Rose City Forecast 14: PTFC vs San Jose

Welcome back to the forecast after the another disappointing week. A loss in Seattle extends the Timbers’ winless streak to five games and leaves them only two points clear of the red line. Seattle got on the board in the first five minutes from a corner kick when Chad Marshall flicked the ball onward, and it then struck an unsuspecting Cristian Roldan to deflect past Gleeson into goal. After those first five minutes, the Timbers looked like the better team for the rest of the half, but they could not find a goal. Dempsey got away with two hands/elbows to faces without so much as a yellow, and Alonso and Marshall got away with fairly clear handballs in the box to help the Sounders to that win. Nevertheless, the Timbers only managed a couple shots on target, and most were from outside the box.

Pick of the week is shared between MindfulCyclist and Bosoxtjh18 who were both pessimistic enough to predict a Timbers loss, but also got Lodeiro’s assist and, surprisingly, the fact that there wouldn’t be too many cards handed out in this game. RCTID26 takes home the most recommended (and optimistic) prediction for his suggestion that Nagbe would get two goals, and his celebration for the second would imitate a flopping, dying fish. If only.

And the standings. If I made a mistake, let me know!

In their first Friday night game since opening weekend, the Timbers return home to face the San Jose Earthquakes. PTFC played in San Jose just about a month ago, and that game was, depending on how you rate the away draw at Dallas, the start of the Timbers’ current slide. They come into this match with San Jose leading in the standings by one point while the Timbers lead on points per game (barely). While the Timbers get Chara back after his suspension, they may be missing his midfield counterpart, David Guzman, as he left the Sounders match at half time with concussion symptoms. Will the Timbers come together to stop this slide against the same opponent who pushed them down it?

Over/under: 4.5 total cards

The Scoring Format:

• Correct score: 5 points
• Correct result (draw/win/loss): 3 points
• Each clean sheet: 2 points
• Each goal-scorer: 1 point
• Each FK/PK/assist/lack of assist: 1 point
• Goal/assist bonus: 1 point
• Player with the first yellow card of the match: 1 point
• Each player with a red card: 1 point (Cannot earn points for predicting 0 red cards)
• Over/under on total cards: 1 point
• Most recommended/most outrageously accurate prediction: 2 points

Some ground rules and explanations/clarifications (the fine print):

You may amend your prediction at any point up to kick off to account for game day 18 announcements. Though I recommend at least getting an initial prediction sooner, just in case you forget to come back in that hour or two before the game.

Keep your scoreline predictions realistic. Basically, if you’re predicting lots of goals all the time to just earn points on goals and assists and ignoring the score, I feel that goes against the spirit of this thread. This hasn’t been at all a problem in the last two years, so let’s keep it that way!

The goal/assist bonus is an additional point if you correctly get the correct scorer and assistant on the same goal. (e.g., if Nagbe scores, assisted by Valeri, and you predicted that exact combination you get a total of three points - 1 goal, 1 assist, 1 bonus. However, if you predicted Nagbe scores assisted by Adi and Adi scores assisted by Valeri, you would get two points from the Nagbe/Valeri prediction - 1 goal, 1 assist)

Please be clear whether you think a goal will be unassisted, assisted, or from a PK/FK. Unassisted = no assist, run of play; Assisted = player who got the assist; PK/FK = directly from a free kick. For the purposes of this thread, a PK counts as a FK, and a FK as a PK. If you just leave the assist section blank, I will assume you’re declining to make an assist prediction.

Even though a player can be awarded a secondary assist by OPTA, I will award a maximum of one assist point per goal. But that point can come from either the primary or secondary assist in the box score. However, please keep your predictions to one assist per goal.

For the over/under on cards, a second yellow leading to a red counts as two cards, not three.

You may predict more than one red card if you’re expecting a chippy match, but only up to three total.

Most weeks, I will reward the most recommended prediction with the 2 points. However, if someone predicts that Caleb will bring a towel to dry off Seattle’s field, and he does, they’ll probably get those two points, regardless of whether they got the recs. We’ll also be testing this out, because I want to be careful that this doesn’t end up favoring the first few people to post their prediction. As I see it, the goal here is to add even more fun without going too over-the-top ridiculous.

If you’re looking for where I set the over/under on total cards, check the end of the preview paragraph after the standings.

Format:

In the comment title, post your predicted score with the winners, eg: 4-2 Timbers

In the body of your comment, start with the goals and assists, like so:

Nagbe (Valeri)

Valeri (Free kick)

Adi (PK)

Blanco (Unassisted)

Beckham (Free kick)

Donovan (Beckham)

Next, choose your first yellow card, and that means picking only one person.

First yellow to Nigel De Jong

Then reds, if any. (NOTE: no points awarded for correctly calling a red-card-free match, so take a guess.)

Nigel De Jong gets a red card for stomping Blanco.

Clearly note whether you’re predicting over or under on total cards. Don’t leave me to try and figure it out!

And lastly, make your fun prediction.

Nigel de Jong tries to stomp Nagbe’s ankle again, but this time, Nagbe avoids the tackle. Being angry Nagbe for the first time in three years, he kicks the ball straight into NDJ’s groin. Camera pans to a trademark Chara smile.

As always, any questions about anything?