ZYanksRule
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Good. About time. Glad he’s doing a real press conference.
Todd Dunivant Named New York City FC Sporting Director
- Thread starter ZYanksRule
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Good. About time. Glad he’s doing a real press conference.
Should we make our company line bingo cards?
- Excited to have Tallas back
- Some reference to the deep playoff run to justify the limited roster moves
- Disappointed to see Haak go, but they tried their best
- Maxi's leadership is important. We are lucky to have him back
- Some BS about the bar being high and the goal being to win trophies (despite their actual actions showing the opposite)
- Generic Julian is training with the team statement
- Some win-win comment about working with Illenic to find a situation that worked for him, and showing it as another example of how NYCFC does right by their players.
- Excited about the job, such a unique opportunity to step into an SD role on a team that just made the conference finals
- Something about young players stepping up this year
"It's an honor to be associated with such an historic club as New York City FC."
ezbeezy214
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We will continue to be active in the market, but have to be opportunistic given resources and wait for the right player and more importantly, person.
I'm cool with him taking a couple weeks to get his feet under the desk. But you're right, it's definitely time to hear from him.
I'd prefer to hear from him in the form of incoming roster moves patching our glaring holes as opposed to a press conferecne but I guess we take what we can get.
That would be great, but we still have the same problem we've always had: our primary transfer window is the world's secondary window. There's a much smaller talent pool to draw from this time of year.
Thank goodness that's changing next year.
But we'll see. If everyone is healthy (Alonso being excepted, of course) we're in pretty good shape except for striker, and maybe backup right back depending on whether Drew Baiera is ready to do a Jonny Shore. And you never know, Seymour Reid might surprise to the upside. He certainly has the physical skills.
That's not really an excuse when most MLS teams do not go 70% of most seasons with incomplete rosters. Also, after doing so in 2015, NYCFC managed not to do it for 7 years, but then 2 of the next 3, with this year TBD.
This has been a choice.
Ignoring academy, Next Pro, super draft, loan conversions, and waiver players as of today, MLS teams have added players through:
Players transferred from other leagues: 32
Players traded between MLS teams: 24
Players added as free agents: 23
That's an average of 2.63 players added per team; NYCFC still stands at 0.
The window timing is an NYCFC excuse; all the other teams in the league do just fine addressing their roster needs going into camp.
Source: MLSsoccer.com - The Official Site of Major League Soccer
Louder for the people in Orangeburg
Todd, Ignoring academy, Next Pro, super draft, loan conversions, and waiver players as of today, MLS teams have added a total of 79 players through transfers from other leagues, trades between MLS teams, and players added as free agents. That's an average of 2.63 players added per team; NYCFC still stands at 0. Without using winter window timing as an excuse, can you explain why NYCFC has failed to do what almost every other MLS team has done and make a meaningful winter signing?
I would really like someone at the presser to ask it like that.
I would like that as well, but I suspect we'd get an unsatisfying answer along the lines of, we brought Tallas back, and this is a team that just went to the EFC, we are in a much stronger position than other clubs, driving the addition numbers.
I actually don't think that would be spin either. The club's barometer for success is playoff wins, and their stats, which they rattle off about being the only team to have achieved blah blah conference finals and blah blah playoff appearances, serve as validation to them that their approach is working. They have a different approach: don't sign aging stars, stay younger, focus on the winter window, and don't worry about starting the season with roster holes, just have a plan to be whole come playoff time. They think they are outsmarting the rest of the league. We won't see a change until we miss the playoffs again or hit a stretch of consistent first-round exits.
0:00 – Introduction of Todd Dunivant
0:23 – Transition of USL to MLS
1:10 – Bringing Stronger Attendance Numbers to NYCFC
2:35 – Media Access to Players in 2026
4:17 – The Biggest Challenge For Todd in 2026
5:17 – Transfer Window Approach
6:35– Transfer Differences from USL to MLS
8:22 – Playing at Both Yankee Stadium and Citi Field Plus Etihad Park Next Season
9:27 – Interleague Transfers
10:57 – What Makes Todd Different From David Lee?
12:08 – Team Building Philosophy and Acquisition Priorities
14:15 – Talles Magno's Return
15:32 – His Involvement With Sacramento and the Decision to Leave
17:17 – Talles Magno's Return (2nd Question)
18:52 – Animosity between Todd vs David Beckham?
20:37 – Maxi Morales's Return
21:49 - Thoughts on the Travel involved with MLS
23:14 - 2027 Schedule Change and Contracts
24:59 - Philosophy About Contracts and Budgets For New Players
I'm not confident this is so in its entirety. I think it's a very situational justification. If we routinely earned 56-60+ points but won zero or 1 playoff round every year, much like we did pre Covid, they'd be talking about how fickle playoff results are and regular season results are the only measure of team success you can reliably control. I agree they are not adamant on having a full roster for most of the year, but I also think they believe that the early season holes in 2023, 25 and possibly this year are a series of unfortunate events.
I suspect they know they're overselling the playoff success aspect. It has to kill them that they've only had 1 playoff home game in each of 2024 and 2025. That's not good for profits, and will be more important once the stadium is in place and they can capture more of the playoff revenue.
tldr: I agree they're not as bothered by early season roster holes as we fans are, but I don't think they have a philosophy behind it. It just sort of happened and they're making up excuses along the way.
ezbeezy214
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It’s kinda funny (read: sad) they had this, with a question about media availability, yet at no point did NYCFC socials let it be known it was going to happen, happening, or say that it happened.
That last question by Roberto Abramowitz was especially good. Dunivant certainly implied CFG is ready and willing to spend, and how we do it is going to be determined by need and opportunity. As they should be.
But "we're in conversations weekly, sometimes daily" doesn't really clarify much. Who is in the conversations? Is it Todd and the sporting department with Brad and the suits in marketing? Or is it between New York City and Manchester?
I would have loved to be there to ask that follow up.
That's certainly a valid conclusion. The question is, why? To simply sit out windows and not bring players in even though we need them? To what end? To save a couple bucks, while at the same time writing a check for $785 million?
I'm having trouble squaring that circle. More likely, need and opportunity weren't aligned (at least in David Lee's judgment, for whatever that's worth).
Those are just numbers. Every team is different. Every team has a different core at a different stage of their development. Lumping the teams which are aging out and need new young talent with the teams who are young and green and need to bring in veteran talent with a team, like ours, where the entire roster — with the exception of Maxi — is either in their prime or about to enter it doesn't make analytical sense to me.
ZYanksRule
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Could not have said this any better myself.
MLS is improving rapidly. The top teams are getting better each season. Standing still is falling behind.
The acquisition numbers are an imperfect measure without context. Context:
Nico has never scored more than 6 goals in a season in his professional career. Nevertheless, based on his play in the final quarter of 2025 I'm hopetimistic he can be a double digit scorer in MLS for NYCFC. But even if that works and even if Wolf proves 2025 was not an upper bound outlier, this roster is treading water on offense with Martinez out.
The last time NYCFC had an offense that scored in the top third of the league was 2022. Last year NYCFC ranked 16th in goals scored, literally the best of the bottom half. In 2024 NYC ranked 14th and in 2023 27th. The team is completely reliant on its defense and goalkeeping for every point. Management made a big push to address this for 2024. It only managed to push the offense from third worst in the league to mediocre. They are starting Year 4 of this rebuild with a weaker offensive roster than 2025 Decision Day. Camp is not over. First game of 2026 is in 32 days. The 2026 transfer window dates have not been announced, because MLS, but the winter window probably closes in 7 to 10 weeks.
Tick tock.
- NYCFC does not have a first choice striker right now.
- Compared to other East Conference Playoff teams NYCFC had the worst scoring depth in 2025. It was not even close. We've so far done nothing to fix that except return a loanee who scored 4 goals in all competitions in his 2 years away.
- Among our full healthy roster in their entire careers there is just one year of double digit scoring which is 2025 Wolf with 11. His career average before 2025 was 5.
- In Doyle's analyses (East and West) of premium roster slots for every MLS team he identifies only one team for whom "striker" or "center forward" is a prime position of need and that's NYCFC.
- As of mid-September NYCFC had the fifth most GAM in the league.
Nico has never scored more than 6 goals in a season in his professional career. Nevertheless, based on his play in the final quarter of 2025 I'm hopetimistic he can be a double digit scorer in MLS for NYCFC. But even if that works and even if Wolf proves 2025 was not an upper bound outlier, this roster is treading water on offense with Martinez out.
The last time NYCFC had an offense that scored in the top third of the league was 2022. Last year NYCFC ranked 16th in goals scored, literally the best of the bottom half. In 2024 NYC ranked 14th and in 2023 27th. The team is completely reliant on its defense and goalkeeping for every point. Management made a big push to address this for 2024. It only managed to push the offense from third worst in the league to mediocre. They are starting Year 4 of this rebuild with a weaker offensive roster than 2025 Decision Day. Camp is not over. First game of 2026 is in 32 days. The 2026 transfer window dates have not been announced, because MLS, but the winter window probably closes in 7 to 10 weeks.
Tick tock.
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