MLS Coaching and Front Office - News & Discussion Thread 2019

To be fair, coaching Monterrey is a huge step up. No surprise him wanting to take that job. At least it isn't a lateral move.

 

"We are developing players. This is how you should judge us!"
"We are not responsible for developing players. How dare you judge us on that!"
"We are not responsible for choosing the best players. It is about The System!"
"We are not responsible for any System! We are stuck with the players we have !"
"Trapp and Bradley are responsible for being the Quarterback of The System!"
"We are not responsible that Trapp and Bradley are the only Quarterbacks we can envision for The System!"
"We were chosen on merit. You can only judge us by the performance of the team"
"We were chosen on merit. How dare you judge us by the performance of the team! "

General Egg, your brain is fried.

 

Salt Lake Tribune sports columnist Gordon Monson weighs in on the ineffectiveness of RSL owner Dell Loy Hansen: DLH could make RSL great again - if he changes his mind and his MO

The column is pretty fair IMO.

 

The Revs had several great drafts in a row, sort of like the Steelers around 1970. I guess that was the beginning and end of why Nicol won so much.

I wonder what Twellman might have to say about this.

 

Exactly. They had one hell of a squad for that time in MLS. Between the regular, drafts which I think was mostly luck, the contraction draft which was a lucky goldmine, and the small league, it was much easier to build a competitive team and win with primitive tactics.

 

I've worked every SuperDraft since 2003.

The draft isn't as bad as some people say. The available talent is probably close to what it has always been as U.S. youth development and regional (mostly Caribbean) scouting has always improved. Yes, most of the cream is now skimmed off the top by MLS Home Grown tags and European/Mexican poaching, but quality through the 60-80 picks hasn't really decreased.

But there's a difference between 10/12 teams drafting and 20-24 teams. Teams just don't suddenly six or seven of the first 25 picks. Now some teams don't have any in the first 48 picks. That would've been hard to pull off 10 years ago.

The other big changes are that 1) the gap between NCAA and MLS is far bigger than it used to be and 2) the bottom end of the MLS "first teams" has really gone up. Even if an MLS team landed 5 picks in the first 48, they would be hard pressed to find college players ready to start, even though those new draftees are generally as ready, if not moreso, than their contemporaries were. It's just that the generic MLS roster filler is much, much better than they used to be. MLS teams used to be 5-8 good players then a bunch of scotch tape, smoke, and mirrors. Slotting in a draft pick was much easier. Now most MLS teams have a good 14-20 soccer players. It's a lot harder to make the gameday roster much less the Starting XI as it was.

Of course Nicol's big secret was just to draft whoever Jay Vidovich was graduating from Wake Forest. As to the dispersal draft, Kansas City fans are still pretty bitter over the Taylor Twellman thing, but to be honest not as much as Dallas fans are about getting screwed out of Chad Marshall in 2004.

 

I think you are being kind to college talent that existed in the early years of the league. Most of the early drafts barely went 30 players (let alone 80) and I think you'd be hard pressed to find 11 guys capable of playing in MLS if you combined the 97 - 99 drafts. As you point out the depth of the league is much better so the floor is a lot higher. But the depth is in college is also much higher higher. What has changed is that there is more money in the game so most of the very top end prospects are getting signed before they even get into college or at the very least, are home-grown.

 

Howard is going into ownership (Memphis and Dagenham & Redbridge).

 

Beasley would make an interesting assistant GM, especially if he focused on managing the youth side of the game.

Sadly there is 0 chance he does that for us because all of our players hate management only slightly less than ownership.

 

orlando city needs to nail this hire

 

Time to open the 2020 thread?

https://www.mlssoccer.com/post/2019/10/07/orlando-city-sc-part-ways-head-coach-james-oconnor

 

Dammit. I thought you were talking about Toast.

 

Parkhurst never sold his house in Columbus and is on record saying he was moving back here.

If he coaches somewhere, it will likely be with the Crew.

 

The Bo Jackson plan.

 

Meanwhile...Adrian Heath's tenure in Orlando keeps looking better as time goes by.

Perhaps they should have given him that third year.

 

The BS podcast?