Lack Of A Striker Looms Over Rapids

No, not that type of striker

Today started with a rumor that the Rapids were chasing Preston Eoin Doyle, only for it to get squashed in a matter of hours as he was loaned back to Oldham before the English transfer window closed at the end of the day.  In ended with news that attacking draft picks Brian Iloski and Frantzdy Pierrot are passing up their chance to make MLS for trials in Europe.  In-between Colorado scrimmaged Columbus to a 2-1 loss, more on that tomorrow.  The only new name in the scrimmage was midfielder Enzo Martinez who has been a USL player for the last 5 seasons, the last 3 with Colorado affiliate Charlotte.

Now this offseason has brought a solid rebuild of the defense for the new formation, good upgrades in midfield, and no help in attack.  The Rapids have been linked with forwards Eion Doyle, Claudiu Keseru, Lee Nguyen, Ross McCormack, and Aldo Kalulu.  That's just the names from the last month.  Notice something about them?  None of them are here.  We had a Front Office that set a goal of having all the key components signed by last Monday when camp started and we have yet to sign a striker with any type of top-level experience.  We currently have a total of three signed forwards, two of which have played more than 2/3rds of their career appearances in USL games and have five MLS goals between them.

We have a CCL game in 20 days.  Anyone we sign from outside the league is going to need a week or so to get moved over to the U.S., get paperwork done, etc.  That means if we announce somebody tomorrow the best we can hope fir is about a week and half to get to know the team before our match.  Realistically the only one of those names that might be close is Keseru and we've heard no rumors in the least week or so that a signing is imminent.  So more than likely we're looking at a week and a half before we can expect a striker to be training with the team, about a week before the CCL game.

This offseason has shown new purpose and focus from the Front Office, but it won't pay off if there's nobody to score goals.  Until this hole is filled this team is going to be incomplete and our hopes for the CCL and 2018 season short lived.  We don't need a home run signing but, to torture the analogy, we need a least a double that can be stretched into a triple.   This isn't an easy thing to do, the last time the Rapids signed an double-digit scorer from outside the league (not traded for or drafted) the year was 2001 and the player was John Spencer (who would also score double-digits in 2003), but it a must have if the team is going to be successful and if the fanbase is going to have faith in the new leadership.

Signed Players:
* = international
HG = homegrown
DP = designated player

GK Tm Howard - DP
GK Zac MacMath
D Edgar Castillo
D Kip Colvey
D Mike da Fonte
D Kortne Ford - HG
D Marlon Hairston
D Eric Miller
D Axel Sjoberg
D Tommy Smith*
D Jared Watts
D Danny Wilson*
D Deklan Wynne*
M Bismark Adjei-Boateng*
M Stefan Aigner*
M Michael Azira
M Johan Blomberg*
M Shkelzen Gashi* - DP
M Sam Hamilton
M Ricardo Perez - HG
M Jack Price*
M Dillon Serna - HG
F Dominique Badji*
F Caleb Calvert - HG
F Jack McBean

Unsigned Draftees:
GK Thomas Olsen
F Niki Jackson
F Alan Winn

Trialists:
M Enzo Martinez

Rapids Add Rangers CB Danny Wilson

As heavily rumored/confirmed over the weekend, the Rapids officially signed Danny Wilson from Rangers today.  He's a 26 year old Scottish centerback who has played about half his career at Rangers in two different stints but spent some time being loaned out from Liverpool and at Hearts in-between.  He's signed a 3 year deal with a team option for a 4th year.  No word on any transfer fee paid but I expect whatever it was was minimal as he would have been out of contract in May and was looking to leave.

With the signing the Rapids now have 25 of 30 roster spots filled and 9 internationals against 7 international slots.  Some work to be done there.  Oh, and we still need a striker or two.

