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NYCFC Weekly Updates By The Numbers – MLS Week 25 August 28

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This was a pretty good week for NYC, except for the hopes of winning Supporters’ Shield. Many of the teams chasing NYC played twice, and none won twice, which means they are wasting games. At this point time and the passing of games is an ally.  Drawing at RBA was a pretty good result when you consider that all the best scenarios going into this week required that NYC rarely lose and draw 2-3 times. With this game behind us, the toughest games should be Away at Chicago and Montreal.
The big wild card now is the pair of unusual Home games in September.  SKC is up next with the Blues holding an extremely depleted roster, and then hosting Houston in East Hartford. NYC has 3 of the next 4 at home, and it needs to build points because after that comes 3 straight Away. Despite being a strong Away team the difference in PPG is a full point: 2.308 at Home against 1.308 Away.
One other odd schedule note: there are only 24 interconference matchups left in MLS this year, NYC figures in 17% of them, and they are the next 4 games in a row.
Montreal’s failure to beat Toronto in Montreal pretty much kills any remaining rational hope for a Supporters’ Shield this year. NYCFC can very well join the short list of teams to get 60 or more points and not win. In fact it is unlikely even to be close. NYC is 9 points back, and has 8 games left. Toronto has 7 left. If NYC wins its extra game, it still has to make up another 6 points on Toronto just to tie. Toronto, however, has lost only 3 times all year. It is hard to see them losing 3 times in their last 7. But let’s try to develop a plausible (or at least possible) if unlikely scenario. Toronto’s worst stretch of 7 games this year was from June 3 to July 22 when they went 3-2-2 for 11 points. Let’s assume they do slightly worse and finish 3-3-1 for 10 points in their last 7. That gives them 66. The Blues must go 6-1-1 to match that, finish with 66 points, and would have 20 wins to 19 for Toronto which wins the first tiebreaker.  So that’s it. Toronto has to lose as many times in 7 games as it has in 27 to date and NYC has to win 6 of 8, something it managed to do once in its history, last season. In that stretch the Blue Robber Barons lost the 2 games they did not win so going 6-1-1 has never been done by NYC. Together, this means that Toronto has to have its worst 7 games of the season, and NYC has to have its best 8 games ever. It can happen, but at this point NYCFC is playing for second place in the league, realistically.
Back when Toronto and Chicago were tied for 1st, I wrote that “I don’t think either Toronto or Chicago will finish with 68 points. If they do NYC is not catching them.  I do think it will take more than 60 points to win the East (and therefore almost certainly also win the SS). It might even take more than 60 points to finish second.”  It seems to have been a mistake to expect Toronto to falter, but but Chicago might not even make 60.
Before playing at Yankee Stadium, seven games ago, Chicago was tied with Toronto for first, piling up 2.0 PPG, and riding an 11-game unbeaten streak. Since then, including the 2-1 loss against NYC, the Fire is reeling. They have only 1 win in 8 games including 4 straight losses now. Two games ago when their streak was 4 losses in 5 I hesitated to pronounce them in freefall.  The 4 losses were all away, and although they managed 2 wins and 3 draws Away during the 11 game unbeaten streak, they had the worst Away record among league leaders even before hey stumbled.  Prior to the unbeaten streak their Away record was 0-3-2. So their failure to win any Away of 4 games was not surprising, and that they were all losses only slightly unusual.  As I explained at the time I always expect a team to play to its record, and winning only 1 game in a stretch of 1H/4A was not out of line with  Chicago’s record.
Two games later, Chicago’s fall is clear. You can maybe excuse losing to Toronto at home. TFC is on fire, losing only twice in the last 21 games. But now the Fire have lost to Minnesota in Chicago, handing the Loons their first ever road win and putting Minnesota’s PPG up to 1.0, and we have undeniable evidence that they are not as good as the 2.0 PPG made them seem through 19 games.
The best case you can make now for a Chicago revival is their streakiness.They started at 1.38 PPG through 8 games, then earned 2.46 through the next 11, and sit at 0.43 in the last 7. Schweinstager was a catalyst but not enough to explain singlehandedly the switch that marked the break between their first 2 streaks, and another inexplicable change of fortune could be coming.  We could be shocked by another switch to winning again, or a least doing better than losing nearly every game. Their remaining schedule is a rough balance of Home and Away and Easy/Tough opponents. Nikolic had chances against Minnesota before Minnesota scored and just couldn’t finish. A return to form from him could right their course, even if they don’t reach their previous level. Without that and they probably limp into the playoffs.
That in mind, here’s an update on the teams chasing NYC.
  • Montreal: Game in hand, 11 points back, H2H in Montreal. The Impact can beat us at home, and win their extra game, and still will be 5 points behind us.
  • Dallas FC: 1 in hand, 11 points back. They can the extra game and still will be 8 points trailing.
  • Red Bulls: 1 in hand, 8 points back: If they win their extra game, which is hardly a given as it is Away, they still will be 5 points behind us.
  • Atlanta: 2 in hand, 11 points back, 8H 2A remaining. They can win both extra games and still will be 5 points back. Downside for NYC: this still leaves them with a favorable 6H 2A in remaining 8 games. If on top of winning all their extra games they also win two extra home game, and all else being equal, they jump ahead of us. That’s a lot going right for them, however.
  • Seattle: 5 points back, One fewer game remaining: 4H 3A. Very tough path to catch NYC.
  • SKC: 7 points back, Game in hand, 4H 5A:  If they win the extra game (at home) they are still 4 back. Also substantially behind on first tie-breaker  (Wins).
  • Chicago: 6 points back, 4H 4A. No structural schedule advantage.  To overtake NYC they have to simply outplayed NYC by 6+ points. If they tie on points, they probably make up the win deficit and have a shot at the GD, where they currently sit 2 back, but if they make up the 6 points that likely comes with the points.
I think the first 2, Montreal and Dallas, are no longer a concern. If they catch NYC it means NYC has a major slump and multiple teams ahead of them also overtake the Blue Notes.*  In fact, with the few remaining games NYC’s advantage over all these teams is almost — not quite but almost — as big as the advantage Tronto holds over NYC.  The Blues trail TFC by 9 points with a game in hand.  The closest teams to NYC are
  • five points back with a game in deficit (Seattle) or 2 games in deficit (Columbus)
  • six back and even on games (Chicago) or two games in deficit (Portland)
  • seven to nine back and a game in hand (SKC, RB, and Vancouver)
  • 11 back and 2 games in hand (Atlanta)
It is hard to judge with the uneven schedule but Chicago is probably closest. SKC can jump over Chicago if they win their extra game.  Everyone else is probably further back from NYC than NYC is from Toronto. Here’s another way to look at it. Assume NYC slumps, and plays well below its level to date, finishing 3-3-2 (1.375 PPG) and gets 58 points. To meet that and maybe win a tiebreaker:
  • Chicago has to go 5-1-2, 2.22 PPG
  • SKC has to go 5-1-3, 2.00 PPG
  • RB has to go 6-2-1, 2.11 PPG
  • Seattle has to go 5-1-1, 2.29 PPG
  • Vancouver has to go 6-1-2, 2.22 PPG
  • Atlanta has to go 6-0-4 or 7-2-1, 2.20 PPG
  • Columbus has to go 5-0-1, 2.67 PPG
Note: 3-2-2 would match NYC’s worst 8 games of the season, from April 23 to May 31, a stretch that included only 3 Home games and featured a 4-game road trip, including the Dallas->RSL->Orlando week.
* Besides all but settling the race for first place, Montreal’s failure to beat Toronto in Montreal also puts the Impact in a tough spot to make the playoffs. They are tied with Atlanta but AU has one extra game to play, and all those home games.   Montreal gets to play Toronto twice more in Toronto.Montreal has 3 games in hand on Columbus but is 6 points behind.  

