I'd rather win them.* *But point conceded. That's the whole issue, as I layed it out. First, we have a statements that club is happy with the squad as-is (perhaps that changes in wake of this transfer), and second, we have a poor player acquisition record in recent years, that doesn't fill me with confidence, and frankly, I don't see how anybody could feel good about it. Noting Dero as the exception (an already known quantity), fails to account for an extremely poor ration of hits to busts. So given stated planned inaction, and history of poor execution, I have significant concerns about improving over 2012.
We need to get better with our scouting outside of MLS/colleges. We've done well with the draft and with our Academy and have made some quality trades withing MLS. We just haven't done well recently outside of the US. I wonder if some of it has to do with the fact that we find some good talent, but just no one wants to come play here. We've been very bad for a while (until last year) and we have a crap stadium and facilities. As an outsider, if I could go to Seattle or Portland or DC I'd probably choose the pacific northwest or SKC or etc... We also don't have a ton of money to throw around since we've been losing it hand over fist and until last year didn't have owners with tons of $. Add that to some just really bad decisions in terms of player scouting and you get what we've got. A solid team that will win some games, but currently won't likely come close to challenging for a title.
You're both right. Hamid passes to McDonald. McDonald launches a long ball (predictable) and nobody knows where it will go (unpredictable).
I dunno, I'd expect it to land on Pajoy who will somehow get position and muscle off 2 guys before mistakenly thinking he's Drogba and head for goal without his teammates. Okay, that was a little cynical.
my ImTranslator add-on is the new babelfish - I love what it did to one of the last paragraphs of Andy's story on his new club's site. the translator chose french, I have no idea if that was correct or not Andy Najar, 19 years old, goes out of good third season to DC United. It had taken part there in twenty-five matches (which twenty-two as holder). In passage, it had issued four decisive passes. It is a pure product of the school of the young persons of the DC United.
Shea sold for more because he has more games for his NT and his NT is bigger. He also has scored more goals. Goalscorers always get more money. Finally, he's a left footed flank player. Lefties are a rare commodity. There are many talented players around the world who can play the midfield like Najar can. A natural left winger who can score is a much rarer commodity and can get good money from the clubs who need that kind of player.
Congrats to Andy! Wish him the best. So underwhelmed with the roster. Here is to hoping Pajoy has a break out season and doubles his goals and assist from last year. We're going to really need those 6 goals and 2 assists!
LOL ... To be fair he did have 8 counting the whole season including Philly. I'll be happy if he matches that again. I know ... low bar, but remember he's not out there to score. It's all the other magic he does.
I feel your pain. And I completely agree with you. I am hoping that if and when DC United gets their new stadium things will change (I am thinking with more money they can purchase a bit more expensive players, not unlike LA & NY), but it's probably wishful thinking on my part.
There is no doubt that is very good business short term. Long term, remains to be seen. Why do I say this, well if DC United sell Hamid, Pontius, etc. in successive years, the team is going to be made up of DC United Academy players. Will that sell tickets? One can counter with, well management will find rare gems, but given the last decade track record of DC United, that is iffy at best. Lets face it the last quality pickup was Christian Gomez and DC United won an MLS Cup. Is it going to be another decade before we lift another MLS Cup? Again how is that going to sell tickets? The Academy will produce some players like Andy, but one cannot expect the academy to produce them with abundance. And if that is the case the team is not going to get much better. Again will that sell tickets? Let's face it Washington DC is a bandwagon city...
We can all burn down RFK if the $650K allowed for the roster isn't spent on the roster. If management spends that on something else...well, guys, that's what the amount DC receives ABOVE the $650K is for. Good job accentuating the positive while acknowledging the negative. DC has a terrific backbone of intra-America talent, enough to win titles in MLS. What DC needs to do is patch (much) higher quality international talent around those guys. I'm hopeful, but dubious. (That would make a terrific tagline for this forum. ooh ooh ooh, Hopeful But Dubious would be a great bad name as well.) I'm very excited that my college sophomore poli sci project now has value. In Belgium they have two languages, Flemish (which is basically a Dutch dialect) and Walloon (which is basically a French dialect.) This was probably written in Walloon.
