2020 USL Championship - RGV Toros

https://www.rgvfc.com/news_article/show/1076149

First two additions of the year:

26 year-old Brazilian winger playing in Serie C and a 22 year-old fringe St. Vincent and the Grenadines national team player who was going to college at UTRGV. Edwards also won USL League 2 Golden boot in '19 (15 goals, 3 assists in 13 games).

RGVFC roster is now:

GK: Ben Willis (23, USA)

DF: Robert Coronado (22, USA), Andrew Samuels (22, USA)

MF: Isidro Martinez (22, USA), Kevin Rodriguez (23, USA)

FW: Kyle Edwards (22, St. Vincent and the Grenadines), Taiberson Ruan Menezs Nunes (26, Brazil), Nico Lemoine (19, USA), Juan Carlos Obregon Jr. (22, USA/Honduras)

Samuels was a 2019 Dynamo draft pick. Rodriguez and Lemoine I believe would both be eligible for homegrown contracts.

 

https://www.rgvfc.com/news_article/show/1077123

Deshane Beckford’s loan extended from Montego Bay United.

Also added 2020 Sounders second round pick Timo Mehlich.

 

would be a weird quirk if an affiliate could sign a player from another system without blinking but if he came here we'd have to compensate the pick.

 

multi year loans on a prospect sound odd. it's a development team and he's either worth the effort or not. one year should suffice.

 

Assuming you're talking about Beckford, he was loaned towards the end of the season (August), so he had a relatively small sample size, i.e. he wasn't playing here a full year.

That said, they have done some multi-year loans in the past. Jorginho James for three years is the one that springs to mind (though he had an extended injury issues in a season as I recall).

 

From my analysis and based on what coach Echeverry told me in my latest interview with him, the Dynamo had a plan for 2020 for RGV to rely on Dynamo loanees for experience and talent, but had no backup plan. COVID-19 exposed their lack of preparation and alternatives

— Edson Javier Ochoa (@EOchoa_8) November 4, 2020

an explanation of RGV’s issues this year

 

Caveat this with the fact that RGV has historically been awful outside of Cabrera's one year there. They just aren't really a great team. There are a lot of reasons why, but I don't think that it's purely a "oh, we were hoping to have Dynamo guys down here" answer.

The Dynamo read from this is maybe that they intended to pack Palomino or Lemoine off down there, but then ended up keeping them on the roster.

 

well the Dynamo only have themselves to blame for RGV’s lack of success since they control the whole technical aspect.

 

Definitely so. I’m not trying to advance the argument that the Dynamo are victims/et. al. Point being more that that team has sucked even when they shipped fringe Dynamo guys down there in the past. Maybe says something about the quality of the depth and academy guys we have that they have consistently been so bad.

I’m shocked Echeverry is still there as well given that he got the job from being buddies with Cabrera. Guess they just don’t really care about it that much.

 

RGV has always been terrible, but this year they were downright unwatchable. Not even the lack of games due to the pandemic could keep me interested.

Could a big part of it also be coaching?

 

It’s a combination of things. The coaching isn’t great, the players aren’t really good and other USL teams have improved. There’s noticeably a steadily growing number of fringe/ex-MLS guys down there which are better than the bulk of what RGVFC has. Also some teams are fielding better quality younger guys as well.

I don’t know if it’s the case this year (haven’t paid as much attention), but in the past years there was also a big game to game turnover in the lineups. Like half the starting XI changing

 

I think in many small market teams they are more interested in winning than developing / selling players. This is evidenced by these teams hiring experienced coaches (many from the UK) who seem to not accept poor play. These coaches are continually churning their rosters and bringing in higher salary guns for hire to replace players they deem as poor performers. Sort of like Adrian Heath. They aren’t much interested in young player development. They also have a sprinkling of older vets who had some time in other higher level pro leagues.

 

I think assuming the Dynamo have a strategy related to RGV/USL/Development is a faulty assumption. I recall rumors that they almost didn’t affiliate with RGV this year and RGV had issues with the roster of Dynamo assignees.

I’m sure the Dynamo FOs goals with respect to an affiliate and development are (1) cheapest options, (2) cheapest options, (3) Matt Jordan creating perception that he’s doing something, (4) cheapest options

 

with the state of the senior team, would you rather have lemoine and junqua up and getting minutes or down and making RGV more competitive? it's like we're supposed to have gold cup and the olympics next summer -- assuming -- and some people are like send all the good kids to the olympics. i think they are crazy. in a year this busy on a team this mediocre, anyone any good should be funneled to the senior team to see if they can help qualify. the u23 team should be the no-hopers. back full circle, with a veteran team this lousy the good kids should be up getting a look. this is how the "minors" work. it doesn't make the coach look good but the first premise here is development instead of winning. it should be a somewhat unstable situation where one loses their successes to MLS and has to coach up another litter to replace them. it's almost more akin to a college job.

if they have a problem with a bunch of loan players and roster instability they have a problem with being a farm team. if they want a settled roster of 25-30 year old "going nowhere" USL talent for the fans and for competitiveness then go unaffiliated.

to be clear, until this season they not only quit winning (besides that one year) but weren't developing players worth a crap who could help.

let's be real, though, one reason echeverry may be gone is the whole arrangement may be gone. you're reading it as a quality evaluation and then considering his excuse that he was stripped of players. fair enough but it may be simply that our time in RGV is evaporating and along with it any contract ties to there. if we hired or chose the coach and aren't staying, then we just let it run out. they can pick how to go forward.

 

Exactly. 27 year old Michael Salazar is basically useless to us. Short career window left and substandard performance which should already have been evident from the resume. We want a bunch of 20 year olds with 10 years to play and no history of being cut from MLS and getting flushed. All upside. In practice on the field that may end up looking like a college team against adults but those adults are peaked and not at a good level.

To be fair, some of this is GIGO. There are better affiliate teams than us with better academy systems that produce better players. The dominant teams in USLC are not farm teams. But some of the affiliates are better than others. Our poor standing reflects poor development and a senior team so bereft it has to pull anyone worth a crap up. And Dallas is competitive within USL League One.

 

what did the RGV fans think of Hoffmann?