Ground Zero

The first Timbers playoff game since 2021 became the worst loss in their history.

*Cover photo credit to Sean Meagher/The Oregonian*

Has it set in yet? The worst loss in Portland Timbers history? Reader, yes it has. 

I never begin these recaps with the starting lineup. But today’s game warrants a lineup graphic.

Two changes from last weekend’s lineup in Seattle. David Ayala replaced Cristhian Paredes, and Miguel Araujo started at center back next to Dario Zuparic. Let’s see how that lineup worked out.

It didn’t work in the slightest, especially defensively. Portland continued their woes in front of the net (this time, they didn’t even look threatening when they moved the ball into the attacking third). Vancouver found the breakthrough after a poorly cleared set piece found its way to Ryan Gauld at the far post in the 20th minute.

Back in March, the Timbers had lost 2 straight games: one in Houston and one at home against Philadelphia. I published an article about the metaphorical far post, aka the numerous mental errors that have plagued this team for years. This is how I closed that piece:

Those 2 consecutive losses spiraled into a 9-game winless streak. Phil Neville never conquered the far post. There were signs of improvement (the 1-0 victory against Seattle where the Timbers defended corner kick after corner kick) but those were outliers. A team that is this leaky and disorganized during dead ball situations will never get far in the postseason. And an opportunistic and motivated Vancouver Whitecaps team took full advantage. 

Three minutes after Vancouver’s opening goal, Diego Chara made a typical Diego Chara tackle and earned a yellow card. Out of all the things that went wrong tonight, the refereeing certainly wasn’t one of them. The referee showed consistency aside from one moment that I’ll get to later. But the team captain was on a yellow card, and the far post returned to haunt the Timbers one minute after Chara’s booking. 

Each of Vancouver’s three first-half goals will be blamed on either the players or the coaches. Overall, the coaches share blame for all three of the goals because they’re the ones that picked tonight’s lineup. But on this second goal, unquestionably the ugliest one the Timbers conceded tonight, blame is squarely on the players.

This play begins with a short free-kick. Gauld picks up the free kick and immediately looks for a long ball into the box. Look at the players in green. They are lined up all across the top of the box in total disarray. Miguel Araujo is man-marking Brian White. Dario Zuparic is a half-step behind Ranko Veselinovic. Mathias Laborda (he will be important later) is already two steps ahead of Claudio Bravo. Other players are in position to potentially win a knockdown header.

Everyone in this image except Zuparic (who is currently diving for a header that he has no chance of winning) is ball-watching. Bravo, shown on the near side of the field in the box, has completely lost his man. Everyone on the field should know that Zuparic isn’t going to win this header. It’s obvious. The ball is way over his head. But the leaping Veselinovic is jumping for the ball because Zuparic is going to jump with him. That allows the ball to go to Laborda at the far post. 

The Uruguayan controls the ball, flicks it over Bravo’s head, and suddenly Portland is outnumbered in their own 6-yard box. It doesn’t take a genius to figure out what happens next.

Laborda’s cutback ball bypasses two defenders (including Miguel Araujo) and finds Brian White at the back post (who Araujo was man-marking on the initial free-kick). Catastrophic defending. Two goals in 4 minutes, and the Whitecaps have firmly planted their foot on this game. 

Could the Timbers find a way to get back into the game before shooting themselves in the foot again? Well, they tried, but Bravo’s cross from the endline got blocked. But in order to go forward, they must go back. That’s probably what Bravo was thinking when his 31st-minute backpass for James Pantemis fell right to an opportunistic Gauld who predicted that Bravo was going to go back to his goalkeeper. 

This is obviously a sub-optimal position to be in as a defender, particularly if you weren’t aware enough to notice Gauld beginning his run into the box as the pass was being made. But don’t worry, James Pantemis is going to close down the angle and prevent disaster.

