Andrew Jacobson signs with French team Lorient

The Season's Going Down The $hitter!!!

 

The question is: was AJ associated with DC United for long enough to merit posts on the DC United Alumni Forum? This proves that taking a chance on an undrafted, unsigned prospect is just that - a chance. Bon Chance, Andrew.

 

This really puts the Super in SuperDraft.

 

I heard he signed over there due to the more traditional and upright font on the jersey.

 

draft doen't work in football.

 

They aced us out on style? Damn those Frenchmen!

 

Another sign that MLS is turning into the USL of American soccer drafts.

Now we see why the USL abandonded their draft this year...

 

Goff with details on how all this went down:

http://blog.washingtonpost.com/soccerinsider/

 

you're right, it's not a perfect system.

but nothing works 100% of the time.

if only the FO had spent the time and resouces this off-season to bring in some proven international players instead of putting all their eggs in the Draft basket.

the "system" is evolving in the US. players have international options. youth systems must become more important, and given time they will at MLS clubs. but for now, the MLS Drafts (and the resource of available, cheap NCAA players) is still a somewhat beneficial one (Nelsen, Bowsell, Gros, Namoff, Carroll, Burch and many other examples). and yes, at times guys like Jacobson will get drafted and never sign with the league.

or they could try an overseas adventure and if it doesn't work out (Kenny Cooper, Robbie Rogers, Landon Donovan) they can come back to MLS.

DCU still "controls/holds" Jacobson's MLS rights for a year, do they not? the question is, do those rights have any value? doesn't look that way, at this point. so yes, it's looking like a wasted draft pick. but that happens every year for some reason or other. that fact doesn't make the current Draft system "nonfunctional" or "useless" -- but it does mean that teams can't necessarily rely on it as the may hope.

thankfully, DC United has a FO that knows how the system works (and there are plenty of non-draft options in which to find players), and they can craft a (very solid) roster, even if their top pick never signs with them in a given year.

 

In fairness, they're probably paying him more than your average fry jockey at McD's.

 

The only one that signed is Ryan Cordeiro, yikes...

 

Gonna be interesting to see whether we're the only ones for whom the draft is 'broken'.

Probably not.

 

We'd been discussing this in other threads here and on Goff's blog all morning. I'd even asked here and in Goff's blog yesterday what confirmations we had about our picks having signed. This morning, Goff posted "Jacobson is supposed to arrive in Bradenton tomorrow," after Lorient had already announced his signing.

This all really makes me wonder how seriously DCU even takes the draft. Goff wrote later that "Kasper said United received no indication before drafting Jacobson that he might pursue European opportunities" . . .which is funny, because it was in the press before the draft that Jacobson was looking to go to Europe.

This really makes the idea of getting draft picks + allocation money from Colorado for Gomez' rights really funny, doesn't it? Why don't we just say they can have him for the allocation money, seeing as draft picks are meaningless where DC is concerned?

 

Even though this is kinda a unexpected signing, I actucally hope that he does really well. Shows that United has some good enough scouting that we can draft quality world class players. So also what was the point of drafting him, i know he didnt reveal it to Kasper but still he should warn them. Lets go and BUY someone else! Lets go find some cheap Houndouran and Costa Rican talent Like the Revs. Just kidding.

 

Well said Bootsy.

Furthermore, I think what United is doing, or have done over the past few years, is put less and less priority on the draft knowing full well that international talent is the wave of the future. DC will still get their share of "water carriers" in young American talent via the draft or simply signing guys who essentially are free agents (Perkins and Boswell).

Let's face it, there simply isn't that much useful talent coming out of college nowadays. If you are an MLS team banking on college talent, you very soon will be left in the dust (Hello New England and Houston).

I'm not suggesting what United is doing is the right path to take but honestly, what value is their in a draft pick when you rarely even get a pick in the first round? Our last first round pick was just sold for $350,000 dollars. Not too bad.

I'm not too fazed about it to be honest. MLS at some point was going to start losing players to other leagues. It simply didn't happen before a year or two ago.

 

well, lets see, needham wasn't all that for pr, although its debatable, he was good enough for usl standards

ligue 1 is not the usl, losing a player to ligue 1 is ok, but since he didn't sign with the league no one really benefits but him, we'll see how this pans out

i don't even think mls is keeping up with inflation, mls players union has got to work on making sure the younger players are making the money they do/don't deserve

 

Look it at this way, its only a 6 month deal (almost kind of an extended trial to me-if he doesn't work out, he's on a free at a prime time for him). If it doesn't work out over there, we've got first dibs on him.

PS I would like to give myself a congratulatory pat on the back for out-scooping Goff (albeit in the rumors thread).

 

Several people did. Goff was way behind on this one. But what's disconcerting to me was that the team was too.

 

Originally I thought Lorient were a 2nd division side. They're a mid table Ligue 1 side?! While it's disappointing that the DC FO allowed themselves to be misled by his agent, it's surprising that a Ligue 1 side would sign Jacobson.

So to recap...our goalie goes to Norway and we sign two replacements who may be better, we send a young bench warmer to the Bundesliga, we sign Gallardo from PSG, our draft pick signs with a Lorient...(sarcasm alert!) That's it! Aside from Lyon, MLS is as good as the French league.

On a more serious note...it does present a problem if players MLS is only willing to pay $30,000 get offers from European 1st division clubs, if youth prospects who're picking pine out of their rears transfer to major clubs, if strikers like Taylor Twellman can triple their incomes abroad. MLS is a victim of it's own progress on the field and the salary cap hasn't adjusted to match it. IMHO, the CBA can't be renegotiated soon enough. And if the league wants to maintain its standard of play, the cap will have to go way up. I'd say by at least 50% (from 2.3 to 3.4M), though I'd hope for it to go closer to 4M.

Of course, I know the Krafts & Hunts will cry poverty and fight any increase. They won the debate this year, keeping the increase miniscule. Still, with RBNY (and perhaps others: AEG, Chivas?) pushing for an increase, ownership may give more to the players than I expect.

 

I wonder if a similar conversation is going at BigSoccer.ar?

 

didn't the Patriots get Tom Brady in the draft? he's worked out pretty well for them.

 

So true. When I expressed the notion that we should have kept Arguez for another year as he would have been a good backup, I was told that Jacobson was brought in for cover. So much for that brilliant idea. I like some of the major moves that DC has made. The team has done much better, earlier, than last year. However, some of the smaller moves have been a bit disappointing as those players at the end of the bench for "normal" games are going to end up having to put in serious work this year due to the sheer amount of games.

 

Because the No. 24 pick didn't sign?

 

Sadly enough with MLS's goofball economics, I think that's pretty insulting to FULL-TIME fry jockeys...