I've noticed throughout many of the postmatch threads that Ivanov is consistently criticized as the weak link of the defense. Given that Reyes should be healthy and playing on the right side (Ivanov's current position), should DC keep Ivanov or release him and free up an SI spot? I think that we have enough depth at defense that releasing him would not do much harm and could give us another spot to pick up a quality defensive mid (Colosimo?) and/or a new attacking midfielder should Marco retire. What do you think?
I think the "Ivanov decision" won't be made until sometime in the offseason. Clearly the team needs to add a holding mid/D-mid. While Kovalenko is there and we're winning, he's not a great solution. And Hudson has already indicated that Nelsen isn't the solution there either (assuming Kiwi is back). So that gives you one hole to fill. After that, who knows? Will Nelsen be back? That has some impact on whether or not you want Ivanov to return. Will Etcheverry be back? If so, that takes away an allocation (which may be more important for cap reasons than anything else). We already have an SI slot so freeing up another matters little if we don't have cap or transfer money. If Etcheverry doesn't return, who's the A-mid? Let's not all automatically say Convey. He (Convey) may view left mid as his best chance to get back to Europe. he may also view it as the position he's more likely to get PT with the USMNT. And, if he plays the rest of the season in a funk, it's kind of hard to see Hudson just handing him the keys to the car automatically. In short, I'd like to see Convey as an A-mid but I think (for a variety of reasons that have NOTHING to do with whether or not he'd be a good A-mid), he may not play A-mid next year. And this impacts Ivanov b/c we may want to use his cap money if Etcheverry doesn't leave or if he does and Hudson feels we need to acquire an A-mid. I have no idea if Ivanov would fetch any money on the transfer market (which would earn us an allocation). I'd think his primary value would be to Bulgarian club sides and they wouldn't pay much (buyer's market, exchange rate issues). I think that if Stoichkov is not here next year (and I expect that to be the case), that decreases the chances Ivanov would be here. One last point, some players take a year/season to adjust to a new country and league. That wouldn't be the first time. Those closest to Ivanov may feel he will be much better in 2004 and thus give him one more year to show consistent play.
There are some very good defenders (in fact there is one excellent defender) coming out in the draft next year, so that would also have somewhat of an impact on the decision making.
That's the funniest post I've seen on BS in a long time. Judging by how much this year's draft picks have played, I seriously doubt Hudspar is looking for help from the draft. And we've already traded away our 1st round pick, so the highest pick we'd have is mid to high teens.
Yes I hesitated before I posted that. But, there is a certain defender coming out of college that may just be it. Adn seeing how defenders make the transition to MLS much easier, e.g. SJ's Dunivant. Hudspar have stated on the record, I don't recall exactly where but it was right after the Ali Curtis trade, that if the right player came along in the draft that they would be willing to trade for a 1st round draft pick. Yes, I know they say a lot of things that don't come to pass, but...
Obviously the draft is not exactly the highest of priorities for United at the moment, or ever, but a sleeper pick that United could be interested in for a lower round pick would be Seth Stammler from Maryland..... Chad Marshall is the obvious #1 pick for a defender with Ryan Cochrane not too far behind as well, but those guys will definitely be gone should they throw their hat in the ring in MLS..
Actually, he would be perfect for this team, but he'll be gone early as well.. Good catch, I forgot about him for the moment..
Way too early to determine if this is a strong draft or not. For instance, if 4-6 of the U17 teams goes P-40 (and the right ones of those players), it's a strong draft. On the other hand, if those same players go to college or sign with European clubs, the quality went down a lot. Additionally, if there is a Chivas-USA that joins MLS, that dilutes the draft somewhat (and teams likely lose players to expansion). If they don't join, that makes a double difference (they're not in the draft, and no expansion losses). And again, who stays and who goes on the roster? There are a bunch of players who may seek to go overseas (Nelsen being only one, I thought Prideaux's contract was up as well) or may retire (Stoichkov and Etcheverry). All of those decisions have impacts on what we want to do with the draft, what happens with Ivanov, team needs, etc. The only real certainty is that we need a holding midfielder.
Who cares about the draft? Reyes comes back next year, and Stokes should be ready to be at least a backup next year. That leaves us with 6 defenders - Petke, Nelsen, Prideaux, Reyes, Namoff and Stokes - if Ivanov isn't brought back.
