It’s the only thing TFC fans seem to want to talk about. It doesn’t matter that Paul Mariner and Earl Cochrane have been given the go-ahead to build the Reds for 2013. Fans still want to debate the merits of firing both.
That obsession has created an environment where any attempt to discuss what TFC needs to do in the off-season is derailed by those that want to scream for Mariner’s head.
In an effort to clarify my position on Mariner, and to focus discussions on whether he should be retained, I present this column: The 24th Minute’s final (until January) thoughts on Paul Mariner. Please direct all comments about his future to this thread. Comments that are off-topic in future columns will be deleted and moved here.
Below the jump, my official position on Mariner.
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First off -- and I cannot stress this enough -- I am not pro-Mariner. I am pro-stability. I strongly believe that firing Mariner now would absolutely ensure that TFC will suffer through another terrible season in 2013. They would not have significant time to find a replacement, no one in their right mind would want to work for the club, and they would lose a tremendous amount of political goodwill league-wide.
Many dismiss the importance of MLS politics, but the truth is it matters. Marnier is viewed as a good league servant and TFC firing him after giving him less than a year to build the club would be viewed as a slap in the face to him.
If TFC fires Mariner they would be looking at D-list caliber managers to replace him. It’s almost certain that the Reds would go into 2013 with a manager with no MLS experience, or a guy that has been out of the league for a significant amount of time and did not have success in the league prior to being fired.
In my mind, the biggest error TFC has made since its launch is that it has not shown enough respect to the league and to what’s been successful in it in the past. After six years of trying to do things differently maybe it’s time to acknowledge that we don’t know better than the rest of MLS. If Toronto wants to win it needs to do things that work in MLS.
Mariner has been successful in MLS in the past. You can dismiss that as being part of the so-called “MLS 1.0” era, but that attitude speaks to the disrespect I touched upon above. Bluntly, Toronto management and fans need to get over themselves. We don’t know better than the rest of the league. Evidence suggests that we don’t know what the hell we are talking about, actually.
That said, I do not believe that there is enough evidence to support the idea that Mariner is the right long-term answer.
Let me repeat that: I do not know if Mariner is the long-term answer.
One more time: I do not know if Mariner is the long-term answer.
In case it isn’t clear: I do not know if Mariner is the long-term answer.
I want to find out though. If he is the long-term answer we’ll need to see some improvement in the following ways.
Tactics:
Talking about tactics is dangerous. As the old adage goes, a little bit of knowledge is a dangerous thing and there are a whole lot of TFC fans that have a little bit of knowledge. I, too, have a little bit of knowledge.
So, all discussions about the relative value of direct football (or, “HOOFBALL!1!!1!, if you prefer) versus possession football needs to be taken with a grain of salt. The biggest failing of Winter, in my mind, was tactical inflexibility. If Mariner is to be successful he needs to avoid acting in the same, stubborn, way.
That said, there is little doubt that TFC currently gives the ball up too quickly and too often – and part of that is by design. When he took over, Mariner told his defenders to boot the ball away from trouble rather than dribbling it out of the problem area. There is a time and a place for that, but Toronto does it too often.
Mariner needs to find a way to create more possession. That doesn’t mean that he has to make TFC Barcelona, but he simply cannot have the team giving it up willfully.
Game management:
He has failed to use subs in many games and has used subs too late in others. Mariner does not have a lot of in-game management experience and he needs to improve. I suspect he’d agree.
Line-up selection:
Mariner plays a lot of players out of their natural position. I suspect he’d say that he does that because the players playing out of position are better than the replacements, even if the replacements naturally play the position.
Which speaks to…
Talent identification:
Mariner needs to find better players. There are many that suggest that he’s mostly responsible for the mess TFC’s line-up is now. If you think that then you think that he’s had enough time to make his mark, and that TFC needs to cut him loose now before he does further damage.
However, that’s not what I understand his role under Winter to have been. If you disagree, you disagree. Regardless, we can all agree that it’s his team now. He will be judged by the line-up that hits the pitch next March.
If he starts the 2013 season as poorly as Winter then he absolutely should be fired.
If TFC finishes 2013 with less than 30 points again then he should be fired.
I disagree that an arbitrary “make the playoffs or else” mandate should be at play because I don’t want him tempted to make moves that are short-term in thinking. However, he absolutely needs to make this team competitive next year.
If he can’t do that he should be fired. If he’s given a year to do it and fails then no one could complain, and the club would not be hurt politically in the same way that it would be if it prematurely sacked him now.
As for Cochrane, I'll say just this: He's main role is negotiating contracts. Under Mo Johnston, TFC's contract situation was a disaster. Under Cochrane it isn't. So, it's disingenuous to suggest that he's been a complete failure in his job, a job few understand.
He's struggled on the PR front a couple times -- the DeRo to Celtic situation being the most obvious. That could have been handled better, but to place 100 percent of the blame on Cochrane is misguided. The second TFC told Celtic they were not informed on the trial he was pulled from training and he did not return to the practice pitch until the paperwork was in place. That tells me the DeRo people may have made some mistakes too.
Feel free to disagree below. This is the appropriate place for doing so.