Minnesota United: Postseason Preview
/by Ryan Anderson (@mlsfantasystats)
#SnowOpener. Lost 1-6 versus the other new kids on the block. Now Minnesota is the one putting up 7-1 scorelines versus newcomers.
“We deserve more respect in this league.” The former captain was traded to the Chicago Fire, and Minnesota’s defense is now one of the best in the league.
“Three-year plan.” Although the exact origin of this phrase in reference to MNUFC’s inaugural triad of seasons in MLS isn’t well-documented, it looked incredibly unlikely the Loons could turn it around after 2 disastrous years, but they have.
What a transformation! Let’s take a closer look at Minnesota’s 2019 regular season where they made the playoffs, dominated the Lamar Hunt U.S. Open Cup all the way until losing to their #SnowOpener and 2017 sibling rival Atlanta United in the final (because of course), and likely saved Adrian Heath from being canned again.
With the slate of away games, Minnesota pulled out some wins despite falling behind in expected goal differential. That led to a dominant 3-month stretch from June to August where they were at home 7/10 games, but as the opponents got tougher in the last 2 months (LAFC 2x, POR, SEA, RSL, even SKC) and they went on the road more, their average dropped off.
Overall, the team ended at 3rd in xGD in the West, behind LAFC and [does double-take] San Jose (their drop-off is another story altogether). Their 4th-place finish in the regular season points seems fair. They get a well-deserved home game at Allianz Field, but they’ll likely be on the road for the rest of the tournament if they move on.
Rather than focus on the team for the rest of this article, I’m going to highlight some of the players who have made the biggest impact, along with some who have underperformed.
Goalkeeper
Vito Mannone has made some spectacular saves, and he deserved to be in the conversation for at least the most entertaining GK of the year. Compared to the angstiness of Bobby Shuttleworth last year, Mannone is a refreshing change. He’s done an excellent job managing the defense: having 11 clean sheets (3rd best in MLS) is quite the achievement for a team which only had two the previous season.
Despite the success, Vito is a decidedly average keeper in MLS from a G-xG per game perspective. He may have saved the team on occasion, but he didn’t perform markedly better than other keepers would have in the same situations. At $594k in guarantees, though, Minnesota’s man between the posts is the third-most expensive player in the league at his position. Compare that to Matt Turner, who makes less than middle management in corporate America, yet saved New England over half a goal per game. Whether or not Mannone is worth purchasing and giving a likely very expensive contract in a notoriously difficult-to-assess position will be a discussion for the offseason, but for now the Wonderwall can enjoy the man who now is getting to be known for his game-saving penalty saves.
Defenders
What. A. Difference.
Although Minnesota’s historically bad defensive years have now been eclipsed by both Orlando and FC Cincinnati, the Loons still were one of the most improved teams in the league when it comes to letting in goals. Orlando had 18 fewer expected goals against versus 2018, Chicago had 16 fewer, and San Jose and Minnesota both had 15 fewer expected goals.
This defensive overhaul had a significant impact on the team’s fortunes: Minnesota had the second-largest increase in points from the 2018 season, going from 36 to 53; only San Jose had a bigger jump. Some have attributed this monumental shift to one man.
Ike Opara: 2019 MLS Defender of the Year. His former club Sporting Kansas City didn’t even make the playoffs, although that may have been due to their offense as much as it was their defense.
Given what I just said, I get the hype. But honestly, neither Opara’s nor even Boxall’s stats stick out as particularly outstanding, and some might argue from these graphs that Boxall has had the better season overall. This is probably one of those cases where stats don’t tell the whole story, and someone who is much better at film study than I am could go into why Ike deserved the award.
They’ve both played fairly typically for their position, excepting their below-average passing, which can be attributed in part to the larger offensive roles the outside backs play in Heath’s 4-2-3-1 scheme. Their defensive actions, though, have been above average, with Opara landing in the top 10%. Neither have been shy of dribbling well into the midfield if given the space. Both have done well defensively and in getting involved with set pieces, but in most areas they’re, in a word, good. At least they appear to be pretty solid at the thing you want defenders to be good at: defending.
Romain Métanire, however, has been the surprise package of the team. The former Ligue 2 Malagasy was initially thought to be a significant risk, with $412k in guaranteed compensation for a defender with no MLS experience. That risk paid off, though, with Métanire becoming one of the cogs to the Minnesota offense while still maintaining an above-average defensive profile for his position. That in itself is an impressive achievement.
The concern with Métanire is his tendency to put in long crosses and pray for the ball to find a teammate. Crosses are a notoriously bad strategy for scoring goals on a consistent basis, but because of the random success Métanire had with a cross finding the back of the net, the team occasionally fell into a rut of passing the ball to Romain and then running to the penalty area to wait for the inevitable Hail Mary from the right back.
