Danny Hoesen celebrates one of his five goals in 2019. Photo credit: ISI Photos/San Jose Earthquakes
It’s been a blind preseason for Quakes fans. None of the scrimmages have been televised, or even in front of live audience. For the most recent – Tuesday’s against Reno and Friday’s against Sacramento Republic – we didn’t even get lineups.
From the gleanings that we have gotten, though, San Jose has been deploying a two-forward system. It takes some fine readings of semicolons, but the starting pair has been Danny Hoesen and Andy Rios. There could be a few reasons for this: there is no real #10 on the roster, this opens up Zone 14 for Vako’s in-cutting runs, someone has been inspired by 2006 World Cup highlights again.
Hoesen playing somewhere besides the tip of the spear may be a great place for the 29-year-old. After a somewhat-lost year in 2019, he will be in a spot to cash in sharing minutes with Rios and Chris Wondolowski by doing something they don’t: possess the ball.
Hoesen’s Profile
Let’s get this out of the way first: Danny Hoesen is not a visionary passer.
The dynamic passer that San Jose’s been looking for since I started watching this team? Yeah, he’s probably racking up an assist to Espinoza in this scenario:
Hoesen is a confidence player, by which I mean some days he is unstoppable and other days he’s his own worst enemy. His 3.9 fewer goals than expected in 2019 was bottom of MLS, Non-Bewitched Hungarian Division. In 2018, when Danny went for 12G/3A in league play, his G-xG was a much more normal +2.2. He isn’t a bad finisher, rather a streaky one.
A Broad Skillset
Thankfully, for such a hot-and-cold guy Danny is a lot more than a finisher.
In order to learn more about his skillset, I used the trusty American Soccer Analysis database. I downloaded their shooting and passing data for all forwards with >1500 minutes from 2018 and 2019 (i.e., Hoesen’s 2018 season and 2019 seasons are two different data points). That info can be found here.
I wanted to look at both 2018 and 2019 for a couple of different reasons. First, Hoesen was the team offensive MVP in 2018 and had a difficult 2019. It seems more fair to look at the two. Second, Hoesen played as a forward in two very different schemes: Stahre’s counterattacking(?) and Almeyda’s wing possession. Including 2017, however, when he was on the wing quite often, would be misleading. Comparing his 2018 and 2019 to the field would be a more fair approximation of Hoesen’s skillset, rather than his role in a system.
That said: he’s a better passer than you may think!
There are 50 forwards in the dataset: Hoesen’s xA/96’s place him 12th (2019) and 25th (2018). For Key Passes/96, he’s at 9th (‘19) and 17th (‘18). The Top 10 list is good company:
KP/96: Forwards with >1500 min
| Name | Year | Team | KP/96 |
| Rooney | 2019 | DCU | 2.85 |
| Villa | 2018 | NYC | 2.30 |
| Rooney | 2018 | DCU | 2.19 |
| Giovinco | 2018 | TOR | 1.81 |
| Jordy Reyna | 2018 | VAN | 1.72 |
| Fernandez | 2019 | POR | 1.56 |
| Ibrahimovic | 2019 | LAG | 1.50 |
| Ibrahimovic | 2018 | LAG | 1.47 |
| Hoesen | 2019 | SJE | 1.46 |
| Manotas | 2019 | HOU | 1.45 |
For someone who clearly gets a thrill out of blasting the ball into the upper 90, Hoesen is actually pretty clever in the box. His back heel leading to San Jose’s second goal against Portland was particularly nifty.
Valuable in Buildup
Which is not to say: “Hoesen is a hub of the attack.” He completes about 70% of his passes, which puts him in the bottom tier of forwards. He hit about 21 passes per 96 minutes in both 2018 and 2019, again putting him in the bottom half (33rd in 2019, 36th in 2018 out of 50) of forwards.
Wayne Rooney had about 10% of all DC’s touches in his two-year stint. Hoesen has 5.9% in his big 2018 and 5.6% in 2019. This puts Danny, again, near the bottom.
