Rapids Salary Info - 2009 - March 15th Update

The MLS Players Union has released it list of 2009 salaries. Its current as of the March 2nd roster compliance date. The Union will publish the salaries for players signe dafter that date probably shortly after the season starts.

The Rapids 2009 team base salary based on these numbers is just over 2.1 million, which puts them 11th in the league. If you add in the 200K of Gomez's salary that the Rapids are reportedly covering it counters the 145K of Generation Adidas salaries (Colaluca, O'Brien) that don't count against the cap. Its a little unclear as to which number, the base or the guarenteed, conts against the cap and currently the Rapids are at about 2.3 million in guarenteed salary. That give the Rapids roughly between 100K and 300K to use ont heir last two roster spots.

Here's the list of the Colorado salaries. The first number is their base salary, the second number is their guaranteed salary for 2009. For comparison, the 2008 numbers are here.

Ballouchy Mehdi M $ 1 00,000.00 $ 118,000.00
Burpo Preston GK $ 5 7,871.99 $ 57,871.99
Casey Conor F $ 2 00,000.00 $ 200,000.00
Ceus Steward GK $ 2 0,100.00 $ 20,100.00
Clark Colin M $ 8 5,000.00 $ 90,000.00
Colaluca Nico M $ 7 5,000.00 $ 108,000.00
Cooke Terry M $ 1 87,500.00 $ 192,500.00
Cummings Omar F $ 6 5,000.00 $ 73,750.00
Dalby Greg M $ 3 4,650.00 $ 34,650.00
Gibbs Cory D $ 1 10,000.00 $ 117,142.86
Guerrero Ivan M $ 1 54,000.00 $ 161,000.00
Harden Ty D $ 3 4,008.00 $ 34,008.00
Harvey Jordan D $ 5 0,000.00 $ 51,250.00
Ihemelu Ugo D $ 1 40,000.00 $ 140,000.00
Kimura Kosuke D $ 5 2,500.00 $ 52,500.00
LaBrocca Nick M $ 7 0,000.00 $ 72,500.00
Mastroeni Pablo M $ 2 55,000.00 $ 300,500.00
O'Brien Ciaran M $ 7 0,000.00 $ 103,750.00
Peterson Jacob F $ 1 00,000.00 $ 118,750.00
Pickens Matt GK $ 1 25,000.00 $ 127,500.00
Richardson Gregory F $ 5 7,000.00 $ 62,250.00
Schunk Ross F $ 3 4,008.00 $ 34,008.00

It appears that Pablo didn't quite get the big raise we all thought he did, his guarenteed number is about 18K lower than 2008.. I thought giving him a raise on a long-term contract at his age was a bit much, so seeing the lower than expected number made me feel better about that signing. Clark's salary has tripled with his new contract, Cummings has doubled. LaBrocca is the big winner with a increase of 600%, but that's easier to do when you only made 12.9K last year.

Outside of the Generation Adidas players, who are given big contracts to be development players, my candidates for most overpaid are Mehdi Ballouchy and Jacob Peterson who are both making 118K after a few years in the league without a lot of production. You have to figure 2009 is a make or break year for both of them. John DiRaimondo is is clear winner in the most underpaid category, only making 20K after spending 2008 as a regular in the game-day roster with 11 apperances and 8 starts.