New Deal On The Back Line

Today Colorado announced they signed CB Lalas Abubakar to a contract extension.  He'll now be with the club through 2024, with a team option for 2025.  That would make him a Rapid during the best years of his career (26-31 years old).  If he continues to be a regular starter that whole time that would make him one of the longest serving Rapids of all-time, getting him near 200 starts and appearances.

Also the team lost nobody to Austin in the expansion draft today.

Rapids Make Moves On The Back Line

Yesterday's expansion draft resulted in no Colorado players being picked, as expected.  Today the Rapids made moves to add two large pieces of the 2020 puzzle.  First they traded to bring Lalas Abubakar back permanently after his loan ended.  They then made a move to bring in the Union's centerback Auston Trusty. 

The trade for Abubakar was $400K in GAM and an international slot for 2020.  Obviously we know how Lalas fits into the team so there's no surprise there.  The good news is the cost, while some sources (mainly in Columbus) were tossing around numbers like $1M in xAM we got him for a much more reasonable $400K.  Some media were rating Abubakar the third best defender in the league in 2019 but we got him for an above-average MLS defender price.  Great move by the Front Office.

For those wondering about the international slot we currently have five internationals (Mezquida, Price, Rwatubyaye, Shinyashiki, and Wilson) and we know we're negotiating with Smith to be the sixth.  With this trade and the Lewis trade earlier this year we've traded away two of our slots for 2020, leaving us with 6.  So we're fine on that front right now, and we can always trade for more or decide to send Rwatubyaye back to the Springs next year to free up a slot.

The second move of the day was the more surprising one.  Auston Trusty wasn't on anyone's radar as a possible pickup.  He was signed as a homegrown player by the Union in 2016, spending the rest of that year and the following on loan to their USL affiliate where he made 31 appearances.  He then started and played every minute of the 2018 season for the Union.  He started the first 22 games of the 2019 season for the Union before being relegated to the bench and not seeing any more playing time, for unknown reasons.  He hinted that he would talk more about what happened next year but clearly whatever it was meant he was unlikely to factor into next year's plans for Philly.

Trusty is a 21 year old center back  who has been capped for the U19 and the U20 U.S. national teams and has received a full National Team camp invite but has not yet been selected for a game roster.  Obviously with 80+ professional appearances he's more experienced than the average 21 year old and right now it seems like he's likely to be expected to start along-side Abubakar in our back line in 2020.

To get Trusty we traded $200K of TAM in 2020 and $300K in GAM in 2021.  Depending on his performance in 2020 the Union could get an additional $150K of GAM in 2021.  If we sell Trusty before the end of 2021 the Union would get 30% of the remaining transfer fee after the Rapids recoup the $600K (or $750K with performance bonus) they paid to get him.  If he's sold after that Philly would get 25%.  As part of the deal Trusty signed a new contract with the Rapids (he was on an option year in 2020 with Philly).

So combined today we spent $1M in xAM and gave up an international spot for next season in exchange for two young starting quality MLS centerbacks.  That's a nice bit of business for the Front Office.  This leaves the team with a starting back four (Rosenberry - Abubakar - Trusty - Vines) with an average age between 22 and 23, all under multiyear deals  That's a young, long-term back line we can build off of.  With Ford and Rwatubyaye as depth and reports that we're still negotiating with Smith we're pretty set at CB for 2020.

Ins and Outs in Commerce City

A trio of trades by the Rapids before the window closed last night has certainly generated some discussion today among burgundy fans.  We're going to break each one down in order of complexity and then talk about the bigger picture.

Rapids loan CB Lalas Abubakar from Columbus until the end of the season for $125K in TAM

This is pretty straight forward.  The Rapids needed CB help immediately and Abubakar wasn't getting a ton of time in Columbus.  I expect Lalas to start ASAP, maybe even on Saturday.  I also get the impression that the teams will work out a long-term deal to keep him here before the season ends.  Abubakar is a 24 year old Ghanaian who was the 5th overall pick in the 2017 SuperDraft.  He made 20 starts for the Crew last season but has only made 1 start this year.  He played for the Ghana U-20 team but got his green card last year.  He's not a top MLS starter but he can do the job.

