Peter Luccin in charge at FCD: 10 things we've learned
Peter Luccin in charge at FCD: 10 things we've learned
The sample is big enough now to draw some strong conclusions
In looking at what FC Dallas has done under interim manager Peter Luccin, the raw math (i.e. “results”) look good, bordering on excellent. So, it’s all puppy dogs and lollipops around Toyota Stadium, right? Well …
If we meander out of the air conditioned, comfy zone of “results” and step into the hot, humid outside air of “how they got here,” examining things a little closer, it’s not as cut and dried.
But in a season where things went so unexpectedly sideways, most FCD supporters will take it. And the fact is, the team IS getting results, now 5-3-1 in league play under Luccin.
Luccin has been at the wheel for 10 games now. No, it’s not a large sample. But it’s not a tiny one, either. It’s a good time to pick up a stick and poke at this thing a little. So here are 10 things we’ve learned:
1. The schedule was insane
Luccin has been in charge for 10 matches (pending this weekend’s League’s Cup opener in St. Louis). And those 10 matches happened in a window of 36 days. That is – not to put too fine a point on it – brutal and ridiculous.
(Aside: I know scheduling is tough. Lots of moving parts, etc. AND I know that one of the matches was a U.S. Open Cup date. And yet, still insane. Major League Soccer has to do better. Suggestion: Add a midweek game in March and April. FCD was 10 games into its MLS season before bumping into a midweek date; and even then it was an Open Cup date. Back to matters at hand… )
The cluster-f of a schedule is too bad, too, because we really have zero idea what Luccin could do if he wasn’t patch-working lineups together, squeezing performance from a much smaller pool of players than he’d like.
The injury situation remains a perplexing mess; the recent 1-1 draw at New England saw FCD piecing together a team despite missing (arguably) 9 of it’s top 20 players.
Actually, this is surely a point in Luccin’s favor. The results are better than acceptable despite it all.
2. Confidence restored
There are numbers to demonstrate the improved performance, but there’s also the eye test. Simply put, the team’s spirit and confidence has been mercifully restored. Hard to say what happened previously under Nico Estevez, but the players had clearly become tentative, reluctant to take chances in attack, always choosing the more defensive, protective option. Which all served to make the attack utterly toothless. Chance creation was at an absolute trickle. Perhaps it’s true what they say, that teams gradually take on the personality of their managers; Estevez was a nice sort, very laid back. The team’s attacking choices gradually looked the same.
Luccin can be a sweetheart, too. But he’s more fiery. As a player, he was a hammer. (And you know what they also say: “To a hammer, everything looks like a nail!”)
So Luccin made sure to release the players’ personal handbrakes. “GO!” … “Play forward!” … Being more vertical was suddenly vogue again.
He was careful to run practice sessions in ways that demonstrated the subtle difference between “patience” and “passive.” Patience is good. Passivity can’t be tolerated.
A team previously at the bottom of pretty much every offensive category is now scoring at a clip of 2.33 goals per game — which is A+ level. (The defense is also conceding more, but the trade off seems worth it for now.)
3. Tactical changes?
Honestly, not so much.
The playing principals have remained mostly the same. FCD plays out of the back. They press “some” but not at the rate of a St. Louis or old school NY Red Bull. They typically release one outside back or wingback, leaving the opposite side to slide over and provide protection against the counter.
Luccin has shifted the team back into a more sensible four-man back line. Actually, they usually defend in a 4-4-2, then morph into something closer to a 3-4-1-2 with the ball, with a couple of moving parts (like, say, the right-sided midfielder moving into the “10” spot, while Paul Arriola shoots forward from his right back spot.)
Mostly, however, the tactics haven’t changed significantly. It’s that aforementioned mentality change that’s made all the difference. Well, that and …
4. Top guys, top performance
Estevez simply wasn’t getting the best from more of his top men: Arriola, Sebastian Lletget, Nkosi Tafari, Jesus Ferreira and Petar Musa, specifically. (Maarten Paes has been outstanding throughout.)
For whatever reason – really, we don’t have enough time to go into all of them – these guys are looking like top pros once again. Musa has probably benefitted most. Luccin said right away: “He’s a box striker; he needs to be in the box.” I don’t doubt that Estevez tried to keep Musa closer to goal; Luccin has actually managed to convince him. Result: Musa has 13 goals, tied for 5th best in MLS, with an outside shot at Golden Boot. Imagine that.
I think they all tried hard under the well-liked Estevez, it just wasn’t happening. It is now, and that’s what counts.
5. The man is candid
From the very first match Luccin has been unfailingly candid about things. His first game in charge was a 2-0 win over St. Louis. After which the brand new manager wasted no time in saying what we all thought: the team maybe didn’t deserve to win.
