Rapids Pass On Esteves

Yesterday the Colorado Rapids announced that they would not exercise the buy clause in Lucas Esteves' loan contract.   This was set at $1M for 50% of his rights (or in Football Manager terms, a $1M transfer fee with a 50% sell-on clause).  In order for that to make sense the Raids would have had to have gotten at least $2M in value from Esteves, either in his play or in a future transfer fee.

Colorado reportedly sold Vines for $2M+, so essentially Esteves would have to be as valuable to the Rapids as Sam Vines was.  Esteves is not as valuable as Sam Vines.  This was a good decision by the club even with a lack of an obvious replacement at the moment.  The team should not throw money away just because they feel like they don't have an option.  We're not going to get better by using our limited fund on players who aren't worth it.

This, however, leaves let another hole for the Front Office to fill in an offseason that's starting to get short.  I expect training camp to open somewhere between January 9th and the 16th.  Last year it opened on the 10th but we had a CCL game to play before league play started, which meant we had to open camp a little earlier.  Essentially in about 6 weeks players will be reporting and we only have half a starting XI right now.