The San Jose Earthquakes were the sweetheart story of the first half of the 2019 MLS season. A woeful side that finished dead last in 2018, San Jose experienced a resurgence under coach Matías Almeyda last season. In August, the Earthquakes rose as high as third place in the Western Conference. Almeyda looked like a no-brainer pick for MLS coach of the year.



The positive vibes from that run still linger in San Jose. So, too, does the memory of what happened over the next three months. The Earthquakes won just two of their final 12 games, dropping six straight to close out the season. It was a collapse that caused San Jose to finish in eighth place, one spot out of the playoffs.



“Heading into the second part of the season, that expectation, that benchmark, was already really high and we had some difficulty in managing those expectations,” San Jose general manager Jesse Fioranelli said earlier this month, as he sipped on a Sprite in the lobby of his...