Bravo:Rapids Actively Seeking Designated Player

I didn't say the last 3 years. Between the beginning of 2008 and Casey's injury in 2011 only Landon Donovan had more goals than Casey. But tell me again how he's just lucky and not good.

 

lol always that stat. comparing casey to landon is like comparing chris rock to eddy murphy one gets the job done. but the other busts your gut.

2008 - till about last year the league really wasn't on the level it's at now.

casey was a fall out boy in toronto and germany. who was considering retirement till we made a move for him. omar to me was the guy doing all the hard work. casey was in the right place at the right time. any big man can do it his nothing special.

 

O rly?

 

Considering Oscar's Colombian connections brought in the unplayable Harrison Henao and the greatest backpost header of the ball short of Wondo (who does nothing else on the field)--Jaime Castrillon--not to mention the up and down Zapata, I would think a change of scenery for the next acquisition might be appropriate.

Don't get me wrong--Castrillon's particular poaching talent has value, and whoever brought in Rivero at least brought in a South American of the right mindset and physical attributes for the league.

Perhaps a Sherjill Macdonald-type player. He doesn't have the box presence that Casey does, but his movement, hold-up and passing play in the field is vastly superior. Then bring Casey on as a sub the way the Quakes did Alan Gordon or Houston did with Ching/Weaver.

It's not an either/or, you just move good role players like Casey to the bench and give them 15/20 mins when a second-half goal or set-piece defending is needed, like Gordon.

 

lol always moving the goalposts when confronted with stats.

How convenient. And I'm sure that magically convenient jump in overall league quality can in no way be hindered by the fact that 4 teams gave up over 50 goals and one player scored more goals in a single season than anyone has scored since '96. Or by the fact that have you have absolutely no facts to back up your assertion.

For the last year and a half, with Casey injured, we saw just what it's like when Omar is the "guy doing all the hard work". So you can drop that angle right now, because you have absolutely zero flecks of dirt to stand on.

 

Everything in your post makes sense. The issue is, Gordon and Lenhart make 390K combined, are 31 and 26 years old respectively, and have, for their whole careers, played the 2nd striker/man off the bench role.

Casey's whole career he's been "the man," he gets paid like it ($400k a year) and he's also just 31 (Ching, from your example, is 34). Unless his injury issues make recovering his form impossible, convincing him to take a bench role is going to be very difficult. I haven't seen anything from Pareja yet that tells me he's capable of such a coaching maneuver or such acumen.

And the other issue is, finding a hold-up player who's equal to or better than Casey and is one that Kroenke would be willing to shell out for is damned impossible. I'm convinced the only reason we pay Casey as much as we do is because they can spin it as the local/homegrown player. Pick another guy from another state/country, and if it doesn't read "Mexico", I doubt Kroenke would shell out a dime over 300k. And that's not likely to buy you a player better than Casey.

(I also disagree completely that Macdonald's holdup play is better than Casey's, but that's beside the point).

 

Well, Kronke doesn't pay anyone right now, and that continues as long as he doesn't sign a DP. MLS paying the salaries and all that. But since we're talking about possibly a DP to replace him, yeah, not seeing it from KSE.

(Oh, and Wynne is going to make over 300K this season as well)

 

Gordon got a USMNT call-up and contributed on the crucial winning goal at Antigua when he wasn't even a starter for his club.

So what I'm saying isn't a judgment on Casey as a player--he has tons of value--but his recent injury history and his age weigh against him as a 90-minute starter in MLS 2013. That's all I'm saying.

Especially when, as you properly say, Casey would have to continue to be "the" guy because Omar tends to drift wide. It's not like he has a Montero or Higuain or Rolfe sitting underneath him. Rivero isn't that sort of player, and isn't yet that caliber of player, either.

I don't know what Omar's salary is, but Darren Mattocks is currently ahead of him on the pecking order of forwards for the Reggae Boys. So maybe there's room to move on his $$, as well.

Anyway--you guys need someone like Kenwyne Jones up top and have Conor in the Gordon role...subbing in always, starting occasionally.

 

Well, that's not entirely true. MLS may "pay the salaries", but that fund of money from which MLS pays the salaries comes from all 19 owners contributing in equal part (that equal part, from my understanding, is that $2.3-2.5M "soft cap" amount). So while technically the checks the players get are from the league, KSE in practice is paying for his club's roster.

 

Right, but regardless of if he paid Casey 400K or 200K he'd still pay MLS the same amount of money every year, that same "soft cap" number (which is actually $2.8M this year).

 

Well, the Indonesian leagues have a number of 3rd division teams on the island.

 

casey andomar both need to go not worth the money we pay. all i ever see anyone say is stats stats stats.

watch the game. numbers are nothing.

 

Yeah, don't let those pesky things like goals, assists, salary numbers, and other facts get in the way of a gut feel or anything. Because, you know, any big man can do Casey's job despite Folan failing at it last year and everyone who tried failing at it this year. And all the other big men in MLS failing to do it as well as Casey does.

(I remember similar sentiments about baseball when the sabermetric guys showed up)

 

the dude from sj is a great example of a big man. so is that new guy toronto got.

casey is bad sorry i never liked him. sure he scored goals but i promise you if we keep him and his fit in shape start of the season he wont score goals like he used to. every team's defense has stepped up thats why omar isn't as effective as he was 2 years ago.

 

I've never liked Donovan. Doesn't mean I can't see that he's possibly the best player in the history of the league. Your personal biases are coloring your view of players.

 

Hinchey essentially said that a DP was dependent on a jersey sponsor in the middle of the season, so I assume they go hand in hand.

 

Another local company (Boulder) that might be interested? THAT'S a sponsor I could get behind

{I remember a while back people were trying to think of larger local companies that could have the money/pull to put their name on the kit. These guys certainly could do it, financially}

 

It wouldn't bother me, but I have a hard time believing that the Rapids or MLS would want a firearms company on the front a shirt.

 

Bingo, no way in hell does MLS allow it.