2023 Roster and Transfer Discussion Thread
- Thread starter Shwafta
- Start date
Uh - Leicester has been remarkably successful. Not sure that’s the best analogy.
As long as we are more successful than the Yankees.
We should demand a good team every year -- any good fanbase would. But we should also understand that these kinds of seasons are going to happen. 18 months after winning MLS Cup, I think we can be a little more patient is all. We should give this front office the benefit of the doubt.
While I agree, a counter point is Seattle who only had that season once in their MLS history... And a few scares in the past with incredible runs to reach the playoffs. I don't see why teams, in the case ours, can't do it consistently at the top... In Europe one season outside the top 4 or 6 is the end of the world. Should be the same in MLS eventually.
The salary cap kind of precludes that. It ensures every team will have a bad season from time to time when you need to reset your roster. If the salary cap ever gets abolished in MLS, that's when I think it would be more fair to demand a top team every single season.
I don’t think some people realize how much salary caps inhibit dynasties. Look at the NHL, NFL and MLB, not other soccer leagues, for comparison. In MLB and the NHL and the NFL even the richest and best run teams have “reset” years and normal fans have sophisticated grasp of that. It’s almost impossible in the NHL or MLB (or MLS) to keep the core of a top team together for more than a year or two. Our previous core was together for 5 or so, which points to skilled cap management.
There are outliers like the Sounders or most notably, the Patriots, who manage “soft resets” and manage not to fall off very hard.
I think the jury is still out on whether this season will turn out to be a soft or hard reset season, given that if we distributed all five goals we scored last night across five games (2 NE, COL, ORL and ATL), we’d be sitting comfortably in the playoff picture in 5th place, 3 points out of the top 3 in a very competitive East. On the thin evidence of how we played last night with Bakrar, I’d argue that the Talles to striker experiment accounts for most of that swing.
Back to the outliers: this team will never be the Pats or the Sounders under the CFG model. Maybe best to find another club to support if that is your expectation. It also will never be the Rapids. And even the owner behind the Pats hasn’t been able to replicate the model with the Revs. Thinking that we or any team in a capped league can be like a Real Madrid or Man City is just delusional. If the cap comes off, that’s a different story.
This has been an extremely frustrating season, but we ain’t Toronto or the Galaxy with big stars and no path to improvement. And even at this moment, tied on points in the league with a tentative stadium situation we are better off than our neighbors at RBNJ.
BTW we still need another striker as injury insurance and for different looks.
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I remember a bunch of our players screening in manchster
Seattle missed the playoffs last year, as did LAFC in 2021 Neither were as bad as NYCFC has been for most of this year, but I don't care too much about differentiated levels of bad. I care some, but only so much.
Revfugee is right: every MLS team eventually gets caught by the limitations of MLS cap rules. You miss on a couple of signings, or injuries, or your roster turnover happens all at once, and you cannot just go out and get new guys because you have no cap space. And when you have cap space and need to overhaul, you can't always just go out and grab the best available at that moment because you cannot afford to make mistakes.
NYCFC was put together in 2018-19 to have a 3-4 year run with limited turnover. I wrote this in the summer of 2020:
I did not include it in the post, but I remember I was also thinking about how we signed Johnson, Callens and Ring, to simultaneous extensions through 2022. We very much were built to go on the run that eventually culminated in the 2021 MLS Cup win. So Covid comes in, and among other obvious disruptions we end up needing a new DP earlier because of the Mitrita family situation and we also need to trade Ring. We also trade Matarrita for reasons. Apart from that, the team core remained remarkably stable through 2021 (as I predicted) and even mostly through 2022.
Lee had to replace Mitrita Ring and Mata, and the U22 initiative also presented an opportunity to add on. But the core was extremely consistent during that period. Of course the defensive trio of Johnson, Callens and Chanot was in its 5th year together in 2021. Even many of the young guys on 2021 NYCFC were team veterans. The top 3 goal-scorers (Taty, Medina and Shradi) were just 22, 23 and 26. but every single one was in his 4th year at NYCFC.
That's a long time to hold 70+% of a MLS starting lineup together. And then it started unraveling. Medina was released when his contract ended in 2021; Shradi was the club's first big loss to expansion; Tinny started breaking down, Gudi and Ronny said veni vidi vici see ya, Maxi went home for a retirement tour, SJ and Callens decided to pursue other options, etc. That's just how it goes.
Revfugee is right: every MLS team eventually gets caught by the limitations of MLS cap rules. You miss on a couple of signings, or injuries, or your roster turnover happens all at once, and you cannot just go out and get new guys because you have no cap space. And when you have cap space and need to overhaul, you can't always just go out and grab the best available at that moment because you cannot afford to make mistakes.NYCFC was put together in 2018-19 to have a 3-4 year run with limited turnover. I wrote this in the summer of 2020:
I did not include it in the post, but I remember I was also thinking about how we signed Johnson, Callens and Ring, to simultaneous extensions through 2022. We very much were built to go on the run that eventually culminated in the 2021 MLS Cup win. So Covid comes in, and among other obvious disruptions we end up needing a new DP earlier because of the Mitrita family situation and we also need to trade Ring. We also trade Matarrita for reasons. Apart from that, the team core remained remarkably stable through 2021 (as I predicted) and even mostly through 2022.
