The link I posted didn't say. And I was wrong. He picked up the injury in the first game against T&T, roughly ten days ago. Thx, Jay!
To pick a nit, he plays for us AND he plays for Jamaica Spoiler (Move your mouse to the spoiler area to reveal the content) Show Spoiler Hide Spoiler If by "us" you mean the USMNT, however, you are correct he doesn't play for us
Happened to be going through old emails. From Soccer America article before the draft rating the top 20 college players (including those who haven't declared or were headed to Europe) Dan Metzger was #20. "20. Dan Metzger (Maryland). The signing of Davis made Metzger, another central midfielder, the odd man out at the Red Bulls, leaving him free to enter the draft when the club did not give him a Homegrown contract. He could go in the first 10 picks at the draft." I thought he was a solid pickup, but this makes it look even better at 42. I had definitely heard a few people pick him to go in the first round. Aguilar was #17 in the same list.
From Goff's post this afternoon on the current roster: With 42 league starts in two years at Houston, midfielder Andrew Driver figured to enter the mix for playing time in D.C. after United acquired him from the Dynamo for goalkeeper Joe Willis and defender-midfielder Samuel Inkoom. This, however, was a case of addition by subtraction. Willis was out of contract and had no intentions of re-signing with United to remain the second- or third-choice keeper. United needed to move Inkoom before the expansion draft. Otherwise, the club would have had to protect him as a rostered international player and, in turn, left Kemp exposed. Driver is out of contract and, at this time, United has no plans to sign him.
OK, so that means: 1. We did get absolutely nothing for Willis and Inkoom; 2. Our situation on the flanks is just as bad as it was last year (or even a little worse, if adding on a year to Rolfe's age is taken into account); 3. Kemp was seen as more valuable than Inkoom. Man oh man.
There's a real chance Houston may get nothing for Driver, too, because they don't list Inkoom on their roster, and Willis may be looking for other opportunities. And yes, they were more afraid of losing Kemp than Inkoom, which is disappointing.
I'm confused. Did we fail to agree to terms or did the FO not make a serious effort? What gives? Have they definitely stopped trying to sign Driver?
I think it's partly CBA uncertainty driven. However, if Driver was such a hot property, he could find a gig back in Scotland or some lower Euro league because of his citizenship. So -- either he's not rated highly anywhere or he's sitting back expecting DCU to make an offer after the CBA is signed or his rights are traded within MLS. As for the fascination with Inkoom. He couldn't beat Kemp or Korb out last year. He only played against Champions League teams with the quality of a high school JV squad. He wasn't a world beater -- Houston hasn't bothered to sign him and he came on a free here which meant all of Europe passed on him as well because he was only making about 100K per season under his contract. I'd focus on developing Jalen Robinson for defensive depth and Aguilar for outside depth. They are cheaper and have a higher upside -- especially someone as young as Robinson. Just my two cents.
He wasn't in competition with Kemp -- they played on opposite sides of the pitch -- or, really, with Korb. He was in competition with Franklin. I don't think anyone's really willing to stick their neck out and say they think he's better than Franklin, but that's irrelevant. That's true -- the CCL matches didn't give much of an indication of his quality.
1. Yes. Sort of. On the other hand, we held on to Arnaud and Kemp. 2. No. Healthier Pontius. Rolfe for the full year. DeLeon got stronger at the end -- that will carry over. Aguilar. 3. Yes. That might be because Kemp played 1083 minutes and Inkoom played 70.
A lot of this was also driven by the expansion draft and being forced to protect certain kinds of players at the expense of others. If not for the expansion draft, we might still have had Inkoom (and others) in for try-outs.
That's fine; but you're going to have a hard time convincing me that there was no possible way we could have gotten anything useful for Willis and Inkoom. It made sense to move Willis; I said at the time that I suspected he didn't want another season behind Hamid. And if they didn't rate Inkoom, it made sense to move him too. But to get nothing at all for them? I just don't buy it couldn't have been done better, sorry. "Healthier Pontius" -- given his history, and the questions about what physically he's still capable of, that's a leap of faith. "Rolfe for the full year" -- and a year older, when he was already getting up there. "DeLeon got stronger at the end" -- it would have been hard for him to slip any further. His 2013 was worse than his 2012; and his 2014 was at best no better than his 2013, and IMO a little worse.. Why should I not expect something similar this year? "Aguilar." -- we don't have any idea what he'll bring. Again, comparisons like that don't make much sense on the surface since they played different positions; but you're right that that's a clear demonstration that one player was more valued overall than the other was. I don't know whether Inkoom would have been any good at all for us in league play: maybe he would have sucked. I don't know. We'll never find out, I guess. But I know I don't rate Kemp very highly at this point. I guess Kemp'll get 2015 to prove me wrong.
It's quite obvious you don't rate Kemp at all, but I feel very differently. I was fine with them using the Inkoom trade to be able to protect Kemp, I thought it was semi-brilliant - even though I was very hopeful that Inkoom would turn out nicely for us and am a bit disappointed we'll never find out (barring a weird return). It's a stupidly low number of players you can protect after all so I can deal with some borderline decisions I wish didn't have to happen. But Kemp in 2014 did all he needed to do to win me over, maybe 2015 will do it for you, though I wonder if the last game didn't do it, what he could possibly do for you. I watched most of the playoff games after the disappointment wore off and found him to be one of the best crossers of the ball in the playoffs. Maybe EJ should stay after practice and figure out how to get on the end of them, he could turn that into a good argument to be a starter . 2013 Kemp was terrifyingly naive but the more-composed 2014 Kemp, especially later in the year was one of the best left backs in MLS (not that he's in a lot of company, though technically every team has at least one LB ) Just one man's opinion of course, I have been full of shit once or twice. Also remember the "intentions" United has or doesn't have are likely Goff's opinions. Wouldn't be unheard of for a sports GM to show low interest in a player in the press to drive price down or move negotiations along (or garner interest in a trade, etc). I've heard Driver is a good crosser and I thought Inkoom was not-half-bad so it'd be nice to have one of these two and I wish that had worked out. And who knows, one might still work out.
That's actually not true. I think he's all you can expect for a substitute LB at MLS wages. But I don't think he's of the level one would have for a starting defender on a championship team. We only had two playoff matches. Did you watch the road match against Jersey? Did you honestly think he had a good match?
as good as any other single United player had, sure - we stunk the joint up in that back-alley-abortion of a game.
Even by the standards of our team in that match, he was particularly bad -- which is why he was substituted out early.
And in the next home game, I thought he might well have been our best player (at least the best one that did not assault a ref)