Stefan Frei finishes fifth in Goalkeeper of Year voting

Stefan Frei continues to be considered among the best goalkeepers in MLS, but not quite the best. The Seattle Sounders goalkeeper finished fifth in this year’s voting, well behind second-time winner Andre Blake.

Frei apparently made the biggest impression on the “club” portion of the vote, which is comprised of the league’s club managers. Frei finished third among those voters.

This is the third time in the last four years that Frei has finished in the Top 5 of Goalkeeper of the Year voting, with the lone exception being last year. The closest Frei came to winning the award was in 2018 when he took second. Frei was third in 2017.

Interestingly, this was not a particularly strong statistical performance by Frei. He finished sixth in goals against average (1.05), seventh in shutouts (6) and his 72.3 save percentage was seventh among qualified goalkeepers. Frei did allow .96 fewer goals than xG would have predicted, but that too was only 17th best. Since 2017, Frei ranks second with -14.67 G-xG.