(A fun sidenote about comparing forwards touch percentage: the bottom five are Zardes, Dwyer, Nikolice, Wondo, and Josef Martinez. The correlation is basically zero, with a Josef Martinez outlier)
But when it comes to buildup, Danny stands out. Looking at xB (ASA’s metric of “team-adjusted xGoals earned by the team on possessions in which the player participated but did not make the final pass or shot,” or value produced outside of final product, Hoesen’s 2019 is right there with the biggest stars of MLS.
xB/96: Forwards with >1500 min
| Name | Year | Team | xB/96 |
| Rooney | 2018 | DCU | .678 |
| Ibrahimovic | 2018 | LAG | .625 |
| Giovinco | 2018 | TOR | .582 |
| Jordy Reyna | 2018 | VAN | .580 |
| Hoesen | 2019 | SJE | .510 |
| Ruidiaz | 2019 | SEA | .499 |
| Ola Kamara | 2018 | LAG | .471 |
| Rooney | 2019 | DCU | .467 |
| Akindele | 2019 | ORL | .465 |
| Ferreira | 2019 | FCD | .463 |
There’s a lot of math that goes into this, but basically: good things happen for San Jose when Hoesen gets on the ball.
To move away from stats and towards anecdote: this makes sense with how San Jose tried to use the field in 2019. With goalscoring coming from Vako and Eriksson (Wondo rarely played when Hoesen was on the field), Hoesen’s role was partially to get the defense out of position, part to move balls into the middle and back out get the opposing backline on their heels, or their hips in the wrong direction, or otherwise discombobulated.
It’s a different look than Wondo, who essentially disappears until a low cross is delivered to the near post. Hoesen doesn’t have Wondo’s lethality, but he allows San Jose to retain possession and move the ball around. He is quick enough on counterattacks to bring the ball forward securely, and he’s big enough in the box to hold off defenders and shift the ball back to the midfield.
Second Striker Danny
One can imagine how good this looks on the practice field. If he was able to combine this with goalscoaring prowess, he’d likely still be in Europe. Comparing his buildup to his finishing (using xG+xA/96, or expected goals+assists per 96 minutes, as a metric), you can see how Hoesen is pretty much within the blob of above-average forwards. If he gets hot, he can finish with clinical efficiency. If he doesn’t, well, he’s still an asset:
On San Jose, this skillset fits the role of second striker: press on defense, keep the ball hot on attack, and be in the right place at the right time when the right ball comes in.
One can look at the Earthquakes last season and see they were plagued by poor finishing. Eriksson and Cristian Espinoza both finished in the top 10 in key passes, but only Espinoza had a good number of assists (his 10 put him in 7th in MLS). Hoesen’s snakebitten season was a part of that to be sure, but what if he was on the other side of the equation? His KP/96 and xB/96 were both quite high:
Getting another forward right next to him, be it Andy Rios, Wondolowski or youngster Cade Cowell, could be a way for San Jose to bolster their finishing.
When I discussed Eriksson’s role earlier this winter, I wrote that in Almeyda’s system “the CAM has the responsibility to quickly tilt the field away from the winger once they draw defenders, switching the attack and drawing the defense off balance.” This, in short, describes Hoesen’s skillset to a tee. He may not have a 10-assist season in him, but with San Jose’s skill at the wings and Jackson Yueill directing traffic, he doesn’t need to. Hoesen can just be Hoesen: a generous passer with quick feet in the box, who can every so often just throw hammers at the opposing goal.
One of the things I’ve admired most about Almeyda’s system is that he fits his players into roles that maximize their skills and minimize their weaknesses. Tommy Thompson, for example, has incredible footwork, balance, and stamina. Footspeed and finishing skill, not so much. Rather than hope for him to get better in the box, Almeyda made him a right back.
It seems like after a year of Hoesen at the tip of the spear, Almeyda & Co. have realized he can be a much bigger asset with a partner in the attack, keeping possession in the opposing half and helping San Jose get shots in better positions. Until we get to see literally any live soccer, it is impossible to say if it will work. But preseason optimism points to its potential.