Signed Players:
* = international
HG = homegrown
DP = designated player

GK Tm Howard - DP
GK Zac MacMath
D Edgar Castillo
D Kip Colvey
D Mike da Fonte
D Kortne Ford - HG
D Marlon Hairston
D Eric Miller
D Axel Sjoberg
D Tommy Smith*
D Jared Watts
D Danny Wilson*
D Deklan Wynne*
M Bismark Adjei-Boateng*
M Stefan Aigner*
M Michael Azira
M Johan Blomberg*
M Shkelzen Gashi* - DP
M Sam Hamilton
M Ricardo Perez - HG
M Jack Price*
M Dillon Serna - HG
F Dominique Badji*
F Caleb Calvert - HG
F Jack McBean

Unsigned Draftees:
GK Thomas Olsen
M Brian Iloski
F Niki Jackson
F Frantzdy Pierrot
F Alan Winn

A Decade Of View From The Couch

10 years ago tonight I wrote my first post on this blog.  Sadly it was ripping into the team for doing nothing in the offseason but the point is that it started something I didn't expect to last this long.  A MLS Cup, a Supporters Shield runner-up, many failed USOC campaigns, and 1760 posts later I'm starting my second decade of blogging this team.  Gone are the days of Cory Gibbs and Jovan Kirovski, in are guys like Tim Howard and Edgar Castillo.  I'd say that's a significant step forward in 10 years.

Just so this isn't completely self-congratulatory there are a couple of interesting Rapids player connections floating around.  Multiple reports from Scotland have Rangers CB Danny Wilson in Commerce City for a medical today.  It seems like we'll be adding another defender next week.  This probably also explains the rumor last week that Axel Sjoberg was on the trading block.  Its likely that if Wilson is signed Sjoberg would be pushed to the bench.

The other bit of news is out of Bulgaria and (translated) says the Rapids have offered Claudiu Keseru $1.1 million a year plus added benefits to transfer but the decision has to be made by the middle of next week.  It sounds like Keseru isn't convinced but he would be a good signing if he came here happily.  You don't want to beg a guy to come though so it will be interesting to see how this one plays out.

Of course the one road block in all of these moves is the number of international slots we (don't) have.  We're already 1 player over our limit and adding 2 more just makes that issue worse.  The two moves we can control is Badji getting a green card (which based on the talk I think will happen soon) and loaning out Wynne to Charlotte.  That would free up two slots.  if Sjoberg is really on the block trading him would likely include getting a slot back as part of the deal, which would be a third.  That would cover us but other teams have to know we're going to need slots so expect the cost to be high.

Tommy Smith Officially Signed

As expected by almost everybody Tommy Smith was announced as the Rapids newest signing this morning.  t also proved me to be an awful judge of how much the Rapids were willing to spend for a CB as when the rumor first broke I dismissed it as unlikely.  My bad.  Smith signed a 2 year deal with a club option for a 3rd year.  He'll be an immediate starter on the backline and expected to lead our younger defenders.

With the signing we're up to 24 players and 8 internationals, one more than the number of slots we have.  More moves are coming.

Signed Players:
* = international
HG = homegrown
DP = designated player

GK Tm Howard - DP
GK Zac MacMath
D Edgar Castillo
D Kip Colvey
D Mike da Fonte
D Kortne Ford - HG
D Marlon Hairston
D Eric Miller
D Axel Sjoberg
D Tommy Smith*
D Jared Watts
D Deklan Wynne*
M Bismark Adjei-Boateng*
M Stefan Aigner*
M Michael Azira
M Johan Blomberg*
M Shkelzen Gashi* - DP
M Sam Hamilton
M Ricardo Perez - HG
M Jack Price*
M Dillon Serna - HG
F Dominique Badji*
F Caleb Calvert - HG
F Jack McBean

Unsigned Draftees:
GK Thomas Olsen
M Brian Iloski
F Niki Jackson
F Frantzdy Pierrot
F Alan Winn

Preseason Starts Tomorrow

In today's Superdraft rounds 3 and 4 the Rapids added 3 more players who will likely (later round draft picks have been known to decide to not pursue a career and never report) join the rest of the team in Commerce City this week as training camp opens officially tomorrow morning.

