Drew VanderPloeg is the host of Home and Away, a podcast covering Sporting Kansas City and we’re thrilled to share his perspective on what’s ailing the club.
Editor's note: A line about Sporting Kansas City's lack of analytics staff has been updated to note the club's pair of performance analysts.
After what was one of (if not the) most embarrassing performances in Wiz/Wizards/Sporting KC club history on Tuesday evening in the US Open Cup – a 3-0 loss at the hands of the USL Championship’s Colorado Springs Switchbacks, it was hard not to start searching for answers.
Being a sports fan means you get familiar with dealing with emotional pain. Half the fans go home sad every game and almost all of them do at the end of every season. But this felt different. There was a palpable feeling of despair surrounding this team that was impossible to set aside. Some of it was probably due to the opponent, and some of it due to the feeling that while the MLS season seemed like an already lost cause, perhaps an Open Cup run could satiate the desire for hope that this wouldn’t be another lost year. There were certainly several factors. But the result was the same. Frustration. Sadness. Anger. A need to find some way to process those emotions.
Commonly we attempt to manage feelings like this by finding someone or something to blame. Who is responsible for this? Why was it allowed to happen? What structural (or non-structural) components led to this level of failure? How can it be fixed, and how quickly?
I’ve seen a lot of takes on this topic over the past week or so, and while I think many of them hit components of the issues at play, they were also incomplete. With that in mind, I thought it could be useful to try to fully unpack what has brought SKC to this point. The hope is that I can provide everyone reading along with some context while also taking you on my own personal journey of catharsis.
Disclaimer: I am not a reporter, nor am I attempting to be one. So, while much of what I will say here is informed by either public information or things I have heard from reliable sources, the words and thoughts are my own.
Let’s travel back in time a bit, shall we?
The year is 2018. Sporting Kansas City is on the heels of winning their fourth trophy of the prior six seasons and is battling new upstart LAFC for the Western Conference title.
Head coach and technical director Peter Vermes has completely re-imagined SKC from its high-pressing, frenetic roots to a more possession-oriented positional play machine looking to pass its way around and through opponents. He could see the team was well positioned for a legitimate run at a second MLS Cup title during his tenure and was looking for ways to further solidify that opportunity in the summer transfer window.
His main goal was adding quality to the center forward position and Sporting KC had the roster flexibility to sign a Designated Player to that position. Vermes had all but finalized a deal to sign such a player and merely needed financial approval from ownership to spend the discretionary funds necessary to complete the transaction. For whatever reason, he was not authorized to do so. Perspectives vary on how or why that happened. Vermes has told the story several times in public venues but his is obviously just one version of events. Ownership representatives have refuted the claim that Vermes was not given discretionary spending approval when he had specifically asked for it.
All of it seems like careful wordsmithing by both sides to avoid taking responsibility for the situation, but the result is the same: the player was not signed. And while Sporting KC eventually clinched the Western Conference regular season title on the last day of the season in a thrilling home win against the aforementioned LAFC, they exited the playoffs in heartbreaking fashion to the Portland Timbers in the Western Conference finals.
Would signing said center forward have changed how that tie went? Would SKC have been able to overcome Atlanta United, a team that were absolutely dominating the league that season in the MLS Cup final? There is obviously no way to know, but this was, in my opinion, the beginning of a worrying trend that leads to where this club is today.
