You pose interesting questions. I do wonder what Villarreal saw in Jozy to drop 10 milliok back in 08. And what might have gone wrong to keep him from being a legit starter?
They saw a massive 18-year-old scoring a goal every 150 minutes. His technical skill is what prevented him from succeeding at the highest level. Still, for my money, the best American striker (Dempsey and Donovan need not apply) of all-time.
I believe $10 million was very fair for Jozy back then. He was a monster athlete who was scoring goals for fun for the US and in MLS as a kid. Now, when he went abroad, I do wonder what went wrong... health, attitude, ability? I don’t think it was ability. Maybe attitude - I don’t think so but possibly. But he has struggled with fitness and recovery throughout his career.
One team in that league hands down better than anyone in MLS doesn't reflect on the rest of the league. There's some real dross from team 4 or 5 on down. That's who he spends the majority of his time playing. He's obviously still got things to learn and I'm not saying it's beneath him but it seems like a fairly damning indictment of his future. Lots of players make a career at that level. It's not insulting in any way but for a kid most thought was one of the most talented prospects of that U-20 team, who was at one time wanted by Porto and Juventus, this is not how I thought his career would go.
Clearly you havnt watched the bottom of the league for MLS as it is pretty unsightly to watch. There is a reason that a lot of major players have played in Austria. Alaba- Bayern Haaland Aleksander Dragovic - Leicester Hee Chan Hwang- Leipzig (20 million transfer this year) Wolf - Leipzig Minamino- Liverpool Naby Keita Dayet Upamecano Sadio Mane These are just the big names over the past few seasons... I could find you about 50 that went on to top 5 leagues. I know that we want to say that MLS is on par with a lot of leagues but you wont find players moving from the MLS to find success like that in Europe. Despite what anyone thinks, Austrian football isnt bad and theres a reason that they sing players who succeed there. Lask and Salzburg obvioulsy did well this year. Wolfsberger had an upset but otherwise competed okay in Europe. The top 6 in Austria would rival any MLS team we could muster. Almiron, Adams and Davies are probably our biggest players to have ever cut their teeth in the MLS excluding maybe Dempsey and Tim Howard. I wont trouble you anymore with talk of MLS vs Austria, but to tie this all to EPB, I think he has made the right decision. There arent a ton of US/MLS defenders that have went on to Europe with successful stints. I think he recognized that and decided if he could find success in Austria then he could parlay that to a top 5 league much like a couple of those named above.
No one is arguing that Salzburg is bad, and that's where all but 2 players on that list played. Of those two, Alaba never played a senior club game in Austria and moved to Germany when he was 16. So you've got Dragovic, who's a rotational player at best, as "proof" that the Austrian league is good. He hasn't played 30 league games in a season since he played for Basel in 2013. Tough sell. It's everything below Salzburg and the occasional surprise team like LASK that is lousy. Your argument does nothing to dispel that notion.
Dragovic and Alaba don't belong in the same league and in this context they don't even belong in the same sentence.
Jozy was a 17 y/o man-child who could score a goal every other game. With the ball at his feet, and a head of steam, he was unstoppable. Had a good Confederations. Had a decent 2010 World Cup. He was Alphonso Davies before Alphonso Davies. But Jozy was a ball-to-feet player and only a ball-to-feet player. His ability to make the kind of off-the-ball runs that would trouble top-5 defenses was nonexistent. And his poaching instincts were horrible. He was mediocre in the air. His ability to press was poor. Yet these qualities were in increased demand, as the game was trending toward lone-striker systems that demanded do-everything forwards. If he had been more lithe he likely would've been moved to winger to have a good top-5 career. But Jozy was and is no slim thing. Alphonso Davies's positional flexibility allowed him to be moved to leftback to become basically one of the best in the world at his position. Altidore's limited tactical nous and limited positional flexibility in turn limited his ceiling.
"Altidore's limited tactical nous and limited positional flexibility in turn limited his ceiling." So where are you on Weston playing multiple positions? I hear so many say that his jack of all trades and master of none has been an impediment to his growth.
Dragovic and Alaba don't belong in the same league, and in this context they don't even belong in the same sentence.
Flexibility allows a young player to get on the field and stay there. And playing multiple positions helps to round out a player's skillset.
The Austrian BL has 12 teams, and if their Top 6 were added to MLS 2019 they'd produce one nailed-on certainty for the MLS Playoffs (RB Salzburg), one that could make the playoffs (Rapid) and two others (Austria Wien and LASK Linz) that could hope to make a play-in round in a vintage year. The other two would have finished ahead of Cincinnati. MLS has 26 teams and if only 2019's Middle 8 were entered into the Austrian BL, Salzburg would have had 36 games a season with the possibility of some genuine competition instead of 10.
Leicester's Christian Fuchs is one, and ex-Bremen Zlatko Junuzović is another, but give me 10 more that have moved in the last 10 seasons that a) didn't move from RB Salzburg and B) played 20 games in any season in a Top 5 league after leaving Austria. The league used to be quite good up until the Bosman ruling abolished nationality restrictions. Since then, it's been downhill all the way and these day almost anyone good is hoovered up by German BL1 sides before they can make their Austrian BL1 debuts. Austria has plenty of football fans, but even in the 90s "the Budesliga" didn't include Rapid, Sturm Graaz or whoever. That's what "our Budesliga" was for.
The team and coaches want him. He has proactively stated he loves Vienna. Seems like a stable situation for another year of starts. Can he move up from being a 'solid' young CB to being one of the top CBs in the league? If he stays that would be next progression. Being one of the top CBs in the Austrian B1 would certainly attract the attention of clubs from bigger leagues.
Austrian news outlets are reporting that the future of Erik Palmer Brown (23) remains uncertain. Austria Wien would like to keep the USMNT CB & is in active discussions with Man City over a solution. The initial buy option post loan was financially not feasible due to COVID. pic.twitter.com/E6qW4AOZIv— OneGoal (@OneGoalUS) August 21, 2020
Find another club/league I suppose. Wien was not ideal. Mediocre league by pool standards, and he just performed solidly there, so wouldn't be advancing. Maybe he could stay in the league if it was Salzburg so in ucl too. Compete w/ or replace Mwepu as a rangy, but underwhelming passing 6 in a press system. Befits EPB's ability. Of course Jesse would be very familiar w/ him. So would some in Portugal from his time winning the 2nd division. That would be an incremental step up from Austria. Upper middle club.
Just caught this Tweet this morning that he is heading back to Austria. #USMNT defender Palmer-Brown to remain at Austria Vienna - Loan deal with #MCFC extendedFor more head to @TMusa_news now!https://t.co/4jO0YY3fZC— Manuel Veth (@ManuelVeth) August 28, 2020
For what purpose? Obviously not to play for the mother ship. Is there a bigger team that considered bringing him in or buying him but wanted to see him get a few more repetitions?
To sell him, duh. A loan to another club in a better league may also be an option. E.g. If Anderlecht are playing EL ball after January and need CBs urgently because one guy triggered his buyout clause and another damaged his ACL, it makes a lot of sense to loan EPB to them. Higher-level competition brings more and better scrutiny. Both are unlikely IMO, but City would be remiss if they didn't at least keep the option open. Belt-and-braces and all that.
January is the last realistic point at which CFG can expect to make decent-ish money on him. This was the last of the prime selling windows. That said, Epb’s options increase when he’s cheap or on a free. The clubs who seem to value him as a player don’t have a lot of money