Eddie Lewis is Officially Ours

Good point David. I'm thinking though, he's been wanting to play more central mid, and the ubiquitous Klein can switch with him whenever necessary -- those two have crazy-ESP awareness of each others' positions on the field. And then Pires would be a defending midfielder only (I haven't been impressed with his forays into final third distributing). And you know Landon and Lewis will track back on defense. So Becks really would have all the coverage he needs defensively to be a stabilizing, distributing offensive force in central mid and on the right.

The more I type about this, the more I'm in love with my plan. Arena! Are you listening!!! I've done 3/5 of the work for ya for the next match.

Maybe Becks can play center mid, but that isn't what he's doing these days. He wanders up the wing and lobs in passes. I suspect that if he was prepared to play the center they would already have put Klein on the wing. But then again, maybe that was just Gullit. I guess over the next few weeks we will really find out whether the problem was the players or the coach.

"it was so depressing I just couldn’t bring myself to try to post something."

See, I felt the same way. I'm glad that David saw some good things live at the game. It was a real yawner on tv.

I am still nervous about having Franklin on the right and not center D. But if that can work out, and we can move Klein up, that would look so good! Klein's crosses are just beautiful -- not the world class that Becks' are, but still great outswingers and CONSISTENT.

So can you see the forwards and mids looking like this?:

--------Buddle------Donovan----------

Lewis-----Pires------Beckham-------Klein

Also, it was great to see Arena play Tudela. I still have a soft spot for our little Monchichi -- I think he's better than he's given credit for.

Eddie Lewis interview since signing with the team:

http://www.insidesocal.com/soc...

I was gonna think of posting about the game, but I got home late and watched on DVR... it was so depressing I just couldn't bring myself to try to post something.

I'm still not sure what the think or say about it... I even tried yesterday but just couldn't come to grips with what seemed so "Bruce" about it... the whole everybody-stay-back style of play that will surely come with Arena-football. I just feel so sick.

On Topic: Swell, another over-thirty player for our side. Not to say anything about Eddie's heart... at least that's something to truly admire. The guys plays to leave it all on the pitch and I'm glad to have another fella who can do that at the HDC.

As many of you have mentioned, we lost to Chicago ONLY 0 - 1. To me, that meant that the team (without David, Landon, and Eddie) managed to do their defensive tasks quite well against a really good Eastern MLS Conference side - a side that did have Nyarko, Rolfe, Thorrington, and Mapp playing. Man v. Man, I hope it is obvious to many of you that Chicago definitely had more player depth that we did. To me, I was kinda' glad that Bruce & Dave did not insist on Landon and Eddie playing in this match. These coaches need to assess our team without the star/key players against true MLS competition. Now, the coaches have a clear picture and we have a better picture, as well. To me, the two weakes links in our starting 11 were Greg Vanney and Alan Gordon. I will not blame Steve Cronin yet... He, realistically, has only got to the starting 11 since beginning of this year. And, so for me, I'm willing to give him until June 2010 to continue to push himself, learn from mistakes, and improve his standing & movements in front of the goal net. I believe the corrections, emphases, and focuses training sessions (3 days altogether) with Bruce and Dave has made a positive impact on this team. But, honestly, I don't think we have a chance of winning games against New England, Houston, FC Dallas, Colorado, Real Salt Lake, and San Jose without David, Landon, and Eddie... these three individuals are the keys to our midfield battles and attack.

Sorry, guys! I'm actually in and out of town for the next few days. A combination of family events and a much-needed couple of days away with my husband.

I didn't even get to see the game, although it seems I didn't miss all that much. I'm hoping one of my co-bloggers will offer up their thoughts on how we managed to lose. (But only 1-0, which was much better defensively than I expected.)

Getting Lewis is great, but what about a larger picture.
Does anybody remember what the Galaxy gave up to get Carlos Ruis? Are these draft picks from Toronto equivalent?

I never felt we were really out of the game at any point. We played fairly well despite not having our two key players and with the addition of Lewis on the left side (Allen plays his heart out but lacks some soccer smarts) we might be looking for a playoff spot or at the very least (again) end the season pretty strong.

Lewis is going to be a great addition. We have a weakness on left mid. Unfortunately, I guess Klein stays at right back and Randolph becomes a backup. Now what about center mid?

Went to the game last night. For a team lacking its two best players we did pretty well. Klein was so much better as a midfielder! I wish we could keep him there. Vanney played pretty well most of the game too. Randolph was great and looked like last year. The improvement makes me think Gullit may really have been the problem.

oh my bad...are jen and laurie auditioning for their own sitcom??

uh..there was a game last night........no post??

I think the more important part of the trade was that we got something we really needed out of it (being able to acquire Lewis), got rid of something we didn't need, and managed to pick up 2 more draft picks for next year (can anyone say GOALKEEPER?).

Perhaps the Bruce Arena Era won't be so bad after all...