THURSDAY, NOVEMBER 3, 2016
Sounders FC HEAD COACH BRIAN SCHMETZER
On his feeling the day he became Interim Head Coach:
"It’s pro sports. I knew at some point every coach could leave or come – but it was a wow moment. This is really here. [There was] that wow factor from my side of it. But then you get a chance to think about things, and then you think about Sigi [Schmid] and all of his years here. A guy has to lose a job if you take over. It was a mixed bag that day.”
On the time he spent enjoying the promotion on July 26:
“About 30 seconds. There was a job to do. That was the thing that [kept me going] – there’s the moment [of enjoying the promotion], but then you think about, ‘OK, what are we going to do, how are we going to do it?’ Those are things that were churning in my head.”
On the feelings from the staff and players and July 26:
“The staff knew because it was obviously a big announcement, so the staff knew. That first staff meeting was ‘OK, let’s plan this week’s training’ because we had a game coming up. The meeting with the players were a little different because each one had a different personality, a different character, a different spot on the roster. The thing that I wanted to do, what was really important, was to make sure that they heard my honest feeling about where they stood and how they could help the team. The messaging of, ‘It’s their team,’ is the thing that I really needed them to listen to. It was a shock for everybody that Sigi had to go, so where is some stability? Where is the stability in that moment? The stability is the team. [I told them] ‘It’s you guys, it’s actually your team. There is stuff happening around you, but this is actually your team.’”
On his local support system in his new role:
“It means a lot. I have a lot of friends out there who are texting me and congratulating me. My mom is very happy, of course. It was exciting. This is the job I have always coveted, for sure. It’s all worked out.”
On what the club means to him:
“The club is the players and their relationship to the fans – that’s the club. We all work for that relationship. The players all do their jobs on the field, the fans support the team, the guys down in Pioneer Square who a great job of putting on a show, the coaching staff, the technical staff, the trainers, the equipment guys, we do our part, but the club is just the team, it’s the team. The relationship the team has with its fans. That’s what the club is.”
On where the mantra of “the team is the players’ team”:
“It probably came from early on with my experiences as a young professional. So when Alan Hinton signed me in 1980, I was only 17. I didn’t really know what was going on, I was just so happy to be a part of the squad. But some of the memories I have of those early days in the ‘80s where Alan would manage the group, he would manage the team, but I got a lot of coaching and advice from the senior players. I fast forwarded my career when I was a little older and I was able to comprehend some more things, and the team when I was in San Diego – the San Diego Sockers – when we were winning some stuff in indoors – Ron Newman was our coach then, and he was a good coach. He outlined some tactical stuff that worked very well, but we – the group, the players – were the ones driving responsibility for yourself, for your teammates. It was a very successful team. I think some of that mentality of holding yourself accountable, holding your teammates accountable, making sure the team is doing everything possible to reward yourself and your teammates for the hard work you do, that’s where it came from.”
On the differences between from being a Head Coach compared to an assistant:
“More details – a lot more details. You have to think of 100x more things just to make sure that when that team goes out on the field, you’re the guy responsible. With that responsibility it becomes a real job. You have to make sure that you do your job, my assistants – they do their job at a high level because I can’t do it on my own, and it goes all the down to the equipment guys. Everything goes into making sure that the player can perform at the highest level.”
On his assistant coaches:
“Tommy [Dutra] has been with me a long time, back to the USL days. He has a lot of pride in the club. So when I think about stuff and I have Tommy on my shoulder saying, ’Sounders, Sounders, Sounders.’ That’s been a big help. You couple that with, I think, he’s the best goalkeeper trainer in our league. He has had a tremendous career coaching some really big names – [Kasey] Keller, [Michael] Gspurning, [Marcus] Hahnemann, [Stefan] Frei. He does a really good job. He does a really good job with the young guys, as well. Ante [Razov], the new guy on the staff – he and Djimi [Traore] – is very tactical-oriented. He sees the game in a way that is different than I do, which I think is good. It’s a good balance for us. [He is a] really eager young coach. He is eager to show people what he can do and I appreciate the effort he brings. Dave [Tenney] has been with me for a long time and he does a fantastic job with his staff because the fitness of the team is vital these days. And Djimi, here is a Champions League winner with experience that I never had. He provides that experience and, ‘Hey Brian why don’t you do it this way? This is how we did it at Liverpool.’ So he provides that players’ perspective that has been vital.”
On if he is surprised by his immediate success:
“I am not sure if surprise would be the word. I am always eager to learn. I think my keep my eyes open. I think I am open-minded enough to know, ‘OK, you can’t have the blinders on and think you know it best.’ I would say I was pleasantly surprised with the way the group’s come together. I like to have an open environment where they like to say how they feel and one of the things we like to do within our staff is that we plan a training session, run a training session and after training we will talk about the training session – what went well, what didn’t go well – and we give a little bit of self-reflection and sometimes some criticism as to, ‘Hey, we could have done this better.’ And I think this is a really good learning environment for us as a staff, so some of those surprises don’t show up because we are already doing that on our own to see what we can do better.”
On the moments that have defined the past few months:
“We know that pro sports is a tough business. The parity in our league is almost crazy. The last two MLS Cup finalists didn’t make the playoffs, so we are very cognizant of what our job entails and how difficult it is. I would say we have had some very good performances – the 4-2 down in LA, that first road game in Orlando and the seven minutes against Dallas in this first leg of the playoffs, I think those were all moments. But as we look back on all of those games, again, this is just what we do as a staff, we look back at the film and say, ‘OK, this was a good game, but we could clean this up a little bit, let’s try something different here on a set piece,’ so we’re always trying to learn and push and make sure we try to get as close to perfection as we can.”
On if he expected himself to be in this position:
“Throughout my life, soccer has been a big part of my life. My family runs a sporting goods store and it’s been a big part of my life, but in 2002 when Adrian had called me, I was coaching youth soccer and working in construction, trying to do what a lot of retired soccer players do – trying to make a living. I am very grateful for the chance that Adrian gave me in 2002, I did not know back then that it would go all the way to 2016 and have the circumstances that are happening now and have them happen to me. I did not think that.”
On his highlight as Head Coach:
“We are not finished yet, but when this season is over you can ask me that question and I will give you, perhaps, a better answer. For right now, I am proud to be the Head Coach, proud to be working with really, really great people. All of the players are really great people, all of them are tremendous soccer players. I have a ton of thanks and love for the effort that they give me every day training and during games.”
On what the Sounders FC crest means to him:
“If I had to answer it with some adjectives, it’s pride, conviction, quality. It’s being part of something is bigger than yourself. There’s a lot of things that this club stands for, but again it goes back to the earliest days when we used to do clinics for kids at elementary schools and me going to Memorial Stadium, watching that first group of guys running around the field in appreciation of the support they got. It’s the birthday party that we had when we were 10 years old, and Hank Liotart, David Butler and some of the guys showed up and we were kicking the ball around. It’s the relationship with the fans. I think that’s what it means.”