Lee had to replace Mitrita Ring and Mata, and the U22 initiative also presented an opportunity to add on. But the core was extremely consistent during that period. Of course the defensive trio of Johnson, Callens and Chanot was in its 5th year together in 2021. Even many of the young guys on 2021 NYCFC were team veterans. The top 3 goal-scorers (Taty, Medina and Shradi) were just 22, 23 and 26. but every single one was in his 4th year at NYCFC.
That's a long time to hold 70+% of a MLS starting lineup together. And then it started unraveling. Medina was released when his contract ended in 2021; Shradi was the club's first big loss to expansion; Tinny started breaking down, Gudi and Ronny said veni vidi vici see ya, Maxi went home for a retirement tour, SJ and Callens decided to pursue other options, etc. That's just how it goes.
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i dont think they have anything set up here for physicals etc. thats why they go over there first. although i could of sworn someone did their physicals in Torque (santi?) and not UK.
Now this i have no idea. I'd assume they just have better medical stuff and are probably part of the "city group" so they're given a full experience?
This could be an interesting question to ask in a Brad Sims interview.
I wonder if it has to do with visas. Maybe it's awkward or even legally problematic to bring a player here w/o a work visa but for a work physical, and then where does he go until the actual work visa shows up. So you do the physical in England where there is no goal of keeping him long term.
Just tried doing a bit of research into this topic but it's surprisingly hard to find information about this .
P1-A visa (Athlete visa) | U.S. work visas | IAS
Athletes with national or internationally recognized talent are eligible to come to the United States temporarily for work with the P1-A visa (Athlete visa).
us.iasservices.org.uk
...But those are work visa, i think for the case of a medical you could probably just get them in with B-1 or B-2 temporarily.
Visitor Visa
Generally, a citizen of a foreign country who wishes to enter the United States must first obtain a visa, either a nonimmigrant visa for a temporary stay, or an immigrant visa for permanent residence. Visitor visas are nonimmigrant visas for persons who want to enter the United States...
It's one thing to give the front office the benefit of the doubt for a few years after a championship and another to just be blindly optimistic when serious red flags are popping up with regard to how the roster is being built. We won the cup with Maxi, a DP with proven big-league experience, and a solid mix of young players and veterans. If the team continued this formula and just got unlucky with a few signings because that happens they get a pass based on the championship.
This front office has completely abandoned the balance between veteran and youth signings. They are treating the team like some CFG youth academy. The team clearly lacks veteran leadership yet all they do is sign more under-22-year-old players. The post-championship leniency comes with some level of conditions and in my opinion, they have used up all their benefit of the doubt.
2022 transfers in (age):
- Thiago Martins (26)
- Kevin O'Toole (23) - not really sure he fits here as he was a local kid, initial depth signing, etc. don't think he fits into any grand transfer plan
- Gabriel Pereira (20)
- Matias Pelligrini (22) - he probably shouldn't be here but instead below in 2023 as a 23 year-old since he was just initially claimed off waivers and then later signed permanently
2023 transfers in (age):
- Braian Cufre (26)
- Monsef Bakrar (22)
- Birk Risa (25)
- Mitja Ilenic (18)
- Matt Freese (24)
- Tony Alfaro (29)
- Gabriel Segal (21)
- Richy Ledezma (22)
- James Sands (22) - not sure he really should be included here since he returned from loan
- Santiago Rodriguez (23)
- *Julian Fernandez (19)
Yeah, most of the signings are on the younger side of things for sure, but when we look at those that I think fit a "transfer plan" in terms of the first team roster (those that I've bolded above), it's about 50/50 in terms of youth signings vs veteran signings the last two years. Cufre, Risa, and Thiago Martins were all square in the middle of their career while Ilenic, Pereira, Bakrar, and Fernandez are all real young signings.
I also don't mean to imply with this response that there aren't red flags to how the roster has been built, especially considering the departures this club has had the last season and a half. The lack of ability to fill particular spots in a timely fashion with quality players (ST, 10, Winger Depth, LCB) have been incredibly detrimental to the team this season. And the FO should be receiving quite a lot of valid criticism for that for sure.
But I don't think saying that this is acting as some CFG youth academy is quite right when quite a few of the signings are almost certainly not going to net any profits for CFG (Risa, Thiago Martins, Cufre). On the other hand, the talented young attackers that are being sold haven't gone to CFG clubs (Taty and GP) while at the same time those players were some of the best in the league their time at NYCFC. So I think for those players there has been that balance of future profits as well as production on the field in helping this team win.
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