In the 3rd round the Rapids took GK Thomas Olsen out of the University of San Diego.  Olsen has been an outside pick for the U-20 national team, filling in when local kid Ethan Horvath hasn't been released by his team for games.  There's an open 3rd GK spot on the roster and barring competition from an Academy product I expect him to take it.

In the fourth round the Rapids took midfielder Brian Iloski out of UCLA and forward Niki Jackson out of Grand Canyon University.  Both players are long shots to make the roster due to the backlog of competition and their positions.  Iiloski will be competing against Sam Hamilton and a bunch of international players while Jackson was the 3rd forward taken in this draft by the Rapids to compete against McBean and Calvert for 2 or so spots.

With the draft complete the roster is "set" for preseason.  Padraig Smith and Anthony Hudson said multiple times this offseason than the goal was to have all the significant players signed by the beginning of preseason so we can hit the ground running.  No surprised to long time Rapids fans, that didn't happen.  I'll give them a bit of leeway for the next couple of days but reportedly we wanted to sign 2 more CBs and 2 strikers, and we signed 0 in either of those positions since that talk started.  I doubt we're suddenly going to see 4 signings before the team leaves for camp in Arizona on Wednesday.  At best we'll get Smith (who I expect) and maybe the rumor of Keseru to the Rapids turns out to be accurate so we get one of each, but I don't expect 2.  So we'll be heading into camp without our full compliment of players, which is SOP for Colorado.

On to my annual camp player list.  I'll keep this up to date, as usual, through out the preseason.

Signed Players:
* = international
HG = homegrown
DP = designated player

GK Tm Howard - DP
GK Zac MacMath
D Edgar Castillo
D Kip Colvey
D Mike da Fonte
D Kortne Ford - HG
D Marlon Hairston
D Eric Miller
D Axel Sjoberg
D Jared Watts
D Deklan Wynne*
M Bismark Adjei-Boateng*
M Stefan Aigner*
M Michael Azira
M Johan Blomberg*
M Shkelzen Gashi* - DP
M Sam Hamilton
M Ricardo Perez - HG
M Jack Price*
M Dillon Serna - HG
F Dominique Badji*
F Caleb Calvert - HG
F Jack McBean

Unsigned Draftees:
GK Thomas Olsen
M Brian Iloski
F Niki Jackson
F Frantzdy Pierrot
F Alan Winn

All-but-signed players:
D Tommy Smith* (I'm including him on the list because all signs point to him being announced this week but he's not official yet)

So that's 23 signed players, 24 if Smith signed as expected, for 30 spots.  Olsen, or some other 3rd GK, will take one open spot so really there's 5 spots up for grabs in camp.  Smith would make 8 internationals for 7 slots so something will have to change there.  We have one DP slot open.

Rapids Take 2 Forwards In Draft

The Rapids made no trades yesterday, leaving them with the 2 picks they had going into the day, the 2nd and 4th in the second round.  They took a forward with both picks, first Alan Winn out of UNC followed by Frantzy Perroit out of Coastal Carolina U.  Rounds 3 & 4 are via conference call tomorrow at noon, Colorado has the 4th pick in the third round and the 3rd and 4th picks in the fourth round.

Winn is a wide player that scored 11 times for UNC last season.  Perroit is more of a traditional #9 who put up 10 goals last season for Coastal Carolina.  He is Haitian by birth but has an American passport so he won't count as an international.

Also yesterday American center back Cameron Carter-Vickers was loaned from Tottenham to Ipswich Town, freeing up Tommy Smith to make a move.  No word yet about a signing here but all the pieces are in place.

Tommy Smith Incoming and Superdraft "Preview"

So those posts last week where I downplayed the likelihood of Tommy Smith joining the Rapids?  Oops.  Its looking like he'll be in camp at least in time to go to Arizona with the team next Wednesday.  At least, if the reporting from his current team is to be believed.  This morning we woke up to a report from an Ipswich paper that the deal to sell Smith to Colorado was done pending Ipswich Town singing a replacement.  Tonight there's a report from the same source that Ipswich is expected to announced a defender joining on loan tomorrow.  That would leave Smith free to come to Colorado and go through the formalities to be announced early next week before the team goes to Arizona.

