​An all round midfielder in every sense, Matt is comfortable on the ball and competitive without it. He was the heartbeat of the midfield in Reno’s exceptional debut season.

~Nashville SC head coach, Gary Smith

Matthew LaGrassa was acquired by Nashville SC from Reno 1868 on November 30, as another part of the Big Bunch of first signings. Born in Elk Grove, California, LaGrassa played college ball at California Polytechnic between 2011 and 2015. He played in 77 games for the Mustangs and scored 18 goals, the fourth-highest of any player at Cal Poly. While in school, LaGrassa also played for two Premier Development League sides, the Des Moines Menace and the Ventura County Fusion where he had 9 and 23 caps, respectively, and scored 2 goals for each team.

LaGrassa was picked up by USL club Sacramento Republic in February of 2016, and he would start and end the 2016 season with Sacramento, but would spend some of the middle part of the season on loan with the Tulsa Roughnecks. After the end of the 2016 season, LaGrassa was traded to fellow USL side Reno 1868. In his two seasons in the United Soccer League, Matt LaGrassa would make 51 caps in all competitions (USL, USL Playoffs, and the US Open Cup), 44 of which were matches he started. He scored two goals, one each with Sacramento and Reno, and had five assists. LaGrassa has played primarily as a midfielder, especially in his most recent season with Reno in 2017. I found a highlight video (that Matt himself put together, actually) of his work:’

LaGrassa has flourished as either a central, holding midfielder, or a straight-up defensive midfielder. This is not a glorious position; this is primarily a support position. Holding midfielders are the focal point for the beginning of the attack, and slot in slightly ahead of the defensive back line in defense. Holding mids do not score a lot of goals. They instead are called upon to execute primarily short passes to find weaknesses in the opposition’s defense, and occasionally lift a well-placed long ball over the opposing back line to provide excellent position for a forward to make an attempt on goal. What we should expect to see, statistically, from a holding midfielder, is good numbers in both defense and in ball distribution. Any goals that do come are very few and far between, but the lack of goals should not be indicative of any failure to score on the part of the holding midfielder. Instead, we should look at the capability of that holding midfielder to set up his teammates to score. If there were a tracked category called assist-assist, the holding midfielder should score high marks in that area.

Now, let’s dive into LaGrassa’s numbers, starting with defense. In the above video, Matt lookedtenacious and aggressive on defense, and his stats back that up. In 2017, Matt blocked four shots, made 44 clearances (1.45 per 90 minutes), and intercepted 96 passes (3.15 per 90). Matt was successful on 65.9% of tackles attempted, winning 54 (1.77 per 90), and out of the 289 duels he fought in midfield, he won 156 (5.13 per 90 minutes), for a 54% success rate.

Once a holding mid wins the ball from the opponent, however, he must set his team up via good ball distribution, and LaGrassa shines here again. Matt attempted 1783 passes in 2017, completing 1520 of them for a success rate of 85.2%, and a rate of 49.9 successful passes every 90 minutes. When it comes specifically to the long ball, LaGrassa excels here, too, completing 73.5% of the 275 long passes attempted. This is not the whole story, though, as LaGrassa chalked up three direct assists, and had a total of 26 key passes, a stat which includes assists. Again, one should not expect the statistics here to be truly glamorous because holding midfielders often do not directly contribute to a goal, but are heavily involved in the build-up to it, and the rest of his distribution statistics suggest that LaGrassa was one of the best holding midfielders in the USL last season. In that highlight video above, there are several instances where it’s clear Matt is just showing off what he can do, with long through balls that slice through the back line, clever switching of play, and the ability to cause havoc with even just a short pass. Matt will be able to contribute immediately and effectively to Nashville SC, serving as the link between defense and offense.

As a treat, if you have the time, check out LaGrassa’ s highlights while played for Cal Poly: