2024 Roster and Transfer Discussion Thread

I'm excited for it. There's going to be lots of variance in game-to-game performances, but we should be exciting at the very least. If these kids are as good as their transfer price and pedigree suggests, we should be really fun this year.

I like having players who are hungry to take another step in their development.
We are generally aiming higher. There's an obviously higher ceiling for a 10+ million 18-year old (Mijatovic) than for a 2mill 22 year old (Bakrar). I find it exciting, but it's obviously unbalanced for the lack of more veteran leadership. Also, the whole league is investing more across the board, so we are trying to get back to being a playoff team and more, but also just keeping up with this new reality.
 
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We are generally aiming higher. There's an obviously higher ceiling for a 10+ million 18-year old (Mijatovic) than for a 2mill 22 year old (Bakrar). I find it exciting, but it's obviously unbalanced for the lack of more veteran leadership. Also, the whole league is investing more across the board, so we are trying to get back to being a playoff team and more, but also just keeping up with this new reality.

Unless Magno is gone and Mijatovic is the replacement for the young DP slot I don't like the signing at all. 18 years old from a weak league means the entire 10+ Million price is about potential, we need guys ready to go now. Imagine the type of player we could get if we spent 10+ Million on a proven 24-28 year-old that will stick around for 5 years and is ready to make an impact on day 1. Mijatovic is going to take time to develop and if he works out he will be sold .5-1.5 seasons after he starts making an impact for us. Given capped GAM on transfers even if we sell him for $15M the benefit to NYCFC from a roster-building perspective is minimal. This is a farm team move, not an aspiring for championships team move.
 
Unless Magno is gone and Mijatovic is the replacement for the young DP slot I don't like the signing at all. 18 years old from a weak league means the entire 10+ Million price is about potential, we need guys ready to go now. Imagine the type of player we could get if we spent 10+ Million on a proven 24-28 year-old that will stick around for 5 years and is ready to make an impact on day 1. Mijatovic is going to take time to develop and if he works out he will be sold .5-1.5 seasons after he starts making an impact for us. Given capped GAM on transfers even if we sell him for $15M the benefit to NYCFC from a roster-building perspective is minimal. This is a farm team move, not an aspiring for championships team move.

The rumor is that Mijatovic is here for only 6 months, then he goes back to Man City. If so, he's a placeholder until we get another striker in the summer window. Which isn't ideal because it takes time for guys to get comfortable in MLS, but we saw last year how much we improved after the summer window. I'm willing to give the organization the benefit of the doubt; the vast majority of transfers have worked out for us over the last few years.
 
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The rumor is that Mijatovic is here for only 6 months, then he goes back to Man City.
I saw that rumor as well, and since it's only a rumor and nothing in his history indicates he's currently even borderline Man City material, I'll choose to wait and see. But if it's true that bullshit. We get nothing from babysitting an 18 year old for half of a season, especially the first half.
Unless Magno is gone and Mijatovic is the replacement for the young DP slot I don't like the signing at all. 18 years old from a weak league means the entire 10+ Million price is about potential, we need guys ready to go now. Imagine the type of player we could get if we spent 10+ Million on a proven 24-28 year-old that will stick around for 5 years and is ready to make an impact on day 1. Mijatovic is going to take time to develop and if he works out he will be sold .5-1.5 seasons after he starts making an impact for us. Given capped GAM on transfers even if we sell him for $15M the benefit to NYCFC from a roster-building perspective is minimal. This is a farm team move, not an aspiring for championships team move.
I'm still holding out for my hopeful best case scenario, which is we're building for a run in 3 years, and will pick up the proven 24-28 year old - maybe a 10 - when we're closer and have a DP spot open.

It does seem that MLS has a bit of a manic obsession right now for being a selling league. It's fine to recognize reality and act accordingly. But it's not really something to celebrate. But every time some team gets a big payday a lot of people seem to things it's wonderful. I mean, fine. I have nothing against the owners making money. But Atlanta FC's roster wasn't helped when they sold Almiron for a record fee, and we didn't benefit from the Taty payoff. If Atlanta sets another record with Almeda it will just mean they rented a promising kid for 2-3 years with probably no hardware to show for it. Again, I get the reality. These transfers had to happen and MLS might as well make a profit along the way. But I "woohoo we sold our best player and made money that can't be invested in salary" is a weird cheer.
 
I saw that rumor as well, and since it's only a rumor and nothing in his history indicates he's currently even borderline Man City material, I'll choose to wait and see. But if it's true that bullshit. We get nothing from babysitting an 18 year old for half of a season, especially the first half.

I'm still holding out for my hopeful best case scenario, which is we're building for a run in 3 years, and will pick up the proven 24-28 year old - maybe a 10 - when we're closer and have a DP spot open.

