Giorgios Giakoumakis named MLS Newcomer of the Year
Atlanta United’s Giorgos Giakoumakis has been named the 2023 MLS Newcomer of the Year, an award recognizing the year’s most impactful new MLS player who has prior professional experience. The Greek international tallied 17 goals and three assists in 27 games (1,792 regular-season minutes).
Round One Best-of-3 series resumes on Saturday
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What happened?: Cucho Hernández got in behind Atlanta’s back line just before the end of the first half and finished at the near post. He added another goal for good measure a few minutes of game time later. He didn’t need to. The Crew allowed one (1) shot on the night.
So, did we learn anything?: We’ve been saying for a while that the Crew would have plenty to say this postseason. No surprises here that they beat up on Atlanta. They’ve made a habit of it this year. They’re an MLS Cup-caliber team and Hernández has almost quietly been one of the single best players in the league this season. His brace on Wednesday gives him 18 goals and 11 assists in 28 MLS starts this year. That’s three goals off of Diego Valeri’s 2017 MVP season in four fewer games and while playing as a hybrid striker/winger. With Hernández playing at that level and the Crew putting in the work defensively, I’d be hard-pressed to pick another team to lift a trophy at the end of this.
That being said, even without Thiago Almada, Atlanta fans were hoping for more than that. The Five Stripes opted to move to a back five while leaving DP Saba Lobjanidze on the bench with the clear intention of trying to stifle the Crew for 60 minutes or so until Lobjanidze and others could come on against tired legs. In theory, that’s an understandable idea. In practice, you can’t help but think the odds of Atlanta’s near league-worst defense holding on for dear life until then were incredibly slim. Even with a few extra bodies in the way. Sometimes, I think it might be best to make tactics step two behind making sure your 11 best players are on the field. Does it turn out differently if Atlanta starts Lobjanidze? Probably not. But you can’t help but wonder if they would have had a little more fight.
That all gets thrown the window next week though. Almada will be back and Atlanta doesn’t have to overthink this one. They’ll be back to their standard setup and back at home. But, with the way the Crew are playing, it might not matter.
Every Game 1 from Round One has been played and, y’all, you’re not going to believe this, but guess what we’ve learned?
Yep, that’s right: Road games are hard. Only one road team pulled out a win. Beyond Sporting KC’s outstanding performance in St. Louis, we didn’t even get a road team pushing a higher seed to penalties. We didn’t even get a game with lead changes. SKC were the only road team to even hold a lead. The total aggregate between home and road teams in Round One came out to 19-8. Take out the St. Louis-SKC game and that shifts to 18-4.
That’s bad news for anyone who was hoping for anything all that engaging to happen in the first game of these series, but it is good news for the folks who were holding out hope for these series as a whole. MLS’ wild home-field advantage disparity is alive and well so far. With all the higher seeds heading out on road trips this week, it’s fair to guess that we have a few Game 3s heading our way.
Then again, there weren’t many games that even felt all that close. It could just not matter and the gulf between the higher seeds and the lower seeds might just be that large. There were a lot of moments where the loser of each match looked overwhelmed. Even if they do get a boost at home in Game 2, they still have to head back on the road for Game 3. Honestly, I wouldn’t blink if we ended up making it through this round with all the higher seeds advancing and looking relatively unbothered doing it.
Well, all the higher seeds and SKC.
Inter Miami's China tour called off: Inter Miami CF will no longer contest friendlies in China later this month due to unforeseen circumstances.
- Cucho Hernández delivered with a "huge night" for the Crew.
- Fabrizio Romano discussed some potential big-name transfers to MLS.
Good luck out there. Get started early.
