Weekend Warm-up: Was this a successful campaign for Bayern Munich?; Three times Thomas Müller almost left Bayern; The Boys trailer; Throwing it back to Van Halen; and MORE!

Bayern Munich stumbled across the finish line to end 2021/22 and did not necessarily allow fans to to enjoy the season’s final weeks.

Sure, the squad had already wrapped up the Bundesliga title, but those final weeks represented some of the most listless, uninspired play that we have seen since the Niko Kovac era.

While those poor performances might not have been a reason for major concern (the outcomes of the final games were meaningless), the drop in quality for the squad definitely triggered emotions in many fans.

The sour taste that was accrued in those final weeks still remains in the mouth of some supporters, while some others are looking at the season as a whole. Either way, many are making a determination on whether or not this first season under Julian Nagelsmann was a success or not.

Here are a couple of positive takeaways:

• The team was a Bundesliga title.
• At times, the team looked like the class of Europe — especially early in the season.

As for the negatives, well, they might have been more impactful the positives:

• The team flamed out in the DFB-Pokal by getting embarrassed by Borussia Mönchengladbach.
• Nagelsmann’s teams also was upset in the Champions League and suffered an unceremonious exit at the hands of Villarreal.
• The squad seemed to experience wild swings of form.

Some other non-results based factors could include:

• The team seems to have enjoyed the season under Nagelsmann, who had a relatively smooth transition into leading a new group of men.
• Nagelsmann teetered between a back three and back four — and even implemented a hybrid approach. None of the formations, however, seemed to fully stick with the personnel available.
• The squad battled through some really adverse injuries.

Sticking to just the coach and the players — and leaving all of the front office moves out of the mix — I’ll say this season was successful and here’s why: A Bundesliga championship is nothing to scoff at. While the league might not be as strong top-to-bottom as it once was, winning domestically is always the first goal on any team’s list. Getting hardware was an absolutely necessity for Nagelsmann during his first campaign and he did just that.

Admittedly, the “lows” for the season were extremely low. Being shellacked by a Gladbach side that was pretty terrible on the season was a tough pill to swallow. Similarly, the Villarreal tie showed that the team — and the coach — were not quite as prepared as they needed to be.

In the end, however, the Meisterschale still holds weight with me. While we can argue day and night about what things look like moving forward (there is definitely some cause for concern...and for hope), I’m basing this season off the Bundesliga title and the fact that there were generally more highs than lows.

The season was extremely fun at times and extremely frustrating at others.

We all lived it — and most of us survived. So, now we will turn the page on 2021/22 and power forward to 2022/23 with a chip on our shoulder and maybe a little more skepticism built into our mindset, but we can relax and and enjoy this season for what it was: One that resulted in a trophy.

Was that good enough for you?

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Bavarian Podcast Works: Weekend Warm-up Podcast Season 1, Episode 50

Bayern Munich’s offseason got off to a rousing start.

Robert Lewandowski wants to leave the club for FC Barcelona. Sporting director Hasan “Brazzo” Salihamidzic has suddenly found his position within the organization in some jeopardy (if you believe certain reports). Bayern Munich was linked to serial underachiever Ousmane Dembele — and about a dozen other options who can play one forward role or another.

We had a poor finish to the campaign, some contract drama, typical FC Hollywood storylines, and an early start to silly season form a “WTF Voltron” to get us going and it is not even June yet.

Yup, it has been crazy. This is what we have on tap for this episode:

• Chuck and Jake talk through Robert Lewandowski’s situation, what might happen, and the huge hole he would leave in the lineup.
• Some options to replace the Polish international.
• Brazzo’s new drama.
• A little praise for Eintracht Frankfurt.
• Why no one wants Ousmane Dembele even if he has some tantalizing ability.

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Three strikes and he was not out

In a recent interview with Tz, Thomas Müller talked about how close he came to leaving Bayern Munich.

“Three times. When Jürgen Klinsmann was coach, Ralf Rangnick wanted me at Hoffenheim. At that point in the winter of 2008/09, I was with Bayern amateurs and could have played permanently in the Bundesliga at Hoffenheim. It was close. In retrospect, Hermann Gerland fortunately resisted with all his power and prevented the transfer,” Müller said. “Then when Louis van Gaal was at Manchester United, this option was also interesting for me. I could have imagined playing again under my the coach who promoted me. But I wasn’t really close to a move because FC Bayern clearly rejected the whole thing — despite the insane offer from United. That was a huge show of confidence on the part of FC Bayern.”

The third time? You can probably guess — during Niko Kovac’s tenure.

“As I have said several times, I would have wanted to move if my situation had not improved. Since I didn’t get the playing time that I would have liked during that phase, I sought out a conversation with the club,” Müller said.

What factors played into him staying?

“It’s a simple answer - because I have everything I enjoy about professional football here. I definitely know that I’m competing for titles here - domestically and internationally,” Müller said.

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The Boys are coming back...soon

If you are a fan of Amazon Prime’s The Boys, we’ve got good news for you: On June 3rd, the show will return.

If you lasted through the craziness of the first two seasons (they were excellent), you will likely already be in the mindset that this season could be the most wild one yet.

Always pushing the envelope, the trailer for The Boys sure makes it look like we are in for another insane season:

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Song of the Week: “Jump” by Van Halen

I am a sucker for the 80s and damn if Van Halen wasn’t huge back then. One of the first albums I owned was 1984 by Van Halen and while there were several great songs on that cassette (?!), this was my favorite. It still gets me going and the blood pumping even today:

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Prediction records

What an abysmal record. Seriously…it is so bad.

Last Bundesliga Match Day record: 4-5

Overall Bundesliga record: 157-149

DFB-Pokal record: 1-1

DFL-Supercup record: 1-0

Champions League record: 7-3

Overall record: 166-153