Roger that

Crew Cuts

Roger that

By Chris DeVille

Andrea Kjerrumgaard/Dispatch photo

Robbie Rogers takes the ball around Kansas City's Chance Myers?on May 3.

A year ago, Robbie Rogers was a ball of potential energy. Today, he's kinetic.

The Columbus Crew acquired the midfield phenom in a special weighted draft before the 2007 season. Fresh out of his teens, Rogers showed flashes of greatness but spent much of last year riding the bench.

Those flashes and a solid preseason earned Rogers a starting spot at left midfield this year. Before the season, Coach Sigi Schmid challenged Rogers and fellow youngster Eddie Gaven to play like leaders.

"Sigi talked to us and wanted us to have some more responsibility on the team, and that's kind of something Eddie and I want anyways," Rogers said. "We've been pretty successful so far, but there's a long season left."

Rogers is right: Many matches remain, but for now, he and the Crew are on fire.

While Gaven has stepped up defensively, Rogers has made a noticeable mark on the offensive end. Last weekend Rogers' fourth and fifth goals of the season led Columbus to a 3-2 comeback win in San Jose. Monday, Major League Soccer named him Player of the Week — not a bad 21st birthday present.

Rogers downplayed his personal success, crediting it to a team that's firing on all cylinders and sitting atop MLS with a 6-1-0 record. It's true: Rogers' teammates have been providing him with some deadly through balls. But the speedy midfielder has made an art of converting those precise passes into goals.

"This year he's showing how good of a finisher he is," Gaven said.

All of Rogers' scores have resulted from canny diagonal runs from the left flank, yet each has been its own unique thrill. Sometimes Rogers catches defenders out of position. Other times he simply outruns them, employing the killer speed that has always been a hallmark of his game.

"Defenders really aren't expecting the outside midfielder to make that run across, so I kind of catch them off guard," Rogers said.

Rogers was friends with Schmid's son growing up, so the coach has been watching him develop for years. He said Rogers' newfound ability to get behind the defense without the ball is the latest in a long line of upgrades that started when kid Rogers played on teams in older age brackets.

"Speed has always been a big asset of his," Schmid said. "If he had ... played in his age group, he would have never learned those other aspects of his game because his speed would have been so completely dominating. Because he was playing up, he always had to have a little more than just speed."

These days speed, skill, stamina and smarts are combining to make Rogers another cog in the Crew's well-oiled machine.

What's next for the Crew?

The wins just keep coming for Columbus. On the heels of the Crew's come-from-behind triumph in San Jose, they'll try to keep their five-game winning streak alive with a Saturday afternoon stop at Toronto FC. CSN has TV coverage at 4 p.m.

May 15, 2008