I noticed some MLS club forums are already starting to discuss what players may or may not be available. I thought it would be fun to start discussing them. For those new to MLS or the expansion draft, essentially every MLS team has to decide which 11 players they will protect. This excludes Generation Adidas or Homegrown players, who are basically automatically protected. Orlando and NYC will take turns picking. Usually whoever gets the first SuperDraft pick gets the 2nd pick of the Expansion Draft. Whenever a player is picked from a team, that team can automatically protect another player. Most likely, no team can lose more than 2 players. So I was reading the Philly forums and they had posted this guess, which is probably pretty close. MacMath GK Nogueria MF, Fernandes MF, Okugo DF,Williams DF, Wenger FW, Ribeiro MF, Edu MF, Maidana MF, Berry DF, Gaddis DF So who does that leave for Orlando or NYC? Brian Carroll Sebastien Le Toux Fabinho Corben Bone Michael Lahoud Ethan White Aaron Wheeler Brian Holt Antoine Hoppenot Danny Cruz Fred Personally, I think White, Carroll or Cruz might be good picks for NYCFC. I am especially thinking that Kreis will want to replicate positions from RSL. So he will definitely want extreme workrate, tough players. He will also want players who can be his new def-mid like Beckerman or a CAM like Morales. He will also want LB/RB that can get up the wings. Anyone in the exposed list that matches these criteria will be a good candidate to be picked. Next we can look at RSL. An excellent RSL blog did a poll and found the following results: Beckerman MF, Beltran DF, Schuler DF ,Rimando GK ,Gil MF ,Velasquez MF ,Garcia FW,Morales MF ,Saborio FW ,Salcedo DF,Plata FW That would expose: Sandoval Findley Borchers Grabavoy Mulholland Wingert Attinella Balchan Grossman Mansally Maund Stertzer Watson-Siriboe This is an interesting group. Especially since Kreis personally picked most of these guys at RSL. Wingert is a possible pick. A little old but a native NYer. Borchers and Grabavoy are getting a little old too but Kreis knows what they cost and what they could do. Big targets on any of those 3. Really I can see Kreis or OCSC going for possibly any of these guys. So what do you guys think? What have you seen on the other team forums? Post them here and lets discuss.
First off, you are no fun. Smile, enjoy the outside and think about the expansion draft. Next, many MLS teams are giving us a good indication of who their starting 11 are right now. Its a good time to think who might be available and who would fit NYC best. Like I said, RSL is a good target, Kreis obviously knows these guys best. I think Kreis will go after Wingert or Grabavoy.
Normally I would agree, but the current MLS Players union salary page says he makes $250k, which is quite a bit for a team already projecting to be dumping almost 1/2 of its salary cap on 3 DPs (plus the $250k penalty to have 3). Thats why I think they might not sign Le Toux.
Usually there are a couple of very good, but high priced players who teams leave open for salary cap reason. My hope is that one of those players happen to fit into our system! Other than that, I think the options will be mostly older higher priced guys who teams don't see as worth the salary anymore, and then younger unproven players. Maybe even a couple of top players who have serious off-the field issues and then some players who are destined to leave for Europe. Hopefully we can end up with at least a couple of solid starters from this draft.
My guess is that Blue is referring to the infamous 2006 expansion draft where RSL placed Kreis on the exposed list only for Toronto to pick him, forcing RSL to make stupid trades to get their Captain and future coach back.
Huh, I did not know that. I started following soccer after the 2006 world cup so either I missed that expansion draft or I wasn't paying close enough attention. Depending on whether the draft happened in early 2006 or late 2006. Although in fairness to myself, Blue Intent was reference to that was quite unclear.
I was more thinking about him being experienced and used to the draft system so we might try to guess what players he might fancy by looking at what kind of players he favoured while being with RSL.
Well there's that too, which I brought up in my first post. Still now you know your coach was the first hostage ever in the MLS expansion draft.
Found this link where they were trying to predict who would be exposed and who NYC and ORL would pick: http://www.reddit.com/r/MLS/comments/1wriqz/hypothetical_expansion_draft_2015_time_to_start/ So far I can see some of these guys coming to NYC in 2015: Philly's Cruz, maybe Carrol RSL's Wingert, Borchers or Grabavoy, possibly Sandoval, Grossman or KWS (Kreis personally signed these guys; you know he will be higher or lower on them then say Heath at ORL) FCD's Moffat LA's Walker or Garcia CHI's Ianni will probably be exposed SKC, I wonder if Kreis will hold a grudge (just kidding) To be continued... 1 player I think NYCFC might go after this year is bench GK Ryan Meara from NYRB. RB are already trying to unload him, he has a bright future and of course, it would be fun for NYC to grab something of RB.
I remember when Meara had an extended run with the bulls. I thought he was superb and better than some of the starting goalkeepers in the league at the time. If NYCFC grabs Meara I would be quite pleased.
Meara is a hometown boy as well, born in Yonkers, went to Fordham Prep and then Fordham U for college.
Not sure if this exactly warrants its own thread, but at the meet and greet this week, Reyna said this: New York City FCVerified account@NYCFC .@CReynaNYCFC: "Right now we are focused on GK, 2 CBs, and a CM. Then we move ahead and plug players in all the way up to the FWDs." So there you have it, NYCFC's first laundry list. What Goalkeeper, 2 Center Backs and Central Midfielder do you think NYCFC will go for?
The SG's forum had some people actually record it an they posted it here along with a transcript. http://nycfcforums.com/index.php?threads/5-1-2014-meet-greet-with-tim-and-claudio-the-results.413/
It's an attempt. The bar was loud and the fans weren't heard very well when asking questions. We were recording with a beat up iphone trying to hold it up to a speaker above our heads. I could imagine parts of the recording were not transcribed perfectly at times. The audio is on the forums there if anyone wants to give a transcription a shot. Regardless I specifically remember Claudio stating the importance that he places, with Kreis, on the spine of a team. He defined the spine as a GK, center backs and center midfielders. That is where they are focusing their player search first.
Cool... So, any guesses or realistic hopes on who that Goalkeeper, 2 Center Backs and Central Midfielder that NYCFC might go for? I'm still thinking Meara might be a good pick. I also wonder, looking at MLS surplus, if Kreis might go for someone like Moffat at Dallas, but maybe thats more a Expansion Draft guy. Thinking of World Football free agents, (maybe these are all crazy DP signees) what about Victor Valdes? Does Ferrano Soriano have enough connections still in Barca to make that happen? Some other crazy thoughts, can the Tottenham-to-MLS-movement continue? What about Mr. "Needs A Restart", Younes Kaboul? Will Athletico offer Tiago Mendes a new contract? Cambiasso? Just crazy talk I know, but besides signing a USL Pro or NASL players, I don't think NYC can sign a under-contract MLS player this summer. But they can sign out of contract (or straight up buy) players from Europe. My guess is that free agents will be this summer when the rest of the world's window opens up.
I'm not really a fan of using a DP slot on a goalkeeper unless it's someone like Casillas or Buffon. Which won't happen. I'm okay with having an average keeper for one season. If the defense and midfield is strong enough then it won't matter who is between the sticks.
Not a Expansion Draft choice... but NYCFC should take advantage of this: AGUDELO HAS WORK PERMIT APPEAL REJECTED AGAIN, LEAVING HIM A FREE AGENT HEADING INTO SUMMER http://www.soccerbyives.net/2014/05/agudelo-rejected-heading.html
Absolutely! Especially if he happens to make it to Brazil and has any impact (kind of a longshot). I think NYCFC's #1 target for a summer signing should be an impact player from the US World Cup team.