MLS Western Conference: San Jose Earthquakes’ failure, tactical tweaks galore & more on each team

Welcome back our two-part weekly MLS column here at Backheeled, where we break down all 29 teams in the league. 

I’ve got the West. Ben Wright’s got the East. LAFC have got themselves a young gem. Let’s chat about the latest for each Western Conference squad, shall we?

To read up on the East, check out Ben’s rundown.

MLS Eastern Conference: Elite striker play, FC Cincinnati look vulnerable & more on each team

We’re dissecting every MLS team in the Eastern Conference.

BackheeledBen Wright

Austin FC

Result: 2-2 draw vs. Real Salt Lake

Sure, Austin FC still aren’t technically eliminated from postseason contention (they can thank MLS’s absurdly welcoming playoff format for that. And sure, Austin FC put together a nice comeback to earn a point against a more talented Real Salt Lake team this past weekend. But boy-oh-boy, things feel bleak. Like, all-time-low bleak. On Saturday alone, we had another fruitless attempt at a striker-less setup, a light home crowd at Q2, and a supporters group officially calling for Josh Wolff to be fired. 

Choosing to part ways with Wolff in the offseason would be more than justifiable from Austin FC’s higher-ups. 2022 truly was a blip, which seemed clear all along after even just a glance at their underlying numbers. The real Austin FC is the one that showed up out of the gates in 2021 and returned last year and this year. That team finished far, far closer to the bottom of the West than the top. It’s safe to say Wolff has done very little to make his players into more than the sum of their parts, which is, like, the job of a manager. Moving on would be an entirely defensible choice.

Still, it’s important to recognize that the parts at Wolff’s disposal are decidedly not good. Driussi’s 2022 was fool’s gold. There isn’t one capable striker in this team (it’s not like Wolff is playing Driussi up there because he wants to!). There isn’t a single high-level playmaker around. Central midfield is a concern.

So, sure, change coaches. It’s possible (and maybe even likely) that another manager will have more success with this same squad. But the top offseason storyline for Austin shouldn’t be their manager. It should be their squad-building.

Colorado Rapids

Result: 3-0 loss at Minnesota United

If the Colorado Rapids don’t have the best version of Zack Steffen, they struggle. That’s been a theme for the Western Conference upstarts in 2024, and it certainly played out that way against Minnesota United this past weekend.

The Rapids’ trip to the midwest was one to forget for Steffen, who had his feet firmly stuck in cement for Minnesota United’s second goal of the evening…

…and was far too slow to react to the game-sealing goal from Hassani Dotson in the second half, with his feet rooted to the grass once again:

According to FBref, Steffen allowed 2.1 goals more than expected against Minnesota, which, yeah, that feels about right. Without Moise Bombito’s insane one-v-one defensive work to limit the number of shots that the Rapids’ opponents can take, there’s more pressure on Steffen to be the version of himself that we saw shine in Leagues Cup. And if the attack is as sluggish as it was against Minnesota, where Colorado failed to play through the lines with precision, struggled to find space to exploit in behind the opposing backline, and couldn’t unleash their fullbacks, Steffen has basically no margin for error.

We didn’t learn a ton about the Rapids in this loss to the Loons, mostly because all of these issues — the goalkeeping, the inconsistent attacking, and the lack of chances when they don’t get a penalty call to go their way — have popped up at various times already this season. On Saturday, though, they all popped up at the same time. If that happens in the postseason, Colorado won’t hang around for long.

FC Dallas

Result: 3-1 loss vs. Orlando City

I’m sorry, but why is the 5’7” (on a good day) Tsiki Ntsabeleng marking the 6’ Rodrigo Schlegel on a corner kick? People are asking!

FC Dallas didn’t play a particularly good game in any phase against former manager Oscar Pareja and Orlando City on Saturday. They were sloppy in buildup. They never seemed to find the right rotations in Peter Luccin’s super fluid attacking setup. They were sloppy in defensive transition. They were poor on set pieces. Luccin certainly should shoulder some of the blame for those things. He rolled out a back four of Ryan, Sebastien Ibeagha, Marco Farfan, and Paul Arriola to start the second half. That’s, uh, not a winning defensive line.