It does seem that MLS has a bit of a manic obsession right now for being a selling league. It's fine to recognize reality and act accordingly. But it's not really something to celebrate. But every time some team gets a big payday a lot of people seem to things it's wonderful. I mean, fine. I have nothing against the owners making money. But Atlanta FC's roster wasn't helped when they sold Almiron for a record fee, and we didn't benefit from the Taty payoff. If Atlanta sets another record with Almeda it will just mean they rented a promising kid for 2-3 years with probably no hardware to show for it. Again, I get the reality. These transfers had to happen and MLS might as well make a profit along the way. But I "woohoo we sold our best player and made money that can't be invested in salary" is a weird cheer.

But these players are also helping you win. Talles scored the game-winning goal in Philly and scored two penalties on the road to the title. We sold Taty to Europe after he won MLS Cup for us. Santi helped, too. Sands was sold after MLS Cup, but that's a different story.

You spend money on players, hope they help you win something, then you sell them at profit and use that profit to help create the next transfer. No the money doesn't help with GAM, but it's money teams can use for the next transfer fee.
 
I saw that rumor as well, and since it's only a rumor and nothing in his history indicates he's currently even borderline Man City material, I'll choose to wait and see. But if it's true that bullshit. We get nothing from babysitting an 18 year old for half of a season, especially the first half.

I'm still holding out for my hopeful best case scenario, which is we're building for a run in 3 years, and will pick up the proven 24-28 year old - maybe a 10 - when we're closer and have a DP spot open.

It does seem that MLS has a bit of a manic obsession right now for being a selling league. It's fine to recognize reality and act accordingly. But it's not really something to celebrate. But every time some team gets a big payday a lot of people seem to things it's wonderful. I mean, fine. I have nothing against the owners making money. But Atlanta FC's roster wasn't helped when they sold Almiron for a record fee, and we didn't benefit from the Taty payoff. If Atlanta sets another record with Almeda it will just mean they rented a promising kid for 2-3 years with probably no hardware to show for it. Again, I get the reality. These transfers had to happen and MLS might as well make a profit along the way. But I "woohoo we sold our best player and made money that can't be invested in salary" is a weird cheer.

to be fair to atlanta, it's not like they didn't try to replace almiron. they brought in pity martinez, who was south american player of the year or something like that?, and barco. both of who were top notch talents when they were brought in. they just didn't adapt to MLS or atlanta or both or whatever.

i don't mind selling, but you're right we need to replace players we sell, and not just with more young players to develop, but with an eye to actually compete and win trophies.
 
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to be fair to atlanta, it's not like they didn't try to replace almiron. they brought in pity martinez, who was south american player of the year or something like that?, and barco. both of who were top notch talents when they were brought in. they just didn't adapt to MLS or atlanta or both or whatever.

i don't mind selling, but you're right we need to replace players we sell, and not just with more young players to develop, but with an eye to actually compete and win trophies.

I don't think those are mutually exclusive, though. You can replace sold players with young players and still compete. We won a trophy with a core that was together for 4 years, but with a lot of young players around them.

Our spine has been together here for a while now, too. Parks, Sands, Martins, Santi and Talles have all been here for a while now. Risa likely to be here for a while. If Freese continues his strong play, he'll be here a while. That's seven core players with young players built around them. We're signing guys to five-year deals so if they're not sold, we have a window for the next 3-4 years with this group of players.
 
to be fair to atlanta, it's not like they didn't try to replace almiron. they brought in pity martinez, who was south american player of the year or something like that?, and barco. both of who were top notch talents when they were brought in. they just didn't adapt to MLS or atlanta or both or whatever.

i don't mind selling, but you're right we need to replace players we sell, and not just with more young players to develop, but with an eye to actually compete and win trophies.
For sure Atlanta tried. A lot of people here, around MLS, and probably in the Atlanta front office mistakenly thought they had the secret formula after their success in 2017-18 with Almiron and Joseph. Turns out it might even be harder to replicate success paying fees for exciting young players than it is paying DP salaries for established aging stars.
This is where the league is right now.
 
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I'm excited for it. There's going to be lots of variance in game-to-game performances, but we should be exciting at the very least. If these kids are as good as their transfer price and pedigree suggests, we should be really fun this year.

I like having players who are hungry to take another step in their development.
Ditto. I'm not into paying big money for guys on the other side of the hill, especially in our league.
 
We're making good progress with transfers this off-season. way better so far than last year! I already can't keep up with all the names!
 
This is building the core (hopefully) for the first year in the stadium which will have massive expectations, like MLS Cup or bust.

I think we're building towards competing for another Cup before 2027. I think we're building to 2025-2026, trying to get a head start on the stadium using the World Cup as a slingshot.

"Oh, you enjoyed the World Cup? Come check out the defending MLS Cup champions while you're in town!"
 
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