YNT-Eligible MLS Players: 2018 In-Season Thread

ATLUTD 2 plays tomorrow at 7 vs Louisville, btw. Assuming Carleton is playing with them because of this tweet:

That feeling when you make your ATL UTD 2 debut tomorrow 😃 pic.twitter.com/Z8Wiww4TJl

— ATL UTD 2 (@atlutd2) April 20, 2018

This should be a really good test. Louisville is 4-0-0, and with Carleton presumably playing the 10 for Atlanta, Goslin can play further back in a more natural position.

Unfortunately USL is on ESPN+ now, but I might actually use my free month just for this game.

 

What the hell is ESPN+?

 

No, ESPN3 will still be around. ESPN3 is online programming at no additional that you may get depending on the package you get form your ISP.

ESPN+ is totally disconnected from your ISP. $5/month for everyone. I think ESPN+ is taking some of ESPN3's content, but ESPN3 will live on.

Of note for soccer fans like @Lookingforleftbacks , ESPN+ is taking over all non-national MLS games from MLS Live. Most USL games will be on it, too, moving from live YouTube streaming.

 

heard of Netflix? Hulu? Amazon Prime Video?

Its a streaming platform for sports.

Demands are changing. People are cutting the cord and dropping traditional formats and just picking up the content they want and streaming it.

 

Dammit. MLS live was pretty damn convenient.

Ok, first of all... get off my lawn.

Second... just give me one app where I can watch games on ESPN, ESPN+, Fox Sports Go, BeIN, Univision, NBC Sports, and whatever else. And make it so I can bring up the app and search by game so I don’t have to know what channel the game is on.

And for that matter, start streaming DA and YNT games and put them on there too.

And make the app not suck. And give me pause, rewind, and fast forward capabilities. And don’t make me pay and then have to sit through app-specific commercials. That’s all I ask.

 

ESPN+ is cheaper than just MLS Live plus you get extra content.

$60 bucks for an entire year. MLS Live was ~$90. You could also just do MLS+ for 8ish months for $40. Better deal all around.

 

Please someone do this.

 

SKC was up 5-0, and had a two man advantage on the field....perfect time to bleed Lindsey for his first MLS minutes. Did it happen? Nope.

 

You can't wait to sign an offer that has not been made, is the point.

 

Same coach who didn't use EPB properly for years. I wouldn't expect many minutes from Lindsey the next few years.

 

Sure. What I would add, though, is that Chelsea, Spurs, Man City (in the case of EPB)....................can go out and sign almost any world class defender that they want. Spurs went out and signed Sanchez from Ajax, so they didn't even need CCV for depth. Man City went out and signed Laporte. They don't even need EPB for depth. Chelsea brought back Christensen from loan, so they don't even need Miazga for depth. Their depth is David Luiz. So those clubs can loan out their young/youngish players for experience...............knowing full well the majority of them will never play for their club. Chelsea has 37 players out on loan. 37! These clubs have relatively high priced veterans as squad rotation players.

In the salary capped world of MLS, depth is usually young and unproven players (drafted, homegrown, or otherwise). Such is the case for FC Dallas, for instance, for whom a third of their roster is relatively inexpensive homegrowns. If they loaned Paxton Pomykal out for the season, then who is Mauro Diaz's backup? Nobody. They'd switch formations I guess to a flat 4-4-2. Barco is clearly ahead of Carleton on Atlanta's depth chart, but Carleton is in fact one of the top 20 players at the club. Most weeks he's in the 18.

This is why clubs don't use the intraleague loan in MLS. Actually, there are quite a number of clubs that don't have open roster slots anyway. They'd have to release one of their own rostered players to help develop another club's player. How many clubs do we think would loan Carleton as an automatic starter? There'd probably be a good number of clubs that would loan Carleton and throw him into a competition for playing time on the wing and central attacking midfield. That, in theory anyway, is what he has in Atlanta.

What bothers me with Carleton isn't that he isn't starting for them. I wasn't expecting that in 2018 anyway. I was expecting regular starts and 90 minutes for ATL2 with about 500 first team minutes across all competition. Right now I'm really confused by their strategy. A week can't go by in which he doesn't play. Pomykal was on the bench and didn't play one week for FCD. So they had him play against Arsenal at the Dallas Cup. Then he got hurt. But the point is that there are avenues to get these youngsters games.

