Off To Mexico With Some Old And New Faces

Colorado left for preseason camp in Mexico today and gave all of us a roster to work with while they're there.  There are three names not on the roster for good reason.  Zack Steffen is at the Nats camp and Adam Beaudry is at the U-20 camp (the teams trained together today).  Kevin Cabral is back in France finalizing his green card and will join the team when that's done and he no longer takes up an international slot.  Other than that all the expected names were on the plane.

They were joined by some old and new names, some under new contracts and some trying to earn a contract.

GOALKEEPERS: John Berner (Trialist), Zack Campagnolo (Rapids Academy), Nicolas Defreitas-Hansen (Rapids 2), Abraham Rodriguez (Trialist)  

DEFENDERS: Chidozie Awaziem, Reggie Cannon, Daniel Chacón, Michael Edwards, Nate Jones, Andreas Maxsø, Ian Murphy, Anderson Rosa (Rapids 2), Keegan Rosenberry, Matthew Senanou, Jackson Travis, Sam Vines  

MIDFIELDERS: Daouda Amadou, Cole Bassett, Sam Bassett, Josh Copeland (Rapids 2), Omir Fernandez, Wayne Frederick, Oliver Larraz, Djordje Mihailovic, Connor Ronan, Noah Strellnauer (Rapids Academy) 

FORWARDS: Alex Harris, Calvin Harris, Rafael Navarro, Kimani Stewart-Baynes, Darren Yapi 

Michael Edwards signed a new deal for 2025 yesterday with an option for 2026.  Rosa was a 2024 SuperDraft pick who went back to college for a year and has now signed a deal with Rapids 2, while Copeland signed with R2 coming out of this year's draft.  Alex Harris was our top pick in this year's draft and was already signed to a Generation Adidas deal prior to being picked.

We've got a couple of former keepers trying to catch on as the third keeper while Steffen and Beaudry are away.  Rodriguez is back after spending last year with Toronto 2 and John Berner makes his return have 7 seasons.  In between he played for Phoenix, Oklahoma City, Saint Louis, Memphis, Huntsville, ant Atlanta 2.

Guys like Campagnolo, Defreitas-Hansen, Rosa, Copeland, and Strellnauer are on the trip to get experience, something the Rapids regularly do with their young Academy and R2 players.  Senanou was our second highest pick in the first round this year and is hoping to make the team.

Nate Jones is on the trip but Tom Bogert is reporting that a deal has been worked out for him to be loaned to the Las Vegas Lights for the season once the USL team gets started for the year.

Awaziem, Cannon, and Murphy, all defenders, are the only experienced additions to the team since roughly this time last season.  While defense was the weaker side of the ball in 2024 adding two central defenders (after selling one in Bombito) and a versatile defender in Cannon is barely enough to trad water.  Its not enough to get better.  We appear to be betting everything that a highly-rated homegrown (S. Bassett), a Generation Adidas player (A. Harris), and a whole bunch of young guys will find some rookie magic.