Colorado Loans Vallecilla To Columbus For Season

Today the Rapids announced that CB Gustavo Vallecilla has been loaned to the Crew for the season in exchanged for $175K in GAM with an option to buy.  Tom Bogert also reported that the option is for $700K in GAM.

Vallecilla was acquired last season from Cincinnati for $400K in GAM last year and $400K in GAM this year.  So even when you account for the $175K we get from this loan we're still paying Cinci $225K in GAM this year for Vallecilla to play for Columbus.  That doesn't include the $400K in cash on top of the GAM that we paid to cover the remaining transfer fee from his Ecuadorian club.

Vallecilla spent more time with Rapids 2 than with the first team last season, largely because when he did play for the first team he wasn't good.  He wasn't a MLS caliber back last season and based on the fact that he spent the end of preseason training with Rapids 2 and not the main squad it seems like he wasn't going to be high on the depth chart this year.  Maybe the Crew will be able to find time for him and he'll improve, but I'm not holding my breath.  He'll need to have a killer year for the Crew to trigger that buy clause and get us close to breaking even on the deal.

Its great we got something for essentially nothing here, but make no mistake, this was a putting lipstick on a pig move.  The trade for Vallecilla looks like once of the worst trades this club has made in some time.  Its not hard to argue its the worst trade since Ballouchy-Beckerman.  At least we're not doubling down on it and playing somebody who isn't up to MLS level.