NYCFC Weekly Updates By The Numbers – MLS Week 24 August 21

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One-quarter of the season is left. NYC is 4 points back of league-leading Toronto, and 5 ahead of third-place Chicago.

  • Many teams behind Chicago have games in hand, and even Chicago has a schedule advantage of one extra home game. So I checked to see what would happen if every team within generous reach of NYC took full advantage of any schedule advantages it has. I checked West teams as well for potential home field in a Cup final match. This exercise ignores strength of schedule and just looks at extra games or extra home games.
    • Montreal: Game in hand, 10 points back, H2H in Montreal. The Impact can beat us at home, and win their extra game, and still will be 4 points behind us.
    • Dallas FC: 2 in hand, 11 points back. They can win both extra games and still will be 5 points trailing.
    • Red Bulls: 1 in hand, 8 points back, H2H in NJ: They can beat us at home, and win their extra game, and still will be 2 points behind us.
    • Atlanta: 3 in hand, 11 points back, 8H 4A remaining. They can win all 3 extra games and still will be 2 points back. Downside for NYC: this still leaves them with a favorable 5H 4A in remaining 9 games. If on top of winning all their extra games they also win an extra home game, and all else being equal, they jump ahead of us. That’s a lot going right for them, however.
    • Seattle: 6 points back, 5H 4A: taking advantage of the modestly better H/A schedule by winning the additional home game leaves them 3 points back. Also, even if they make up the 6-point deficit by winning 2 extra games NYC would have first tiebreaker with one more Win.
    • SKC: 6 points back, 4H 5A: No clear schedule advantage. They do play NYC in NYC which is an opportunity but not an advantage. Even if they make up 6-point deficit by winning 2 extra games NYC would have first tiebreaker with two more Wins.
    • Chicago: 5 points back, 5H 4A. They can win their extra home game and be 2 behind.