Gauld is able to keep control of the ball and 2 defenders come to stop him. They obviously didn’t notice Brian White making his way into the box to be a solid outlet for their Scottish No. 10. 

Luckily, David Ayala is there to get a foot in. However, the ball is still loose, and it falls to Pedro Vite, who quickly moves it to Stuart Armstrong. I count 6 Timbers paying attention to the ball. Do you notice who they’re not paying attention to?

Oopsie! Armstrong was able to chip the ball to Gauld, who controlled it and fired a pretty impressive volley past James Pantemis. 3-0. 31 minutes. The Wild Card Game became a bloodbath.

Oddly enough, it should have gotten worse 3 minutes after Vancouver increased their lead to 3. Diego Chara (on a yellow card) made a hard tackle on Gauld, but the referee let him off with a warning. By all rights, this should have been a second yellow. If I was a Vancouver fan, I would have been incensed with the officiating. Earlier in the season, the Timbers took a 4-0 lead against Nashville. After the fourth goal, Brian Anunga received a straight red card for an ugly challenge on David Ayala. It looked like the inverse was about to occur tonight. But it didn’t. Chara’s blush was spared, and the Timbers’ feckless attack continued to knock at the door but failed to enter. 3-0 at halftime. Changes were needed. Prior to tonight’s game, the Timbers erased a 3-goal deficit in Kansas City. They have made multiple comebacks from multi-goal deficits throughout the season. They needed a jolt, or else their season was going to end in humiliating fashion in front of their home fans. 

Kamal Miller, Eryk Williamson, and Santiago Moreno took the field at the start of the second half. Dario Zuparic, Claudio Bravo, and Diego Chara were subbed off. Did it change anything? Well, Antony was moved to left back, but Portland’s shape remained the same. In the 51st minute, the ball was worked out to Fafa Picault on the right wing.

The winger, now playing fullback, didn’t put in a challenge to stop the cross. Honestly, I can’t blame him. He’s not supposed to be playing there. Throughout this season, the Timbers have had to come back from several multi-goal deficits. Phil Neville likes to put Antony at fullback to provide a little bit more in the attack. However, he needed to defend here, and he didn’t. Coaching mistake. I wonder where Picault’s cross is going.

Of course it went to the far post. 4-0. FIFTY-TWO MINUTES.

Now the Timbers had a mountain to climb, and it was a mountain that they hadn’t faced in 2024. 3 goals was the norm. 4 was astronomical. But they didn’t need to wait long. It was about to get even harder.

After a couple of failed corner kicks, the Timbers were once again on the back foot. Vancouver had possession outside of Portland’s box, and Stuart Armstrong was on the ball.

It’s so obvious where this ball is going to go. Vancouver’s attackers were making incisive runs all night. Armstrong could have shot this. The Whitecaps are up 4-0, there’s no pressure on him, why not have a go? But a better opportunity is waiting, and Vancouver is in no mood for mercy.

Kamal Miller and James Pantemis tried. I have to give them credit here. But Gauld is faster and better at soccer than both of them. His chipped finish past Pantemis is an excellent piece of skill. They were one half-second too late. That’s all the time Gauld needed. 5-0. 59th minute.

It’s at this point where our story turns away from the action on the pitch and into the stands. For the first time that I can remember, the North End began to empty. The people in the Timbers Army abandoned the site of this massacre like their team had abandoned them. It was something that I have never seen before. Only the most soul-crushing of beatdowns could send Portland fans home early. And it is something that no one should be blamed for. It’s a Wednesday night. People have to work the next day. They go to work to earn a paycheck, and then they spend their paycheck on Timbers tickets. This match was never supposed to be held in Portland. Only the poor decisions made by BC Place schedule-makers and the MLS commissioner’s office led to Portland getting a golden opportunity: the chance to host the Wild Card Game despite being the lower seed. This is how their team repaid them. With a complete surrender to one of their biggest rivals. Fans sacrifice a lot to attend Timbers games. Chief among them is their time and money. Before this game kicked off, a tifo was raised in the North End.