There are too many variables at this point to know. Will Nelson be back? Will Sokes develop? For that matter, how will Ivanov be the rest of the season? The adjustment has had to be difficult for him, beginning with the hernia surgery. Then not speaking the language, although that seems to working out. A couple of games ago I saw him in an animated conversation with Marco and wondered what language they were speaking. Right now, I'd say he is #4 of the 4 starting defenders -- behind Nelsen, Petke an Prideaux. He seems to have a mix of brilliance and blunder, much more of a skill player than the gritty, blue collar Prideaux or Petke. When it works it's wonderful, but when it doesn't .... He has a very nice touch on the ball and gets off some nice passes to the midfielders to restart the offense. His shots on goal have been off, as we saw Saturday, for example, but I wouldn't be surprised to see him start hitting. All in all, I think he's coming on stronger; if so, he could give Ray the kind of headache coaces like during the off-season.
Just focusing on Ivanov, the fact that we will probably have Milton Reyes at full strength puts him in a precarious position as Galin will probably then be on the bench. An SI on the bench is not a stable thing.... But as said above there are a bunch of variables this offseason, including the fact that we will probably have some work to stay under the cap. Lots of players are due raises, Stewart's salary will hit us fully, maybe Marco, and Bobby, and Nellie will be back, etc. So really, Ivanov's position is up in the air right now like many other playerts.
Span-garian-ish. SI's need to provide major impact and bang for the buck. So, the question that needs to be asked is if Ivanov can be replaced by someone who doesn't take up an SI and by someone who can do the job cheaper. Reyes has a Green Card. Stokes doesn't even take up a roster or cap spot. Nelsen's salary isn't too high, same with Prideaux. Petke is the only other back on DCU that makes a lot (because he leveraged leaving for Germany back when he was a free agent). Clearly, DC can get more bang for its buck and more use of its SI spot. I just don't see Ivanov coming back as he doesn't provide enough bang for the buck. And, the others are right - this will be a good year for defenders in the MLS draft. Besides Chad Marshall (who I think will go to Europe) and Chris Wingert, there's the aforementioned Seth Stamler who MLS coaches seem to love and Ryan Cochrane who has been solid with the 20s. Also from the U20 team is CJ Klaas, the right back on that team who plays D-mid at Washington. Heath Pearce of Portland and Drew Moor of Indiana are also fighting for a place on the U20 team and can play either wingback (Pearce left, Moor right) or in the middle. From the non-U20 pool, UCLA's Leonard Griffin is one to watch and given that you can't teach size, Maryland's Clarence Goodson (a junior but he might leave) and Michigan's Kevin Robinson are both 6-4. Also, Virginia's Matt Oliver (a DeMatha grad) is a solid back but he may be a bit small for MLS. Boston College's Paul Chase and Dayton's Denny Clanton have been studs in the PDL and David Wagenfuhr has done well both at Creighton and the PDL. Also, there are always sleepers. I mean, very few people knew who Jim Curtin were when he was at Villanova. Given that Ray and Thomas Rongen are buddies and TR still refers to United as "we" when he does the broadcasts, I expect he'll give DCU a very solid and honest assesment of the U20 and U23 (as an assistant) players he's evaluated. And, Trash has enough college ties to be able to know about any sleepers. (Again, I'm not really sure what it is that Dave Kasper does but it appears it doesn't have to do with the draft.)
Obviously there are all sorts of possibilities and factors ... but gut feeling is that Ivanov is not retained. Three reasons behind that feeling ... 1 - He hasn't become a no-worries defender 2 - Reyes, Prideaux, Capt. Kiwi and Petke will start if available 3 - Need the SI slot for the solution to playmaker whoever that maybe (Etcheverry is finished, done, gone, it shouldn't be Convey, Dema, Q1 or Q2 ... I guess it could be Stewart but that doesn't thrill me either)
DCU already has an open SI slot--we'd have two if Ivanov was gone. 3 if Nelsen doesn't return. The larger issue is cap. B/c of the allocation, Stewart didnt' count his full salary on the cap this year. You've got to figure if Nelsen returns, its for a pay increase. We traded for cap room--and that is only for the rest of this season. We probably have 7-9 players (Convey, Quintanilla, Quaranta, Petke, Prideaux, Olsen, Kovalenko, Reyes and Warren all come to mind. I don't know about the contract status of Rimando and Cerritos) who will all automatically get an extra $5K-$10K next year. So without adding a single player for next year, we're substantially over the cap. If Etcheverry retires and we sign an MLS minimum salary player, we're okay cap-wise. To count on adding a max salary play-maker/A-mid, we'll need to clear cap room.