Rapids acquire F Jonathan Lewis from NYCFC for $650K of TAM and a 2020 international slot

Lewis is the big pickup of the day.  A 21 year old winger/forward from Florida, he got his start by signing for Bradford City (his mother is English) before realizing he'd rather be home in the States.  He came back and played for a year at Akron before being drafted by NYCFC with the 3rd overall pick in the 2017 draft.  He's made 31 appearances for the Pigeons over 3 years with 3 goals and 5 assists.  He's also been capped by the U.S. Nats 4 times in 2019.  He's best as a winger, which we're not currently playing with, but can also tuck under a striker more centrally.  Probably not a true #10 but might be able to serve in a pinch.  He came at a high cost though, with a lot of TAM going to NYCFC.  According to reports there were multiple teams pursuing him, which pushed his price up.  Depending on unannounced performance targets the TAM price could go up by up to another $100K.

Rapids acquire CB Abdul Rwatubyaye, $50K TAM, 2019 international slot, a 2nd round pick in 2020, and $250K season ending injury replacement allowance for Benny Feilhaber.  Teams also swap waiver wire priority order (KC to #1, Colorado to #5)

Yeah, that's as confusing as it looks.  Let's start with the players, then we'll move to the rest of the stuff.  Rwatubyaye is a 22 year old Rwandan defender who signed with KC this past offseason.  Before that he had played for 6 years in Rwanda, winning the Rwandan Premier League 3 times.  He's also a regular for the Rwandan National Team after playing at each national team youth level, playing for them in World Cup qualifying and African Cup of Nations qualifying.  He's played in all 4 of their most recent African Cup of Qualifying matches.  All that said, he's still very raw and is expected to be a long-term project, not a 2019 contributor.

In exchange Benny Feilhaber is going back to KC.  Feilhaber was somewhat of a surprise signing this offseason but was expected to bring senior leadership to fill the gap until we could get new DPs in 2020.  Obviously as this season has gone south the need for that senior leadership has evaporated.  At the same time it appears Benny wasn't aware, or wasn't up, for what he signed up for.  In quotes from a KC reporter:

My response to these quotes is "Benny, if you don't want to be here, we don't need you".  I understand the desire to finish on a high note, but its not like this is year 3 of a 4 year deal that hasn't gone well.  This is 10 games into a 2 year commitment for a team that could be expected to be, well, not this bad, but not competing for championships.

Outside of the player swap we also traded some assets.  The $50K of TAM, the draft pick, and the international slot explain themselves (we needed an slot to add Rwatubyaye to the roster).  Swapping of the waiver wire order seems fairly meaningless. I'm guessing KC knows, or believes, that a player they're interested in will be waived soon and want first dibs on him.  The season ending injury replacement allowance is a big name for teams being allowed to spend up to $250K of their own money to replace a significant player that got a season-ending injury in the early part of the season (before the window closes).  Essentially KC is paying us $250K out of their own pocket that we can use as GAM.

So, in the end, here's the combine total of today's activities:

OUT: Feilhaber, 2020 international slot, #1 waiver wire pick, $775K-$875K of TAM (most not payable until 2020)

IN: Lewis, Rwatubyaye, Abubakar (on loan through 2019), 2019 international slot, #5 waiver wire pick, KC's 2nd round pick in 2020, $50K in TAM, $250K in GAM

Essentially we gave up Feilhaber and about $500-$600K in TAM, plus swapped waiver wire and international spots, for a National team player, a raw CB prospect, and a starting CB on loan, plus a draft pick.  That's not a bad days work.  It, however, doesn't help us much for 2019.  Adding two or three young players to the list of Acosta, Anderson, Bassett, Ford, Hundley, Nicholson, Raben, Rosenberry, Shinyashiki, and Vines is a lot of youth at low cost for the next coach to work with.  We've got a full youth movement going, but its going to take time to pay off.  I'm not sure the fans, or Smith, has that time.