The Bullets had decent attendance for years even though they won their last title in '78. While people talk about the Redskins & their bandwagon followers, the sellouts at RFK (these were real sellouts, there were no skyboxes to exclude) started in the 60's and even in the 70's the Redskins weren't great. They went to 1 Super Bowl and I remember Jack Pardee as coach. I have no memory of the Senators but they weren't the worst attended team in the majors but they were consistently bad. I think the only World Series & pennant they won was in '24. Your mind may be clouded by people watching the Capitals but there were people who watched the Caps in the old days. Besides the new Caps fans are immigrants anyway (Iowa, Kansas, Pennsylvania or where ever these people come from).
Regardless, all of DC's teams (or teams anywhere quite honestly) tend to have better attendances (and more "bandwagon" appeal overall) in those years when the teams are in fact winning (more so than in those years when the team is not getting good/exciting results or is viewed as "unsuccessful"). Tying this back to Najar's exit, I don't think his loss from DC's roster will "doom" United to some certain finish of "worse than 2012" (or what "2013 could have been") -- if 2nd in the East and a Eastern Conf Finals appearance (at least) is the new benchmark for "success."
Your conclusion is in error because there is no way you could have collected enough data to make this conclusion. The Wizards/Bullets would have to actually be winning for you to have something to compare to.
Ticket sales should not factor into Kasper and Olsen's roster decisions. Their only worry needs to be making the roster as competitive as possible short term and long term in a parity league. MLS isn't a league where you can be better just by outspending others. Selling Najar needs to fit the bigger long term strategy of making this club better. I think we should take pride that our team has talent that's worthy of a 3.1mil transfer fee. If Hamid and Kitchen follow the same route in coming years, that signifies success. We're nowhere near the top of the food chain so it's inevitable that the real good players will move on ... it's imperative that we at least make money off of them so we can re-invest in the next generation. This is why I love the Rafael move. It signifies to me a shift towards youth. I want to support a club that builds stars, not recycles old European stars that sell tickets but they're super expensive and they'll never be sold to anyone.
Agreed, and DC United specifically has never had much success "selling tickets" based solely on who is on the roster. (Perhaps, save for those early years when RDA had an outsized impact on a certain portion of the ticket sales, but it's also easy to imagine that a lot of those fans in the '90's were there because the team was winning so often in the first 4-5 years.) Simply put, winning is the best way to market the team. (The sale of Najar, or anyone now or in the past or future, is all a part of the business -- and in the specific case of Andy Najar some very good business. And the team must find new or just consistent ways to always be crafting some compiled roster that can go about winning.)
I'm glad everyone is so trusting of the scouts and FO with regards to Rafael. The narrative that we're besting NY and LA by getting youth is pretty powerful, although likely foolish. Rafael could have simply been a consequence of other options falling away, bad scouting and Payne ********ing us as much as anything else. If the guy scrubs out, will we give him the Salihi treatment, or does he get 2 or so years benefit for being young and not used to "ben's system" yet? I must admit, being devil's advocate is enjoyable for me
I don't want to rehash the Rafael argument, but the point isn't the player ... it's the intention. Or rather the underlying strategy. At the end of the day you can't know for sure how a player works out at any salary or resume level. I mean look at Rafa Marquez ... CL winner, but didn't work out for NY. The point is that even if Rafael doesn't work out, the focus on youth is encouraging. This offseason I can see Ben coming into his own. He's not building a flashy team. He's building a unit. He's getting guys like Townsend and Kemp, players that he's familiar with ... players that don't involve rolling the dice. Ben is willing to give responsibility to his draft picks and academy graduates instead of keeping them buried on the bench in favor of some 30 year old European. Ben may not be the most tactful coach in MLS, but this offseason proves to me that he understands the concept of a team. A team that may not be based on skill, but based on a good chemistry of personalities, cohesiveness and hard work.