On short notice, a group of volunteers showed up to paint this. It’s a wonderful work of art. Behind the tifo is the rhythm section of the Timbers Army. None of them get paid to come to games and lead chants. It’s a labor of love. Being a fan of this team is a labor of love. It requires fans to look beyond the sins of the people in charge and still give their full-throttled support to these players and these coaches. This club was here before they came, and it will be here after they leave. It was never theirs; it is ours. Every person who came to Providence Park sacrificed something to be there. This is how the team repaid them. This club took their hard-earned dollars and invested it in a complete embarrassment of a playoff match at home.

The rest of this game is irrelevant. Finn Surman, fresh off an incredible debut in Seattle, made his home debut in the 83rd minute with his team in the pits of despair. There was no reason for this change to be made. The game was over at the hour mark. When the clock reached the 90th minute, the whistle blew. There was no need for stoppage time. That’s all the final half hour of this game was. 5-0. The Vancouver Whitecaps, who lost 4 straight games before coming to Portland, were completely victorious. It was their first playoff win since 2017, when they beat the San Jose Earthquakes by a score of 5-0. They were robbed of their home. They had to travel to another country to “host” a playoff game. And they sent their traveling fans home with something to cherish for the rest of their lives. Regardless of what happens in the next round, they will always have this game. What did those Timbers fans leave with?

They left with the worst loss in Timbers MLS history. There is no other way to put it. The infamous 6-2 game against the Seattle Sounders was 2-1 at halftime, then 2-2 early in the second half. A streak of red-hot finishing and some incredible goals pushed it to the ugly scoreline that Sounders fans keep in the forefront of their minds. Neither of the MLS Cup losses come close to this. Atlanta was simply the better team, and the Timbers’ run to 2018’s final was more than enough to satisfy the fanbase. 2021 was an even game that ended in heartbreak after penalty kicks. Prior to tonight’s game, I said that reaching penalties would be considered a loss in my book. No one, and I repeat NO ONE, saw this coming.

Heartbreak comes in many different forms. When the final whistle blew, the players in green jerseys collapsed to the ground. They felt this grief as individuals, which matches the way that this team has played all year. Sure, there have been moments of collective accomplishment, but for the majority of 2024 the Portland Timbers have been a collection of individuals masquerading as a team. Mistakes have doomed them on the defensive front, while Evander’s brilliance has elevated the players around him. Speaking of the franchise centerpiece, he took to Twitter after the game to share his thoughts about the abrupt and massively disappointing end to his team’s season.

During his first season, many things were said about him. Fans called him lazy, unprepared, too relaxed, and even bad at soccer. That narrative was always foolish and, ironically, lazy. His supernatural soccer talent was obvious, and anyone who couldn’t see that simply had their own agenda or wasn’t actually watching him play. But the biggest step forward he made in 2024 came as a leader. On multiple occasions, he took the captain’s armband and was often the driving force in this team’s incredible ability to erase deficits. Tonight, that magic ran out, and so did the energy of his partners-in-crime (stealing points). The first two tweets act as the first couple pitches of the at-bat. I’d classify the first one as a sinker. Most MLB pitchers employ a sinker in their arsenal, and it is the most common type of breaking fastball. This pitch landed squarely in the zone, and the batter watched it go by. Strike one. With his second pitch, he chose a late-breaking slider. The last sentence causes the pitch to break sharply away from the plate. The batter, still refusing to swing, takes ball one. 

The third pitch (tweet) is a high, inside fastball, almost reaching the batter’s hands, which are dangerously close to the top right corner of the strike zone. If you haven’t guessed, the batter is the front office. They are lumped together as one because they share the same interests. The general manager does the bidding of the owner, and the owner trusts the general manager to build a competitive team. Evander says what every single Timbers fan has known for years. He put it right out into the open. Somehow, after the worst loss in Timbers history, he has re-energized the fans in the ballpark. They are cheering for this inside fastball. It is something that all of them struggle with every time they attend a Timbers game or watch one on TV. In theory, both the batter and the pitcher working together would bring success to this team. But they are in opposite dugouts now. 

