Who are these impostors in the RFO, and what have they done with the Three Stooges? Seriously, the front office moves have actually looked competent (for the most part) this year. I'm still trying to understand how the MLS Champions (I still get a thrill out of saying that) could come through the expansion draft in seemingly better position than they ended the season. Well done, RFO.
I'm not criticizing them for not having a second XI together last year. I'm saying, now that they have these competitions on their plate and they've met their main goal of "getting some silverware," what matters to me is where they go from here, part of which includes making the squad deeper. If the team rests on their laurels after one cup (highly unlikely, but for hypothetical sake), if they think "we won MLS Cup last year, we don't have any improvement to make," then it tells me the same mentality that plagued the last 15 years is still in the Front Office. If, on the other hand, in this next season they make strides (and splash the cash they can) to put together a deeper team, if they pay more than lip service to the Open Cup and Champions League, if they show this year wasn't just a, as DavidJames put it, stars-and-moon-aligning moment and show instead they have ambition to build on this year, then I owe the front office a lot of credit and a lot of apologies. So again, I'm thrilled the Rapids won the Cup. I took the time after the rally at Skyline Park to find Plush before he left and thank him personally. But after 15 years of mediocre-to-terrible teams and decisions made by the Front Office, that one Cup doesn't buy the "all-clear" from me. Not yet. But, as I may have said in this thread already and know I have said elsewhere, the RFO is absolutely starting this off-season moving in the right direction with its transactions and dealings.
I'm really sometimes surprised at how often we see "splash some cash" suggested as a solution to squad related problems when we all know there is a salary cap and short of using a DP to leverage what is then functionally a higher cap I thought we were pretty close to 'capped out'. Now a fuller stadium due to splashing cash on marketing could help with the 12th man. And more money can be spent on coaching, more position-specific specialist, full-time scouts, etc. (but I have no way to know if we are scrimping there). And I have to believe the cash has been splashed on the facility. So credit where credit is due, as a long time bargain shopper that hates to pay full price, I think that of late the organization has done a great job of picking up 'bargain' or good value/for cost players and off-loading pricey players that play like cones or make you go 'meh'. With roster expansion it appears the cap will also have to go up but my expectation is it will be a proportionate increase 'value shopping' will remain as a valid strategy, using high salaries as a single marker for good players -- not so much.
The new 6 spots will be cap-exempt spots, but they will be reserve only positions that would (EDIT: NOT) be allowed to play in league matches. At least that's how I understand it. So I don't think the cap will go up any more than it would have in a normal year.
Hence the "they can" part of "splash the cash they can." Context-dropping on message boards is amusing. I don't expect the team to spend money they can't spend, or to spend money wildly. I do expect that, if cash comes into the Rapids' hands via player sales or trades, they reinvest it in the squad to make it better, as I said before about the potential of Omar leaving. I do expect, if there is still room under the cap and the opportunity arises to strengthen the squad, they'll do so. I also look at our squad, compared to, say, RSL's or LA's, and see our strong starting 11 followed by a LOT of youth, inexperience and not a lot of guys who can just step right into our starting 11 without a noticeable drop-off in quality, especially compared to those two teams. I also look at a few individual positions in our squad (left back, now central defense, forward) where the team is barely 1 player deep at those positions and the reserves we have either need to make a quantum leap this offseason or could stand to be upgraded. If that can be done on a bargain-shopping basis, great. If that has to be done by spending lots of money, great. But it has to be done if the team is going to try to handle the scheduling requirements of next year.
I think Jason's right about the cap. All the stories I've seen so far talk about it the way Jason did--the cap isn't going up, so it will be a 5% increase on last year's 2.55 million, but there will be some cap-exempt spots for the reserve league.
Its either 6 reserve only and 2 homegrown or 4 reserve only and 4 homegrown, I'm not 100% sure. Either way there's a subset of the new players that will be development players that can't play in league matches.
And hence the "how often" in "how often we see "splash some cash"" to make a generalization about frequently seen statements, not a specific nit of one small part of a larger and well said post. But then as you said: "Context dropping on message boards is amusing." ;>) ;>)
That makes more sense (I guess -this is MLS after all) your other post implied/said they would be eligible for league matches.
Whoops, left out a not! The development positions will NOT be eligible for league matches (they may be eligible for CCL/USOC matches, I'm not sure).
No problem, some times I leave out entire paragraphs (or maybe should). I'm not sure I like this, however. For me, the value in a reserve team is not only for regular team players to keep sharp when they don't get in a game or recover from an injury, but add depth to the regular team as needed. Kinda like the old reserve team. I guess I'm not fully understanding why the restrictions.
When MLS visits its therapist they almost always end up going back to its childhood past and its very deep seated fears related to its mother, the NASL. To increase the roster size but not have to significantly raise the salary cap the players are not counted against the cap ... but then to prevent a cold war fought with money and maintain parity (or a reasonable facsimile thereof) they can't play in league matches. Just my guess btw.
I think the guard against this is that some of these slots (not the generation adidas ones) are going to be low-paying. From the interview with Columbus Crew Technical Director Brian Bliss that was linked in the N&A thread:
