Poz named MVP, great work! Congrats in such a difficult season
Poz named MVP, great work! Congrats in such a difficult season
Congrats to Pozuelo!
On another note: Looks like the dream of some is over 🤣🤣🤣
CONFIRMED: Mario Balotelli has joined Serie B side AC Monza on a free transfer
Good. I was kind of hoping he would end up on and then subsequently ruin the Impact or Galaxy but the risk of us maybe considering him is too great. Normally I would rule that out but since we're rumored to be considering Olsen for the managerial spot that means anything is possible.
Same here. We can protect 12 players. Homegrowns and Generation Adidas automatically protected.
So, we have 16 eligible players: Bradley, Gallardo, Pozuelo, Mullins, Westberg, Altidore, DeLeon, Osorio, Laryea, Mavinga, Bono, Endoh , Gonzalez, Silva, Auro, Achara.
Out of Contract: Gallacher,Morrow, Ciman, Piatti, Zavaleta
Auto protected: Delgado, Akinola, Dunn, Dorsey, MarshallyRutty, Shaffelberg, Fraser, Nelson, Peruzza, Priso, Okello, Romeo
Delgado and Akinola being autoprotected helps so much.
We have to protect a minimum of 3 internationals (from Mavinga, Pozuelo, Auro, Endoh, Achara)
So which four do we leave unprotect. Kevin Silva and Gallardo are obvious. Does Jozy have a no-trade clause? (If he does, then he's auto protected). I do Mullins as the third. Altidore as the fourth (or DeLeon/Endoh if Altidore has a no-trade).
Last Year, for comparison:
Protected: Pozuelo, Bradley, Altidore, Gonzalez, Mavinga, Westberg, Osorio, Bono, Auro Jr, DeLeon, Gallardo, Laryea
Unprotected: Ciman, Endoh, Morrow, Mullins, Zavaleta
Last edited by rydermike; 12-07-2020 at 02:55 PM.
I would leave Altidore exposed if we can. Austin won't take him and if they do, thank you. I'd also leave Silva, Gallardo and DeLeon or Endoh unprotected.
mullins,gallardo,silva,endoh,i doubt they would pick any of these guys,since vanney is gone i would try to get some allo for delgado or bono
Trade Fraser for allocation. I want to see the mourning on Twitter.
Not sure how others would feel about this but I'm okay with semi-punting the 2021 season. We can't build anything substantial here until Altidore is gone. I love him but his contract is a boat anchor. In the meantime we can address some other needs, work on getting a new CB into the club and getting him settled, possibly a Morrow replacement. Actually start weaning Bradley out of the starting XI.
Run Jozy out whenever he's actually available and otherwise give lots of opportunity to Akinola, Achara (god willing he recovers well) and Perruzza. With only a year left on his contract at the start of the 2022 season Jozy can be sold for a nominal fee or even bought out if it comes to it. Or if the optics of having Toronto FC play without a full complement of DPs is an issue, sign a Piatti-level DP on a 1 year.
If I'm Manning and co. I would be keeping tabs and preparing a bit pitch for Alexandre Lacazette, assuming ownership allows a big acquisition like this. His contract is up by summer 2022 and Arsenal is a bit of a mess right now so I bet he'd be open to a move. He and Mavinga are very close friends and Mavinga has joked about him coming to TFC previously. He'd have just turned 31 by that summer with no history of major injuries, and obviously he's very good.
Some DP/Youth fund news from The Athletic. I'll copy/paste the relevant stuff. https://theathletic.com/2245419/2020...mauro-manotas/
This will significantly change our dynamics to approaching a DP. If we can sign four youth players with an unlimited transfer fee and a max salary of $600k or sign one traditional DP and youth player, this will significantly change how TFC will approach their DP hunt.
MLS has been planning to add new discretionary spots to teams’ rosters in 2021, and multiple team sources said they expect those plans to remain in place despite revenue losses from COVID-19. Details around the mechanism, though, have not yet been finalized and there has been no official communication from the league that the new youth fund, dubbed the “Under-22 player initiative” by the league in February, will be available next season.
Multiple sources said there are discussions in place that would allow teams to add between one and four youth player slots depending on the number of conventional designated players on the roster. If a club has two conventional DPs, it would be able to add four players with the youth fund. Teams that have three conventional designated players — or three senior DPs that cannot be bought down with allocation money, like Toronto FC did in 2020, for example — would be allowed just one youth player slot.
