SJ decline Ekelund option; Corrales likely to Norway

Donovan, Ekelund and Corrales gone, Agoos, Dayak and Onstad all old, injury prone Ching and DeRosario leading the attack, not to mention losing both of their backup strikers. San Jose has got to be a favorite to miss the playoffs.

 

Correct. I doubt Corrales will be going to Norway. However, DeRo is out of contract and has a good chance of going elsewhere. Unless we draft well, pickup a decent allocation for Donovan and possibly Ekelund, and have some players step up (Dunivant and Alvarez), you are looking at last place.

As you are probably painfully aware of, very similar to Chicago this year. Not good for a team trying to find an owner and a SSS.

 

How ridiculous is it that you can tell a player "I don't want you!" but still have the ability to stand in the way of him finding a new team in the league?

 

My understanding is that Ekelund will be free to sign with any team once he falls out of contract at year's end.

 

This will all change as the second-tier Euro countries realize that they can have a Yank for a song.

This arguably can be a crippling development for MLS. If someone like Nick Garcia can sign for $200-300K or so with Brann, why should Jimmy Conrad play for $63K?

Also, if Josh Wolff can make $418K, why should Davy Arnaud settle for $25K when they're separated by 1 point in the scoring list?

Dwayne DeRosario makes $70K.

The fact that so many Yanks can go to Europe and quadruple their salary will force MLS to make a choice: match the Euros or sell off the US talent.

The former will destroy the existing salary structure; the latter the existing talent structure.

This will be very tough to manage.

 

Nope, teams retain players rights for 2 years. Doesn't matter if their waived or out of contract. And Rommul is right, it is pretty ridiculous. It has sent many MLS quality players to A-League(USL1) becuase teams may want the player, but they don't want to trade what the team is asking for a waived player.

That should definatly go.

 

Bizarre.

Are you sure this applies to waived players and not just to out-of-contract players?

It doesn't make sense at all that a team can waive a player mid-season and still retain the rights to that player.

 

These are issues best managed by the MLSPA. It is up to them to propose (or agree to) a salary cap structure that prevents the Wolff/Arnaud situation. And this will take a lot of self control.

Perhaps the next round of contract negotiations will include a clause where a certain proportion of the transfer fee will be split equally among all players in the league. Sure it might only be an additional $500/player for each transfer, but hopefully this will add up with lots of transfers!

 

You're right. If a team waives a player they don't get that 2 year hold on the player's rights. If a player doesn't sign a contract extension or is not re-signed then his former team keeps his MLS rights for 2 years. He can sign with any team he wants in the world if they want him, but during those 2 years if he decides he wants to play for another MLS team that team has to trade for his rights and make sure he and MLS come to terms on a new contract that fits with the new team's salary structure.

 

Let's see Ching, Wolyniec, and Zavagnin. They were waived by their teams they may have found work in MLS instead of going down to the A-League if their repective teams didn't hold their rights for two years.

I'm also sure this practice can involve waiving as well. The trick is to do it after the waiver drafts. Washington was waived Columbus held his rights, Paule and Williams were waived Metros retained their rights.

 

Their teams didn't hold their rights for two years. Zavagnin was waived by the Metros, wasn't picked up in the waiver draft, and went to the A-League for 1 year. Then he signed a new contract with MLS and was placed in the SuperDraft player pool, and KC chose him.

Ching was released by the Galaxy, wasn't picked in the waiver draft, and went to the A-League for one year. Then he signed a new contract with MLS, and MLS created a supplemental draft to assign him to a team. San Jose traded Devin Barclay to DC for the first pick in that draft.

When a player is waived and then not chosen in the waiver draft, he is released from his contract and is completely unattached.

 

You're right.

http://magazine.socceramerica.com/article.asp?Art_ID=562134518

 

The collective bargaining agreements are better at establishing a floor than a ceiling and the MLSPA basically dropped their pants even on that.

As to the upcoming salary wars, those are based on the "efficient market" principle. In layman's economics, it means that quality eventually gets to its price level. In other words, in the last MLS has been underpaying its Nick Garcias and Davy Arnauds but it can not keep underpaying them forever.

And, if its pay structure changes drastically, it may mean the severe test of its business model, a failure to correct which may result in the demise of the league as an ongoing concern.

Which would make an ironic end to MLS, as NASL folded because it paid too much while MLS will fold because it had paid too little.

 

It was a speculative question. You never know if a player is wanted or not wanted by another team unless their signed.

This whole thing is all about symantics anyway. If you don't sign a player back or pick up his option, I consider that being waived or let go or any other word you want to put it.

Also it doesn't matter how many players have been pushed out by that rule, that it CAN push players out that COULD find work with another team is what matters. If a team waives a player or doesn't pick up his option, then he should be free to find another team.

 

They need to somehow factor in performance based salaries in the contracts, to prevent such egregious descrepancies.

 

Not within MLS. As the article states San Jose will still have rights to him so if someone else wants him they have to trade for him.

 

I think if we opened up the talent pool and allowed teams to compete with each other a lot of this overpaid player nonesense would take care of itself.

I am not in favor of spending money to solve MLS's problems. There are many things we can do before we spend money. Unfortunately that would require MLS to commit itself totally to providing a higher quality product on the field.

They haven't done that yet.

 

Among many other things.

PS Didn't know it was two years. Thought it was only one. Thanks for the info.

 

Its not really that bizzarre. MLS is very concerned about player power and want to keep it as small as possible. This is why the league is structured the way it is.

It is about giving teams all the leverage and giving players little if any.

 

I wonder if KC decided wolf is worth that or someone in New York just said "Ooh national team player!" and decided to give him this big deal?