While United's FO continues to blunder down the meandering path towards finding a new head coach, it might be interesting to read about the process from a man who can speak from experience, Peter Wilt. I wonder if we'll ever know how different the journey is for Kasper and Payne?
Also, I stumbled across this piece on Yanks Abroad about Jay Needham, one who got away (or was driven away) from United, found his feet as a professional, and is now eying a possible return to MLS despite not having the best of experiences with the league the first time around. Considering our lack of depth in central defense and the loss of Olsen and Jacobson in central midfield, I wonder just how charred our bridge to the young, hard-working central midfielder/defender is at this point...
Don't forget to send me your DC United Christmas wish lists. I'm approaching enough for an initial post, but the more the merrier (and the more interesting)!
The Fire article highlights what seems to be a different process than the one currently employed at DCU. From reading a piece on Caleb Porter in the Akron papers, it seemed he never seriously considered leaving Akron. You would think the powers that be would have either:
ReplyDeletea. filtered him out on that basis; or
b. knowing he was reluctant - put on a full court press if they really wanted him - including actually being in the country when the opportunity arose to meet and speak with him.
From the Needham piece, I would surmise that they probably offered Porter a developmental contract which paled in comparison to the 170K he will earn at Akron.
I always liked Needham. I think he would pair nicely with Jakovic and he even likes playing the "latin Amercian" style of football.
Did you notice that Kasper is in Mexico trying to pry a left footed Salvadoran winger away from one of the teams down there. What are the odds of his success?
Considering the FO's success rate with big/important acquisitions as of late and the optimism emanating from the Goffblog commentary of how great this Salvadoran kid would be to have, you've got to expect an apocalyptic failure, no?
ReplyDeleteSomething like Kasper making an offer so insulting that Mexican teams refuse to ever talk to us about transfers again out of sheer spite and Salvadoran players universally boycott coming to DC United.
Or have I tipped the doom-and-gloom-ometer a touch to far? ;-)
I suspect that Needham will stay in Europe, as I don't see MLS clubs flashing attractive cash for defenders, but we shall see.
behind the badge says we already signed castillo
ReplyDeletehttp://www.behindthebadge.com/2009/12/cristian-castillo-signed.php
Great. That means he'll turn out to be a head case, right? No optimism allowed in United land!
ReplyDeleteKidding.
Fantastic acquisition that suddenly frees up a spot on my What I Want For Christmas list.
Hmmm...so what else can I wish for?
I'm not sure if we have burned bridges with Needham at all (not like we fired him). The million dollar question is whether his lack of dignity would sink to, say, playing for the folks who drafted him in the first place?
ReplyDeleteAs for Castillo, I think this will actually be a legitimate positive, if the qualifiers I saw him in are any indication. Good skill, but quite scrappy and determined. Yay.
Now watch Onalfo make him our left back, and stifle any Good that could have come of it.
No, we didn't "fire" Needham, but we lowballed him on a contract offer, and, if you read the article, you'll see that he was a bit put out by that.
ReplyDeleteAt this point, we probably wouldn't pay him much over the league minimum either. Playing well in the USL and Norwegian second division doesn't exactly earn a prime contract in MLS.
It will be interesting to see if Castillo is the real deal in MLS or just a flashy dribbler who doesn't have a cutting edge.