Looking at Atlanta United stats under two different managers

The question I get asked the most is if Atlanta United President Garth Lagerwey will hire Rob Valentino as the team’s next permanent manager.

Valentino has served as interim since Gonzalo Pineda was fired on June 3.

Valentino, an assistant to several different Atlanta United managers, went 6-6-6 in the regular season, led the team into the playoffs and is one win from knocking out heavily favored Miami and advancing into the next round of the playoffs.

The narrative is short story-worthy.

Lagerwey is a data-driven decision-maker.

Let’s look at the data with the caveat that Valentino didn’t have Giorgos Giakoumakis for the season’s final 18 league matches after he was sold on June 16, or Thiago Almada for the final 14 after both were sold during the summer window. Almada’s sale went through on July 6. Giakoumakis appeared in 11 matches this season, none after June 2. Almada appeared in 17 matches, none after June 29.

Valentino did have Pedro Amador, who was signed for depth until Caleb Wiley was shockingly sold to Chelsea. Amador has proved to be one of since-fired Technical Director Carlos Bocanegra’s best finds. Valentino also had Alexey Miranchuk, signed to replace Almada. Miranchuk played the final nine regular season matches.

Category	Pineda	Valentino	Total
Games	16	18	34
Goals	22	24	46
Goals allowed	21	28	49
Assists	23	21	44
Shots	249	244	493
Shots allowed	224	266	490
Shots on goal	76	90	166
Shots on goal allowed	68	103	171

Goals per game	1.4	1.3	1.4
Goals allowed per game	1.3	1.6	1.45
Assists per game	1.4	1.2	1.3
Shots per game	15.6	13.6	14.5
Shots allowed per game	14.0	14.8	14.4
SOG per game	4.8	5.0	4.9
SOG allowed per game	4.3	5.7	5.0
Expected goals	25.4	25.9	51.3
Expected goals per game	1.6	1.4	1.5
Expected goals allowed	20.5	28.4	48.9
Expected goals allowed per game	1.3	1.6	1.45
Record	4-8-4	6-6-6

Valentino should ultimately be judged on his recor

d, which was better than Pineda’s. The remaining stats

don’t really flatter him.

To be fair, Valentino jumped into coaching the team during a very busy stretch when he didn’t have a lot of time to really hone what he wanted to do with the talent.

I thought it might be more fair to look at the final five matches, after Valentino had a few international breaks to really work on what he wanted to implement.

Category	Red Bulls	Orlando	Montreal
Goals	2	2	2
Goals allowed	1	1	2
Assists	2	1	2
Shots	20	9	13
Shots allowed	6	21	18
Shots on goal	6	5	7
SOG allowed	2	10	6
Expected goals	2.6	2.3	2.2
Xg allowed	0.8	1.3	2.5

Now, let’s compare those five-match averages to the season averages:

Category	5	Season
Goals	1.8	1.4
Goals allowed	1.4	1.4
Assists	1.6	1.3
Shots	12.6	14.5
Shots allowed	15.4	14.4
Shots on goal	4.8	4.9
SOG allowed	6.2	5.0
Expected goals	1.9	1.5
Xg allowed	1.9	1.4

The five-match averages are skewed because the first match at Miami was Atlanta United’s third in seven days. The players were exhausted. However, it was the schedule so I’m not going to take those out of the sample. Feel free to do so, if you want.

In short, the stats indicate that it doesn’t seem to matter if it was Pineda managing the team or Valentino. The underlying stats were going to be very similar.

What isn’t similar is the record and the fact that the team has a chance to advance in the playoffs for the second consecutive round, something it hasn’t done since 2019.

That’s what I presume Valentino will be judged on.

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Atlanta United’s 2024 schedule

Feb. 24 Columbus 1, Atlanta United 0

March 9 Atlanta United 4, New England 1

March 17 Atlanta United 2, Orlando 0

March 23 Toronto 2, Atlanta United 0

March 31 Atlanta United 3, Chicago 0

April 6 Atlanta United 1, NYCFC 1

April 14 Atlanta United 2, Philadelphia 2

April 20 Cincinnati 2, Atlanta United 1

April 27 Atlanta United 1, Chicago 1

May 4 Minnesota 2, Atlanta United 1

May 7 Atlanta United 3, Charlotte Independence 0 in U.S. Open Cup