Now, winning is the thing in sports, generally a bottom line business – and Luccin was certainly proud of his team for finding a way. But standards are also clearly important and that was the message Luccin was delivering through his thick French accent: he needed more. Details needed sharpening. Decisions needed some dialing in. Chance creation needed to be more dependable. Performance needed to happen over 90 minutes, without 5- to 10-minute subpar windows here and there.
Still, it was refreshing to hear a coach with so much candor. (Estevez, in his waning days, was reduced to what we call “shining up turds.” He kept trying to tell us the team wasn’t playing that badly, that it deserved better results, never mind what we could all see.)
By contrast, to paraphrase what Luccin has said after almost every win to date. “Happy for the victory – but we can and we MUST play better.” And it most likely will get better once more bodies are healthy.
Again, that’s about “standards.” And about keeping them high.
6. He raised the floor; we’ll see about the ceiling
We know at the very least that Luccin can raise the floor. That is, he can take a team that was pretty much at rock bottom and elevate the side’s lowest level to something far more acceptable. Even if it’s hard on the eyes, as some results have been.
A team previously collecting points at a pitiful clip of 0.87/ game is now collecting them at 1.77/ game. That’s a stunning turnaround.
It’s not exactly apples-to-apples because the majority of Luccin’s league matches have been at home. Still, it means something.
Now, as for whether he can raise the ceiling … ? (That is, what is the top end level of performance he could summon from an improved, healthier roster, whenever that arrives?) Well, we’re not going to find out for a while. Not in 2024. This season is a rescue mission. Luccin has shown that he has plenty of life preservers to toss out and then reel in.
If he can keep that up, he’ll likely get a shot at raising the ceiling next year, assuming the team’s back room staff can build a better roster.
7. Better at home
As mentioned, six of nine MLS matches under Luccin’s steering have been at Toyota Stadium. He’s 5-1-0 in those. And the one loss was to a way-good Cincinnati side. Restoring home form was an absolute must. By collecting 15 of a possible 18 points at home, FCD now holds the Western Conference’s 4th best home record (of 14 clubs).
Once again, we’ll say it: the results haven’t always been aesthetically pleasing. But one more time we’ll say this, too: It’s a rescue mission. Any port in a storm, you know? The home form is keeping the season afloat.
8. But away from the home ground …
Now, as for the road: at some point, if the men of FCD are going to mound a legit playoff charge – laughable 5-6 weeks ago, but back in play now – they’ll have to win away from North Texas. They’ve been competitive in losses at Seattle and Kansas City, and earned a worthy draw in New England. But they’ll need to finish the job and push one over the finish line.
Even if they don’t make the playoffs, they don’t want to join a small list of very bad teams (four of them over 28 previous seasons) who went a full campaign with zero road wins. I’ve spoken of this list before (on our radio post-game shows); it is an infamous roster of pitifully bad teams, and FCD does NOT wish to add its name to that sad fraternity.
9. Playing the kids. Yay!
It would be easy to dismiss a return to “play the kids” as an injury necessitated fall back. But Luccin said straight away that he wanted to nudge the club a little closer to its roots, where young players were pushed through the academy pipeline and given some doggone minutes. It’s what made FCD one of the best stories around MLS in the Oscar Pareja years, on through the Luchi Gonzalez years.
Estevez seemed a little more reluctant to deploy the academy products (other than the proven likes of Jesus Ferreira, Paxton Pomykal, etc.) Perhaps he landed on a down cycle, after the cash register ringing sales of Ricardo Pepi, Bryan Reynolds, Justin Che, and Tanner Tessman. The truth is probably somewhere in between.
But Luccin is assigning more minutes to rookie Logan Farrington, as well. Clearly, the manager has sufficient trust in youth and values the bigger picture of getting these assets on the field. And the young striker has rewarded that faith by ensconcing himself as one of the season’s best stories around Toyota Stadium. Farrington has 2 goals and 5 assists in matches under Luccin, and always finds a variety of ways to impact matches.
10. Staying relevant
I said and wrote all along that finding a way into the playoffs would be a heavy lift. Still is, although we don’t need to squint so hard to see it now. But what I wanted for Luccin and for FCD was this:
Stay relevant in the playoff conversation.
Even if FCD and Co. couldn’t get there, could they improve enough to keep supporters interested into into September and then October? If they could just stay in the playoff conversation, they’d give people something to think about, a good reason to keep fighting that frustrating ingress and egress on match nights at Toyota Stadium.
Well, mission accomplished so far. At the Leagues Cup break, FCD is three points out of a playoff spot.