Massacre At The HDC!

By: NathanHJ | August 11th, 2008

Updates at bottom.

So the hammer comes down.

The Los Angeles Times, in a story by Grahame Jones, reports that AEG has axed BOTH Alexi Lalas and Ruud Gullit in a meeting held today.

Jones reports,

In a pair of sweeping changes brought about by a Major League Soccer season in meltdown, the Los Angeles Galaxy today removed Alexi Lalas as team president and general manager and Ruud Gullit as coach.

In its official statement on the changes, AEG, which owns the team, said that Gullit had resigned “for personal reasons” and that Lalas’ contract was up at the end of the year and that the team decided to part company now rather than wait.

Cobi Jones will take over from Gullit as the Galaxy’s interim coach. The team’s longest-serving and best-known player before the arrival of David Beckham, Jones had served as assistant coach under Gullit since November.

Tom Payne, the team’s assistant general manager will take over Lalas’ duties on an interim basis, concentrating more on the business side. Payne will be assisted on the soccer side by Paul Bravo, the Galaxy’s director of soccer.

All I can say is WOW! I didn’t expect a dual beheading. I thought it would be one or the other, with one winning the internal power stuggle. But I guess the turmoil was one too many frustrations for Gullit who was probably confused by all the rules constraining rosters and player movement in MLS. He wouldn’t be the first high-profile foreign coach to crash and burn over here, unable to adapt to the peculiar structure MLS has.

Related to this I wonder what this says for David Beckham’s influence, since many reports suggest that his team was responsible for bringing Gullit into the team in the first place.

Personally, if Lalas was really responsible for the personnel moves that started in 2006 (epitomized for me by the trade-in-search-of-a-problem-to-solve of Hartman to Kansas City, Cannon to LA, and Herculez and Ihemelu to Colorado) then I have really no sympathy at all for him. If he had a hand in all that he blew up a team that didn’t need blowing up and continued that approach for the next two seasons.

As for Gullit, I thought he had a fine tactical sense and seemed to be bringing some of the newer, younger players along, like Sean Franklin and Brandon McDonald. That might be missed. On the other hand, if there’s someone with a primo futbol brain and a comprehensive knowledge of MLS, its Cobi Jones. So I’m not so worried there, really.

Some of ya’ll have already talked about this in the comments in this post, but feel free to repost here and continue the conversation. As in, what do ya’ll think? Was this the best answer? Do you think it will actually help the team heading into the most important section of the schedule? What would you have done? What would you do now?

UPDATE: Links to news reports and blog postings.
News
Los Angeles Times
The Daily Breeze
The Associated Press
Soccernet

Blogs
Sideline Views (Andrea Canales)
Sideline Views (Luis Bueno)
Soccer By Ives
100 Percent Soccer (Nick Green)
WVHooligan
Dan Loney says it all
Official LA Galaxy Blog (with full press release)
USSoccerPlayers

Goal (Jack Bell of the NY Times)
The Offside MLS Page (by Laurie who also blogs here)
Soccer y Futbol (Bernardo Fallas of the Houston Chronicle)

Some Related Galaxy Posts:

« Guess Who We Have News On? Kyle Martino, That’s Who! | Home | Day After Thoughts On Galaxy Changes »

DAVE

Good Luck Cobi. You have mess on your hands that's by no fault of your own. I hope you are allowed to make the many changes that are needed without the interference of the management group that doesn't have clue.
charlesj27

What worries me is that who are going to be there to seriously instruct, teach, correct, and solidly improve many of our existing players. One of the main reasons I chose to stand behind Ruud Gullit is because of all of his education and training in the style, tactics, and movements of the beautiful game. I have no doubt that Cobi knows the MLS, its teams, its policies, its refs, its restrictions; but, can he teach, can he instruct, can he command? There is no doubt that all of the players will get along with him, respect him, and will work for him... but, can he make this team excel - to be on the path to being good enough so that when we do come up again on SuperLiga and Champions League - we will be ready! Every member of this team has seriously reach in and make a strong, lasting commitment to learning, improving, working extra hard to be fluid, convincing, and precise. I don't want the Eastern Conference MLS teams "steam-rolling" over us.
Laurie

Jen, I was having a "thank God it's over feeling" too. And then I read the "Daily Breeze" link in Nathan's post.
jen

I have another gut feeling now too. It's the feeling of "thank God it's over." The speculations, the firings, the acquisitions -- all of that. (I know there may still be some personnel shuffling going on, but not THIS big.)

I think the team will reflect a sigh of relief in their play on Thursday, rather than more chaos amid chaos. And I'm going on record as saying that. Less anxiety now will produce better play.

