![\"\"](\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/nesoccertoday.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2011\/01\/mariner.jpg?resize=240%2C300\" "\\"Paul")
<\/a>Paul Mariner, who left his position as assistant coach of the Revolution in 2009, is now Director of player development in Toronto. (Photo by CHRIS ADUAMA\/aduama.com)<\/p><\/div>\n
Yet, like so many great things in life, its shelf life was all too short. As the years rolled by, the players, one by one, began to bolt. New players were brought in. Tactics were\u00a0switched.<\/p>\n
But perhaps more importantly, Paul Mariner, the lieutenant of the most dangerous attack the local XI ever unleashed, decided to pursue other opportunities abroad near the end of the 2009 season. For a club known for its fine-tuned offense, it was the end of an era.<\/p>\n
Any question or doubt that things had changed significantly in the wake of Mariner’s departure were promptly erased after last season’s lethargic production. A worst in team history 32 goals scored only solidified the idea that the team was lost without its former Gunner goalscorer.<\/p>\n
Some will point the debilitating brain injuries to Taylor Twellman as the primary culprit behind last season’s famine. Others will point to the departures of Dempsey, Noonan, Andy Dorman, Steve Ralston, Jose Cancela…well, you get the idea. And these are not far-fetched theories.\u00a0They are very good theories, in fact. \u00a0When the club’s first, second, third, fourth, and fifth-best goalscorers all exit within a four-year window, it’s only natural that the goals become fewer and farther in between.<\/p>\n
But, to say that player departures and retirements are the primary reason\u00a0for the downward sprial is to forget the man who developed and cultivated the vast majority of these players.<\/p>\n
And it wasn’t just\u00a0Best XI members\u00a0that thrived as a result of Mariner’s tutelage. In fact, players like Kheli Dube, Kenny Mansally, and Sainey Nyassi all benefited from their former assistant coach’s insight and acumen.<\/p>\n
It was that knowledge that kept the Revolution attack\u00a0potent, even without Twellman in the lineup. Somehow,\u00a0New England always seemed to find\u00a0goals from its supporting actors. Some nights, it was\u00a0Noonan. Some nights, it was Adam Cristman.\u00a0It didn’t matter who, so long as the results arrived.<\/p>\n
For the Revolution, many of those results\u00a0were the byproduct of Mariner’s hard work with his attacking charges.\u00a0As a\u00a0former\u00a0poacher himself, Mariner applied the lessons learned\u00a0during his illustrious playing career\u00a0to his coaching career, and the team reaped\u00a0the rewards: \u00a0three MLS Cup appearances, a U.S. Open Cup Championship, and a SuperLiga Title.<\/p>\n
Given his impressive playing resume, Mariner could have coasted his way through coaching on his\u00a0reputation alone.\u00a0Instead, the\u00a0affable assistant coach\u00a0set out to\u00a0impart his\u00a0experience, insight, and easy-going\u00a0guidance\u00a0to his\u00a0acolytes and, in the process, became one of the best in the business.<\/p>\n
Although his\u00a0coaching reputation sparkled as the Revolution strikers parked themselves in a class of their own during their mid-2000 MLS Cup runs, he was frequently bypassed when coaching vacancies cropped up across the league.<\/p>\n
And that was fine\u00a0by everyone wearing the Revolution blue. After all, they got to keep the man who oversaw their lethal attack – one that wasn’t predicated upon one player. Though Twellman was the class of the field, Dempsey, Noonan, Ralston, and Dorman, all managed to bolster their contributions\u00a0to the goal department thanks to Mariner.<\/p>\n
But perhaps more important than on-the-field form was what Mariner instilled in his players at their onset of their professional careers. Twellman will tell you that, as a young player,\u00a0Mariner’s hiring was one of the best things manager Steve Nicol did for him.<\/p>\n
And Twellman wasn’t the only recipient of Mariner’s teaching. A common sight at training during those successful seasons was\u00a0Mariner engaging in\u00a0one-on-one conversations\u00a0with young strikers – conversations that often\u00a0instilled both insight and confidence, two crucial areas that every attacking player needs in order to succeed.<\/p>\n
What appealed to Mariner wasn’t necessarily having his offense destroy their opponents, but rather, to see the progress and development of a younger player. To see them\u00a0 flourish. That was the reward. The transition from the college game to the professional soccer is often a gauntlet,\u00a0but\u00a0Mariner’s mix\u00a0of good humor and guidance\u00a0served as an elixir\u00a0for many of his younger charges.<\/p>\n
The axiom that players win games and managers lose them fails to grasp the notion that\u00a0the collective\u00a0cannot win unless properly guided. Sure, it helped that the Revolution had a number of talented players during Mariner’s tenure, but without\u00a0him there to squeeze every ounce of talent from those players, the team could have easily turned into an all-talent, no-trophy team.<\/p>\n
Steve Nicol is renowned for getting the most out of his young defenders. Paul Mariner’s intuition did the same for his strikers. Under both, the Revolution became an MLS power, securing playoff berths in consecutive seasons, and reaching pinnacles previously unseen.<\/p>\n
What the\u00a0team needs to do to\u00a0reclaim that success is\u00a0another superb coach of Mariner’s coaching cloth.\u00a0A coach\u00a0who\u00a0can nurture the number of promising youngsters on the preseason list. A coach who can once again get the most from even the most unlikeliest candidates (see: Shalrie Joseph,\u00a0nine goals in all competitions in 2009).<\/p>\n
But until\u00a0that coach is hired,\u00a0the Revolution attack, with\u00a0all the glory it gathered,\u00a0will remain nothing more than a grand memory.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Without their former assistant coach, the Revolution attack faltered. Badly.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":3144,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","enabled":false}}},"categories":[8,3],"tags":[],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/nesoccertoday.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2011\/02\/marinertwellmanfeature.jpg?fit=490%2C225&ssl=1","jetpack_likes_enabled":false,"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/nesoccertoday.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3117"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/nesoccertoday.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/nesoccertoday.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nesoccertoday.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nesoccertoday.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=3117"}],"version-history":[{"count":21,"href":"https:\/\/nesoccertoday.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3117\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":3146,"href":"https:\/\/nesoccertoday.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3117\/revisions\/3146"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nesoccertoday.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/3144"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/nesoccertoday.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=3117"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nesoccertoday.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=3117"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nesoccertoday.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=3117"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}