Give just about any 15 year old kid a half a million dollars per year and I’d be surprised if they weren’t entitled
Pulisic has had more than some success, he’s a regular contributor to a CL winning team. I would rather he not start everyday considering his injury history.
Oddly enough, the two were connected. They were roommates and best pals at the old IMG Academy and with the U17's through their Worls Cup cycle, even though Freddy was a couple years younger. So when Freddy got the sweetheart MLS offer (pick your team, live at home with Mom, all sorts of stuff that nobody else had ever gotten) Szetela (and his Mom) figured he would and should get the same kind of deal. But Danny wasn't the box office that Szetela was and while he was offered a GenA contract (it was Pro40 back then) and told he'd go through the draft like everybody else ( which, ironically, would probably have sent him to CBus anyway since we had the second pick) he was offended that he wasn't getting a Freddy offer (he too wanted to live at ho, figured he could.do better in Europe and bolted for England. All of which is an old story. He got offers from. IIRC, ManU and Chelsea, at which point his Mom tried to create a bidding contest, shopping one team's offer against the other. That's a game they dont play with 17 year old American punks so both teams pulled their offers and Danny skunked back to the MLS offer he had turned down and ended up in that famous lottery. But it was all because of wanting what Freddy got.
Somewhere in all that Dallas got screwed by being forced to trade the number 1 spot to DC. Word is Dallas really wanted Chad Marshall but had to give that up and Marshall fell to YOUR Columbus Crew. The rest is history...
True. Dallas didn't mind MLS basically awarding the first pick to DC , particularly since playing in DC was part of his agreement. But they felt, not unreasonably, that they should then have gotten the NEXT pick, which was obviously Marshall; everybody was salivating over him. But Garber wanted to make it all look legit instead of the back room. deal that everybody knew it was. So Dallas got screwed ( they got a lousy allocation instead) and Marshall ended up in Cbus. Dallas then compounded their lousy day by trading the natural #4 to somebody for not much while Clint Dempsey was still on the board. All in all they should ha e just stayed in bed or gone and gotten drunk. The interesting question is whether, if Marshall had gone to Dallas as they expected, would Columbus - holder of the #2 natural pick, have taken Szetela if he had been signed? If so. then the whole lottery drama accomplished nothing; he was going to Columbus either way. As it worked out CBus got Marshall AND Szetela and Dallas got a royal butt screwing
Keep (13). Zelarayan, A. Morris, Etienne, Moreira, Artur, Diaz, Farsi, JRR, Sands, Parente, Zawadski, J. Morris. Let go (if possible) (5). Molino, Kitchen, Anibaba, Hairston, Matan, Hurtado. Meh (12). Cucho, Nagbe, Mensah, Santos, Degenek, Williams, Room, Bush, Igbekeme, Yeboah, Schulte, Scott.
Best young player on the roster , needs a strong coach who can maximize his talent. LZ is perhaps the most talented but older and not near the athlete as Cucho.
Absolutely. He is a pouter and too selfish. And I am not a fan of short strikers, especially as a lone #9. 1 goal in the last 8 kinda sucked. And he missed chances to ice things (Charlotte and Orlando). If we played two up top, he'd be fantastic. But we don't, so..... If I could flip him for a profit, I'd do it in a hearbeat.
1 in 8 kinda sucks, sure. Didn’t he have 8 in 8 or something like that before??? 9 in 16 is pretty good, no? He played 1,300 minutes this season. A full season is 3,060 minutes, so lets just triple his minutes to 2,900. That would be 27 goals. I’d take that, or anything even remotely close to it.
Keep (13). Zelarayan, A. Morris, Etienne, Moreira, Artur, Diaz, Farsi, JRR, Sands, Parente, Zawadski, J. Morris. I like all these guys but Ettiene depends on the price. I wouldn’t want to lose him to another team. But If some team offers to overpay him than they can have him. Let go (if possible) (5). Molino, Kitchen, Anibaba, Hairston, Matan, Hurtado. I think only Molino is still under contract and I would do anything to get him off the roster. Matan im not sure about his contract but I would loan him out again if he isn’t good enough to contribute and still under contract. I think that was a smart move by Bez. Meh (12). Cucho, Nagbe, Mensah, Santos, Degenek, Williams, Room, Bush, Igbekeme, Yeboah, Schulte, Scott. Cucho- just signed him and he is the best player , what’s not to like ? Nagbe- got to get rid of his contract Degenek- just signed and is our youngest CB and I liked him , he came in and performed better than Mensah’s first year. Despite his hand ball I hope to see him back. Santos - is older so I’m not sure he is still with his current contract but I wouldn’t get rid of him he has a high soccer iq , work rate and a left foot who can play multiple positions Williams, Mensah, Room ,Yeboah i agree but they are all under contract Igbekeme was on loan im meh on him too he hasn’t done anything to warrant keeping him youth GKs can stay on Crew2 unless they are better than Bush
Or you could say defenses figured him out and then he didn't do much, pouted, yelled at Diaz, and hogged the ball. That is kinda what I saw. His performance when we needed him most was "meh." Period. He would not be central to my plans moving forward. But the reality is he'll be here, so the discussion is kind of moot.
A possibility, certainly. One thing I found so frustrating about Porter is that he would mostly stay true to his tactics/formations late in games. Like for like subs. Except when we went 3 CBs late. I'd have liked to see mych more pulling of a CM (Nagbe, Morris, Artur) and throwing on another forward when we need a goal. A #9 (with height) + Cucho as a supporting striker with LZ as CAM behind them would be our best chance to score late. But when Hurtado is your backup, I get it. My wish list would be: 1) A DP level wing (gotta buy down Nagbe, if possible, get him off as a DP). 2) A target forward with some height (JRR, hopefully). 3) Retain Etienne. 4) Get some size into CM. No more Lollipop Guild late in games.
If my understanding of the Expansion draft is correct, and HGs/GA's are auto protected, then we are looking at: Auto protected = 7. Etienne (HG), A. Morris (HG), Zawadski (HG), Parente (HG), Russell-Rowe (HG), Sands (HG), Schulte (GA). I saw early reporting that J. Morris is also HG, but he is not a guy I would protect anyway. Of the remaining guys, I would certainly NOT protect: Molino, Bush, Scott, Anibaba, Kitchen, Hairston, Molino, Matan, Yeboah, or Hurtado. Who does that leave? Remember, we can protect 12 guys. 1. Zelarayan 2. Cucho 3. Nagbe 4. Mensah 5. Artur 6. Moreira 7. Room 8. Santos 9. Degenek 10. Diaz 11. Williams 12. Farsi 13. Igbekeme While a lot of these guys fall into the "meh" category for me, and I do not know everyone's contract situations, I do not think the expansion draft is gonna cost us a big piece. A lot of the roster is either HG/GA (7-8) or clearly vet min/replacement level guys who hardly played (10 or so). For me, since Igbekeme is on loan, I'd leave him open. But if Williams or Pedro are going to retire/leave, then don't waste a spot on them, obviously.
When Sigi took over a failed Crew team, he kept exactly four guys and IIRC at least one of them he couldn't release because he was injured. It wasn't because they all sucked. Some of them were decent players who.went on to have careers elsewhere. He did it because the team had collectively become a bunch of losers and Sigi saw that his first job was to change the team psychology. I would not be opposed to a similar housecleaning.
Im not a fan of a short guy at 9 but that sounds like Bez fault we could of kept Zardes with him and played more of a 433 or got a true winger if Cucho doesn’t want to play winger or as a 2nd striker Striker wasn’t the problem