Swanson: Galaxy fans got what they want – a team worth cheering
What do fans know, anyway? A lot it turns out. The Galaxy's successful supporters strike is case study in what's possible when teams do right by their fans.
CARSON – You know how fans are.
Toxic at times. Demanding, typically. Experts, of course.
Certifiable, so you could call them to the stand to testify, bring them on as a second and third and 1,000th opinion to diagnose a team’s problems. Because they always know best.
They could tell you more than the people on the team, the people whose literal jobs it is to run the team. People who are paid big bucks to do it, who are privy to the private, inner-workings, the deepest, diveiest data and who, nonetheless, are usually doing it wrong.
Right?
Right that you fans are ridiculous? Or right that you, the people most voluntarily invested in an organization, tend to have the right idea?
Well, take the Galaxy as a case-study.
The MLS club’s fans woke up happy Sunday, their Galaxy in third place in the Western Conference standings and two points behind first-place Real Salt Lake after playing that team to a dramatic 2-2 draw the night before, a result that kept the home team – now 5-2-5, 20 points – undefeated at Dignity Health Sports Park.
A year ago, it would’ve been hard to find fans less happy with their side.
The Galaxy’s fans weren’t aggrieved because of how their team started the first dozen matches last season – 2-7-3, 9 points – it was seasons of pent-up frustration that boiled over into an outright revolt.
It was the meager total of two playoff appearances since 2017. The churn of coaches. The misguided name-over-game player signings and ill-afforded, off-the-field missteps that drew sanctions from MLS. The lack of direction off the pitch. The lack of defense and offense on it.
The perceived lack of respect.
And, though no one in the Galaxy’s galaxy would want to admit it, the unavoidable specter of success from L.A.’s other MLS football club up the freeway at BMO stadium, where in its sixth year, the Black & Gold was playing to defend its first MLS Cup, the cherry on a long and rapidly growing list of accomplishments.
It all pained the Galaxy’s devotees so much that hundreds of them felt they had no choice but to take a stand – outside of the stadium.
They brought their fervor for their favorite team to a picket line, boycotting its first seven home matches last season and re-entering the stadium only after Chris Klein, the team’s president who was in his 11th season with the club and who had just been re-signed to a multi-year deal, was ousted. (Technical director Jovan Kirovski would be excused in the offseason.)
Klein Out Protest by LA Galaxy Supporter Groups/Fans #LAGalaxy #mls #barras #ultras #hinchas #kleinout pic.twitter.com/X8xXGfDQoX
— Ultras Barras Usa (@UltrasBarrasUsa) February 5, 2023
And so they got what they wanted, these futbol fanatics. They really did.
New ideas, fresh legs, renewed hope.
Will Kuntz was elevated to the club’s top front office decision-maker in December and signed Joseph Paintsil from the Belgian Pro League and Gabriel Pec from Brazil’s Série A as designated players, pairing them up with premier playmaker Riqui Puig. The Galaxy also added defender Miki Yamane to help and brought aboard former LAFC goalkeeper John McCarthy.
And now, look: The Galaxy’s 23 goals rank second in the MLS (behind Lionel Messi’s Miami FC, with an eye-popping 35). And, despite having faced a series of tough opponents and playing only five of its first 12 matches at home, the Galaxy is near the top of the table, in such a good place that fans are starting to dream really big again.
“What’s this team’s ceiling?” I asked again and again Saturday before the Galaxy and Real Salt Lake clashed, and again and again I got responses like Manuel Moreno’s: “Win a championship,” the 36-year-old from Lynwood said. “I think we deserve it. The faithful ones deserve it.”
Though, yes, the team remains a work in progress. Coach Greg Vanney didn’t hesitate to say so Saturday, explaining what transpired to require a two-goal second-half comeback: “Our team is still maturing and growing up together.”
But that’s precisely what the people on the picket line were clamoring for; they wanted to root for a club that was trending upward instead of fading into obscurity.
“Yeah, our voices were heard, they were definitely heard,” said Ivan Osorio, a 23-year-old supporter from L.A., who was among those who boycotted matches last season. “It was every game that we had at home – we wanted to come, but it was for the team that we couldn’t. We wanted better.
“Now, you see the big improvement; last year we were in the bottom, now we’re fighting for first. It’s a way big improvement. The club did what they needed to do.”
Osorio feels validated, of course. But so too does Jose Juarez, who was waiting Saturday to enter what would again be a sold-out stadium. He was queued up in Legends Plaza, near where I watched an impassioned protest of peeved supporters beat their drum a year earlier.
“I did support the boycott, but I also supported my team. It was very conflicting,” said Juarez, who decided last season it was best to continue to attend games, usually with his son, now-9-year-old Geronimo. “Now it’s like a payoff to a fan like me, in my mind. Because I supported them, I feel rewarded.”
That’s another thing about fans, they don’t necessarily agree.
So, wait. If fans aren’t all on the same page, maybe it’s just as well that they’re not calling all the shots?
12 hours ago lol – sports! https://t.co/sF1Je0vVQ1 pic.twitter.com/F9N5tLRSvR
— Mirjam Swanson (@MirjamSwanson) May 12, 2024
Maybe it’s for the better that the fast-fingered folks who were weighing in Saturday morning on the Reddit thread: “Should LA get rid of Miguel berry?” aren’t pulling the player personnel levers in real time?
Because 12 hours after that online discussion – with many attendees starting to stream out of the stadium, too many of those fans giving up on a team that hadn’t yet given up – it was Berry who came through at the death.
Berry, a forward who, in his first season with the Galaxy, has taken just three shots in 12 matches, whose toe-poke off a Puig pass found its way past RSL’s goalkeeper Zac MacMath with seconds to spare. Berry, who was the hero after Paintsil was pulled and left the pitch.
But you know how fans can be: Impatient. Demanding. Smarter-than-thou. Happy to be right.
Also, though: Optimistic. Faithful. Proud. And sometimes, happy to be wrong too.
This is why you don’t leave an @LAGalaxy game early!! @ACBrigade @LARiotSquad @GalaxyPodcast pic.twitter.com/68slrTnuOQ
— – (@thekevinryder) May 12, 2024
What’s the first word you were thinking when Miguel Berry equalized at the death?
pic.twitter.com/pYkZL24YTY
— Galaxy Fan Talk (@LAGalaxyFanTalk) May 12, 2024