Building 2023: The Defense’s Weakness was its Strength

Hard to say it wasn’t a successful defensive season for FCD: they posted the second-best defensive record in the league and tied for the best FCD defensive record of the last decade (after 2021, their worst season). The biggest difference year-on-year (besides getting to about-average GK play from Paes after Jimmy Maurer’s awful 2021)? Going all-in on defense at the fullback position. Out went legendary baller Ryan Hollingshead and in came defensive specialist Marco Farfan. Out went the rampaging pseudo-wingers of Luchi-ball, and a much more cautious approach was built to protect FCD’s languid CB duo from having to cover too much ground laterally. The defensive results were hard to argue, but did Estevez take it too far?

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