Anyone notice the name change on social media / new logo? "FC Tulsa" seems to be the new direction the franchise is heading in.
I remember having a few conversations with a couple of them late last summer (ran into Ryan at Caz's of all places) and I recommended they either go "full cover band" and call themselves the Roughnecks rebranding with the original 1970s/80s red/white/black team color scheme or or try to create a new brand. They chose the latter. I respect that choice.
By paying players on the cheap for the better part of 5 years, the Drillers have decimated the 5k or so in average attendance this franchise could have maintained at ONEOk by fielding a reasonably competitive team playing an attractive style of soccer. They showed their hand by not making any substantial midseason moves (other than firing a coach), even after they were playing horribly in the middle of seasons... and ended up finishing dead last in seasons two and four....
The Crafts brought in a couple of players after they took over in August.
Otherwise, the Roughnecks would have finished dead last in the Western Conference again, marking the 3rd time in 5 years they've totally sucked.
Instead they finished 16th out of 18 teams, one position behind 15th place OKC Energy.
https://www.uslchampionship.com/league-standingsThis offseason, they've managed to re-sign some players who would have either been poached by other teams or stopped playing altogether.
So, I guess this is a good sign.... oddly, they recently signed 2 forwards and 2 defenders from Miami FC's NPSL club that beat Tulsa Athletic in the playoffs in Miami, handing the A's our first/only loss of 2019. Miami FC recently joined USL-Championship, so either FC Tulsa has poached some quality players from them, or they're getting some hand-me-downs from a club that wants to upgrade to field a more competitive team in USL than they did in winning the NPSL championship two years in a row.
https://www.fctulsa.com/2020-roster There's been an upgrade with a soccer specific front office, the season tickets are quite reasonable and I'm betting individual seats will probably be more reasonable priced once they announce them. And the pitch has been flipped, meaning the field will run east/west instead of north/south....
http://bit.ly/38Vd7LAThe organization the Crafts inherited is worse off than if they'd been playing their first year as an expansion team.
I'd expect them to be decent enough this year to finish in the middle of the pack and maybe gain a playoff birth.
Problem is, they really need to do better than that to re-attract all the fans they've lost over the past 5 seasons.
Meanwhile, my Tulsa A's have accepted a bid to play in the US Open Cup and hopefully will have a shot at playing FC Tulsa.
However, the format this year puts us in the Cup at a time when our college players can't play for us, so we'll see......
https://tulsaathletic.com/2019/12/tulsa-athletic-selected-to-participate-in-2020-u-s-open-cup/