Chris Carrieri available??

Chris Carrieri is the Terrell Owens of MLS...he's not NEARLY as good as he thinks he is.

I see Petke and/or Nelsen waiting exactly 2.5 seconds before they took his head off in practice.

 

Colorado needs to clear cap room. Trading Carrieri doesn't clear much cap room (only about $20K since you'd replace him with someone making MLS minimum salary). More likely Colorado will end up cutting someone like Henderson.

I too agree that Carrieri and Eskandarian are much alike (except that Carrieri has proven he can score in MLS while we think Alecko can and Carrieri is a headcase while Alecko isn't). The only reason I could see going for Carrieri is if: (a) another forward or two (say, Moreno and Cerritos) went down with injuries and (b) Nowak felt that $50K wasn't much of a cap commitment and (c) that he could manage him so he'd stay in line.

 

another forward limited by size and only able to use one foot and with an ego to boot...I'll pass He is a tweener, and we already have too many of those not really a forward..not really a midfielder type players.

 

Nobody here cares what I think but I'll throw in anyway:

On a veteran team, with a strong, secure coach, he could be a serviceable third forward. We have the former but not the latter. You have the latter but not the former.

 

Hey Colonel, you think Carrieri would pull a Sharpie out of his sock to sign a ball after a goal?

 

Unless you have seen him play, he scores equally well with both feet. his 2 MLS goal of the week were left foot volleys and his hattrick in 2002 were all righ footed.... I think with his speed and strenght he can play equally well as an outside player ... He was in the top 3 in GW assits in MLS last year.. and in many of the top 10 offensive categories in 2002 when he replaced Spencer as the main forward and they made it to the semi-finals.. I think he is a steal considering the salries of other players that have 1/2 the stats he has

 

Not sure what this is worth.. but he also has roots in the area. Carrieri went to school in Stafford VA and I believe has family still in the area. He might want to play here...

 

I'm all for somebody to score goals... and if he becomes a headcase here i think Nellie and the Wanker would set him straight as mentioned above

 

It might work if Novak could put the clamp on Chris's attitude problem. I guess it is possible.

 

Huh? Early last year he complained to Marc Connelly about Hankinson playing him on the left wing and how he should be starting at forward. Then, after it went to press and everyone pointed out what an egotistical jackass he is did he recite the cliche about trying to help the club.

 

I don't see Nowak as the type of coach who would take a head case and try to whip him into shape. I see him more as they type who would keep guys like that away from his team.

 

With all this talk about Carrieri being a "head case" and having an "attitude problem" I am left to wonder what he has actually ever done wrong. Aside from smaking Hankinson in the press last year (which was more a matter of him having the stones to say what everyone else thought) what has he done to deserve this reputation?

As a long-time Rapids fan I can't remeber his attitude ever being considered a problem. Something to make fun of him for, sure, but not a problem. He has always been a guy that works hard for his teammates and gives all he's got every game.

 

First, try reading his comments before and after he was drafted by San Jose. He clearly came off as arrogant. And than after his trade by SJ--trashing their management. The comments (two columns worth if I remember correctly to Connelly) were pretty extreme. I've heard egotistical players before but not ones who also trash their own teammates. After the columns he toned down his reactions but still had some slams for Hankinson in the press.

I do agree he hustles around the field and works hard. But on defense? Or to win balls? I think he works hard to get chances and shots. He's a solid scorer. He's a decent player. He may be better than any scorer DCU has (he certainly has a better recent track record in terms of scoring). But I don't know of anyone other than a few Rapids fans who insist he's a team player. No-one raves about his unselfishness, his passing, how he sets up teammates, he doesn't generate a lot of assists, he isn't known for defense or tracking back. And he complains when he is played at midfield instead of the frontline.

 

JoeW may be right about Chris C's approach to the game. On the other hand, the description fits most scorers in professional soccer. They get paid to score goals and that's what they concentrate on. I don't know whether they realize it or not, but all those folks who have wanted DC to get a proven scorer are essentially talking about a player like Chris C. Sure there are some well-rounded players who also score lots of goals, but they don't play in leagues like MLS. At the MLS level, well-rounded forwards look very much like Stewart and Cerritos. It's a matter of pick your poison.

