Two Out For Sure, Third Probable, One In Possibly?

I was going to spend today focusing on the new kit but that's going to have to wait for the weekend because the Rapids had a busy day of roster moves today.

The big one was that Kevin Cabral has been waived.  This immediately frees up a DP slot that can be converted to a U-22 slot if we want.  There's now sugar-coating this, Cabral was a disastrous signing that not only hamstrung us for 2.5 seasons but also helped the Galaxy, who went on to win a  MLS Cup in that time.  On December 2nd 2022 the Galaxy were fined $1M, had $1M of GAM taken away, and were put on a transfer ban in 2023 for international players due to not reporting Pavon's salary correctly and cheating the cap.  This put LA in a bind as they had no open DP slot and little flexibility to bring in helpful signings from around the league (inter-league moves were outside the ban).

Enter Padraig Smith 6 days later, who gave LA $1M in GAM for Cabral, instantly making them hole on GAM after the fine and opening their DP slot for the flexibility they needed while under the ban.  All this for a player who looked out of place in MLS while playing for LA.  It was a bad move on it face and Cabral's play proved it.  He started less than half the games while he was here, played 3772 minutes across 2.7 seasons across all competitions (34 game regular season is 3060 minutes, plus playoffs, CCC, and Leagues Cup) and had 7 goals and 5 assists.  Those are MLS bench warmer numbers and for this he was getting paid $2.2M a year, half of which was paid by the Galaxy.

Its not hard to make the argument that he is the second worst DP signing in team history behind Juan Ramirez, and unlike Ramirez we knew how he would react to MLS since he had been in LA for two seasons (1689 minutes) and scored 6 goals with 0 assists.  The decision to trade for him alone is enough to explain why Padraig Smith should not have any say in player moves, before we get to any other mistakes.

The good news is that cutting him free instead of letting him finish his contract and be released in the offseason is a sign that the Rapids are willing to do something this window.  We'll get to that in a second after we go over the other move today and an update on Awaziem.

After announcing Cabral's departure the Rapids also announced that goalkeeper Adam Beaudry has been loaned to the Switchbacks for the rest of the season.  This is a logical move to get him playing time above MLS Next PRO now that Hansen has surpassed him for the number 2 spot.

Braidon Nourse at the Denver Post, among others, is reporting that the Rapids are finalizing the deal to send Awaziem to Nantes.  Its now a matter of not if, but when. he leaves it seems.  I would expect it to happen before the Philly game next week but it would be very helpful if they could work it out for him to be here for that one.  The transfer window for incoming players doesn't open until Thursday and with the Rapids not linked with any CB's right now the odds of us filling his spot before the Philly game 48 hours after the window opens is essentially nil.  That means some combination of Cannon, Rosemberry, Murphy, and Atencio would need to play CB in Philly.  That's not a great set of options.  Still, I expect the deal to get done early next week.

Lastly there is a rumor about what the Cabral move is setting up.  Before today the Rapids had 3 DP's (Navarro, Mihailovic, Cabral) and 3 U-22 players (Bassett, Atencio, Ku-DiPietro) which meant we were limited to TAM deals to bring in anyone new.  The league allows teams to move from the 3+3 model to a 2 DP + 4 U-22 model if they want.

Enter Alexis Manyoma.  Multiple sources are reporting the Rapids interest in the Colombian winger who currently plays for Argentinian side Estudiantes.  Tom Bogert, however, is suggesting they are considering him as a U-22 signing, something that wasn't possible until Cabral was waived today.  Right now the reports point to a loan with an option to buy.  Transfermarkt shows his value at $1.7M.  He turned 22 this year and was an off and on starter in this year's Apertura, with no goals or assists in 369 minutes of play.

Look I'm going to be blunt.  We've all seen this story before.  Smith goes out and finds a young player to bring in at midseason on a loan to buy, and then (Navarro excepted) either the player doesn't work out out or the agreed on price in the buy option is higher than we want to pay and we let him go.  I don't see why Manyoma will be any different.  He's clearly another prospect with "potential", not somebody who's going to have an immediate impact on results.  I'll get excited about this move when he shows up and is able to contribute regularly at MLS level.  AKA, when he's better than Cabral.

One In, One Out, One Changed

Going in reverse order of the title and going fairly quickly since I'm on the road in our Mexicali office tonight a set of roster updates.

One changed: Kevin Cabral has gotten his green card and will count as a domestic player going forward.