So what do we know about Tommy Smith?  He's a 27 year old New Zealand center back that has spent his whole career with Ipswich Town (he has 29 appearances with 3 different teams on loan).  He's made 245 appearances for The Tractor Boys since he joined the squad in 2007.  Hes also a New Zealand international and he has been capped 32 times for the All-Whites including playing for Anthony Hudson a few times though most of his callups were before Hudson took charge.

Smith has dealt with a back injury recently and has only appeared 13 times for Ipswich over the last season and a half as he's fallen out of favor.  Transfermarkt lists his value as $2 million but hopefully with him being out of favor we could get him for a lower number than that.  Obviously he is an international so acquiring him will require us to make another move before the roster deadline day to free up an international slot.  He would fill a the hole at CB, leaving us a back 3 likely of Ford-Smith-Sjoberg, but there's a rumor that Sjoberg might be on the trading block so there may be more changes to come.

We could see those changes tomorrow as Superdraft day always ends up with wheeling and dealing around the league.  There isn't much to preview for the Rapids as they have two second round picks tomorrow, the 2nd and 4th picks of the round, having traded their first round pick for Eric Miller.  Over the last few years any pick outside the first round has been a crap shoot, the last player to be picked outside the first round and notably more than an average MLS player was Joao Plata who was drafted in the second round in 2011 by Toronto.  Other than that there are some decent MLS players who have been drafted in later rounds but nobody who's become a leading player for their club.  With our current picks I expect Colorado to draft somebody who sticks with the team out of camp tomorrow (like Sam Hamilton has from last year's draft) and a goalkeeper on Sunday the be the 3rd keeper on the roster, but nobody who's going to make a significant difference to this team.

The USSF Election, Can We Talk Realistically?

What I'm feeling making this post

Many readers (if I have enough readers to be considers "many") are aware that next month the U.S. Soccer Federation will be electing a new President to replace the outgoing Sunil Gulati.  Familiar names such as Eric Wynalda, Hope Solo, and Kyle Martino and less familiar names such as Kathy Carter, Carlos Cordiero, and Michael Winograd have thrown their names into the ring for the position.  The voters in the election are representatives from each state association, each professional organization, and the commissioners of the Youth and Adult councils.  I'm not going to get into details of who these various people are other than to point out the general fanbase is not directly represented and this is essentially an internal election (and that's not meant as a criticism).  I'm also not going to directly endorse a candidate (not that my endorsement is in anyway meaningful but I want to clarify this post is not in direct support of anyone).  In fact I wasn't even going to discuss this election here but I reached a breaking point tonight (thus the image to start this post).

What I do want to talk about is the level of unbelievably misinformed discussion going on in the fanbase about this election.  There's a large segment of fans, on both sides, that have decided this is where the various pro/rel, schedule, and gender equity battles will be won or loss, with no understanding of how the President will be elected and what power they actually have.  For example, the NY Cosmos (a theoretically professional organization who has been the loudest voice in pushing for pro/rel and other changes) tweeted this today.  They immediately deleted it but not before it was screen capped:

Seriously?  Are you f-ing kidding me?  Quoting Martin Luther King to advance a debate on the structure of soccer leagues?  Get you're priorities in order Cosmos!

This is just the worst example (because it came from a professional organization and not a random fan) of some of the discussion you see on social media about these issues.  Clearly many of these "fans" don't actually understand how little power the USSF President has.  I have news for them.  Any USSF President (and largely its Wynalda and Martino pushing major changes) who comes to the MLS Board of Directors with an ultimatum about pro/rel or changing the schedule is (rightfully) going to get laughed out of the room.  They will not have the power to dictate the change to the leagues, at best they can make a recommendation to the USSF board that MLS (and presumably, USL) have their licensing revoked which would make the leagues rogue and unrecognized by FIFA.  Of course that board includes representatives from those leagues, not to mention many other people, most of whom will need more reasoning than the platitudes being thrown out by these candidates in order to gain "grass roots" support, in order to support forcing such a radical change and the idea will go nowhere.