 

I think another reason they aren't too common is that the teams are in competition with each other. Losing to a team that has a player under contract to you would not look good from any angle and it would be especially damaging if that player were to play a key role in that defeat. On the other hand, developing a player for one of your competitors also runs against the grain. How would it look for a team to play a young prospect, have that prospect do ok during the season and then breakout the next year with his parent club? Add in the possible worst case scenario of that player also playing a key role in destroying your season (key defeat in playoffs or reg season etc). If it is a loan with the option to buy, is becomes a bit more palatable perhaps.

In Europe, how many loans do you see within the league? (B1 to B1, PL to PL etc)

 

Forewarning: This one got kinda long, and I apologize, but MLS teams not playing youth players

The weird thing with Vermes is that there just doesn't seem to be an understanding that you should treat youth players and 30 year olds differently. He just doesn't treat players like they develop at all, but instead that their abilities are stagnant.

Maybe he thinks of himself as a tactician and not a developer, I don't know, but he just seems to treat Lindsey (and formerly EPB) like they're in their prime and won't improve if you give them minutes.

It's such a stark contrast between SKC and NYRB. With Adams and Miazga, NYRB gave them time to adjust and improve, because they knew that those guys were more talented than their other options, and with around a full year of getting used to MLS, NYRB understood that they would already be among their key players.

EPB is just as good a prospect as Miazga. Lindsey isn't that level, but he's surely good enough to play in MLS (based on his Swope performances, he should be starting every week). SKC fans will say that they're first in the western conference, but that thought process encapsulates the difference between MLS and the rest of the world. Graham Zusi, at 31 years old, does not need to play 90 minutes every week. That's going to hurt you at the end of the season and next season. Matt Besler and Ike Opara were 30 and 28 last year, but playing EPB didn't cross Vermes's mind, when playing your youth players make everyone on your team better at the end of the season.

 

Akinola on the bench for TFC's "B" team match against Houston

 

Rotating players? Providing platforms for your own youth? Looking at opportunities to sell young players on to provide ROI? You shut your god damn mouth!

 

Didn't play. Only non-goalie sub to not enter the game for TFC.

 

Trusty and McKenzie starting CB pairing for the Union tonight.

 

I’m at the game right now and so far AC has been quiet aside from a couple good touches.

You guys are letting the hype speak. He’s been dispossessed a few times already and is a little slow to make decisions sometimes. Anyone saying that he should just walk into the first team is not thinking objectively at all. I’ve been watching Carleton play in person for years and I want him to succeed as much as anyone, but you guys are putting the wagon in front of the horse.

If you’re looking for someone to hype in Atlanta, make it Bello. He’s been a monster this season and Tata likes him a lot.

 

I knew they would do this.

This is an absolute no win situation for Carleton. If he doesn't have some combination of like 3 or 4 goals today, they'll say Martino was correct.

But he clearly isn't. Carleton has produced every opportunity he's gotten. Judging him on a game below his level where his teammates have not gotten him the ball, at all (because they are chasing the ball the whole game), shows an agenda against the player. If you have watched him as much as you claim, I don't think you'd be drawing that conclusion off of 45 minutes of one low-level football match, so I am going to say that you probably haven't watched him play much.

 

I’ve seen you say that Carleton a big better than Almiron so I’m not taking your opinion seriously on this. That’s the definition of not thinking objectively. You’re just emotional and hype-driven.

 

Carleton career for Atlanta: G+A every 53 minutes
Almiron career for Atlanta: G+A every 125.8 minutes

There's reason to think if given the minutes the foreigners were given, Carleton would produce better.

But lets go with the opinion of someone who got excited that Carleton didn't have an amazing half, and immediately went to post about him being overhyped.

 

Listen to yourself. I’m an Atlanta United STH and ATLUTD2 STH. Why would I want him to fail? I came here to share that he was starting and saw an entire conversation about how he’s supposedly being mishandled.

He’s a great talent and I love watching him play but wow let’s relax a little.

Or we could think he’s better than a guy who’s a starter for the Paraguayan national team and one of the best players in MLS.

 

Atlanta just won a penalty. AC stpped up and wanted to take it but Gallagher came in and took it from him

WAIT he’s letting him take it now!

Aaaanndd AC puts it 20 yards over. Damn it.

Gallagher wasn’t going to let him take it but Sandoval came in and had a talk with him and they decided to let AC have it. AC really wanted that one.

 

Timing of Pomykal's injury sucks as Oscar is certainly experimenting with lineups right now.