because we tend to spend more on DP's then others do. High salary DP's do not guarantee success either - (see us 2018 & Miami this year)
This is extremely spot on. People bitching about only winning in 2017 are writing off that the team made the finals two other years, which in MLS structure is a pretty amazing feat.

I don't think you can read too much into this season, given the COVID asterisks, but they still did just fine until injuries took them down in the end.

He took a team that had never made playoffs before, got them their first berth, then next year their first final (losing in PKs), then their first shield and Cup, then all the way to CCF finals PKs. Over those 2.5 years the team had almost no downtime because of making it to the finals, and at the end of the CCF run they were broken, and with the league's roster structure, they couldn't recover for that season. The next season they were right back to the finals.

That's actually a hell of a record.