Multiple bids for Evander have been rejected this year. Most recently, a sizable (but still not big enough) offer from a Qatari club was turned down. Contract negotiations began, but no agreement has been reached. Based on Evander’s third tweet, those negotiations are still ongoing and are getting close (or have already reached) a breaking point. The fans are always going to side with Evander and want to see him paid what he is worth. It won’t affect the salary cap, and should be the top priority on the club’s offseason to-do list. However, these people that he is dealing with aren’t normal. They will disparage a cult hero when he’s not around and call him “lazy” despite his never-ending desire to play for the badge, up until the final whistle blew on his final game in a Timbers shirt. They will do whatever it takes to protect their investments, even if it reaches the point of ignoring a woman’s cry for help and trying to silence it. Evander has no issues accepting his lack of control in the matter, showing more maturity than the people who he sits across the negotiating table from. Not just the negotiating table either. All 60.5 feet from the pitching rubber to home plate.

That third pitch lands outside the strike zone, but a wonderful framing job by the catcher fools the umpire. The count sits at 1-2, and Evander’s fourth pitch is a crowd-pleaser: the curveball. In many ways, it’s his signature pitch. Think of all the mind-boggling curlers he has scored in only two years at this club. One of those curveballs turned a draw into a win in Yankee Stadium, which has seen scores of great pitchers take the mound. Another one earned the Timbers a win in Austin, which happened to be their only shutout win on the road during the 2024 season. Sometimes he busts out a knuckleball like he did in Salt Lake City to tie the game. But when he can, he always throws the curve. The fans love it. So he begins his windup and the curveball settles in the bottom corner of the strike zone. He left the batter flat-footed. Exactly like the handful of goalkeepers that have been on the wrong end of that curveball since he came to MLS. It’s an easy strike three call for the umpire. The crowd goes wild. “To the fans, you deserve much more.”

This game does not call for any player ratings. There’s no point in going through every single player and pointing out which ones were simply OK rather than downright awful. However, a couple players do deserve special mentions.

David Ayala: El Perro

This man deserves a nickname, and he deserves every single bit of adoration from this fanbase. After tearing his ACL in April 2023, he worked tirelessly to get back to full match fitness. It took him a bit of time after making his season debut, but his ascent to a starting role coincided with Portland’s strongest run of form. Even though Evander filled up the stat sheet on the way to a MVP-caliber season, my Supporters’ Player of the Year vote went to El Perro. Phil Neville singled him out in the post-game press conference, saying that they played with 1 man against 11. That one man was Ayala, who never stopped fighting. 4 out of 5 tackles won, 1 block, 2 clearances, 5 interceptions, 8 recoveries, 6/6 ground duels won, and 1 out of 3 aerial duels won. He didn’t commit a single foul. In addition to his excellent defensive output, he completed 71/79 passes, including 11/14 of his attempted long balls. If Evander’s potential contract extension is priority number one, finding Ayala a long-term partner is priority number two.

Diego Chara: El Capitan

Tonight was a 45-minute disaster for the club captain, but his on-field performance is not the main concern. His contract expires at the end of 2024, and his return to Portland in 2025 is still up in the air. He was asked about the status of those negotiations during his post-game press conference, and opted not to go into detail about it due to the severity of tonight’s result. 

There’s only one thing to say: if that’s the last time Diego Chara takes the field in a Timbers uniform, it’s an absolute travesty. Unfortunately, Portland has a tradition of club legends finishing their Timbers tenures with utter disappointment. Liam Ridgewell’s final game in a Timbers uniform was a 2-0 defeat to Atlanta in 2018’s MLS Cup Final. Diego Valeri missed a penalty in the shootout with NYCFC in 2021. Sebastian Blanco’s final Timbers game was the 3-1 loss to Houston on Decision Day last year. Blanco was upset that he never got a proper goodbye from the fans.

