don't think we can grade it until these guys show some worth. at least i don't know enough about college soccer to know if these guys have potential to be superstars. the hope is we find ourselves a KOT or Jones among these picks.
2026 Roster and Transfer Discussion Thread
- Thread starter LionNYC
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don't think we can grade it until these guys show some worth. at least i don't know enough about college soccer to know if these guys have potential to be superstars. the hope is we find ourselves a KOT or Jones among these picks.
ZYanksRule
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The high likelihood is that all of these guys will be for NYCFC2 and won't appear in a game for our team at least next season, so I don't think anyone knows. This draft is much more for the MLSNP team than it is for our team.
I haven't followed the college game in years, so I couldn't say. However, just by surfing around this afternoon to see what's what, it appears a lot of people think we may have struck gold with Luca Nikolai. Apparently he was a pretty good player coming through the Borussia Monchengladbach (sp?) youth system and he dropped, because a lot of teams thought he might be going back to Germany.
Given he ended up being the 87th pick in the draft, why not take a chance?
ZYanksRule
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I don't think it's this nefarious. I think it's as simple as we hired him during the holiday season and he needs time to close out his Sacramento duties and move across the country during the holidays. Obviously while he's in transit he can be in communication with the interim sporting director, whoever that is, and clearly the club is still getting stuff done (academy director and by all accounts a strong draft). I'm assuming they're putting off the biggest moves until Dunivant officially arrives, but we've never been a team that signed a lot of guys in December anyway, so they probably don't think it's a big deal.
I think we'd all prefer him to have already taken control, but he will still have nearly two months to make additions before the season starts and we always make signings late in the window anyway so this won't change anything.
Carolina MaxiWhy is that a downside? If anything it's an upside
The Sacramento Republic FC release has the answer, and it's SOP for NYCFC: hide info for no good reason:
"Sacramento Republic FC announced today that President and General Manager Todd Dunivant will step down from his role at the end of the year to pursue a new opportunity outside the club. Dunivant will continue to support the organization through the transition period, including ongoing recruitment efforts, completion of 2026 roster-building, and continued development of key strategic initiatives. Todd will join Major League Soccer’s New York City FC as the club’s third Sporting Director in January. "
We're going 3 months without an SD, with no announcement of who is acting SD, and NYCFC can't even be arsed to tell us why he needed to delay starting for a month when the answer is very simple. He's still working for Sacramento.
Also, if I had a nickel for every time someone offered the holiday season as an excuse for him not starting his job for a month during an active roster build season I'd have 2 nickels, which isn't much but really it's surprising to me that even one person thought it was cogent. People start new jobs in December in every industry and even move cross country to do so and it is by no means routine not to start in December while you still work for your old company because "holidays." It's true across industries, but the best analogous example is college football coaches. The regular season finishes end of November, teams fire and hire immediately (sometimes even in-season), and the coaches instantly start up with the new team and work on recruiting for the new school, even when the old team has playoffs and/or bowl games left to play. They don't take December off because the transfer portal is open in January and they need to do prep work. NYCFC has gone through the entire off-season roster process (Options and Bona Fide Offers, Free Agency, re-entry Phases 1 and 2, Waivers and the MLS Draft) with an unnamed person in charge while our SD works for a USL team instead.
Also, I guess there are no conflict of interest expectations for USL or MLS sporting directors because most players who get taken in the MLS draft are USL quality and Dunivant currently has 2 loyalties and apparently both Sacramento and NYCFC are OK with this. Lane Kiffin just tried to keep coaching Ole Miss in the CFB playoffs after taking the HC job at LSU and Ole Miss told him to FRO. Everyone besides Kiffin's agent and the hacks at ESPN understood that what Kiffin wanted to do was insanely improper.
As NYCFC secrecy, weirdness and mismanagement goes this is second or third tier level. The stakes for the Super Draft are not Super level. But it's poor form.
It's impressive I guess that they have had so much on field success despite a clear absence of standard management processes. We let SDs, coaches, and players leave whenever they want on their terms and haven't had a plan for a smooth and quick successorship since Lee succeeded Reyna on the same day in late 2019. Since then:
* Based on what we've learned in the past few months from Lee by way of anonymous leaks to Bogert I now wonder if Lee never much cared for Cushing, did not want to hire him in 2022, and CFG more or less forced him to after letting Lee diminish and undermine Nick as a provisional first. I'm inclined to believe Lee in the stories of his disagreements with CFG about firing Cushing and signing teenage daydream forwards.