One out: The Rapids and Daniel Chacon have agreed to a mutual separation of his contract.  He has already been linked (I don't think its official yet but it will be) with Alajuelense in his native Costa Rica.  The Chacon signing always felt like a move to sign a guy to make money off of him, not to improve the team.  Which was good because he made 8 appearances with Rapids 2 and none with the first team, while going on loan twice to make 11 appearances each time.  So 30 appearances over 3 years and walks away with no transfer fee paid.  To be fair his injuries derailed the plan for him, but it is another in a long line of international signings with "potential" that didn't pan out.

One in: This isn't official yet, but reported by Tom Bogert this morning and confirmed by everyone from Burgundy Wave, Matt Doyle, and the Denver Post the Rapids are buying homegrown midfielder Ted Ku-DiPietro from DC United.  This is part of the new cash transfer fee system MLS announced last month.  Colorado will buy him for $1.125 million with up to $275,000 in add-ons.

Ku-DiPietro was recently re-signed to a U22 contract so he'll have a low cap hit.  He's also a domestic player who's already familiar with MLS.  He had a strong 2023 season but suffered in 2024 (as did most DC players) and dealt with injury as well.  The thinking is he was misused in DC's system last year but will be a good match for Colorado's system.

If we play the 4-2-3-1 we did last year he will probably slot in at one wing with Cabral on the other side.  If we go with the rumored 3-5-2 he's more likely to be a supersub off the bench to spell Djordje, Bassett, or possibly Cabral up top.

Its nice to see what is, essentially, the Bombito money starting to be spent.  Along with the GAM we sent Cinci. to get Awaziem and Murphy that's essentially 3 players brought in with that sale, and we've only spent about a third of the initial fee.  Its also our first significant attacking signing since bringing in Djordje (unless you're going to count bringing in Navarro on a permanent deal last summer).

Rapids Acquire Kévin Cabral from the Galaxy

Today Colorado made its first big move off the season, acquiring French winger and Designated Player Kévin Cabral from the LA Galaxy in exchange for $600K of GAM in 2023 and $400K of GAM in 2024.  LA will pay half of Cabral's salary and retain a percentage of any transfer fee should the Rapids sell him.

Cabral was acquired by the Galaxy in April of 2021 for over $6M and in 61 appearances had 6 goals and 5 assists for LA.  Prior to that he was with French Ligue 2 side Valenciennes FC where he came up through their youth academy, having originally started in PSG's academy.  In 63 appearances with Valenciennes he had 11 goals.

At 23 years old (24 in July) Cabral is still early in his career but his start in MLS was not good.  Widely considered one of the worst DP signings in recent years by the Galaxy he was an albatross on their roster and with their upcoming transfer ban for overpaying Pavon and not reporting him as a DP and the $1M GAM fine for it the Galaxy were really on the ropes.  This move helps bail them out of the hole they dug.

On the plus side however, getting them to eat half his $1.65M salary and having already paid his transfer fee means the Rapids are only on the hook for the GAM and for about $150K in cash for each of the next 3 years to pay off the amount between the max salary and 50% of his salary.  So the cost here for a 6 million dollar player 20 months ago is minimal.  He does take a DP slot, but lets be realistic, the Rapids weren't going to use all those slots anyway.

There are still a couple of big negatives for me in this deal, and I think I come down on the side of "this had better work, because this looks like a bad deal right now".  First of all paying the same amount as we got for Kellyn Acosta seems out of whack on this move.  Either we sold Acosta cheaply or we overspent on Cabral, because as a MLS player Acosta is a lot more valuable than Cabral  Secondly, letting a fellow Western Conference team off the hook like this is not a great move.  LA was going to bein a world of hurt, and still will be, but since the transfer ban doesn't take effect until summer this gives them a chance to fill a DP slot before the winter window closes, and replaces the GAM they lost in the fine.  Third, this deal reeks of another case of Plan A and B for a new signing fell apart, so now we need to find a Plan C we can actually get over the line.  Similar to Zardes and Gutierrez last year.

Regardless of how you feel, the Rapids FO (Padraig Smith and co.) have put all their chips on Max and Cabral this season.  That's $2M+ investment in two players that so far haven't shown to be up to making a difference in MLS.  I can't see us making another major attacking move after those, so we will live or die on how that midfield works out.

In related news, earlier this week Minnesota United announced the signing of Clint Irwin, so as expected Yarbrough will have a new backup this year.