However, on the other side of the coin, Dairon Asprilla provided the game-winning assist earlier this year. A few weeks later, Larrys Mabiala entered off the bench to help Maxime Crepeau record his first clean sheet in a Timbers uniform during Leagues Cup. 

Although Ned Grabavoy has publicly stated that Chara will be back next season, anything can happen. If his final contribution in a Timbers uniform is an early exit at halftime coupled with a 5-0 playoff loss, it would be the worst way for his glorious Timbers career to end.

Jonathan Rodriguez: [Nickname Redacted]

During his post-match press conference, Phil Neville said that Rodriguez was battling an injury suffered in last weekend’s game in Seattle. The head coach still made the decision to start his star winger, and the Uruguayan was unable to overcome the injury and produce. Earlier in the season, Rodriguez would track back with regularity. However, tonight, he wasn’t fit enough to adequately defend to the best of his ability. It has been a good year for 2024’s marquee signing. But when the team needed him most, he disappeared. Was it entirely his fault? I think it’s a little bit of both. Either way, he’ll be back in 2025. 

James Pantemis: King Pants

On paper, starting Pantemis was the right decision. He quickly ascended to the first-choice goalkeeper after an excellent showing against Dallas and another superb outing against Seattle. But his start does raise another question: why not Maxime Crepeau?

This is going to sound silly and incredibly contradictory after my recent statistical analysis of Portland’s goalkeepers, but it needs to be said. Crepeau’s best performances this season came in big games. Whether it was with Canada or against a Western Conference rival, Crepeau is a big-game goalkeeper. I expected him to start tonight’s game, and I wouldn’t have been upset with it given his track record in big matches. That’s why the Timbers signed him, right? Giving Pantemis a run-out against Dallas was fine, and you could make the same case for the Seattle game. But Crepeau used to play for Vancouver, and no one would have batted an eye if he got the start. If I really wanted to, I could blame Pantemis for the 3rd and 5th goals, but that’s ridiculous. No matter which goalkeeper got the start tonight, their defense was bound to let them down. I just think it’s rather interesting that Neville proclaimed that Crepeau was the club’s #1 after the Dallas game, and then he didn’t start any of their final two matches. Curious.

The Head Coach’s Thoughts

During his post-game press conference, Phil Neville said the following: “What I saw out there wasn’t a reflection of what I saw all season. I think it shows how much work we have to do.” Well, it wasn’t a reflection of the attack, but it was exactly what we’ve seen from the defense magnified to the 300th degree. There were no other MLS games today. For those casual fans that wanted to tune in and see a Wild Card Game, they saw an utter beatdown. Not even one team playing the other off the pitch. Just one that couldn’t stop beating themselves. Vancouver had the motivation and the drive to keep pushing forward, but the Timbers handed them goals on a silver platter. Exactly what they have done to opposing teams all season. 

I asked Neville about the specific issues that caused the team to give up 3 goals in 11 minutes during the first half. “We didn’t clear the ball. We didn’t win the first header. We didn’t have players in position to win headers and then we didn’t clear the ball and they scored. The third was a backpass from Claudio [Bravo]. Poor decision. And I think the second one was a long ball where we couldn’t deal with a straight ball. We knew their patterns of play and we practiced it and rehearsed it. We didn’t execute our game plan. We didn’t execute our job. We just fell short. In the big games, you have to defend set plays and do the basics really well.”

This has been the story of the defense all season. The only difference between tonight and the comebacks was the attack. If that attack is neutered (which they have been for at least a month) the defense becomes much more important. That’s how the Timbers were able to secure results in Vancouver, in Seattle and at home against Dallas. The defense held strong. Their defense had been enjoying a bit of a renaissance following their recent run. I expected it to carry over to the playoffs. It didn’t. Nowhere close. Why did it fail at this moment in time?