All that said, that doesn't mean the "status quo" side of this debate has clean hands either.  Changes do need to happen.  I mean, the men missed the World Cup for the first time in 32 years and the women are losing the general lead they had over most of the rest of the world, to say nothing of the youth teams results over the last few years.  We need some significant changes, but those changes aren't "change the schedule" or "add pro/rel", things largely outside the USSF's purview.  The changes are "in house" at the USSF, changing how they run their teams, how they do outreach to youth players, how they spend their money, etc.  Going out their as the candidate supported by Don Garber (even if officially that hasn't been stated) isn't a sustainable platform either.

If fans really want the sport to grow in this country we owe it to ourselves to look for options in the middle, because they're the only thing that will work.  Taking up positions at the extreme edges and driving the candidates there means we're either going to get the status quo, or a USSF President that has no ability to work with the professional leagues.  Both will be failures on some level.

And now to clarify my own positions:

1. Pro/rel won't be workable and won't be instituted in any time frame anyone can reasonably project (~20 years).  Beyond that the sporting landscape is too unknown to make a projection meaningful.

2. Anyone who wants to consider a fall-spring schedule is welcome to go sit out at the Dick for 2 hours tonight.  Assuming you don't die of frostbite you can tell us how you plan to sell tickets to fans to do that.  If the solution is "a winter break" any winter break that would avoid the problem would essentially encompass the same time frame as our current winter break, so you wouldn't actually be making any schedule changes.

3. The USSF Presidents first task, whomever they are, should be to hire a TD/GM position for all the national teams and give them the job of improving the on-field results of all the teams.  The President should be responsible for all off-field/business decisions.

4. That new position should look at Germany's plan that brought them back from their low point ~15 years ago.  It involved getting a group of all the stakeholders together from the Federation, the leagues, etc. and setting goals that all could agree to work towards.  The USSF needs some sore of coordination like that.

New Staff, Player Rumors, and Superdraft Week

I know I've been quiet this past week but in terms of actual news, not rumors, not much has happened.

Starting with the notable news, both Edgar Castillo and Jack Price were officially announced on Tuesday and Friday respectfully.  Castillo is here on a one year loan with an option to buy.  Price's length of contract was not announced but multiple sources in the UK have reported its a 4 year deal.

That leaves us with 23 of 30 roster spots filled and all 7 international slots used.

Padraig Smith and Wayne Brant had their interim tags removed this week.  Smith is now the Gm and executive VP and will oversee all soccer-related activities while Brant is the senior Vp of business operations and will oversee all business and other non-soccer related activities.

There were two new Front Office additions this week.  Fran Taylor was named assistant GM, coming over from stat DNA and shows additional commitment to the stats/numbers based approach to the game that the Front Office has talked about since Smith arrived.  Chad Kolarcik joins the Rapids as the head of sports science & performance, coming over from the Sounders where he was the head strength & conditioning coach.  He'll be expected to revamp the conditioning aspects of the team with the newest findings.  There was a murmur of discontent from the Front Office last season about how the team's health and conditioning were handled and this seems to indicate that the new leadership has different ideas about how it should be handled.

We also had a couple of big player rumors this week, neither one appears to have panned out.  I had heard that Colorado had been perusing Mexican center back Oswaldo Alanis who's currently at Chivas but it appears he's going to wait for the summer window and try to move to Europe.  It sounds like he'd consider Colorado then if Europe doesn't work out.  It was also reported that the Rapids had taken the lead in acquiring Ola Kamara but yesterday the reports were that he's looking for something more coastal with more opportunity and the Rapids are moving on.  That's toom bad as Kamara is exactly the type of player we need.  The last rumor is that we're interested in New England's Lee Nguyen which has potential but it would be a move away from the 3-5-2 we have apparently been planning for this offseason as the planned formation doesn't really have a spot for a #10 like Nguyen.