Going into the playoffs, Minnesota will have to rely less on Romain’s crossing and more on playing through the middle, which brings us to what arguably is one of the best central midfield pairings in the league.
Midfielders / Wingers
Ozzie Alonso has once again cemented his place among the best defensive midfielders in the game, and his signing has been instrumental to the team’s defensive improvement. Although his numbers lag behind the likes of Michael Bradley and Jonathan dos Santos, his pass quality and safe play demonstrate Alonso as the model of dependability in possession. As much as the Minnesota’s new captain has been a rock in the middle of the field, a certain newcomer has come on to be the team’s MVP.
Jan Gregus: there’s nothing he’s not good at. Gets in position to take shots, whether through dribbling or lurking around the edge of the box? Check. Makes counter-attack-stopping tackles? Check. Puts free kicks on dimes? Check.
Boxall ties it on the header from Gregus after Vela put LAFC up #MNUFC pic.twitter.com/KOTRBJ3kWQ
— Paid man gets bored (@cjzero) September 30, 2019
Where he really stands out though, is his lack of turnovers (one every 19.8 pass attempts) and his role in moving the team farther up the pitch. For being only a TAM-level DP at $884K guaranteed, Jan has been very much worth the price. After the seemingly slow start to the year, he’s starting to be noticed by the league and was even in the running for the Newcomer of the Year award.
I would be remiss if I didn’t also mention Kevin Molino here. The Trinbagonian didn’t get many minutes this year due to injury and fitness, but boy did he ever make the most of what he had. He’s beginning to demonstrate the superb playmaking abilities Adrian Heath saw when he brought him in as Minnesota’s first big signing in MLS.
Kevin Molino is the best player in Minnesota right now, and he’s the game-breaking force the team has needed, since they often aren’t getting production from their...
Strikers / Attacking Midfielders
In a 180-turn from last year, the Loons’ offense has been the liability of the team. No visible progress has been made from last year, except that they’re now solidly average instead of slightly below average.
Mason Toye has gone on some scoring tears, but hot-headedness and a visible lack of effort at times have stunted his involvement. Honestly, he’s been ok, but really not superb at anything except scoring goals, but I guess if that’s his only role to play, he’ll do it well. The now-TAM target man Ángelo Rodríguez has only been marginally better from a statistical viewpoint, but the goals and assists haven’t come at the pace Adrian Heath would have liked, leading to Toye taking over.
Darwin Quintero is still elite goal-creating material, leading all central attacking midfielders with 0.51 xG+xA from open play per 96 minutes. But he often leaves the team hanging on breakaways by being too focused on the man in front of him and not looking around for open teammates. For all the dribbling the Scientist does, he’s only successful half the time, and he has the highest rate of unsuccessful dribbles in the league, at 2.5 per game (minimum 9 appearances). It isn’t an uncommon occurrence in the Minnesota community to hear “Darwin should have passed there.”
Quintero was relied upon too much to be the focal point for the team last year, and he struggled in that role, especially when opponents focused on shutting him down. With Molino and Gregus taking on more of those creative responsibilities, it has freed up Quintero to focus more on putting in that final pass or taking shots, both of which he can be very, very good at.
The pieces are there in the offense; they just have to step up to the level at which the defense and midfield have been playing if they hope to survive against the goal-scoring behemoths facing them in the rounds to come.
Path to MLS Cup
Minnesota is slated for a home game verses L.A. Galaxy in the first round. The challengers include the second-most prolific goal-producer in the league in Zlatan Ibrahimovic (29.3 xG+xA) and perhaps the best defensive midfielder in MLS today, Jonathan dos Santos. Even though JDS’s expected goals and assists are low for his position, his expected buildup (a measure of the total xG earned by the team on possessions in which the player participated but did not make the final pass or shot) is 5th in the league, and he had a whopping 14.1% share of his team’s touches when he was on the pitch (2nd only to Nicolas Lodeiro); the Galaxy depend on dos Santos for getting the ball up the pitch to their assisters and goal-scorers. And looking at his unreal passing scores, who wouldn’t want to depend on him? Alonso and Gregus have to focus on shutting dos Santos down, especially since the Galaxy’s third designated player Romain Alessandrini may be making a partial return this game after his devastating injury earlier this year.
If Minnesota does beat the Galaxy, though, the road after doesn’t look any more pleasant. The winner of this game travels to to face arguably the best team ever to play in MLS—who also will be coming off a bye. The Loons won the 2-game series with LAFC in the regular season with a 2-0 victory at Allianz Field, followed by a 1-1 draw at Banc of California Stadium, but LAFC came out on top in expected goals over those two games.
Due to this mountainous challenge, FiveThirtyEight gives MNUFC only a 1% chance of winning MLS Cup in their power index model, and betting odds are currently around +1900, equivalent to only a 5% chance for the Loons to win it all. But hey, this is single-elimination now. Small samples are where luck thrives. The Loons have a chance to make even more history.