Elimination Day and its consequences for NYCFC

The final nail went into the coffin on Halloween of all days, with New York City FC held to a 1-1 draw with CF Montréal and officially eliminated from contention for a spot in this year's MLS Cup Playoffs.

This episode begins with a long discussion among hosts Mark Radigan, John Baney, and producer Andrew Leigh about this year's NYCFC team missing the playoffs. It's partly a revisiting of the many things that went wrong throughout the season to keep the team from finishing among the top 18 teams in Major League Soccer, and it's partly a conversation about what changes should or shouldn't be made heading into the 2027 sprint season. Does Pascal Jansen stick around, and how much personnel change is coming following the disastrous end to this season?

The only real positive topic touched on in this episode: Gotham FC winning the NWSL Shield for the first time in the club's history with a 2-0 win in their final regular season match. Gotham keeps collecting trophies and continues to set a high standard in NWSL, and everyone agrees that their continued success only adds to the excitement of seeing them make the move across the Hudson River to begin playing at Etihad Park for the 2028 season.

Two NYCFC players who don't appear to have great odds to be playing home matches at Etihad Park are Keaton Parks and Thiago Martins, with each set to be out of contract at season's end, and with each making comments to the press following the club's playoff elimination that indicate they might have played their final home match as members of New York City FC.

Their comments and their futures open up a discussion about how much change to expect to this squad heading into 2027, which also leads into one of the final topics of note on this episode: The 2027 sprint season, which will end up being a big farewell to Yankee Stadium, with six of seven home NYCFC matches set to be played in the Bronx between March and May next spring.

There's a final (meaningless) match of the 2026 regular season to be played, too, though the show's approach is that the less time spent talking about a blockbuster DC United-NYCFC matchup of non-playoff teams, the better, though one final round of NYCFC result predictions does take place.

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