Just off of numbers I see us finishing 8th at best. Atlanta, TFC, NYCFC, NYRB, Revs, Miami and the Union will all be better and that is 7 teams right there. Miami could bomb but with what they are spending and how they seem to be run I'd say that is highly unlikely. The Union don't spend but their academy development over the years allows them to have quality soccer at a discount price. We are in a pot with the Impact, FCC, Crew, OCSC and Nashville SC fighting for the right to travel for the scraps.
I wouldn't argue your perspective. I am choosing to be optimistic, but at the end of the day, ownership isn't investing in the product on the field sufficiently to do anything other than make us a bubble team. It has long been my perspective that DCU under its current ownership was always going to be fighting an uphill battle. I'd honestly forgotten about Inter coming in, since there's been literally no roster news out of Miami other than them floating BS stories about Messi and Suarez. Most of their news has been about their stadium debacle. It makes you wonder how they even got in this year. That said, I wouldn't sleep on them being able to attract premium late career talent. You've got as big a name as there is in the sport recruiting for them. A terrific Latin-American community in Miami and a major gateway for direct flights to South America. And then we've got at least St Louis coming into the east in a couple of years. So yea, we're in trouble. I've been pointing this out for a while and in spite of getting the stadium that was supposed to fix all of our problems, that doesn't seem to be the case. Surprised? No. Shocked? No. Disappointed? Yes.
Miami has spent almost $15M in transfer fees on two young South American players so it seems they are following the Atlanta model. I have no doubts that they will have a quality roster that will take time to adjust to the league but will be good once they adjust.
Wasn't sure where this went. Bit the bullet and suscribed to improve the reading content I was getting in my RSS feed: https://theathletic.com/1362372/201...at-provided-the-blueprint-for-mlss-modern-era: "One of the key findings that drove a number of the study’s recommendations: Fans of MLS believed that its quality of play was lacking compared to its regional and global competition. The study offered up multiple options: Change nothing, and risk both losing fans and falling further behind the competition; lift restrictions on teams that want to spend more, enabling them to thrive while making it harder for thriftier teams to compete; or find a hybrid model that could simultaneously improve the on-field product while maintaining the parity valued by many of the league’s fans, but at the expense of competing regularly with Liga MX and other global leagues. If the league wanted to choose the hybrid option, the study offered a way forward: spend more on roster spots four through 11, and potentially integrate a system with a higher cap ceiling and spending floor that would allow higher-spending teams to compete on a more level playing field with their Mexican counterparts. The league followed this recommendation, but not to the letter. While no spending floor was created and the ceiling was not lifted substantially, the league introduced targeted allocation money (TAM) in 2015. The new funds would eventually add up to $4 million more for teams to spend on players. As the study predicted, it increased the quality of play while maintaining some level of parity."
Reading that whole article, its like a flat out DCU playbook that leaves me with the sad reality that our next DP is probably Oliver Giroud or similar short term rental.
I read this story too. It was clear that DC United was taking the Boston Consulting Group advice to heart. That looks especially true for youth development so I expect that to continue to be done at minimum levels only. Spending more money on roster spots 4-11 would be welcome news to me though. The biggest piece of the article seemed to focus on quality of play which can improve if the team spends more on payers 4-11 (even with Ben's dreadful tactics). There was a great chart that showed comparative team expenditures/revenues/etc. It probably wouldn't be too hard to identify which team was DCU. It would be interesting to see how poorly DCU spends compared to the rest. That pretty much gets covered each year in SI's MLS Team Ambition Rankings though.
IIRC, DCU actually made money last year and performed rather well relative to many other teams. What, then, is the incentive for the ownership to spend heavily for the future?
From my read of the article I got the impression that the study said the big name DP (and the cash spend to acquire them) was not worth it for what the team would get. Most of the players were not effective in either bringing in fans or overcoming the overall crapitude of the their team. It seemed to point to the Atlanta/LAFC DP method as being more effective - and I guess Miami. James
That’s about the only place where we were divergent from the BCG report. Not the only team either. But their decisions around courting other fan segments and packaging an experience rather than a winning team is the mold. With Charolette as the next likely expansion team, in the east this team is never getting a sniff of the playoffs on the current template of roster building, let alone an MLS Cup. I stand by my assertion that our owners brought the short end of a broken stick to a gun fight.
Just checked in on Chris Durkin's "progress" in Belgium. He's made the bench 3 times, zero minutes in first team matches. Guess who is coming home in June 2020?
Its now been 6 years since a team not in the top third of MLS payrolls has won the MLS Cup and only twice in the last decade has a team outside the top third won the cup. We continue to fall further and further behind. I would wager fairly heavily that next year's MLS Cup will be won by a team in the top third, which will push the sporks out of that decade long window leaving only Portland as a team outside top third to win the MLS Cup.
we are going to continue to be a team that trades TAM for GAM to make it easier to bring in the Emma Boetangs of the world
Yup and people keep focusing on Ben Olsen as the problem... replacing him only gets us 1/8 of the way to winning an MLS Cup, even if we got the best coach in the world, we're not going to have a competitive roster with how we spend or rather don't spend. And if we're not playing to win the Cup, what are we playing for? A nice record? That and a well funded metro card will get you someplace in the District and no more.
50/50 chance, I'm told, that D.C. United re-signs @gorwld, who arrived midseason, did not make any league appearances, posted 10 goals and 3 assists in 16 matches at second-tier Loudoun United #dcu #mls #usl— Steven Goff (@SoccerInsider) November 9, 2019