As we get ready to head in to the 2023 Timbers Major League Soccer season, their 13th (knock on wood for luck) season in the top league, it’s time to catch up a little bit on what’s being going on in a busy offseason.
Scrimmage vs. Sporting Kansas City
The Timbers have been in Phoenix for their preseason training this year, and had a 60 minute scrimmage against Sporting Kansas City on Saturday, January 21. The Timbers started a mostly experienced roster in the first half, with a lot of trialists and less experienced players in the second. But it was Nathan Fogaça who would score the only goal of the match in the 45th minute (15 minutes into the second half) on a nice bicycle kick.
Front office moves
I usually try to stay out of the business of front office moves at the Timbers or Thorns, but obviously there have been many moves during the offseason for both teams that I don’t need to go into detail here. But basically Gavin Wilkinson is out as GM, Ned Grabavoy is in. Merritt Paulson is out as CEO of both teams, and Heather Davis is in. Rhian Wilkinson is out as coach of the Thorns, and Mike Norris is in. The announcement of Heather Davis is CEO is the most recent news, detailed below:
Timbers appoint Heather Davis as Chief Executive Officer | Timbers Website
Stumptown Footy will no longer be supported by Vox Media
It can’t be ignored that Stumptown Footy has been a great resource for MLS information and interaction by fans for the past several years, especially with the Soccer City USA message board being shut down (against my will, by the way) but Vox Media is dropping a lot of their websites, including almost all of it’s Major League Soccer sites. I really hope the site survives but am also looking at options to once again open a message board at this site should those options fail. I don’t want to compete, but I also don’t want to see the Timbers fans left without a place to interact.
Stumptown Footy will no longer be supported by Vox Media – but we’re still moving onward | Stumptown Footy
