2026 Roster and Transfer Discussion Thread

Just posted that because it's the only news about a potential name I've seen since Sylla and Pascal coached in Hungary so maybe there's something there.
 
SoupInNYC said:
https://twitter.com/x/status/2028943837595357404
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My big takeaway from this was confirming that we can, in fact, buy down Thiago Martins as Tom Bogert initially reported and that the roster profile the league posted is incorrect.

Later on, I asked Todd Dunivant to clarify the DP situation and he also mentioned there is one available now and later on, explicitly said that they are able to buy down Thiago Martins.
 
ZYanksRule said:
And we are starting to amass evidence that the slow-moving nature of our signings was a David Lee problem.

Sporting KC is an absolute mess right now, and we signed an impact player in January and (nearly) signed a DP striker too before the medicals failed.

We still need more information, but I am fairly convinced our slow-moving signings were David Lee's fault.

As for the CFG issue, that interview from Brad Sims makes it pretty clear that as long as we stay within the budget, we have free reign to sign players; CFG is not the reason for the slow decision-making, unless Brad is lying which is certainly possible.
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I wouldn't use this offseason at SKC to judge David Lee. They were in the middle of selling the team so he likely had zero insight into what kind of budget he was allowed. This offseason was a very unique situation for whoever would have been the Sporting Director in SKC.
 
Dunivant didn't make much news in this answer, but for the sake of completeness after yesterday's conversation here's what he said about signing a striker this window. The piece of news is that the Club is also looking for a winger.

Q: The striker position is the one that's the glaring spot on the roster there that you're addressing. Is the club actively talking to players now to add someone in this window these three weeks? If so, can you give us some insight into that profile that you're looking for?

Todd Dunivant: Yeah, we're looking at that now and we hope to. Ultimately, we're not going to force it and make a bad decision. At the same time, we want to add to the team now. We've been actively looking in the market and have a list of names that we're working through. I think from our profile, Alonso brought so much verticality to our team and ability to get behind defenses that you're going to miss. Somebody that can do that is helpful. We also, just from a team structure standpoint, not having a 9 shows up. Again, we can make it work, but it's not ideal. So I think having somebody come in that is a true No 9, or has the ability to play there, is what we're thinking about.

We also feel like we could add another another winger, as well. We loaned out Julian Fernández to Rosario in Argentina, found an opportunity for him that we thought he would really thrive in. He's going into Argentina and sort of stepping in next to Angel Di Maria. You know, childhood dream for him, but also he's elevated his game to another level, and that's good for us and good for the club. But it's a good player that's out of our team that we want to replace. So I think that's another area, we've got two spots that we're really trying to look at.
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It's very much a write-your-own-adventure deal right now, but I'm still hopeful we get it done in the next few weeks.

From HRB: Todd Dunivant: 'We do have flexibility to add a DP'
 
ZYanksRule said:
Dunivant didn't make much news in this answer, but for the sake of completeness after yesterday's conversation here's what he said about signing a striker this window. The piece of news is that the Club is also looking for a winger.



It's very much a write-your-own-adventure deal right now, but I'm still hopeful we get it done in the next few weeks.

From HRB: Todd Dunivant: 'We do have flexibility to add a DP'
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If we sign 2 DP level attackers that are of similar quality to Nico I will join you in thinking this team can contend for the cup. That said I think they have to bring at least one of the two on board this window. If they wait on both until the second window we are going to drop too many points and enter the playoffs with minimal home games. Not to mention the insane amount of miles that will put on Maxi.
 
One other possibly enlightening tidbit from Sims was buried down in a question about his thoughts on the new sponsorship slot on the back of the jersey. Of course he's excited about it because its a revenue opportunity but towards the end of the response he said this:

You open up a piece of inventory like that, that's a piece of inventory we think should sell for $4 or $5 million bucks a year. That's two DPs. That's two really good players from a piece of inventory that wasn't available to us a few weeks ago.
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Maybe he misspoke, but assuming he didn't that means the club budgets for annual DP salaries in the $2M-$3M range. Nico makes $3.5M annually so it lines up. If thats how Sims thinks about DPs its a pretty strong sign that there are no plans to go out and sign a big name anytime soon as Son makes north of $10M per season and you'd have to assume guys like Salah and Griezemann would command similar deals.
 
gbservis said:
One other possibly enlightening tidbit from Sims was buried down in a question about his thoughts on the new sponsorship slot on the back of the jersey. Of course he's excited about it because its a revenue opportunity but towards the end of the response he said this:



Maybe he misspoke, but assuming he didn't that means the club budgets for annual DP salaries in the $2M-$3M range. Nico makes $3.5M annually so it lines up. If thats how Sims thinks about DPs its a pretty strong sign that there are no plans to go out and sign a big name anytime soon as Son makes north of $10M per season and you'd have to assume guys like Salah and Griezemann would command similar deals.
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I really don't know what Sims exact thoughts were when he said that, but I got the sense it was more of, that could be 2 DPs just from a pure math standpoint. Not necessarily that's what he thinks the club would be spending on DPs.
 
gbservis said:
If we sign 2 DP level attackers that are of similar quality to Nico I will join you in thinking this team can contend for the cup. That said I think they have to bring at least one of the two on board this window. If they wait on both until the second window we are going to drop too many points and enter the playoffs with minimal home games. Not to mention the insane amount of miles that will put on Maxi.
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Agreed! If they don't bring in an attacker -- and preferably a DP attacker -- this window, their odds of going on a deep run are substantially lower. it absolutely needs to happen this window for them to be a legitimate MLS Cup threat.
 
We don't need a 3rd DP right now for MLS Cup. we can limp across the playoff line like we did last year with Nico and go on a run. An interesting data trend is that in recent years home field advantage is way down.

We do need that DP if we want to compete for all the trophies.
 
A player I thought was pretty harshly criticized on here last season Aiden O’Neil has been fantastic since about September last season. To create a verb, he sixes well. He cuts off passing lanes and angles, tackles very well and is a very good passer and carrier of the ball. I think he needed some time to find his feet but he has been great since last Autumn.
 
BC19 said:
A player I thought was pretty harshly criticized on here last season Aiden O’Neil has been fantastic since about September last season. To create a verb, he sixes well. He cuts off passing lanes and angles, tackles very well and is a very good passer and carrier of the ball. I think he needed some time to find his feet but he has been great since last Autumn.
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From a counting stats standpoint I'd say the criticism last season was well warranted. His defensive stats were pretty underwhelming last season especially considering the caliber of player he was touted to be and the fees the club paid for him. He's been way better this season, it seems a full off season and camp is allowing us to see him at his best but last season he wasn't good. Per 90 defensive stats of O'Neil by season:

Screenshot 2026-03-09 at 12.33.21 PM.png
 
gbservis said:
From a counting stats standpoint I'd say the criticism last season was well warranted. His defensive stats were pretty underwhelming last season especially considering the caliber of player he was touted to be and the fees the club paid for him. He's been way better this season, it seems a full off season and camp is allowing us to see him at his best but last season he wasn't good. Per 90 defensive stats of O'Neil by season:

View attachment 14436
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yea. i was definitely expecting more from him last season. but I always forget he didn't have a pre-season and he was coming off a full season in europe too. he has been better this season and thankfully, has worked well with Parks. Would have been an issue if they didn't play well together.
 
When Perea is back and we have O'Neill, Parks, Perea, and Trewin for basically 3 spots that's going to be interesting. Wonder how Pascal handles that because we have some serious players for the D-mid/CB spots.
 
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