Joe- I think you should copy this post of yours so that you can paste it periodically this offseason. People are gonna need remending of our cap situation.
The easiest solution then would be to release or trade a few players. I still believe that either Q1 or Q2 (or both) will be gone next season. Add in players who are on the edge (Barclay, Alegria, and Ivanov) and our team isn't as stable as it seems. Add players who may retire (Stoichkov, Etcheverry, and maybe even Stewart) and it looks even more shaky. Our immediate needs should be a left mid, defensive mid, and an attacking mid. Convey can play two of those positions, but there are doubts to whether he'll still be here or not. Colosimo has been bandied about by Hudson and may be on trial in the offseason. It's still early, but I'm looking at the big picture and it just looks very uncertain.
But remember that Barclay was P-40 (so cap and roster-exempt). And Stoichkov (for a range of reasons--I'm convinced that the league is eating a chunk of his salary but I have no hard evidence on this) barely counts on our cap. So seeing either of those two leave doesn't help us much cap-wise. DCU's challenge is this: we've got a couple of players at the max or near it. We've got a ton of players who are making substantially more than MLS minimum. Basically, there are two models in MLS: Go the DCU route of 2001 and Metros route of 2003 (3-5 max salary players and almost everyone else makes minimum and you start and play a lot of P-40 players) OR, you skimp on the max salary guys (have 1 or 2 at the most) and can afford 6-8 players making $70K-$130K apiece. DCU, with guys like Convey, Kovalenko, Prideaux, Petke, Olsen, Quintanilla, Rimando, Nelsen, Reyes, has clearly gone for the depth with medium-range salary route. We actually got to cheat the cap this year b/c of the Stewart allocation deal, the Stoichkov situation in terms of cap, the huge number of P-40's (who even though they didn't play much, realistically a Brian Carroll brought more to the side than did a Sergio Salas or Micah Cooks--the lesson being that some P-40's can not play and provide more depth than others). Plus, we traded for cap room. We're not in the cap mess that we were at the end of the 2002 season (or definitely not the caphell that Chicago was in last year). But assuming we're just going to conveniently add a max salary player of any sort is naive I think--even if Etcheverry does leave (and that isn't a lock--Marco has something to say on that issue and if he refuses to retire, we probably lose the allocation which has more impact on acquiring an A-mid than does the cap room). As for cutting players, when your roster consists of guys like Olsen and Convey, that means you can't just cut 1 player to get lots of cap room. Instead you cut 3 of them (much like Metro did last off-season when you saw them jetison Andy Williams and Ross Paule).
Could we please defer this type of discussion until after our season is over? Until then our players need and deserve our full support. Not only that, but it's so early that such musings are not very productive because so many factors are variables: expansion draft; contract re-signings and extensions; options exercised; retirements; injuries; playoff winnings; USOC winnings; deals already made but not published; changes in the cap; other League-wide changes. I guess if you want to waste time, that's your prerogative. There will be massive amounts of time and opportunity to discuss these things once the season is over. In the meantime, please enjoy our current run of success. One thing in life to me is clear -- you've got to take time to "smell the roses", i.e, appreciate the current team, because next year it will be significantly changed. GM
Well-said, Tom. Remember - this will be the first off-season that a union could have an impact. Trying to figure out things based on the past is pretty fruitless since the cap may go up, minimum salary may go up, there may be an expansion draft, etc., etc., etc.
Oh I do, but I'm also a realist. There are issues that need to be addressed right now that won't be realized until the offseason. Personally, I wish the league would up the salary allowance for each team (something which may occur when San Diego joins the league). Does anyone have a list or a link of DC players' salaries. I'm interested to see who may be offloaded to keep us under the cap.
Re: Re: Will Ivanov be on the team in 2004? Not unless you know how to hack into Stephen Zack's computer... Otherwise, all we have is the few that Goff reports in the paper until the MLSPA and MLS agree to a CBA and make them public, if they choose to do so. but this is all I've been able to collect: DC United Marco Etcheverry - approx $400k expires 2003 Olsen - expires 2003 Nelsen - expires 2004 per SA Confidential Convey - expires 2005 per USAToday Salary $120k Stewart - expires 2004 Max salary 2004 Kovalenko - expires 2003 per Washington Post
When talking about next year's cap, don't you also need to include Cerritos? Part of the trade with Dallas included cap room for this year. Next year we'll be saddled with his full salary (though i don't know what it is).