Roster, Draft Picks, Allocations, Discoveries: What we know, how we know it. [N&A]

Good points.

Maybe it's just that MLS now has more than two guys who can look at a college player and really figure out what they can do with them.


.....or maybe it was only Sarachan and Bradley who could do it all along.

 

Knave, I understand now that you're talking about proactive actions (rather than waiting for a lottery, waivers, etc.). And I agree than that the waivers, lotteries options aren't really proactive (though we can assume waiver drafts at certain dates when teams most comply with the cap in January and then roster cut-down dates).

Still, I think teams can sign players without having to require a discovery or allocation if there is no transfer fee or dispute in who gets first crack. As for the Dalglish example, our two allocations that year were Reyes and Quintanilla. And even then we added Lassiter and Zambrano. Okay--you can argue we acquired Lassiter off waivers (though I don't recall a specific waiver draft being held as per league "policy"). But Zambrano? So I don't think Dalgish would have been classified as a discovery.

And look at this year: we signed Thiago Martins and I don't believe he was a discovery, not an allocation, not a waiver pick, and certainly not a superdraft pick.

At one point last off-season, Colorado had 6 players on their roster (and no high draft picks and only 1 allocation coming their way). Metro had only 7 players on their roster. If the league truly held to the position that you could only add through picks, discoveries, allocations and then trades/waivers/lotteries as they were available, then neither of those teams could have fielded anything close to complete rosters.

I'm not trying to pick a fight with you over this. I think you're reading the league rules accurately. But the league rules also say you can't trade discovery slots and the Metros-San Jose deal is about as obvious as you can get to not being consistent with the wording of those rules. I think what started out as very exact (you had to use a discovery for players making below certain amounts or not waiver/draft talent) has evolved into something far looser.

 

The IR moved created the roster space but what mechanism was used???? Discovery? Lottery Draft? I do not remember anything being mentioned at the time.

 

Things you can absolutely count on? My man, this is MLS!

As for Martins, the league's rule page doesn't spell out what "roster relief" is. I assumed it just meant that your injured player wouldn't count against your limit but that you'd still have to use the usual methods to acquire a new player. However, the portion of the page that says that is titled "Replacement Players" even though there is nothing in the following paragraph about how one is acquired!

Also, under "Means of Player Acquisition" they simply list Allocation, Draft, and Discovery. Nothing else. Of course, above that they mention waivers, etc. Unfortunately, it's not a comprehensive document.

 

But it just says "roster relief." Those two words sure don't say to me "a free pass to sign another player outside of the usual methods." Of course, that may be what they mean (in conjunction with meaning the injured guy doesn't count against your 24, which is what I thought they meant), but they sure don't say anything about how it gets done, whether you get priority over other teams interested in signing the same player, etc.

 

From my understanding (and I forget who I heard this from), "roster relief" is MLS' equivalent of the 10-day contract in the NBA or the third quarterback in the NFL.

You get a guy who you get to pick, but you only get him for a specific amount of time and it can't require a fee or anything. I don't know if this means that the Galaxy could sign Klinnsmann for a month if Ruiz blew his ACL, but the gist was that it was a special exception to usual acquisition rules because of the circumstances.

 

Let me weigh in on the "roster relief" issue.

My understanding is that originally MLS had the "Clint Peay" situation--where a player suffered a long-term injury (in this case, a career-ender) and the team cut him. The league acted to stop abusive action on this (players injured while under contract) still got paid and couldn't be cut. But the league created marquee replacements (so when one of your designated marquee players went down, the league got you a "big name" replacement) for your roster and cap. The marquee replacement rule eventually died (for a lot of reasons--the Ben Olsen situation combined with league finances probably had a fair amount to do with it IMO).

But the league was still faced of what to do with the situation of players on small rosters who suffered season-ending injuries. Thus, an IR of sorts was created--you could declare that play ineligible for the season and get "roster relief". That's distinguished from "cap relief" of course b/c the injuried player still counts on the cap (as Reyes did this year and Amman did last year).

I do not interpret "roster relief" to mean "so you'll get a special way to acquire talent." When I read that term (Roster relief) it just says that "an injured Milton Reyes won't count on your roster. So if you've got the cap room you can add another player." I don't see how that term says we get a special "gimme" (another discovery or limited allocation or special lottery) to add that player. This interpretation is consistent with the league's shift from identifying the allocation players and talent to the teams taking on that role.

Teams have signed a couple of A-league players this year (as we did with Thiago Martins). In some cases, it appears that a transfer fee was paid (probably with Onstad) and thus they counted as discovery players. But if the player is out-of-contract (ie: no transfer fee), his rights aren't owned by another MLS team, why should that require a discovery? Plus, even some of the "reactive" player acquisition means (such as: waiver drafts, USMNT drafts, lotteries) tend to happen when the team and player is ready--see Hejduk and Joe Max Moore, Jonny Walker, Brian Ching. I think the Metro this year are an excellent example of a team that decided what talent they wanted, went out and got it, then figured out (working with the league I guess) how to assign that talent distribution.

 

In the beginning....discoveries were "team originated" players (basically cheap discoveries) and allocations were "league originated" players. That distinction is now almost totally gone. For instance, we probably paid more in transfer fees for Milton Reyes than we did for Galin Ivanov. And the lead didn't identify Ivanov, DCU's braintrust (with the help of Stoichkov did) as I understand it.