"Sacramento Republic FC announced today that President and General Manager Todd Dunivant will step down from his role at the end of the year to pursue a new opportunity outside the club. Dunivant will continue to support the organization through the transition period, including ongoing recruitment efforts, completion of 2026 roster-building, and continued development of key strategic initiatives. Todd will join Major League Soccer’s New York City FC as the club’s third Sporting Director in January. "
We're going 3 months without an SD, with no announcement of who is acting SD, and NYCFC can't even be arsed to tell us why he needed to delay starting for a month when the answer is very simple. He's still working for Sacramento.
Also, if I had a nickel for every time someone offered the holiday season as an excuse for him not starting his job for a month during an active roster build season I'd have 2 nickels, which isn't much but really it's surprising to me that even one person thought it was cogent. People start new jobs in December in every industry and even move cross country to do so and it is by no means routine not to start in December while you still work for your old company because "holidays." It's true across industries, but the best analogous example is college football coaches. The regular season finishes end of November, teams fire and hire immediately (sometimes even in-season), and the coaches instantly start up with the new team and work on recruiting for the new school, even when the old team has playoffs and/or bowl games left to play. They don't take December off because the transfer portal is open in January and they need to do prep work. NYCFC has gone through the entire off-season roster process (Options and Bona Fide Offers, Free Agency, re-entry Phases 1 and 2, Waivers and the MLS Draft) with an unnamed person in charge while our SD works for a USL team instead.
Also, I guess there are no conflict of interest expectations for USL or MLS sporting directors because most players who get taken in the MLS draft are USL quality and Dunivant currently has 2 loyalties and apparently both Sacramento and NYCFC are OK with this. Lane Kiffin just tried to keep coaching Ole Miss in the CFB playoffs after taking the HC job at LSU and Ole Miss told him to FRO. Everyone besides Kiffin's agent and the hacks at ESPN understood that what Kiffin wanted to do was insanely improper.
As NYCFC secrecy, weirdness and mismanagement goes this is second or third tier level. The stakes for the Super Draft are not Super level. But it's poor form.
It's impressive I guess that they have had so much on field success despite a clear absence of standard management processes. We let SDs, coaches, and players leave whenever they want on their terms and haven't had a plan for a smooth and quick successorship since Lee succeeded Reyna on the same day in late 2019. Since then:
- it took 2 months to name Deila after Torrent left at roughly the same time as Reyna
- despite a multi-year history at CFG and NYCFC as both head coach for the ManCity women and first assistant to Deila and obvious successor, Cushing is named "interim" because I guess they weren't paying sufficient attention to have an opinion yet*
- 40 plus days to hire Jansen after firing Cushing
- 2 months to hire Dunivant plus a one month deferral
- when key players leave it often takes 2-3 transfer windows to sign a replacement
* Based on what we've learned in the past few months from Lee by way of anonymous leaks to Bogert I now wonder if Lee never much cared for Cushing, did not want to hire him in 2022, and CFG more or less forced him to after letting Lee diminish and undermine Nick as a provisional first. I'm inclined to believe Lee in the stories of his disagreements with CFG about firing Cushing and signing teenage daydream forwards.
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ZYanksRule
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Perea re-signed, per Club announcement. Through the 2027-2028 season, with an option for the 2028-2029 season.
Interestingly, there is no Club comment in the press release, which is an indication Dunivant negotiated this but they can't confirm that.
Interestingly, there is no Club comment in the press release, which is an indication Dunivant negotiated this but they can't confirm that.
ezbeezy214
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Basically a buffer year to see how he recovers. Have to do it.
ZYanksRule
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Glenn and Roberto said during the postseason run that Perea expected to be able to return near the start of the upcoming season. This is not a 12-month injury for Perea.
I think I saw somewhere it was a fibula fracture. If that's the case, he may indeed be ready by then, or maybe even sooner.
Not only do we let people leave whenever they want, but Sims actually frames this as an international strategy, one the club believes gives it a competitive advantage. I’m skeptical that NYCFC’s “we’ll accommodate any request when the time comes” approach is delivering enough upside to outweigh the very real downsides of losing coaches, sporting directors, and key players mid-season, often at the worst possible moments.
As I’ve said before, I don’t think the Nico signing is quite the coup Sims wants to make it out to be. And even if it were, Sims is essentially admitting it only happened because Nico knows he can leave whenever he wants. How is that a good thing for the club?
It also doesn’t seem to be helping with the Haak situation. If the club is truly as effective at accommodating players who want to move to Europe. and that’s clearly Haak’s goal. Why wasn’t he open to an extension last season, paired with a planned loan or sale to Europe this coming season?
Full Sims quote for reference:
Dude is jacked, though. As I just mentioned on HRB, Dyan reminds me of James Brooks from the NFL: a guy who looks undersized on paper but is a beast out there on the field.
One thing I noticed in the highlights was his ability to body up. It's just a small sample, of course. But throughout the reel, much bigger guys were trying to knock him off the ball and couldn't do it.
ezbeezy214
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Find that hard to believe still.