The summary is that only Atlanta has enough extra games and home games baked into their schedule to let them jump over NYC just by seizing those advantages.

  • A 3-game win streak and 4 of 5 has this table looking a bit better to reach the top spots. Winning 5 more games is very doable and that all leads to 60+ points. Even winning 4 more gets to 60 with a couple of draws.

Also, I ran the number adding NYC’s Home PPG times 4 games + the Away PPG times 5 and it comes to 62 points.

  • NYCFC is 8 points ahead of 2016 through 25 games. Last year the club reached 46 points at games 30-31, jumping from 45 points to 48 with only 3 games to go.

A final note on the graphs. The PPG line for 2016 stabilized around game 19. After that it just squiggled up and down without moving much. Part of that is just that it gets harder to move the needle the deeper you go into the season, but NYC last year also did not have a winning or winless streak longer than 2 games after that point. You can see this year the line has diverged more later based on the current 3 straight wins and 4 of 5.

2017 MLS Interconference Play – Week 23 August 14

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Week 23 – 4 Games 
East Record 3-1-0
At Home 2-1-0
On Road 1-0-0
Goal Differential +5
East Points 9
West Points 3

Season To Date
East Record 38-28-24
At Home 29-6-8 (43)
On Road 9-22-16 (47)
Goal Differential +31
East Points 138
West Points 108

NYCFC is responsible for the East’s road win this week. NYC is now 4-2-1 against the West for 1.86 PPG. NYC is 9-5-3 for 1.77 against the East. The East overall is earning 1.53 PPG against the West. The East excluding NYC is at 1.51 PPG.

NYCFC Weekly Updates By The Numbers – MLS Week 23 August 14

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There’s one game left to finish this week due to the rain delay in DC, but neither team (DC and RSL) are of much interest so I’m putting this up now.
  • Hello Second Place. It’s been a while since we’ve seen you. I’m exactly not sure when, but it was probably the end of 2016. I don’t think we started strong enough to have been in second even by accident near the start of the season.
  • In fairness, NYC and Chicago are as tied as 2 teams can be when they have not played the game amount of games. I suppose NYC and Chicago could have the same number of points, but then the Fire would have a clear PPG advantage with the game in hand. As it stands, NYC is up 2 points, and 0.01 ahead on PPG. Chicago has a game in hand, and the one game remaining between the 2 teams is in Chicago.  
  • Both teams control their destiny. If NYC wins out, including the game in Chicago, the Fire cannot catch them. If Chicago wins out, NYC cannot catch them.
  • Meanwhile, Toronto just keep chugging along.  Four games ago, Toronto and the Fire both had 3 losses, by far the lowest in the league.  Since then the Fire have lost 3 of 4 while Toronto is still sitting on 3 for the year. They lost once in their first 14 games. Then lost 2 of 4. And since have gone 6 games without a loss.  They don’t win more than anyone. They are tied with NYC in wins. Chicago and RB are each one win behind with a game in hand. But TFC has only 3 losses and the next lowest (Chicago) has double that. When Toronto does not win it has 3 losses against 8 draws while NYC has 7 losses against 4 draws. Toronto had a weak start to the season, which easy t forget at the point. They only won 1 of their first 6 games. But they also only lost once.  Four draws in the first six — two of those at home —  was a poor start. But those four draws also represent the difference between 1st and 2nd place right now.
  • Last year NYC won 6 road games and had the most Away wins and points in the league. The fifth road win came after 8 games, including a stretch of 4 wins out of 5. 2016 NYC only won 2 of the last 7 Away games. This year it took 12 games to reach 5 wins, but they have come more regularly. With 6 left, it is reasonable to hope for 3 more wins.  2 more is probably the most likely, but 3 is a good hope, with the weakest opponents being Colorado, Montreal and New England (which is not to concede RB and Chicago, either of which would be even more valuable. But 3 more road wins makes 7 more wins very possible. Even 8 becomes thinkable with 3 Away wins. OTOH, getting just 1 more Away win caps the team at 5 or 6 more wins, which is still on track for the neighborhood of 60 points, but probably comfortably far from First Place and maybe even from Second.
  • NYC 2017 is now 6 points ahead of NYC 2016.
  • A few more schedule notes. The West is all askew right now with Dallas in 4th place despite having the highest PPG. At the same time their PPG puts them tied for Fifth Place in the East. Atlanta had one game in hand going into this week. They were inactive this week, and will be again next week due to their stadium delay, leaving them will 3 games in hand.  But a win at home by NYC next week creates an 11-point gap. Atlanta has a tough gap to make up even with all their home games, and their 8 games in 24 days should tire them out. NYC can be in a similar position with RB next week, but that requires 2 results in the coming week, and I try not to count on getting help. But it would be nice if after next week we know the game in Harrison is important only for pride, a season sweep, and the all-time record, while the only team that can threaten NYC from behind — barring  a loss of form — is Chicago.

