I hope RSL doesn't make any more moves until they have a coach in place. DLH extended Garth. tick tock tick tock.
They are in another salary cap bind and they didn't get allocations for the CCL. Hence one major reason Palmer moved on so quick is to re-sign people and re-tool for 2014. And thats usually a decision where Garth has the biggest say in. Time waits for no man, or coach. They have to make these decisions now. Coach or no coach.
Palmer and CJ Brown developed an extremely close bond this season. And in my view Palmer's game is a mile ahead of Mansally's. Palmer obviously had some trade value. I'm not sure Mansally has any.
Every year at this time the " get under the salary cap" comes up. But yet I see other teams getting a new dp or picking playes in reentry who have large salaries or finding new foreign player who get paid a lot seem to not have any problems being under the cap. Why is that.?. Is that we are just stuck with a cheap owner who won't put the money out on his own so we would be under the cap? Also thought getting rid of Palmer was a big mistake. He was the only guy that play both for Beltran and wingert with good play. The argument that he is 29 is such bull. Keeping him because he is good for 20,000 more for another year than keeping manually (who is iffy on field ) is a better decision than what the FO did. Makes no sense to me.
Getting under the cap has nothing to do with the owner being cheap. It has everything to do with being over the cap, and needing to get under it. Had we made CCL and got the allocation money, then things would've been a fair bit different. I agree that losing Palmer sucks. As far as the Sabo/Ned/Velasquez rumors. I could possibly see moving Sabo and Ned, as they have high salaries and had pretty great seasons overall, so the trade value would be there. Moving Velasquez would just be stupid, imo.
I will venture a guess as to why RSL is doing what they do, Depth. RSL proved to be the deepest team in MLS last year, and several years for that matter, and they did by being masters of the salary cap. They do it by finding affordable and capable players at every level of pay. They could have DP's but that wouldn't stop this annual ritual of working the salary cap unless as mentioned they had a little more inn allocation money for CCL. I wouldn't mind a quality DP or two but if history shows us anything it's that DP's guarantee nothing on the field. Whatever success RSL has enjoyed over the last 7 years has come from the current philosophy of finding as many good, reliable, under served, under used, quality players from in and out of MLS. RSL traded away Will Johnson, Fabian Espindola, and Jamison Olave and were ONE PK away from lifting the cup. If Garth feels it was necessary to trade Lovell Palmer for allocation money and that there are probably a couple of other moves coming I will trust him. It's an easy bet to make that RSL is not just shedding salary to get under a number but making moves to improve the team that includes shedding salary AND bringing in players that will improve RSL. Worked last year. My money is it will work again this year. Now get Garth signed so he can work his magic for years to come. PLEASE!
You do realize that we do have a good amount of people in the 100k+ range right? That's something we can't really do if we go out and grab a DP or two. If we went out and grabbed these DP's, we'd have to either shed more starters, or shed some depth to get cheap minimum salary players. I'd say we've done a good job of paying people a livable wage, while keeping a solid group of starters, with capable backups. We could easily swap that philosophy and buy some DP's, and have a thin and weak bench due to having to replace solid backups with league minimum guys. Can it work? Sure. Getting a few injuries could really ravage the team and throw off the season though.
Those weren't rumors, just a poster joking that Palmer was moved because he missed his PK, so Saborio, Grabavoy, and Velazquez were next.
One reason we are always closer to the cap than others is that we have high performing players who we keep for several years in a row - multiple contracts even. I would hazard a guess that we have less turnover within our core team than any team with the possible exception of Houston since 2008. That ratchets up our team salaries versus the cap, which is the con. The pro is what you see in terms of results. I would also guess that Palmer would still be here if we were getting allocation money for being in the CCL, since we could buy down salaries that way. Now, we need to get the allocation money some other way.
Also: please someone, get us a positive story on our team page at MLSSoccer.com. We're three days into the current quartet of depressing stories (Kreis leaves, players have surgery, Palmer is traded, RSL doesn't make the CCL), with this terribly depressing photo capping it all: I don't want fake good news stories, but there has to be something we can play up!
The team has a history of taking care of players who want to move on. With Brown going to Chicago, quite likely Palmer wanted to follow him. It is not so much a statement of Mansally as a solution or is better, but in respecting Palmer as we've respected other players.
What was it about Hansen that Kreis didn't like? I've been reviewing interviews done with Hansen over the years to try to understand his management approach in order to understand if he is a long-term liability to the club and this kind of candor could be insightful.
The Team Formerly Gaffed by the Coach of the Next MLS SuperClub owned by a Premier League Team or It turns out, money is an object
So Saturday I head down to the Riot thinking after everything that has happened in the last couple weeks I'll pick up my STH gift and that will make me feel better. Some cheap Christmas swag for the kiddos to throw under the tree - Let's see, we lose the Open Cup, we lose the supporter's shield, we lose best record in the West, we win the Western Conf title but really we didn't per CCL rules, we lose MLS Cup, we lose our coach, we officially lose CCL, Grant Wahl tweets depressing internal strife with DLH..... So I walk into the team store to pick up my gift - and I'm told to return during the week to the ticket office to pick up my RSL 'shot glass' I hadn't heard this was the gift so I nearly burst out laughing.... how unbelievably appropriate that the STH gift would be a shot glass, this year of all years. Assuming we have to pay for the vodka on our own....
I thought it was supposed to be a pint glass? I need to hassle them anyway and see if they'll ship it. I don't really have a way to get down there and it's pretty much bs that this wasn't finalized before we ran out of home games.
Well you're really in luck. Apparently they think we all play 'Drinking with Dunny' and so you get the 2013 adult pint sized shot glass. All the better to drown your sorrows - cheers!