YNT-Eligible MLS Players, 2025 In-Season Thread

Gozo has looked better. I agree, end product not there, but he hasn't looked out of place starting MLS games, which I feel is a difference from his prior MLS appearances. He's making strides.

 

I think Pareja and Arena have played enough youngsters that when they don't we need to look closer and not assume they deserve lots of minutes and instead try and figure out if they aren't as good as we think or have a clearly better player in front of them. They get to see them every day and while I know for sure coaches make bad decisions each of those two clearly do play young players ate times.

 

Yeah Arena isn't playing Niko Tsakiris (or Noel Buck who he just acquired) much but he is certainly playing Beu Leroux... who has 2 goals 3 assists and just made the MLS team of the week vs Miami. We'll see if he was right about Oscar Verhoeven, who they sent on loan to San Diego after playing him for just 5 minutes, he already has around 35 minutes for San Diego who are higher up in the standings.

 

Didn't realize that was a loan. Might be pretty smart if he gets playing time in MLS and SD takes all of the lumps a young defender might have and then once the loan is over he's ready to start.

 

Verhoeven got his first start at RB yesterday and helped SD keep a clean sheet.
It's not even clear that Arena sees Verhoeven at RB, his 5 minutes for the Quakes before being loaned to SD were in the midfield and after the game Arena said that's where he's best suited.
So far it seems pretty clear that Arena prefers college draft picks (a half dozen guys from Leroux to Munie) to Quakes homegrowns (Tsakiris sidelined, Verhoeven loaned out)...

 

They initially didn’t even want to send him to San Diego FC. The deal might’ve been done in preseason if they were initially open to the idea.

 

Hey may just miss eligibility for this thread but here's the NYT article on Alex Freeman

https://www.nytimes.com/athletic/6366691/2025/05/19/alex-freeman-orlando-city-mls-usmnt-antonio/

 

Most U23 minutes from Inter Miami (3.5k) to Charlotte FC (0)

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This is actually pretty bonkers.... even Toronto FC has given American U-23s more minutes than St Louis, Columbus, and Charlotte.

6. CF Montréal - 2798
20. Vancouver Whitecaps - 1122
27. Toronto FC - 340

28. St. Louis City SC - 245
29. Columbus Crew - 161
30. Charlotte FC - 0

 

I would have expected Columbus to produce and integrate more talent beyond Morris over the last 5 years. Yea places like Portland and Minnesota probably are the furthest places from soccer hotbeds in the US but you’d think between the 2 of them they’d do better than just Farfan.

I would have expected Nashville to do better than spotty minutes for a 19yr old Corcoran by now. Cincinatti is another whose had enough time to develop their academy to do better than someone like Valenzuela. A year ago I’d complain about Orlando, but Freeman and the 16yr old prove they can now contribute to potential US NT players.

Generally things are much much better than they were 5+ years ago and especially 10+ years ago, but the additional player development probably needs to come from teams that don’t/rarely play young US players. I wouldn’t expect a team like Philly likely who tends to have 2-3 young HGs to start 4-5 season to season.

 

Really no excuse from the Crew here aside from being really good and chasing trophies. I wish Habroune had been given more of a shot in the last two seasons. There's definitely talent there between Adams, Brown, Habroune, Mrowka, etc.

St Louis and Charlotte are both newer teams, and it takes years to get academies up to speed to produce youth players. Especially true since youth development is a numbers game.

 

Habroune really should be playing more. He does well almost every sub appearance.

Presthus is the other Crew youngster I'd really like to see get more minutes.

 

Zavier Gozo goal

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debut

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Miller had the opening goal and an assist on the 3rd goal for NE last night. Also had another assist that was called back on a pass that could have been delivered to Miller sooner.

 

I feel like Rick has been pretty solid for Philly. Without having seen much of guys like Kochen at Barcelona or another at Leicester’s academy, Rick could be the most promising young GK around this age group.

 

Westfield has to do better defensively here. But Zaha is quality, so it was a tough assignment

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After that mistake, Westfield gets an assist on Anderson’s winner (Anderson’s first MLS goal)

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Peyton Miller went 90 minutes for the Revs in a 1-0 loss to Cincy. Miller played left wing, played well despite the result