I must say I was a bit mixed about this firing. I thought there was plenty of heat on Steve Morrow but I didn’t think it was the right time to start placing the blame for the club’s recent play solely on him. It was more of a collective blame around the whole club for the recent play, not just Morrow though his coaching and tactics didn’t help.

Plus there are a couple reasons why I was a little surprised with firing.

• The owners (HSG) has made it pretty apparent in recent years that they didn’t like to do any kind of coaching or GM changes in mid season. HSG tends to let contracts expire before they do anything about them. Also, it was noted that GM Michael Hitchcock and Morrow were in a contract year this season.
• I also don’t completely buy into all the reports on the locker room issues and that there were issues over the Alvial firing a week ago. Sure those things didn’t help but I doubt it heavily weighed in on this decision.

Apparently something happened between the final seconds of the LA game on Sunday and this morning. A meeting between Morrow and the owners and Morrow and Hitchcock. Something didn’t go over well and the sides came to this result.

After sitting in on the conference call earlier today that was conducted by Hitchcock, I got a real sense that this was totally his deal and not the owners. Its kind of like he went to them and said, “look we can sellout this place but not with the coach doing the things he did on Sunday.” Again, Hitchcock is on a contract year and he knows he has to save his butt as well here with the owners and maybe cutting ties with Morrow was the case.

Let’s be real honest here too. Morrow and Hitchcock haven’t always seen eye-to-eye on things. Hitchcock brought in Denilson last year and he never really fit into what Morrow was doing. Neither would actually take the blame for the bust of a signing like Denlison but you could bet that one would probably blame the other if they got the chance.

I think in the end it was a bit early to fire Morrow but at the same time if he was indeed losing respect of his veteran players at this point in the season then it may be a smart thing here for his firing. Losing veteran respect in any locker room will do more harm than anything else. What’s exactly what you were seeing in Dallas over the last few weeks. Loss of respect lead to bad results on the field and uninspiring play.

There’s also the idea that his tactics weren’t winning him over and that was also causing the poor play. Not to mention his tactics in player signings and such. Those are well documented over the last couple of years.

I also think here that if things don’t change too soon that we could see Hitchcock on his way out as well. I’ve said for a while that the Hunts need to get him back into just selling tickets (which is what he is a master of doing) and relieve him of his GM title. Tickets are his thing, not players.

Also, Dallas needs to get a technical director in place soon, and it may be a good idea for that guy to pick the coach. Just an idea but that probably won’t happen

But until things change, its now time to look and see who will coach this club. Buzz already has a solid list of coaches that could fill the position.

Who do I have in mind? Names like Oscar Pareja come to mind. I think someone like New England assistant Paul Mariner or Houston assistant John Spencer have to get a look. Or maybe a former Bruce Arena assistants like Richie Williams or Jeff Agoos. I don’t buy into Steve Sampson or Hugo Sanchez as candidates.

Schellas Hyndman, the SMU coach has been offered the job a couple of times but has turned it down each time. Honestly, I wouldn’t offer him the job this time around. As good as he’s made SMU into these days, he hasn’t won a big one in the NCAA tournament.

If it were up to me I wouldn’t go for college coaches right now. Get a coach who understands the MLS system and that understands how to coach in Texas. So yeah, no Bruce Arena either here.

Here’s the release that was sent my way by the club:

FC Dallas General Manager Michael Hitchcock announced today that Steve Morrow has been relieved of his duties as head coach, effective immediately. Marco Ferruzzi, in his fourth season as an assistant coach, will coach the team on an interim basis. Ferruzzi will make his debut against Real Salt Lake on Saturday, May 24 at Pizza Hut Park (7:30 p.m. CT).

“We have set high standards, expectations, and goals for this team and organization,” said Hitchcock. “I feel that the team was not heading in the direction we had planned, and believe it is in the best interest of the club to make a coaching change at this time.”

FC Dallas is currently in fourth place in the Western Conference with a record of 2-3-3 (9 points). The team is riding a four game winless streak, and is 1-2-1 at Pizza Hut Park this year.

“This is obviously a difficult decision for me to make, since it was my choice to give Steve this opportunity,” added Hitchcock. “Having said that, Pizza Hut Park is an incredible venue, and our great fans deserve much more from our team for their continued support. We appreciate Steve’s contribution to our organization and wish him success in his future endeavors.”

Morrow was introduced as the club’s fourth head coach on December 11, 2006. In his first season as head coach, FC Dallas posted a 13-12-5 record (44 points) and finished in third place in the Western Conference. The team advanced to the 2007 Lamar Hunt U.S. Open Cup championship game for the third time in team history, falling 3-2 to the New England Revolution at Pizza Hut Park. FC Dallas advanced to the MLS Cup Playoffs for a league-record tying 10th time in history, though was eliminated in the Conference Semifinals by eventual MLS Cup Champions Houston Dynamo.

“I have thoroughly enjoyed my six year association with this organization and was proud to be Head Coach of FC Dallas,” said Steve Morrow. “I feel I leave the team in a very strong position with a wonderful group of players that are capable of achieving great things. Due to a recent run of poor results, I fully accept responsibility, and, if the team needs to go in a different direction then I wish the players nothing but great success for the remainder of the season and beyond. I’d like to thank my staff, the players, the Hunt family and all the fans for their support.”

A Northern Ireland native, Morrow played the final two years of his professional career with Dallas. During the 2002 and 2003 seasons, he scored three goals in 41 career regular season games and once in three playoff matches, playing primarily as a center back.

He was hired as one of the team’s assistant coaches on Feb. 3, 2004, and was the first assistant coach during the 2005 and 2006 seasons.