Finally the combine has started in Orlando in preparation for the SuperDraft on Friday and Sunday.  Rounds 1 and 2 are Friday in Philly at the national coaches convention, 3 and 4 are by teleconference on Sunday.  Colorado traded their first round pick to Montreal two years ago for Eric Miller.  We hold two picks in the 2nd round, the 2nd pick from LA in the Jermaine Jones trade and our natural pick, the 4th of the round.  We have our natural (4th) picks in rounds 3 and 4 and we also have the 3rd pick in the 4th Round as part of the Marcelo Sarvas trade to DC.

While I wouldn't be shocked to see us move around in the draft I'm not expecting any major moves.  We don't hold any high enough picks to trade for quality players and I don't think the current leadership is interested enough in the draft to try to move up to make a major pick.  I expect we'll end up picking one player that will make the roster out of preseason and a young GK that will spend the season on loan somewhere.

So far the Front Office has talked the talk but not walked the walk this offseason as once again Rapids fans are wondering where the major attacking signings are.  Training camp opens a week from tomorrow, so about 190 hours from now.  The Front Office has talked multiple times about having all the key pieces in places by then so the team can hit the ground running.  There's a lot of work to be done in that time as this team needs a major DP/TAM striker signing, another center back, and probably a second starting-quality striker signing to push Badji and to allow for rotation.  Now's when the rubber meets the road.

New Players...Almost Official, A Callup, and a Negotiating Tactic?

Bunch of news today.  We'll begin with the big stuff.  At 4pm today fans were invited to RiNo for a chance to meet Jack Price and Edgar Castillo.  There has yet to be an official announcement of the details of their signings but clearly they've joined the team.  The Denver Post article confirms what most fans had inferred from Hudson's interviews, we'll be playing a 3-5-2/5-2-3 this season with 3 CBs and Hairston and Castillo as wingbacks.

It also talks about how Hudson sees Price anchoring the midfield in this formation.  I don't  know if this is just talking up the new signings or if the plan is really for Price to be a starter.  The midfield is a bit crowded at this point with Aigner, Azira, Blomberg, Boateng, Gashi, and Price for 3 spots so it will be interesting to see if anyone is heading out and who wins the starting spots.

With these moves we are at 23 of 30 roster spots filled and all 7 international spots filled.  In order to bring in any more international spots there will need to be some moves to free up an international slot.  The obvious choices are sending Wynne to Charlotte for the season and Badji getting a green card.  After that its either trading for a spot or moving somebody out.  Either way, the next couple of weeks could be interesting.

In other news today Marlon Hairston got a callup to the U.S. National Team camp in LA later this month.  Its his first ever invite to the Nats.  The roster for the Bosnia & Herzegovina friendly on the 28th will be taken from the camp.

Finally, following up on Saturday's rumor of Tommy Smith being linked to the Rapids, this appears to be a rumor started by Smith or his agent, if this BBC article is anything to go by.  His current manager says Ipswich Town has received no contact from the Rapids about Smith.  If nothing comes of this it won't be the first time that a European player has used the threat of moving to MLS as a negotiating tactic.

Player Rumors Are Swirling

We've had 2 new player rumors break today and confirmation of an existing one as well.

First we'll start with the two-fer from Steven Goff.  Wolves center mid Jack Price is discussing terms with the Rapids and Castillo is a done deal.  I've heard the same on both fronts.  Price is a 25 year old midfielder who's played his whole career with Wolves, coming through their academy (he has gone on loan to a couple of clubs).  He's under contract until the end of the Championship season with a team option for next year but there's new leadership at Wolves so they may not see a future for him there.  TransferMarkt.com estimate his value at about $875,000.