Give me a couple of games to see how this pans out before you throw tomatoes. :)
jen

Whoa-ho-ho!!! I did NOT see the double ditching happening. Wow. They always seem to do it (whatever "it" is) BIG at the Galaxy.

I'm interested to see what Cobi can do as well. But I realistically see him staying on as asst. coach next year, regardless of how this year plays out. I don't think I actually want to see him as head coach, because then he becomes that much more fire-able. I want to see him stay with the organization. He's a good man -- smart, with values -- and the Galaxy need more of that.
Whitney Sterk

FINALLY!!!! too bad this happened so late in the season.....
TJ

My prayers and my mass emails to AEG have finally paid off!
The soccer gods are with the LA Galaxy now!

Now this organization can finally get set onto the true path of "Super Club" (thanks, Lalas!).

This should make for an interesting rest of the season. I don't know if Cobi is cut out to be a coach, but i could honestly see him as a GM of the Galaxy - he knows this league better than anyone - he just needs the guidance on how to run a team with a salary cap - may I suggest a book called "Moneyball" this book speaks MLS and how to run a team on a tight budget!!!

They say he is going to get a fair chance - but honestly - don't know what he can do with the personnel he has that would be any different than Gullit than say attitude change from the players themselves - it's now all them at this point!

I definitely see more changes if not now than at the end of the season - house cleaning of the talent pool! Plus, I wonder if the player acquisitions of this year were more to do with Bravo than Lalas - if that is the case - he should be history as well.
Glen

Now with Rudd putting his home up for sale a couple weeks back, I think he already knew this was coming and after the loss to San Jose that was it. It's really too bad to see this happening, I liked the way Rudd was wanting to have this team play but he couldn't do what he wanted with the talent available. I think Cobi as interim will do fine for the rest of the season (and maybe just maybe make the playoffs) and depending on his (the teams results) will tell us if he'll be the head coach next year. I think he'll get the teams backing and remember this is embarrassing/sh*tty for the players to have this happening all over again like the last couple seasons so you never know what will happen from this point. I know this is an easy answer but they will either fold or play their hearts out for pride and I will still be a fan!

When's the public flogging of Lalas :p
Danny

Im ok with cobi as coach and finally alexi goes

a little off topic- where's eduardo dominguez?
Melissa

I'm gonna be there for the Classico! Cobi's first job as head coach! I can't wait to live the magic.
Nicole

Never fear, nathan! This could be Cobi's finest hour. The players will rally around him and go on a tear the likes you've never seen before! MLS Cup Champions, baby!!
charlesj27

NathanHJ,
First of all - "Jesus-Jehovah-Jamima", finally!!! Finally, the LA Galaxy gets to rid itself of the profoundly stupifying hysteria of Alexi Lalas. It's more than over-due. Personally, I would have like for Ruud to stay and see what else he could accomplish with this team - but, I fear that he was severely hand-cuffed by the cumbersome, insane, twisted rules of MLS. He probably thought - it would be well after 2009, before he could bring in the players he really wanted. But, some-how... bringing in a European Head Coach to MLS...is like using a Kitana sword to fend off the Serbian and Croatian militia. The tool is too fine, too graceful - for what land-mines and poison gas can do more quickly. Sorry for the grim and inhumane analogy. No, I do not condone wars and ethnic-cleansing. I don't!
So far, the Head Coach that has really impressed me in MLS is Dominic Kinnear. The man is a lion among wolves... and, he commands obedience, respect, and results. He uses players from our own American soil - and, puts them on a do-or-die regimen of team-work, hard-work, and passion. And, in the end, he gets the results out of them.
Personally, I believe this is a LOT to put on the shoulders of a 37-year old ex-LA Galaxy player. I totally respect Cobi, and loved him as a LA Galaxy player... but, is he ready to handle the cunningness, the shrewdness, the tactical superiority of Head Coaches Steve Nicol, Dominic Kinnear, Juan Carlos Osorio, John Carver, and Sigi Schmid. To me, this really seems like an intense trial-by-fire... We only have 11 more regular MLS season games left. Really, we're going to turn around our record and standing with just 11 games? I really don't want Cobi to set-up for failure... he does not deserve that from the organization he gave hsi heart for for 12 years!
Lee

Yeah, "Holy Batshit, Batman".

It's certainly going to be interesting to see if the
team shows up to play on Thursday or if the season is
a write off. Honestly, I could see it going either way.
George

I just read about this on the official Galaxy blog, and it said something about Ruud leaving because his family did not like living in LA.
Laurie

Wow.