I talked about it earlier today. Things weren’t going well for Dallas and Morrow is the first causality to show for it.

Once I get more information on this I will pass it along to you all. I didn’t expect a firing to come this soon but obviously the Dallas front office didn’t like what was going on inside the club as things were leaking out left and right lately.

Reports in recent weeks say that there are some issues going on in the DC and Dallas locker rooms. DC could be in the middle of a coaching change and Dallas seems to be losing respect for their coach. Fans are a little tired in both towns due to moves both made in the offseason. DC made lots of moves while Dallas added a couple pieces after trading away was what said to be a locker room cancer.

I will start with DC as they seem to be maybe the more confusing of the two.

Questions have been raised over the past couple weeks about the chance that head coach Tom Soehn could be fired this season for the way things have been going with his club. After eight weeks its pretty evident that things aren’t going too well in DC these days.

Two wins and six losses are telling some people that Soehn isn’t the man for the job. Same may even take this further back to last fall with DC in the playoffs. Lots of people blame Soehn for his formations and tactics in the first round exit against Chicago.

Either way you spin it, things just aren’t going well for Soehn and his club these days. Injuries could be to blame, poor player signings in the offseason could be as well, and so could just the overall cohesion of the team. Or maybe just being over hyped as the best club by people like myself and other media members.

Usually when a club makes a lot of changes in an offseason like DC did this year it means a couple of things. It means the club is expecting to win and in the previous year something was missing that could have helped out before. I think it also puts pressure on the coach to win with those new parts right away. High profile signings always indicate that the coach needs a little lift or boost; and a lot of times it works out like in Chicago with Blanco or in Columbus with Schelotto.

You look at this season with DC and you can tell things are not great. Their best scorer from a year ago either isn’t happy or just lost a big step from a year ago. Their unsung hero in the midfield is out with an injury and may not even get to return this year. Just a bunch of little things with player movement like leaving a certain player open for the expansion draft. Plus a couple of the players brought in this season aren’t cutting it.

But all can be cured with a coach I think. That’s where the heat is on Soehn. Getting Luciano Emilio to play like the Emilio from a season ago and getting someone to step up for the absence of Ben Olsen and the loss of Brain Carroll. So far the pieces that were given to Soehn aren’t working and he hasn’t found the way to get them to work.

Now firing him or having him step down now would be a rash thing to do. But I’m sure any DC fan will call for his head right now. I would too if I were a fan.

But the thing is DC President Kevin Payne wants change but I don’t see him doing so in the form of a coaching change. DC, just like most clubs in this league, are one or two good players away from being able to reach a MLS Cup here. This club still has the talent to do some good things this season, it just may take a little longer than most would want to see.

Clubs like Chicago and Real Salt Lake made coaching changes this time last year is due to many reasons. Both coaches weren’t work out at all but at the same time neither team had the right parts in place to do anything about it. Both clubs had to wait until the summer for players to come in and change things up.

I don’t think Soehn will be fired this year but with the heat on him this badly its hard to tell just how long the DC front office will hold out after their spending in the offseason. More than likely they will wait it out until the summer and then try to bring in some new talent to mix things up a bit. If that doesn’t work, then you can easily bet he will be gone sometime in this year.

Switching down south, Dallas is another mess. Reports over the last couple weeks have suggested that things in the Dallas locker room aren’t all that rosy these days. It was particularly interesting on Sunday after the LA game when Al Dia reporter Diego Aparicio posed a question about the locker room situation to Dallas coach Steve Morrow.

“That’s a ridiculous statement, I have no comment.” – Steve Morrow

This all stemmed from a resent firing of an assistant coach Jorge Alvial. Aparicio wrote on his blog about the events surrounding Alvial (in Spanish). He wrote that some players were upset over the release of Alvial and that they were getting frustrated with how Morrow was treating the situation.

This isn’t a first with Dallas. Over the past year or so we’ve seen players get upset over contracts and such with the Dallas coaches and front office. Mostly it seems to be a bit of the same deal. Player is promised a certain thing if he plays well in the first season of the contract. The player then lives up the promise and the club then seems to fail at living up to their end of the promise.

Alvia apparently was taking a stand for the players and thus was let go by Morrow because of it. Some players are even said to have a total lack of respect for Morrow. To that, I can say losing causes loss of respect and even in times of winning there are players who don’t fully respect a coach.

The fact of the matter is that some are getting the feeling that Morrow is losing control of his club and that is showing up on the field.  Losing always breads more losing. Just as winning breads more winning. Both are contagious. So I don’t think he has fully lost control of his club here.

But unlike DC, this wasn’t all totally unexpected here with this club. Expectations were already set in most people’s mind that this would be a .500% club this season. They are young and are easily showing their age right now. But the longer the growing pains go, the more fans in Dallas will get restless with Morrow.

No longer can the club throw out the excuse that there is a locker room cancer like Carlos Ruiz or Ramon Nunez. Right now there aren’t any players like that.

The hot seat is hot though for Morrow just as it is for GM Michael Hitchcock. Both are in tough spots and could see the boot. But more than likely that boot won’t be kicked until after the season. The only thing I can see saving their jobs right now is winning. But not winning in the sense that the club wins just enough to reach the playoffs and then lose in the first round kind of winning. More like they win, get into the playoffs and actually win a series.

Both coaches deserve to be on the hot seat right now but at the same time they both deserve a little more time to work things out and patch things up. Hell, Morrow even went as far to say that the club would win the next game coming up against RSL.

Things usually resolve themselves in situations like DC and Dallas. Its just how long can you the fan wait it out? I know the Dallas fan in me is frustrated but I know things will work out.