Knave, my understanding is that while discoveries don't have to involve transfer fees, many of them do. So I didn't mean to imply that its a discovery if it involves a transfer fee. Discoveries at one point (and I don't know if they still do) have limits on the salary you can acquire via discovery (thus the "special discovery" rules allowing you to pay higher transfer fees and higher salary up to a combined amount for the first year).

I think were you and I are having this impasse is that you're reading the rules exclusively. They talk about allocations and discoveries as the ways to acquire players. Your interpretation is that is therefore the only ways to add players (other than the reactive ones of: waivers, lotteries and so on). And my argument is that the league just spells out special mechanisms for acquiring players (principally those players that may potentially involve transfer fees) but that an out-of-contract player (like a Dalglish or a Thiago Martins) can be added to a team if no-one else has a claim on them (ie: they could have potentially been in the superdraft otherwise or b/c they used to belong to another team in MLS such as Digi, even if those rights have expired).

 

Right. Isn't that how the Crew added Hedjuk? No one with a allocation wanted him and then he went to the first team in reverse order- the Crew?

 

Basically correct. Except everyone knew Frankie was going to Columbus before it happened. Just like DCU talked briefly with JMM but he went to Boston on a similar situation--it didn't take an allocation either.

 

I think people can debate all this stuff 'till the world stops spinning...and it won't matter.

MLS doesn't have rules. It makes things up as they go along. There is really no way to know what is going to happen.

They are going to make sure we get Adu. No existing rule will be followed, they'll just make one up.

I'm hoping it won't be too much longer before single-entity goes away, but I guess we just have to be patient.

 

Exactly

But the SEM isn't fundamentally incompatible with real, actual rules. You could have both at the same time.

 

A few questions:

1. Isn't there a waiver draft in a few weeks? I remember there was one after MLS Cup last year although we didn't acquire anyone, instead we waived 5 players.

2. What are the chances of MLS clubs being added next year (Rochester, Club America etc.)?

3. Somebody was talking about an out of contract forward a few threads ago. Started with a C... anyone remember his name? Just wanted to know how whoever posted it found out about that.

Lastly, I don't think we should try to acquire a high-scoring forward in the draft since those are the hardest to find and have the lowest success rate, but rather go after a d-mid since that sort of position usually has a higher success rate. Although to have that situation happen we would have to trade for at least a second rounder.

Doesn't Maryland have a good d-mid (Stammler???)? If they do thats good since the United brain-trust is done there scouting the ACC finals which had Maryland vs. Virginia (it was on CSN, Virginia won on 9 rounds of Pk's). UVA also had a very solid center-back senior named Matt Oliver http://virginiasports.ocsn.com/sports/m-soccer/mtt/oliver_mahatha00.html. If you really think about it we could actually use a center-back considering Nelsen and Petke are the only real ones and Nelsen won't be here much longer.

 

1) Probably

2) 40/60. News will come within the next few weeks

3) That would be Jeff Cunningham, who I still think we should acquire as he is a free agent.

 

You should probably learn something about single-entity.

"Free agent" is a meaningless term when it comes to MLS intraleague affairs. Single-entity is designed specifically to prevent the wage escalation that results from bidding among teams for a player's services.

To get Cunningham, you would have to trade with Columbus for his rights, not simply offer him a contract.

 

Even if he's out of contract? Why on Earth would we have to pay Columbus for a player the don't own?

 

It's one of the perversities of single-entity.

All players are contracted to the league, not the teams. The rights are assigned to the teams.

The league negotiates with the players (or really their agents). If Cunningham were to ask for more money than the league wanted to pay him, then he would be a free agent-- but only to teams outside MLS. Maybe that team would be in Germany (like Hertha Berlin when they signed Sanneh, who was lowballed), maybe it would be Charleston, SC (who have signed MLS players like Wynalda who didn't get what they wanted from MLS).

Teams DO have some ability to authorize MLS to offer a certain wage to their players. But their authority isn't that great-- they wouldn't be able to pay a clearly mediocre player the maximum salary, even if the GM somehow were self-destructive enough to mis-value players. It's when the league sees the necessity of keeping a crucial player that teams run into cap problems. Carlos Bocanegra certainly deserves way more money now than what he signed for as a rookie, and if MLS doesn't pay him a fair salary, he'll go overseas for the money he deserves. But Chicago might then have to trade him to a team with more salary cap room.

If the league and Cunningham agree on a deal, Columbus automatically gets the right to keep him, but they would have to deal with the salary cap. That wouldn't be a problem for them, though. So the issue is what DC is willing to give up in compensation, unless Columbus were to unilaterally give up their rights by waiving Cunningham. But the rights to a player stay with the last team, even if that player went overseas for a time.

It's a strange system, no doubt, but if you listen to the owners, single entity the only reason MLS has been able to afford to pay its players and stay on solid financial footing. As a contrast, look at the NHL, where runaway wages-- largely due to free agency-- are putting that league in peril.

 

Its not Cunningham its like Carrica or something. From somewhere in South America.

 

That would be Claudio Ciccia, who is likely to go to NY or LA if either Mathis or Ruiz leave.