This would be a surprise add to me, as it feels like our midfield is a bit full already, especially with internationals.  Aigner, Azira, Blomberg, Boateng, and Gashi are already on the roster, adding Price would make 6 international midfielders for a 3-5-2.  It sounds like its going to happen though. so it will be interesting to see if that means we make another move with an existing player.  Certainly we'll likely need to find another international spot as we only have one open (which Price would take) and I expect another international signing at striker.

Castillo being added is expected at this point, though I still don't love that its on loan.

The other rumor today has us linked to Ipswich defender Tommy Smith.  This is the first I've heard of this rumor.  Smith is a New Zealand international and we do need a 3rd CB so it makes some sense that Hudson would be interested.  Still this kind of feels like somebody making a leap that since the former NZ coach needs a CB that we'd be interested in him.  Smith is 27 years old and has spent his whole career (minus a couple of loans) at Ipswich.  Transfermarkt values him at $2 million which seems a lot for the Rapids to spend on a defender.

I will say, I'm enjoying the Rapids being in the mix for some notable (if not "big") signings.  Its a nice change.

2018 Schedule Released!

Always a good day when we get to see the 2018 schedule.  First things first, in order to give the Rapids more time to deal with the CCL the league agreed to reschedule our home opener on Mar. 3rd to June 13th.  Our opening game will now be the game in New England on Mar. 10th while our home opener will be against KC on Mar. 24th.

That bit of rescheduling aside, lets break down the schedule.  As expected we get every Western team home and away with an extra away game against FSL.  We host Philly, Toronto, Orlando, RBNY, Chicago, and our first look at Atlanta and we travel to New England, Columbus, Montreal, NYCFC and visit new Audi Field in DC.

At home we have one Sunday afternoon game (on ESPN) plus the final game of the season when all games are played on Sunday afternoon, a Friday night and a Saturday afternoon game, both on TSN in Canada, a Saturday afternoon game on UniMas, and the rescheduled Chicago game on a Wednesday night.  The 4th of July is a Wednesday as well, so that's technically a Wednesday night game.  Everything else at home is the traditional 7pm Saturday kickoff time.

The schedule sets up nicely with never more than 2 league games in a row at home or on the road.  We have two Wednesday games following weekend games, but the weekend after that is a bye for us.  The first week of July is Sunday-Wednesday-Saturday with us being home midweek for the 4th with trips to Canada on either side.  That's the only 3 league game week.  USOC and hopefully CCL will end up changing some of these numbers.

The midpoint of the season is between the 4th of July game and the following weekend but our 9th (middle) home game is June 23rd.  In other words our home schedule is front loaded and we'll be on the road more in the back half.  We play 13 games from the start of August on, 11 of them against Western Conference opponents.  That's when we need to be pushing into a playoff spot.

The good news is that all  Rocky Mountain Cup matches are on Saturdays, which means good travel opportunities.  The bad news is that both road matches in Salt Lake occur before our home match, so we need to at least pull a draw out of one of those to bring the opportunity to win the Cup home (or win them both an bring the Cup home that way).  Also we get our home game against Dallas as our final game, so maybe there will be some playoff circumstances around that game.

The only real oddity is the opening few weeks where we'll host Toronto in the CCL, go to Toronto in CCL, have a bye, got to New England, have a bye, then have our home opener against KC.  Kind of a start-stop beginning of the season, though it will give everyone time to get used to Hudson's new system and the new players to gel.

Overall this is probably the best schedule the team and fans could have gotten.  It could have been much worse, as we've seen in prior seasons.

2018 State Of The Rapids

I'd call this the State of the Union, but then I'd be talking about Philly and who the hell cares what Philly's status is this offseason? :D

As we enter 2018 I thought it would be a good time to take stock of where we are and what we should be expecting in the 7 weeks between now and our opening CCL match against Toronto. 

