2025 Roster and Transfer Discussion Thread
- Thread starter LionNYC
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Good enough, I suppose. Wish we had also gotten a second winger or a striker, but that's a lower priority. Would have been better to have closed the deal for Gustavo earlier.
In the end, we added a DP at the biggest area of need, and he seems to be a good one so far.
In the end, we added a DP at the biggest area of need, and he seems to be a good one so far.
I'd say in the context of just this season, it's fine, Lee added the minimum he needed to fill the biggest gaps. My concern is that Lee consistently says he prefers to add players in this window. If that's true and he plans to do minimal business in the off-season, he needed to do much more.
ZYanksRule
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That's the thing for me. He did what he needed to do, but his actions continue to not match his words. It feels like at the end of every window, he kicks the can down the road to the next window.
I agree with this. There can never be a complete window, always something that gets pushed out or kicked down the road.
ZYanksRule
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There's a level of hypocrisy between what he says and what he does which is very hard to square.
Is it possible Agu showed enough in training to make a winger less of a priority? Is it possible Malachi is close to returning and will be available for the full season next year and possibly make it no priority at all?
I really don't know. And I don't know whether Keaton's situation is affecting our long-range plans, either.
All I'm sure of is, we got our guy in Nico. No doubt in my mind he's a great acquisition. So, in my book, all is forgiven. (For now. LOL)
I think at min we need another attacker and a left back. Even if you rate Ojeda and Fernandez, theres been multiple where games where we have needed an another attacker off the bench.
We need a backup left back, at least. We had almost zero options when O'Toole got hurt, although credit where credit is due, Birk Risa gave a good account of himself when he was pressed into service.
But alas, he's back home, and Cavallo went ice cold after a promising start.
As far as the attack is concerned, we're going to find out everything we need to know about the current squad over the next nine matches.
The Risa at LB tactic with Haak surging into the attack worked well in a number of games. Gustavo is a fast, left-footed CB. Is he the new backup LB and occasional starter when Pascal wants to run his old Risa at LB tactics?
As it stands now, we’ve had two players transfer out this window and two transfers in. Add to that all of the transfers out over the winter window, and the roster depletion due to injuries, and we’re still a couple of players short of a full, competitive roster. I realize that as a metric for addressing team needs, this is a bit of a blunt tool, but at the least I expected the in/out ratio to be in the plus side this window. We’re also sitting on a mountain of GAM, have several open international slots, and could add one more of a U22/DP. I don’t get it. I’m tired of going into matches hamstrung by the front office.
There was one brief period in the last 3 years when the club felt complete.
The roster started falling behind in summer 2022 when they let Taty go and did not replace him. That's 3 years ago. There were some big departures the next winter and the roster for the first 70% of 2023 was horrifically incomplete. I think we briefly seemed complete after the winter 2023-24 window. Between July 2023 and February 2024 they added Bakrar, Risa, Perea, Martinez, Moralez, Fernandez, Freese, Wolf, Jones, Ojeda, Tanasijevic, and Mijatovic, plus other smaller pieces. They really did stock up. In March to May or so of 2024 the roster seemed complete.
But the problem quickly arose that too many of the front line acquisitions were either not good, too raw, or soon became hurt. Bakrar and Mijatovic are gone. Jones is out long term. Maxi missed close to a year and while performing admirably in 2025 he has a rapidly diminishing shelf life. Fernandez and Ojeda are still mostly potential despite being here 1.5 to 2 years. And the club hasn't replaced any of them really. The biggest transfer in this summer replaced Santi, who left in winter 2024-25.
The roster started falling behind in summer 2022 when they let Taty go and did not replace him. That's 3 years ago. There were some big departures the next winter and the roster for the first 70% of 2023 was horrifically incomplete. I think we briefly seemed complete after the winter 2023-24 window. Between July 2023 and February 2024 they added Bakrar, Risa, Perea, Martinez, Moralez, Fernandez, Freese, Wolf, Jones, Ojeda, Tanasijevic, and Mijatovic, plus other smaller pieces. They really did stock up. In March to May or so of 2024 the roster seemed complete.
But the problem quickly arose that too many of the front line acquisitions were either not good, too raw, or soon became hurt. Bakrar and Mijatovic are gone. Jones is out long term. Maxi missed close to a year and while performing admirably in 2025 he has a rapidly diminishing shelf life. Fernandez and Ojeda are still mostly potential despite being here 1.5 to 2 years. And the club hasn't replaced any of them really. The biggest transfer in this summer replaced Santi, who left in winter 2024-25.
It initially appeared to be a rebuild, but now it seems like constant roster turnover, where every departure requires multiple transfer windows to replace.
ZYanksRule
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Four weeks ago today, NYCFC announced Thiago Martins had undergone surgery and would return to full training in 4-6 weeks.
Today, Pascal said Thiago is available for Saturday. Very quick recovery.
Today, Pascal said Thiago is available for Saturday. Very quick recovery.
Good question. It's entirely possible. Our gaffer certainly knows what he's doing, and he's not in the least bit afraid to throw a wrinkle or two out there.
I expected more, too. I couldn't be any happier with Nico, who was the main priority. Hopefully, we've hit the bullseye with Gustavo as well. But I thought we'd use more of our dry powder.
It's possible Lee was waiting for word on Keaton's status and long-term prognosis. Those are extremely tough shoes for us to fill should it come to that (it's heartbreaking to even think about it, but there it is). That's just a guess, though.
I'd expect significant turnover with a develop-and-sell strategy, but there's no denying it: we don't seem to move with alacrity. There may be good reasons for that. But from a supporter's perspective, it's frustrating as hell.
Returning to the poll my son set up in June. He forgot to tabulate before he set off for summer camp, and then we were out of the country for much of July. Well, he finally finished it today.My 9-YO wants me to offer everyone the chance to participate in a poll on the best players on this year's team. It's through Google Docs and simply asks you to vote for your Top 10 players in order.
The key is to make sure you don't pick a player twice, as that will mess up the voting. You will have until June 20 to put in your answers.
Should be fun.
Below are the results. They are a good snapshot of how we were feeling about things in the first half of June. Thanks to all who participated.
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