Details of the youth fund were in the latest CBA. Players will hit the budget at $150,000 or $200,000, depending on if they are older or younger than 20. They must be younger than 23 and cannot turn 23 in the year in which they are signed. There would be no limit to transaction or acquisition fees and the players can earn up to the max salary, which is $612,500 in 2021. Players who did not require an acquisition fee may earn up to $200,000 over the max salary on their second contract.
While it’s possible the league moves forward with the youth fund, one source said fewer teams are expected to use the slots in 2021 due to financial losses from the pandemic. One source classified the youth player slots as a potential “game-changer” for the league and a progressive step forward on roster spending.
There are still some unanswered questions, however. Among them: whether a player would still qualify for the designation (and associated reduced salary budget hit) if they turn 23 years old and remain in MLS.
So having 2 "senior" DPs would alow a club to sign up to 4 youth players whereas 3 DPs would restrict you to just 1. Clearly the league wants clubs to sign more international young talent. Had we had this earlier we would have probably profitted from signing Alexis Mac Allister or Facundo Pellistri by now. Maybe even both.
Nice find! I think adding that 3rd senior DP and just the one youth slot benefits this team more right now. We have so many veterans that it is hard to find minutes for the young players we already have coming. Use our one youth slot and add a defender to groom to take over for Omar. Once Altidore leaves the team can re-evaluate and likely go with the additional youth slots.
I think MLS is kidding itself with this strategy and this is bound to fail. This is a league driven by the gate and entertainment value. Grooming or scouting the future is not their forte, especially when it’s non-domestic players.
Teams will take an absolute bath on these signings and there is no way giving a bunch of young guys big money is going to help locker room cohesion.
I just hope it’s the cheap clubs that get burned the worst. They deserve it for their own stupidity.
After sleeping on it, I have to agree that signing a 3rd traditional DP and one young player is probably the better option for TFC at this point. The likelihood of success with these young players is too low. At $600k salary, you should get a player better than Gallardo, but I think he's an example that you're going to miss on some of these signings. I wish the four young players were in addition to 3 traditional DPs rather than forcing teams into making tradeoffs. It's a dumb method to placate the cheap clubs in the league.
I also don't really see how signing four young players would better our first team immediately. Maybe you go for a LB to backup Auro and Richie, a back-up CB, a back-up winger and a back-up striker. I struggle to see us getting a Pellistri or Mac Allister type on the $600k salary budget.
I think MLS is trying to figure out the best mechanism to raid the youth talent in South American.
I think the Young DP thing didn't work out the way they wanted, so this is the new thing to try.
If you are a team like TFC - this may not be for you - but if you are rebuilding a team, maybe the 4 young players is the way to go.
I’d much rather the four youth players are you kidding me. That is a ridiculous amount of depth to be able to add to a roster and 600k is a shit ton of salary to sign a 21 year old out of Argentina for example.
Exciting, innovative and flexible way to rework the rules in my opinion. Hats off to MLS if official.
Contract, maybe.
Fold? I doubt it. The powers that be that run a lot of teams in MLS are not doing badly right now.
That, and, I take any talk of "we lost this amount of revenue" from Garber with not just a grain of salt - I'd apply the Goderich salt mines.
Agreed. They are simply positioning themselves for hand outs or strong arming the players in negotiations.
I can say with certainty, this league will not fold. If the owners didn’t have deep pockets to keep this floating, (which they most certainly do), what would happen is, in an absolute worst case scenario, these teams would file for protection from creditors.
And here’s the thing about any business that goes into creditor protection and continues down that path: the business only disappears if nobody believes in its value or future prospects. When NASL folded, nobody believed a league was financially sustainable. Today, there would a boatloads of potential buyers to step in.
The old ownership groups would be wiped out and lose their entire investments. There would be hiccups along the way. But the league would continue on, with new owners, and frankly nobody should care.
But again, none of this is happening because these owners know the value of what they have here and would be sure not to part with it. I just don’t want to see society bail out causes like this when we all should have other concerns
Last edited by ag futbol; 12-08-2020 at 11:21 PM.
They just expand the league with 3 or 4 new teams and their $$$ issues are solved!