I assume at this point that the coaching staff is pretty much set.  We could see an additional assistant coach added or something but really no major news is coming on that front.  So the major additions we'll see the rest of the preseason will be on the roster.  First the numbers:

Signed players: 21
International slots: 7 (Base 8, got permanent one from FSL, sent one to VAN through 2031, one to ATL through 2018)
International players: 6 (Boateng, Aigner, Badji, Blomberg, Gashi, Wynne)
DPs: 2 (Gashi, Howard)

So essentially we have 9 open roster spots but only one open international slot and one open DP slot.  The former number could be improved by sending Wynne on season-long loan or if Badji were to get a green card but more likely we'll need to trade for a slot if we want to sign more than one international.

Lets break the roster down my position.  For this analysis I'm assuming that the Rapids will likely play a 3-5-2 or 5-3-2 as their primary formation this season.  This is due to Hudson's interviews here he's talked about wanting to use wingbacks and talked about liking to play with 2 strikers.  Those are really the only two formations in modern football that allow for both of those.

Goalkeepers: (Howard, MacMath) - We're set here.  I expect we'll draft a keeper late in the draft for an additional backup but whomever that is will likely spend all season in Charlotte or with some other USL team.  Assume one of the remaining nine roster spots will be used here.

Center Backs: (da Fonte, Ford, Miller, Sjoberg, Watts): We need a starting center back for the 3rd man on the back line.  I'm comfortable with Ford and Sjoberg as starters but I'm not convinced Miller/Watts is good enough to be the 3rd starter.  Once we get that we're set as I'm comfortable with those two as backups to the starting trio.  We know that da Fonte will spend all season in the USL and won't matter to the Rapids season.  Assume one of the remaining nine roster spots will be used here.

Wing Backs: (Colvey, Hairston, Miller, Serna, Wynne): I expect Castillo to be announced any day now and added to the list here.  That hives us him and Hairston as starters, Serna and Miller as experienced if not great backups, and Colvey and Wynne as depth.  That's probably good enough but we'll be putting a lot of faith in our youth (Hairston, Miller, Serna) being able to come up with a solid starter all season.  I wouldn't be shocked to see us acquire a solid backup but I'm not sure its necessary.  Castillo will use one of the remaining nine roster spots.

Midfield: (Boateng, Aigner, Azira, Blomberg, Gashi, Hamilton, Perez) - I'm grouping the midfielders into one pile because we don't really know yet what the 3-man/rest of the 5-man midfield is going to look like.  My educated guess is that its primarily 3 attackers with Aigner, Blomberg, and Gashi as the regular starters.  From how Smith and Hudson have talked I don't expect to see a whole lot of playing time for d-mids and there's no way we play tow of them like we have the last few years.  That leaves Azira and Boateng as backups but likely not starters.  Hamilton and Perez are depth that will improve for future years.  The other possibility is that Boateng plays an 8 role with Aigner and Gashi as wingers in front of the wingbacks and Blomberg is backup (or they trade off).  Or one last possibility is Aigner - Boateng - Blomberg with Gashi up top, but I think we all saw that Gashi as a forward is not his strong suit.  Regardless I think Azira will take the biggest hit to his playing time under the new leadership.  I'd expect some backup signings in midfield still but I don't expect a major signing of a starter-level player.

Striker: (Badji, Calvert, McBean) - The biggest area of need on the team.  This is not a MLS quality strike force.  Badji is the only one who should be considered a starter and honestly, I'd prefer him to be in a battle with another player to start.  We clearly need a major signing here, this would be the place to use our DP (and probably international) slot.  On top of that we should sign a second MLS-quality striker to either start or to push Badji as his backup.  You could even make a case for a third signing as I'm not sure Calvert or McBean are ready to be a regular backup.  Assume at least two of the remaining nine roster spots will be used here.

So that leaves us Castillo, a center back, and two forwards that need to be signed before preseason starts, and a goalkeeper and depth signings that will be needed at some point to fill out the roster (two of these will probably come from the draft).  Even with these signings I feel like the Rapids will have a good starting XI but a very shallow roster this year.  Considering where we're starting from thoguh, its hard to expect much more than that in 2018.