Well it has started y'all. BREAKING; Former guest on the show @KristieMewie joins German Champions @FCBfrauen on a one year deal.— Beyond 90 (@Beyond90AU) August 31, 2015
Well that certainly makes it better. Cause from where I was sitting I was about to start panicking for the Breakers because if Mewis of all people leaves, THAT is not good.
It seems like almost every time a NWSL player signs with a FBL team there is some sort of "miscommunication" re: announcement and contractual realities... are the leagues just trolling each other, or what?
Its becoming notorious of these German clubs now that I don't take any of their announcements about length of contract/loan correct.
OK, so now Boston is saying she signed a contract for 2016 with an option for 2017. Guess that means she's no longer allocated, which is disappointing; I figured with Boxx, Holiday, and Buehler retiring (plus Wambach doing her thing) there would be plenty of allocation spots available... They went from 28 in 2014 to 26 in 2015 to 21 lined up for 2016 barring any more retirements or deallocations (one would expect that someone like Barnhart wouldn't be allocated anymore, if Mewis isn't).
Might it be a question of when the allocations occur? Maybe she'll become an allocated players? Although according to others, there are plenty of players in the competition for USWNT pool spots so maybe Mewis wouldn't get one of those spots anyway.
Well, the allocations are officially announced prior to the start of the season, but seem to be known by the players/teams much sooner than that (for instance Averbuch signed with FCKC in November 2014, but allocations weren't announced until Jan 2015, so they knew at least 2 months in advance that she wouldn't be allocated). And, so far, the only time an allocated player has been announced as signing a contract, the following season they are no longer allocated. I find it hard to believe there are 5 players above her on the list. The only players (not playing for PSG) with any caps over the past 2 years who haven't been allocated already are Allie Long, Amber Brooks, Erika Tymrak, Sam Mewis, and Sarah Hagen. And only 2 of those have had any caps since Kristie's last cap/Ellis took over (MewTwo and Long). So I doubt Brooks, Tymrak, or Hagen would be above her. For 5 players to displace her, that would mean at least 3 would have to be players who haven't had a cap in the past 2 years (if ever).
The tradition has been players removed from allocations happens around the end of the NWSL season. Other examples would be Winters and LePeilbet. U might also surmise the RVH decision might have been spurred by similar news. Mewis surprises me tho. She would not be high on my personal list but the facts that she is young camp regular and that Boston has few allocated players makes it odd. The question is what does this signal? Is the US reducing allocations to the league? R they clearing USSF contracts to give Ellis wiggle room to build her Olympic roster? Maybe she just hates Mewis
It's got to be tied to when USSF contracts r done for the next year but Ive never seen a hard date on when contracts r issued.
On a side note this would have been the perfect situation for Ohai. The BM passing style would have helped her improve her ball handling and holding the ball in tight places. Hopefully she is planning to play somewhere this fall.
Maybe Ellis is actually paying attention to NWSL and plans on allocating a whole new crop of players.... What? I can dream!
This is what it looks like to me. Maybe they are slowly reducing the number of allocations until the point comes that there are none left? Well, I don't know about hate, but she certainly doesn't seem interested in her. Like I pointed out above, she hasn't had a cap since Ellis took over. And it now seems that she's not in Ellis' long term plans either.
Could this be part of an initially planned long term strategy of after several seasons of reducing or even eventually eliminating the USSF subsidy (via allocations) to the clubs?
Thanks for the laugh! Seriously though, I'm not a huge Kristie Mewis fan (if I were to pick my favorite Mewis, it would have to be Sam), but if I were to do a short list of the 5 best non-allocated players in the NWSL this season, Kristie would have be on it (Just for the record, 3 of my 5 would be from Chicago ). Sure her shots to goals ratio was pretty bad, but watching her play you can see she's a step above the rest. 40% of Boston's goals were scored or assisted by her. Sure, it's not quite as amazing as Dunn's 60%. But it's still an incredible number. Not too far behind Little at 44%. The only other players I can find above Mewis are Long with 54% and Ohai with 45%. McDonald tied at 40%.
I noticed that Houston and WNY are selling season tickets for 10 home games for 2016. Seems like I heard somewhere there was to be 12 home games next season.
By my count there were 27 allocated players this year. U have the 23 WCers plus Dunn, Mewis, RVH and Barnhart. Four have retired, Wambach is unattached and Mewis makes six open slots if the USSF plans to maintain the current number. Any nominees?
I only counted 26. As far as I can tell, Chalupny was never allocated. But that's just a 1 player difference either way, so no big deal. Everyone on the Red Stars not currently allocated... I joke, but seriously, there are a bunch of young talented players on that team.
They had to give Chalupny a full contract due to time with the NT but no I dont think she was originally allocated this season. While I really like a lot of the Chicago kids Im not sure anyone did anything that screams allocation. In fact Im not sure I could name six new candidates. Cameron comes to mind if they drop Barnhart or want to have 5 allocated keepers. Freels maybe. Kallman maybe. Yanez maybe. Sam Mewis maybe. of the really young one, including Mewis, they seem to need to do at least one more year.
Well, I think DiBernardo has earned it for sure. And Colaprico and Gilliand would be my other Chicago choices (I chose them based on perceived need at those positions). Like I said earlier, if I had to make a top five, Kristie Mewis would still end up on it. There isn't really 5 better players in the NWSL based on performance this season. Yeah, I was figuring they wouldn't be allocating any additional keepers. If they did want to replace Barnhart the competition would be between Cameron and Betos for the spot, I'd expect. (Unless Franch has been awesome in Europe and they can convince her to come back) I was really expecting big things from Freels this season, but she had a disappointing season, IMHO. Now if the SBFC midfield had played all season like they did against Seattle, I would say Freels for sure and Killion and Lytle should get looks too... Nairn is another one I was expecting big things from, but she hasn't been as productive as I expected either. Not with how bad Boston's defense was. If you're gonna add a defender it's gotta be Gilliland. Unless you really want a CB, though I can think of a few players on much better defenses that are more deserving even if it's unlikely they'd ever get it (eg. Kendall Fletcher). The only problem with Yanez is she's got all those forwards in front of her already. Maybe if Wambach officially retired and wasn't just doing this not playing in the NWSL thing she could get it. I like MewTwo, but she didn't earn it from her play this season. Maybe next year.