News: 2025 MLS Preseason Thread - Stuff that may or may not matter

Arriola quit in disgust over the toxic atmosphere generated by Losada

 

I should have said it is good business if you in turn use it on a solid player that doesn’t get hurt all of the time.

I don’t trust DCU, so I don’t know what to think?

 

DC sold Paredes for a club record $7.35M and if it weren’t for a series of ankle injuries would be looking at getting more from the sell-on clause soon. He is a shining star example of developing and selling a talented young player.

I think it’s a lot more nuanced than just jumping on any reasonable offer:

• What is the club’s internal valuation of the player? If a new offer exceeds that by a certain point, they are almost definitely getting sold
• Are you doing right by the player? This matters a lot when you’re bringing children into a youth academy. This can mean many things. To name a few:
  • Is their dream to play in Europe as soon as possible?
  • Are they in limbo here where they aren’t in a position to play a lot yet but would benefit developmentally from a sale to a bigger club, possibly with more infrastructure. I.e. Akinmboni/Fletcher going to bigger clubs who’s reserve setup is somewhere between MLS and MLS Next Pro (I know, no DCU affiliate, point still stands) or a loan to a USL club
  • Maybe they go to a league like the Belgium which isn’t totally dissimilar to MLS but offers more exposure and the opportunity for first team football in Europe, especially among the middle and lower sides?
• You get a lot less choice over the most talented players in the academy. Maybe a player isn’t a system fit. I’m one of KDP’s biggest fans but was he ever 90 minutes fit here? Is he really going to be able to be both a consistent starter and thrive in this system? Especially when nobody is under the impression that Benteke is here to press on the defensive end?

There’s quite a few extenuating factors and this is not meant to be a comprehensive list but just to show some of them. Ultimately there are two factors that really matter:

• Value: what the club thinks a player is worth now and can be worth in the future
• Desire: what does the player want for their career

You say we’re selling them too early but what if Paredes had stayed and started having his injury issues? They’d be looking at a fraction of the transfer value, if anything.

What if Ted learned he’s not going to be a starter when he comes back from injury and asked for a move to a place he can be on the field regularly?

Many youth transfers won’t work out. You hedge your bets when you can with a sell-on clause and the knowledge that if you do right by them and it doesn’t work out, they’ll be interested in a return just like Durkin.

 

I have no disagreement with your very reasonable post. Selling KDP for this amount of money can definitely be part of a good strategy for the team.

As a whole however, I just don't see us going down a path that leads to DC United regularly appearing in the playoffs let alone challenging for a title.

That said it is too early to judge so I am going to stop doom posting for a bit, until I actually see some of these guys play.

I do strongly believe that team fit and skillsets are incredibly important to soccer player evaluation and someone that struggled, even on a relatively poor team, could still be a great player in a different situation.

It is definitely possible we are signing good players for our system that will play better than their pedigree suggests.

It just seems like we are going to have to be really good at talent evaluation and team building given the types of players we have been going after.

 

That’s all totally fair. DCU has gone a long time without a strategy. Or, possibly worse, a strategy of scrapping together what they can and then overpaying not bad but not great players to come in and try and plug the holes.

It’s clear the team is reorganizing around a different strategy and is very much a work in progress at the moment. They are going for younger players and guys with some experience who could turn out to be bigger values if things turn out right, like those coming off of injury. The team also chose the U22 model which further indicates the youth movement.

I do wonder if there’s another move coming since Ted was just extended and signed to a U22 contract in September. As you said, there’s a lot of moving parts and it’s too early to know where all the chips will fall.

 

I though Arriola was $1M Garberbucks. Source?

 

Thanks a lot, Losada

 

You promised us there wasn't going to be any math.

 

I had higher hopes for TKD, I guess, than some of you did. But I wouldn't be against the move if I had any level of faith that we'd do something with that money that would improve the team.

 

Correct, it was pretty much a forced sale.

 

For what it's worth his family is happy with the move, other than missing him, playing across the country. They think CO suits his style more.

 

From an outdoorsy/mountains perspective or, um, a Connor Casey perspective?

 

Anyplace would be better than here for him to develop.

That was $2M GAM and there might have been some other considerations in that deal that I am not recalling.

The Paredes sale was the right move at the time for the money offered. We'd invested little more than a bag of balls in him and $7M+ was not to be passed up. He was good, he wasn't going to grow into Vinicius jr or Saka.

Or even selling Arriola. Where it went off the rails was that we then fired the coach a month and a half later, knowing full well what was going on and we didn't help ourselves in the summer window by moving Gressell and spending the $7M on Benteke. None of these moves by themselves were horrible, but chained together, they're catastrophic. And what did we get for all we sold in 2022? Romo, Brad Smith, David Ochoa, Benteke, Taxi, Martín Rodríguez Victor Palisson who we never played in his correct position, we converted BHI's loan, Miguel Berry, and ...? Oh yea, Ravel Morrison

 

At least Taxi is the type of DP MLS teams should be targeting - in his prime and clearly effective. No one knew at the time things would spectacularly implode like they did.

 

Yeah, it obviously ended poorly but at the time Taxi was a great signing.

 

Looking at it a 2nd time, it wasn't such a bad haul, but other than Bentke its all turned out to be quite shit. Can't imagine what Benteke would have done with service like Gressell's.

 

It’s almost as if the trifecta of Losada, Rushton, and Rooney were abjectly terrible at roster strategy and player acquisition. None of them have proved this wrong at subsequent destinations, either.

 

They may have kept up the façade if they had not come to DC. DC United where careers go to die.

 

Not Losada or Rooney - They both went onto other coaching jobs and failed miserably again

 

Rushton’s career is going backwards, too. After DC, she was GM of Bay FC where she only lasted 14 games. Now, she’s an advisor to an actual GM at Portland Thorns.
DC is the high water mark for these people butting up against the Peter Principle. Because the team is cheap and has to take chances, this will continue. Hopefully Lesesne will rise above, but they’re not doing him any favors roster wise.

 

I would note that Doyle was one of the most optimistic of the 17 MLS pundits last year. He had us finishing 11th out of 15. Only 1, Sammy Sadovnik, has us higher - at 10th. And he was correct!

https://www.bigsoccer.com/threads/2024-pre-season-offseason-new-thread.2128812/page-33#post-42021900

 

if someone had the time, it would be interesting to go back and evaluate just how accurate the pundits have been over time....

 

I will go out on a limb and predict us finishing between 2 and 15.

 

Listening to "Soccerwise" a few days ago, Gass and Bogert discussed the Ku sale to the Rapids. Two things: 1) they speculated the sale was a result of DCU's view that Ku had plateaued and his value as a transfer was at its peak in 2025 for a 23 year old part time starter in MLS; and 2) Bogert mentioned, without specifics, that DCU was looking to add another attacking player and Ku's sale indicated that other deal was close to completion. We'll see, but it put some context on this move.

 

Did he say if it was the trialists Rida Zouhir and Brandon Servania being signed? Or a completely separate deal?