This is one in a series of team previews preparing fans for the 2023 MLS season. Check out the full list; teams will be revealed in predicted order of finish from Feb. 10-24.
What Seattle Sounders FC did last year
It was the best of seasons; it was the worst of seasons. The Sounders became the first-ever MLS team to win the Concacaf Champions League in May, even though they lost mainstay defensive midfielder Joao Paulo during that competition with a knee injury. In large part because the Sounders sacrificed Joao Paulo at the altar of Concacaf, they ended up missing the playoffs for the first time in their 14 MLS seasons.
Yet, in true Sounders fashion, they recovered some after being left for dead in late summer and very nearly qualified anyway in the final weeks. (There was, if I remember this right, a really hilarious possibility several weeks before the end of the season where they would have won a five-team tiebreaker for the final playoff spot if things broke right.) Still, as we confirmed last summer with Sounders expert Jeremiah Oshan, CCL champs + no playoffs is a Faustian bargain many Sounders fans would take.
Key additions
Forward Héber (trade from NYCFC)
Key departures
Forward Samuel Adeniran (traded to St. Louis), forward Will Bruin (option declined, moved to Austin FC), midfielder Jimmy Medranda (out of contract)
Making the case for Seattle Sounders FC
Adding Heber to a pretty competently-built squad is a good thing, and Joao Paulo’s getting worked back into full service right now, meaning he should be quarterbacking the Sounders for most of the season. Raul Ruidiaz and Nico Lodeiro and Cristian Roldan and Jordan Morris still play for this team, Brian Schmetzer still coaches it, and the academy still produces teenagers who can slot into the lineup without the team missing a beat. While “they’re the Sounders” isn’t as surefire a statement as it was this time last year … they’re the Sounders.
Players to watch
It’ll be telling to see how much Heber is used — whether he’s just needed as a change-of-pace striker to spell Ruidiaz or if Schmetzer will get wild and go for a two-striker system from time to time. Otherwise, it’s about seeing where Cristian Roldan will slot in and whether Joao Paulo will stay healthy and then just enjoying what they all collectively do, unless you are a Timbers or Whitecaps fan.
A nerdy tidbit
With Stefan Frei starting 27 matches and Stefan Cleveland subbing in for 7, the Sounders managed to net the 4th best save percentage of 2022, only behind Philly, Nashville and FC Dallas. That’s a reminder that in addition to being stacked with outfield talent, Seattle also has two goalkeepers that could start pretty much everywhere else in the league.
A fun tidbit
Congrats to the Sounders for winning the best kit of 2023.
Be Water, My Friend.
— Seattle Sounders FC (@SoundersFC) February 15, 2023
Introducing The Bruce Lee Kit, a community collaboration inspired by the life and legacy of a global icon. 🐉 pic.twitter.com/Og7Kr2qqOp
There was a lot of good entrants, but nothing Adidas did this year for MLS was better than Bruce Lee + Dragons. It doesn’t even matter that this is nowhere near Seattle’s color palette.
Projected finish
2nd in the West
So, this is based on everything going right and no one feeling their age in particular, but also, it’s difficult to imagine a world in which the Sounders miss out on the playoffs two years running, so at this point, it just becomes who can they surpass in a very competitive West, and we arrived at “almost everybody.”