Neville also spoke about how this team needs to “build a roster that can compete.” Well, there are several schools of thought on that. The three highest paid players are the Tree Amigos: Evander, Rodriguez and Mora. Directly below them are three center backs: Zuparic, Kamal Miller, and Araujo. Zuparic has proven that he can compete in these games at this level. I didn’t think that the Croatian would be removed at halftime. Araujo, on the other hand, has shown some moments of quality and a few good games. But, looking at his performances on the whole, he has been miscast as a center back in a back four. That’s not where he played at his previous club, and it isn’t where he plays with his national team. The numbers indicated that Zuparic and Kamal Miller were the best center back pairing on the team. I published an article back in August about it! Since MLS play resumed, the Timbers have played 10 games. Miller and Zuparic started 3 of them together as center backs. Those weren’t the only games that they played together, but Miller had to play left back due to Claudio Bravo’s injury struggles. 

This goes back to Neville’s answer about building a competitive roster. At the beginning of the season, left back was the Timbers’ weakest position. Bravo was the unquestioned starter, but the only two players backing him up were forced to play there out of position. No additional signing was made before the Primary Transfer Window closed. Ditto for the summer window. Portland sacrificed better defensive stability by forcing Kamal Miller to start at left back. Even starting Eric Miller at left back would have been a net positive because it kept a consistent center back pairing. The Timbers, with arguably the deepest center back room in the league, had so much trouble figuring out their starters that it put a hard cap on their season!

A competitive roster also has quality depth. During the summer transfer window, two attackers left and one arrived. Mason Toye, to his credit, has worked tirelessly whenever he’s on the pitch. But the failure to add another winger to properly replace Dairon Asprilla (who did not have to leave in mid-July with 6 months left on his contract for zero transfer fee) has been apparent over the final games of the season. Jonathan Rodriguez has been run into the ground, and he had to play through injury tonight. The only options on the bench available to replace him were Marvin Loria (a total of one minute in 2024) or an injured Santiago Moreno. Moreno got pressed into playing due to the desperation of the situation. Ned Grabavoy’s failure to add even a single depth piece out wide forced the coaching staff to give extended minutes to their starters which left them absolutely gassed for the end of the season. That’s not even counting the numerous players for T2 who could have seen the field! But those T2 players (including last year’s top draft pick Kyle Linhares) were never going to get first team minutes because of the desperation of the situation.

Because the Timbers had another typical slow start, their onus to go all in for the rest of the season was a necessity. Only the top senior players were going to get a lot of playing time, and Grabavoy didn’t supplement the roster. Even a loan could have worked! When was the last time the Timbers acquired a player on loan? 2022 with Josecarlos Van Rankin? “It’s an acceptable transfer window,” Grabavoy said after the summer window closed. “I think we’ve got a team that can finish the season strong.” This team did not finish the season strong, especially after the Tree Amigos had a downturn in form at the same time. Another attacker could have really helped. 

Final Whistle

I tried to describe how catastrophically bad this game was, but I don’t think any more words can do it justice. This isn’t just Portland’s worst playoff defeat since joining MLS, this is their worst home loss in that same timeframe. No other game at Providence Park has ended with a 5-goal defeat, and this was a playoff game against one of their biggest rivals. There are only a few other losses in this stratosphere: 5-0 in Houston last year, 6-2 against the Sounders in 2021, 5-0 in Dallas in 2012, and a 5-0 defeat in Carson in 2015. All of those games (except Seattle) were on the road. This team is no stranger to losing by 3 goals, or even 4. A loss like this at home was unheard of before tonight. Adding in the fact that it was a playoff game (play-in, whatever, who cares) and tonight’s game occupies its own tier in Timbers history. The only other game that is somewhat comparable is a Decision Day loss in Vancouver in 2016. The Whitecaps blitzed Portland 4-1 and kept them from returning to the playoffs one year after winning MLS Cup.

