Still, it's not only about wins and losses but about marketability and you absolutely need the latter in cities like NY and LA at least to some extent. DPs can help or you can build in other avenues. The cap is set up specifically to offset the immediate attributes of a DP signing bc you have to give up depth unless your academy program is steadily churning out winners which doesn't even happen with the best clubs in the world.
you haven't watched Juve too much this past season, have you? Del Piero has essentially taken the role of 15 minutes left sub who sits around the top of the center circle hoping for service and to make 1 or 2 runs. He is a Juve legend, but he won't have what it takes to play physically in this league at all Dinho is looking for a new place to party. He is a decent player who might have a little left in the tank, but he isn't going to take MLS or LAG seriously. He'll be out at 2 am the night before a game on a bender. He did it at Milan, why would he suddenly change now?
Honestly out of all the foreign dp's the league has seen, there's only a few I can think of offhand that have been worth the price. Angel, Schelotto, Henry, and Beckham has been pretty solid the last couple years (not so much the first few). That's 4 out of.. what, 20 or so? Most of the rest fell flat on their faces or weren't anywhere near worth it on the field. I'm sure a lot of them the cost was made up for in merchandise and extra people at the gate, but not for on field performance.
I put this in the "play GM" thread, but belongs here: Portland and Philly swap unproductive strikers I think Mwanga has a higher ceiling. And having to play for Nowak... yikes
The good news for Perlaza is he probably won't be playing for Nowak for long. Even Philly's FO has to be smart enough to fire him soon. Piotr Nowak is now unemployable IMO. I wouldn't hire him to trim my hedges. And this is a very unpopular opinion, but I still maintain that he ruined Freddy Adu. I think Freddy would have had a much better career if Nowak hadn't been his first pro coach.
Yeah. He must've been thrilled to get out of that situation and move to that career-building mecca that was Ellinger's RSL.
Does it still count if we totally blew him off and let New York have him, only to be informed by Garlick that he was leaving soccer to pursue his true passion of real estate, at which time we called New York and said, essentially, "Oops! Can we have him back, please?"
Seemed to work with Kreis as well. Sadly, up until Rimando, I never really liked any of our keepers. I'll always remember that terrible mustache competition though.
Were it not for Piotr Nowak, I don't think the Ellinger part of Freddy's career would have even happened. Recent and long-past history tells us that Nowak makes personnel decisions based on his current state of emotion...not the way to build a winning franchise.
Didn't see anyone mention this yet but Winter is out as head coach of Toronto FC. Paul Mariner is in. Mariner getting a head coaching gig is about 5 years too late IMO. Does that make TFC better? Right away I'd say no, but long term I think it does. If TFC have the patience to stick with him, that is.
Will TFC be patient, though? I think Winter's side had a lot of potential and was just getting all the bad luck in the world. I mean, hell, they should have gotten at least a point off us here. They should have drawn if not won nearly half of those first 9 or 10 games they lost. Their situation wasn't as bad as their record suggests. I fear that they'll be in for another "transition" year or two, not do as well as hoped, and then can Mariner. It's essentially like having the head coaching position of the Knicks. Tons of pressure, inpatient owners, and fans that will eat you alive.
not just them, vote for teams that are cutting it close to the salary cap. The wonderful setup in MLS makes it so that bonuses received from being selected go against the cap...
...and Fredy Montero, Alvaro Fernandez, and although he wasn't perfect Blaise Nkufo hardly fell on his face. Danny Koevermans hasn't been great this season, but there were few strikers on more of a tear last season. Omar Bravo was also good last season. He was a headache but he played well. 9 goals don't lie. There are more than a few good DPs. To say anything less is a bit of an over-generalization that's way too common concerning this topic.
In this case it wasn't just TFC. At least on this forum, their fans seemed patient enough and understood the downside of a quick trigger and how that had bitten them in the past. It seemed more the general soccer media that was calling for Winter's head more than anything. What's ironic is that after weeks of the general media wondering when TFC would finally can their coach, they all seem bewildered today that TFC has gone through so many coaches.
What's really remarkable, beside the media showing themselves to be morons, is the apparent influence the media has on MLSE's decisions about TFC. I can't imagine Hansen/Checketts (or Manning, I guess) ever caving to repeated, blistering attacks from James Edward calling for them to replace a coach they had stated was hired as part of a long-term project. Maybe it's just because MLSE is already well-established in the sporting culture in Toronto, and if it were a group that didn't also own the Maple Leafs, nobody in the media would care?
Voting opens today. If you pick only SJ and Seattle players you get the exact 11 that you can vote for...