Maybe you saw the graphic. Points in each season over the past five years. Philly’s looked like a staircase: Each season they got better, grew stronger.
Then, in 2019, it all came together. A foundation of veterans, a few savvy newcomers, and an injection of young talent.
A new club record for points and goals, and, of course, that all-important home playoff match.
Jim Curtin told us what he was going to do, and then he did it. The local kid brought the postseason back to Philadelphia in 2019, and he did it in his first season incorporating new principles into his playing style.
The doubters said he couldn’t press with Haris Medunjanin in the first eleven.
They said he needed to spend heavily on a striker.
They thought Marco Fabian would have to carry the team on his back.
They looked at the progress and thought it was a house of cards.
Curtin never listened to the doubters.
Now he gets to walk out to the sound of his city as they push his club toward a postseason win. He has earned it. And he has earned the right to be a Sigi Schmid MLS Coach of the Year MLS Coach of the Year finalist.
