{"id":245099,"date":"2026-03-31T14:11:10","date_gmt":"2026-03-31T14:11:10","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/245099\/"},"modified":"2026-03-31T14:11:10","modified_gmt":"2026-03-31T14:11:10","slug":"lucky-or-good-john-thorrington-keeps-lafc-striving-for-best-results","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/245099\/","title":{"rendered":"Lucky or good, John Thorrington keeps LAFC striving for best results"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

John Thorrington<\/a> must be the luckiest general manager in MLS.<\/p>\n

Just consider the evidence: In his 10 years with LAFC<\/a>, Thorrington has hired three coaches and each one has been better than the last. How many other executives have a track record like that?<\/p>\n

Then again, maybe it\u2019s not luck. Maybe Thorrington simply has been the best general manager in the league over the past decade.<\/p>\n

\u201cEither one. Doesn\u2019t really matter,\u201d Thorrington said when asked for the secret to his success. \u201cThe results are what matter.\u201d<\/p>\n

And the results have been phenomenal. Since entering MLS in 2018, LAFC has won more games, scored more goals and earned more points than any other club. Over the last eight seasons, no team has won more trophies or played in more CONCACAF finals than LAFC.<\/p>\n

None of that was lucky. It was the result of hard work.<\/p>\n

\u201cTo categorize this almost like a self-driving car is inaccurate,\u201d Thorrington said. \u201cThe coaches have a great deal to do with the success we\u2019ve had, and hopefully will continue to have.\u201d<\/p>\n

Thorrington was 4 years old the first time he kicked a soccer ball with purpose, in an AYSO game in the South Bay. He got better after that, winning two Southern Section player of the year honors at the Chadwick School in Palos Verdes Peninsula. His professional career took him to six teams in four countries before he retired at 33, enrolled in graduate business school at Northwestern and started a second career with the MLS players\u2019 union.<\/p>\n

But he had absolutely no experience managing a soccer team when LAFC, which has a well-earned reputation for thinking outside the box, named him its first general manager less than three weeks before Christmas in 2015. Twenty months later, Thorrington picked Bob Bradley \u2014 who coached him with the national team \u2014 as the club\u2019s first manager.<\/p>\n

It would prove to be the first in a series of smart choices.<\/p>\n

\u201cFor us the definition of success is to compete in a sustainable way,\u201d said Thorrington, who is also LAFC\u2019s co-president. \u201cI was told early in my career \u2014 and I agree with it still to this day \u2014 the most important executive skill is hiring well. I think we have done that well here at LAFC.\u201d<\/p>\n

The decision to pick Bradley was a conventional one. He was a no-nonsense taskmaster who had won an MLS Cup and two U.S. Open Cups with the Chicago Fire, had taken the U.S. to the round of 16 in a World Cup and was the first American to coach in the English Premier League. He was chosen in part to establish the club\u2019s culture and its unwavering commitment to success, and he rewarded Thorrington with the best season in MLS history in his second year and with a trip to the CONCACAF Champions League final in his third.<\/p>\n

Thorrington\u2019s next two coaching picks weren\u2019t nearly as conventional, yet they\u2019ve proven even more successful. When Bradley left after the 2021 season, LAFC replaced him with Steve Cherundolo, the man whose spot Thorrington took in his national team debut. Cherundolo had spent his entire club playing career and most of his coaching career in Germany and in his only previous try at managing a club in the U.S., his Las Vegas Lights went 6-23-3 in the USL Championship.<\/p>\n

But the laid-back San Diegan was the opposite of the intense Bradley and that\u2019s exactly what LAFC needed. Cherundolo won a Supporters\u2019 Shield and MLS Cup in his rookie season, made the MLS Cup and Champions League finals in his second year and won the U.S. Open Cup in his third. He averaged nearly 18 wins in his four seasons in MLS.<\/p>\n

Thorrington\u2019s current coach is Marc Dos Santos<\/a>, a Canadian-born Portuguese citizen who served as an LAFC assistant under both Bradley and Cherundolo but who lost nearly twice as often as he won in Vancouver in his only previous stint as an MLS manager. He had won everywhere else he coached, however.<\/p>\n

Each time LAFC had an opening, Thorrington said he was inundated with emails and phone calls from established coaches around the world. The safe, defendable choice wasn\u2019t necessarily the right one though.<\/p>\n

\u201cAt LAFC we have certain qualities and principles that we are very upfront about,\u201d said Thorrington, 46, who was named the MLS executive of the year in 2024 and probably should have won the award at least one other time. \u201cThe advantage in all three cases was I knew each of the coaches really well.<\/p>\n

\u201cThere is risk with anybody. For me, the risk I would rather take is not hiring a resume but hiring a person that we feel like meets those qualities.\u201d<\/p>\n

Dos Santos, who speaks four languages, is a bit of a mix of LAFC\u2019s first two managers \u2014 not nearly as strict as Bradley, the drill sergeant, yet not quite as relaxed as Cherundolo. So far he\u2019s proven more successful than either.<\/p>\n

Granted it\u2019s a small sample size, but Dos Santos has been this close to perfect in his LAFC start, going 4-0-1<\/a> in his first five MLS games, all five of which have been clean sheets. It\u2019s the first time in league history a team has opened a season with five consecutive shutouts. Dos Santos is also unbeaten in CONCACAF play too, taking LAFC to the next month\u2019s quarterfinals of the Champions Cup.<\/p>\n

If you include the preseason, LAFC is 9-0-4 under Dos Santos. But that start is just that \u2014 a start.<\/p>\n

\u201cI\u2019m really pleased with not just Marc but the technical staff and all of the staff here,\u201d Thorrington said. \u201cBut the focus here is that it\u2019s early. We haven\u2019t done anything yet and I know that there is hunger to improve, push our boundaries and make sure that we are becoming the best version of ourselves.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt doesn\u2019t happen without that strong culture. Our standards, our accountability and the way the group pushes each other every day, that is what has sustained our performance independent of who the head coach is. And we\u2019ve had three great ones.\u201d<\/p>\n

None of that happened because Thorrington was lucky. It happened because he\u2019s good.<\/p>\n

\u26bd You have read the latest installment of On Soccer with Kevin Baxter. The weekly column takes you behind the scenes and shines a spotlight on unique stories. Listen to Baxter on this week\u2019s episode of the \u201cCorner of the Galaxy\u201d podcast<\/a>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"John Thorrington must be the luckiest general manager in MLS. Just consider the evidence: In his 10 years…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":245100,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[27],"tags":[39417,1883,4690,109728,109727,48,52,51,12407,47,50,49,47913,11203,18419,278,12410,4424,427,109729,72],"class_list":["post-245099","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-los-angeles","tag-bob-bradley","tag-club","tag-coach","tag-good-result","tag-john-thorrington","tag-la","tag-la-headlines","tag-la-news","tag-lafc","tag-los-angeles","tag-los-angeles-headlines","tag-los-angeles-news","tag-marc-dos-santos","tag-mls","tag-mls-cup","tag-season","tag-steve-cherundolo","tag-success","tag-team","tag-u-s-open-cups","tag-year"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/245099","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=245099"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/245099\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/245100"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=245099"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=245099"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=245099"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}