NYCFC Weekly Updates By The Numbers – MLS Week 22 August 7

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  • Last year NYC played 23rd game in late July, had 36 points, and were in First Place in the East with 1.57 PPG and a projected 53-54 point finish. Catching the West leaders for SS was possible but highly unlikely (and didn’t happen). The biggest concern was whether Toronto could catch up at 7 points back but 3 games in hand and most of them at home. Instead TFC slipped after it made up almost all the ground, and RB caught up by not losing again the rest of the season. NYC had a disproportionate 4 of its remaining 11 games against the West. After a weird season with very imbalanced H/A stretches it evened out and NYC faced 5H/6A the rest of the way. NYCFC finished at 54 points.
  • This year NYC reached Game 23 a week later, has 4 more points and projects to 59-60, but sits in Third Place in the East. Atlanta is behind with one game in hand and most of at home. The West leaders can theoretically catch us and the East leaders but it seems unlikely. NYC has a disproportionate 5 of its remaining 11 games against the West, and again 5H/6A the rest of the way.

  • The playoff line in the West is higher than the East, but the East’s 5th place team is closer to the top of the West than to the 6th place West team.
  • Catching Toronto or Chicago will be quite tough, and we will need help. Both have 6 home games to NYC’s 5, and Chicago has one extra game overall. If they win that, they are as far ahead of NYC as Toronto is. Neither has lost at home. Maybe they are due for a loss, or maybe they just won’t lose at home (we play Chicago in Chicago). In the 3 previous seasons only 2016 Colorado finished undefeated at home.
  • Toronto is 4 points ahead of NYC and has 4 more road draws.

  • Same matrix as last week. A Home game is tough if against a team ranked 1-3 in its conference. Away is tough if against 1-6:

  • Atlanta still has all the Home games. Toronto has no tough Home games. RB has by far the most tough games. NYC is essentially in the middle.

  • That 4-0 loss to Toronto killed the Goal Differential. Looking ahead to tie-breakers, if we tie either Toronto or Chicago, we will probably have more wins overall, but if not and it goes to the second breaker, NYC is 9 behind on GD. Pigeons are also 5 ahead of RB and 3 behind Atlanta (thanks Loons).

2017 MLS Interconference Play – Week 22 August 7

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Week 22 – 3 Games 
East Record 1-1-1
At Home 1-0-0
On Road 0-1-1
Goal Differential +1
East Points 4
West Points 4

Season To Date
East Record 35-27-24
At Home 27-5-8 (40)
On Road 8-22-16 (46)
Goal Differential +26
East Points 129
West Points 105

When comparing East and West, a certain theory keeps coming up that the best of the weaker conference is even weaker than they appear because they have an opportunity to beat up on the worst teams in the league (who are in their conference) by playing them more often.  At the end of last year I dug deep into the stats during the off-season, then got distracted and never wrote it up, but from memory and some quick scanning:

  • Last year every non-playoff team in the East had a winning record at home but were road fiascos. So playing them 2x Home and Away is less favorable than playing then 1x at home, but better than 1x on the road. Then, most West teams had a mixed H/A schedule against the worst of the East combined, so on the whole it evened out. The West this year is a more muddy situation, but let’s see how it looks at year end.
  • Causation is tricky: Does DC have the worst record in MLS right now because it has to play the best 3 teams in the league multiple times, or are the top 3 teams in MLS in the East because they get to play DC multiple times? Then look at NYCFC’s record against DC and it gets even less clear.
  • FWIW, the non-playoff teams in the East last year had a winning record against the non-playoff West even though the non playoff West had a better record overall and the West beat the East overall head to head.
  • At the moment, the PPG of the East playoff teams exceeds that of the West playoff teams by 0.16. The PPG of the East non-playoff teams exceeds that of the West counterparts only by 0.08. Which seems to indicate that the gap between the conferences is bigger at the top than the bottom, but what does that prove about strength of schedule?

NYCFC Weekly Updates By The Numbers – MLS Week 21 July 31

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The narrative this week is that 1st Place is now a rather unlikely dream, and there is some occasion to worry about 5th Place and a road knockout game. It’s not a most likely result but even a brief slump could do it.

NYC is closer to Atlanta in 5th Place than to either Toronto or Chicago above. In fact, the next 2 clubs behind us could catch us with no help. The good news is that RB has a very tough Away schedule that will make a sustained run difficult. Atlanta’s schedule is easy, except for the timing, which we’ll cover shortly.

At this point exceeding 60 points will take a run that is not something one would expect given performance to date, and requires a Win to Loss ratio of better than 3:1. Given a current ratio of 1.57:1, that is a major stretch. Still, another 4-game win streak would do wonders.
Meanwhile Toronto can get 63 points by going 6-4-2, which is a substantial step down for them.

We’re 4 points ahead of last year’s pace. The 2016 team did not finish super strong. Most of its best work was done mid-season, going 7-2-2 and fitting in both a 3-game and 4-game win streak within games 9 through 19. The 2017 team has not had a stretch nearly as good as that, and surpasses the 2016 team largely by also having avoided anything as bad as the 1-3-4 start.
In the final 12 games last year NYC never won more than 2 in a row, although it only lost 3 times. It was a solid finish, but did not significantly outperform its own average. The same 6-3-3 finish this year would put NYC at 58 points for 2017.

Remaining Schedule
I considered doing a weighted measure, averaging out the remaining schedules against each opponent’s H/A record to date, but decided on something different. it’s a bit arbitrary, but allows you to focus on individual games rather than saying one team has a remaining schedule with a remaining difficulty factor of 1.53 while a rival has a remaining schedule with a 1.47 difficulty factor. I tried to measure who many tough games and easy games remain. I arbitrarily chose the following cut-off lines: Home games are tough if the opponent is in the top 3 spots of its conference, and Away games are tough if the opponent is above the playoff line.

Look at that. Toronto has the easiest schedule, with no tough home games and only 2 tough road games. The most one can argue ist they have 3 games left against Montreal, and they always seem to play each other hard. But still, this chart gives little hope that Toronto will falter unless they just suddenly play much worse than they have to date.

The Red Bulls have a very tough road schedule, which as noted above will make any sustained run difficult.

Atlanta has the most Home games against quality opponents, but also has 9 Home games against only 4 Away. The most challenging thing about their schedule is a stretch of 8 games in 24 days. They play weekend-plus-midweek four weeks in a row. On the plus side there is almost no travel, with 7 of the 8 games at Home, including the first 6 in a row. On the negative, 6 games in 18 days in Atlanta with their style of play could wear them down considerably. But having 3 more Home games than everyone else on this list has to be considered a plus.

Overall, chasing Toronto remains a dream. NYC can catch Chicago, but nothing in the schedule gives us an advantage. RB’s Away sked should give NYC an advantage, but Atlanta has a real advantage, if their fitness can let them take advantage of all those Home games. It is probably easier for NYC to slip to 4th behind Atlanta than it will be to catch Chicago.

2017 MLS Interconference Play – Week 21 July 31

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Week 21 – 3 Games 

East Record 0-2-1
At Home 0-0-0
On Road 0-2-1
Goal Differential -5
East Points 1
West Points 7

Season To Date
East Record 34-26-23
At Home 26-5-8 (39)
On Road 8-21-15 (44)
Goal Differential +25
East Points 125
West Points 101

Good week for the West, but all 3 games were in their home fields, and time is running out to make things close. There has never been any meaningful uncertainty as to which conference would come out ahead this year for a long time, and now the numbers just aren’t there. With 39 games left, of which only 17 are Home for the West, they would have to go 20-12-7 just to pull even with the East.