That 2015 season kick-started an interesting pattern. Every three years, the Portland Timbers returned to MLS Cup. The magical runs of 2018 and 2021 ended in defeat, but the journey of 2018 was all that mattered. 2021 was a bit different, and it ended in heartbreak on a windy December day at Providence Park. 2024 was the next year to follow in that pattern, and it ended with Portland’s worst ever MLS loss. What a way for the hammer of the gods to come crashing down.

Spirituality is important to tonight’s result because of an off-handed comment made by Phil Neville on Tuesday. “God is a Timbers fan” turned into outright mockery on Wednesday night. However, the soccer gods are just. They saw that the Whitecaps were robbed of a home playoff game and decided to give them a glorious day in the sun. To be absolutely clear, there was nothing supernatural about tonight’s result. One team wanted it more, had a better coach, and ended a 7-year drought without a playoff win. Good for them. 

One other trend carried over to tonight’s game. After their draw in Seattle, the Timbers clinched the Cascadia Cup. Let’s look at their previous Cascadia-conquering campaigns. In 2012, the Timbers had their worst finish in MLS with 34 points from 34 games. But it wasn’t a total loss, because they won the Cascadia Cup. Portland finished on top of the West in 2017 with one more win than the Sounders. That season ended with a 2-1 defeat in the playoffs to the Houston Dynamo. The 2022 Timbers had a dreadful attack and missed the playoffs after a massive stumble in Salt Lake City. Add these 2024 Timbers to the list. 

Phil Neville took to the podium after tonight’s defeat and spoke about a couple nameless players who “quit on the club.” “It’s better to find that out now than in year 3,” the head coach said. Neville has a three-year contract, and Year Two begins now. A full breakdown of the coming offseason will be on the way soon. Portland needs to fix a lot of problems before 2025 begins. So what does that say about 2024?

Honestly, this season has been a complete rollercoaster. A 9-game winless streak turning into a 7-game unbeaten streak. Alternating home wins and road losses. But, finally, the thing that sunk them was a 6-match winless streak that culminated with the worst home loss in franchise history. More words will come over the next couple of weeks, but it has been a hell of a ride. 

Evander’s curveball is the last word. “To the fans, you deserve much more.” The 2024 Timbers were not for the faint of heart. When the Timbers qualified for the playoffs before their game against Dallas, I only had one thought: it certainly wouldn’t be boring. Tonight’s game wasn’t boring before the 60th minute. Rather, it was an absolute catastrophe. A complete car crash that brought shock and amazement to the faces of casual viewers, utter despair for fans of the home team, and utter joy and delight to the fans of our rivals. No Timbers fan had witnessed a game like tonight’s offering since the team joined MLS in 2011. Watching it in real time was comparable to MLS Cup in 2021. It just happened so quickly. Decisions will be made, contracts will be offered, options will be picked up, and the last memory of an exciting, frustrating, and outright dumbfounding 2024 season will be this game. God can never be a Timbers fan because God is not a human. Only humans can create the circumstances for this soccer club to fall and then rise and then fall again. I’m thinking back to the first time that Portland and Vancouver met in 2024. The Whitecaps blitzed the Timbers for two goals in the first half before the Timbers fought back to tie the game. But, at the very end, the Timbers tripped over themselves. A late cross into the box couldn’t be cleared, and the Timbers collapsed after all their hard work to pull themselves level. It was the perfect microcosm of this season played in 90 minutes. They did try to warn us. But no one expected it to happen like this.

Thank you to every Cascadia FC subscriber, reader, follower, or some other category if one of those doesn’t match you. The offseason has just begun, and more articles are coming. You guys are the best and your continued support keeps me going. As always, Rose City Till I Die. Thank you all.