John Spencer--not the one from THE WEST WING.
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  • John Spencer—not the one from THE WEST WING.

The Portland Timbers announced this morning what many in the soccer world had assumed for some time now, namely that John Spencer will be the team’s new head coach beginning with their inaugural Major League Soccer season in 2011.

While this is Spencer’s first head coaching gig, he comes to town with a long and distinguished playing career as a striker with Glasgow Rangers in his native Scotland, also Chelsea in the early 90’s—where “Spenny” was a fan favorite—and later captaining the Colorado Rapids in MLS. Most recently, Spencer was the assistant coach with the Houston Dynamo helping lead them to back-to-back MLS Cup championships in 2006 and 2007 and four consecutive playoff appearances, including a run to the Western Conference finals in 2009. Soccer By Ives—one of the leading U.S. soccer news blogs called him, “one of the most highly-regarded assistant coaches in the league.” As a fiery Scotsman, Spencer has been also known to say things like this. (No. Not really. I made that part up. But he is fiery.)

Current head coach and technical director Gavin Wilkinson will continue with the team but focusing solely on technical directing duties with the jump to MLS. A formal press conference will be held tomorrow and I will relay what I hear from there.

ALSO. It is sad to say but this will be among my last posts for the Portland Mercury as I move on to new opportunities. I have enjoyed my time with the lovable, memorable and passionate folks here in Mercuryland and think that somehow, somewhere, they’d all make a formidable, if not downright delightfully colorful, starting XI.

HOWEVER, if you would like to pick up the reigns and continue where I left off, then today is your lucky day. The Mercury is looking for an able—if not more talented—replacement. With the Timbers returning home tomorrow night to take on the NSC Minnesota Stars, it is a perfect chance to write up your own take on things and email it to this guy and see what happens. I tell you from experience that the world of a Timbers Portland Mercury Blogtown blogger is filled with exciting soccer matches, press passes, occasional free food, and beautiful summer nights. It’s a rough-and-tumble life . . .

11 replies on “The Name Is Spencer. John Spencer. Timbers Name New MLS Head Coach”

  1. Pfft. I saw the headline for this post and got a little excited, thinking that you were about to mention something cool, like the Jon Spencer Blues Explosion reforming and playing in Portland.

    Instead, all I got was a post about fucking soccer. Ugh. What a letdown.

  3. John Spencer the actor… Jo(h)n Spencer of the Blues Explosion… John Spencer who lived around the corner from me when I was growing up… John Spencer the schizophrenic who hung out at the coffee shop I used to work at (he was “married” to Joan Jett)… And now John Spencer, coach of my local soccer team… Is it normal to run into one name this often in a single lifetime?

  5. Nice Job, Brian! Thanks for your posts. You are the Hristo Stoichkov of soccer bloggers (He’s my favorite player, so meant very much as a compliment).

  8. s-puss,

    I hope your attempt to dismiss soccer as merely something meh that white people like a few posts after championing the Jon Spencer Blues Explosion was an exercise in blatant irony.

    If so, barely funny. If not, pretty funny.

  9. @Snagglepuss: JSBX has reformed, at least sorta… showing up at a couple of things this year (Pitchfork Music Fest and the Matador @ 21 show) shows a glimmer of hope.

  10. tk – Let’s hope that JSBX does manage to come around here sometime soon. I don’t know about you, but I somehow managed to miss them throughout the entirety of the 90’s, and would love a chance to catch them live.

    TSW – Yeah, I did realize there was some irony involved in what I was typing, but I rather liked the ‘Stuff White People Like’ post, and went ahead with it, anyway. Having been one of those kids who spent a couple of summers playing those obligatory soccer games, and having witnessed both myself and those around me completely lose interest in the game after those aforementioned summers, well, leads me to think there might be a bit of merit to the post.

    Anyhow, to each their own, I suppose… but if I really wanted to attempt to dismiss soccer, someone else’s blog post likely would not serve as the primary premise in my argument. I might start just such a criticism by pointing out just how excruciatingly slow and boring soccer is compared to, say, basketball or hockey, and perhaps liken its pace to the constipation that is baseball (or American football… ugh!). Where would that get me, and why would I even bother to waste that much effort on something I’m ambivalent about?

    Besides, any and all arguments you or I could conceivably construct to attack or defend soccer will be very easily reducible to subjective personal taste (like the above preference I stated for a faster-paced sport), which, frankly, is pretty fucking boring and pointless to argue about, don’t you think?

  11. Yes, it’s fucking boring to argue about.

    That being said, points with which I agree–baseball is beyond tedious. American football has its moments, but from an article last year in the NYT, a study showed the average game has around only 11 minutes of actual action for a 3 + hour broadcast. The rest is filler.

    Basketball is where we depart views. With such a lengthy season, 90% of a season’s games are insignificant, therefore not worth watching. Let’s be honest, other than blazer games, the playoffs are the only time to really start watching hoops. The majority of games themselves aren’t worth watching until the fourth quarter. Then there’s the myriad disruptions to the flow–time outs, free throws, tv timeouts, more timeouts, fouls, intentional fouls. Most games grind to a finish puncuated by constant starts and stops.

    I’ve played ice hockey since exiting the womb so we are in full agreement here-it’s the greatest game on earth, the most fun to play and the most fun to see live. Soccer mirrors hockey in many ways-fluidity and perpetual motion (albeit slowed down), limited stops. The game is done in 90 minutes. That’s it. To watch it is to get the most out of your viewership.

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