 

That doesn't necessarily mean that they publicly badmouth their coaches and teammates. Much as, say, Carlos Ruiz may be a pain in the butt on the field, he has always credited his teammates and Sigi for his success. And Ruiz is a much better player than Carrieri.

Carrieri a proven scorer? 19 goals in 3 years, with 11 coming in one season is fine for a team that has players like John Spencer and Mark Chung, but to suggest that Carrieri can be our go-to guy over a 30-game season is stretching it a bit.

By contrast, Dema Kovalenko has 15 goals over the same 3-year span coming out of midfield, and only scored one goal in 2002.

 

I don't think I buy the argument that goal scorers--if they're good (or maybe b/c goal scorers are precious) are allowed to be jerks and prima donas.

--Taylor Twellman is as good a finisher as there is in MLS and no-one (including his detractors) says the guy is a jerk. Actually, he gets accolades for being a good guy.

--Jason Kreis is a standup guy. Slumped last year but otherwise you won't find a more consistently productive goal scorer over the history of MLS.

--Not sure I'd consider Jaime Moreno a "great goal scorer" but despite the issues the past two years, again, I don't think he goes into the prima dona category.

--Brian McBride is as classy an individual as you'll find in soccer. Rarely gets carded, plays hard, great runs off the ball, great defender, plays with pain, comes up big for his country. No A-hole there.

I could name a bunch of other guys with stats that are as good or better than Carrieri's (Josh Wolff, Landon Donovan, Ronald Cerritos, Joe Max Moore, Spencer). All of them have their warts but they don't criticize their teammates in public and are pretty much regarded as good guys to have on your team. Even guys like Roy Lassiter, ATC, Molnar (who was very flaky), and Ante Razov all are perceived as guys who don't blast their teammates in public.

If I had to identify MLS strikers who were just outright jerks and also publicly criticized their teammates, I'd have to come up with: Diallo, maybe Stoichkov, Diego Serna.

If we went world-wide, I never heard anyone argue Pele or Marco Van Basten or Gerd Muller or Michael Owen labeled as egotistical players who blasted their teammates publicly and claimed they were the saviors of their teams. If anything, Pele and Van Basten were the opposites of jerks, very good teammates, and deflected a lot of praise in their prime towards teammates.

In short, I don't think you need to be an A-hole to be a good striker. None of that means Carrieri would or would not be a good addition. Only that I don't excuse his excesses b/c he scores goals.

 

WOW! He sounds like ROY LASSITER...

Maybe we should trade for him.

Kidding of course... but at the sametime a good goal scoring forward simply needs to put the ball in the net... "Defense" (from a forward?!), assists, passing... its all BS if he leads the league in scoring.

 

I seem to recall Rocket Roy being a bit hard on his Tampa team after arriving in DC. He said that he expects and needs support, aka "service" to score and they (Tampa) failed to help him do so.

After his tear with DC I think he was right.

 

Everyone has (correctly) mentioned Carrieri's attitude problem, and I also think that'll bar him from being brought to United. But what isn't being said is that Carrieri is ~~F~A~S~T~~ and Esky is not. Yes, both are small, but they're in no way similar players. Esky is the scrapper with a quick shot and good ups (despite being short).

And don't underestimate McOwen's point about Carrieri being local, that goes a long way in MLS. I personally hope we do not add him, but he is a scorer.

-Digital

 

Let's not confuse an "attitude" problem with an overall approach to the game. It was asserted that Chris C does not play defense, doesn't pass, worries about scoring goals and so on. Just like every other "scorer" in a league like MLS!! That's my point. Much the same could be said of Roy Lassiter, as others have mentioned. No one minds any of that as long as you keep scoring.

I don't know whether Chris C has a bad attitude. I doubt whether anyone else on this thread knows either. Whether Chris C is or was a jerk off the field is, nevertheless, not the point at all.

 

Is Chris Carrieri available?

I think he is taken dude. That special someone might have been John Spencer.

 

Tired of people laughing at you in rivalries?