Pickens To Tampa, Rapids Luck Out

Matt Pickens had been claimed by New England on Friday, a day after the Rapids waived him.  Today the Revs sold Pickens to the Tampa Bay Rowdies of the NASL for a reported $150K transfer fee.  According to the Rapids this worked out for us:

The reason it ended up aiding Colorado is that the Rapids will now receive the full salary cap relief for what was owed to Matt Pickens in 2014, which will allow the club more flexibility with the roster.

“We knew that Tampa Bay was interested in Matt, and if he had gone directly from the Rapids to the Rowdies, or even stayed with New England, we would’ve only received partial salary cap relief,” said Bravo. “Once the transfer was completed to Tampa Bay, that meant that we would save the full amount.”

To clarify Bravo's statement, it appears (according to the Rapids FO) that he meant that if he had gone directly from the Rapids to the Rowdies after being waived by the Rapids we would have only gotten partial salary cap relief, we would have gotten full relief had we sold him to Tampa.

Bravo also said:

The end result, according to Rapids VP of Soccer Operations and Technical Director Paul Bravo, was “the best possible outcome for all the parties involved.”

 Which I greatly disagree with.  This was an acceptable solution that the Rapids managed to luck into, but hardly the "best possible outcome".  The best possible outcome would have been for the Rapids to sell Pickens to Tampa directly and pocket the $150K transfer fee (which, under MLS roster rules, becomes allocation money).  Instead the Rapids had Pickens for a year and were unable to move him, resulting them in waiving him and being on the hook for part of his salary cap hit.  The rEvs pick him up for free and within 5 days manage to sell him for $150K.  Mike Burns even suggests that this wasn't the ultimate goal when they claimed him:

Jeff Lemieux ‏@jeff_lemieux 29s
In speaking w/ Burns, pretty clear #NERevs didn't claim Pickens w/ intention of transferring him. Deal was just "too good to turn down."

So in 5 days the Revs claim Pickens to apparently add him to the team but manage to turn around and sell him, something the Rapids couldn't do in a year.  Instead the Rapids resigned themselves to taking a cap hit on Pickens and releasing him for nothing.

Yes, its great that we got out from under his cap hit with this move, but this was hardly the "best possible outcome".  This was the minimum outcome I was hoping for last season when it became apparent that there was no reason to have both Pickens and Irwin on the roster going into this season.  We owe a tip of the hat to New England for freeing up that cap space for whatever moves Bravo is hinting at here:

“This allows us to do a number of things, both in the short and longer terms. We’ll be able to re-sign players that deserve new deals here, and we can also be a little more aggressive in bringing in additional players,” continued Bravo.

The Technical Director stated that he hopes to make other roster announcements in the next week or so, using some of the salary cap space saved in this deal.

Lets hope we're more successful with those moves than New England is with the allocation money they got today.

Pickens Taken By The Revs In Waiver Draft

Apparently there was MLS interest in Matt Pickens.  In today's waiver draft for his rights New England claimed him.  This isn't helping my feeling that there was a deal to be made with Pickens sometime in the last year but who knows.  There's also some talk that Colorado may be on the hook for some of Pickens salary still, I've got a question into the Rapids about it but I'm not sure they're going to be willing to answer it.  that would be really poor handling if it turns out to be true.

Rapids Waive Pickens

The Rapids announced late today that they've waved Matt Pickens.  After breaking his arm against FSL a year ago last weekend he was never able to reclaim the starting role, and his $190K salary was too much to invest in a backup keeper.  The Rapids tried to trade him up until the end, per the Denver Post last night, but there was, not surprisingly, no takers since the Rapids were obviously desperate.

You have to wonder if the Rapids could have managed this better.  By the time Pickens healed from his injury it was fairly obvious that Irwin had supplanted him and both keepers weren't going to be on the roster this season.  In those 9 months it wasn't possible to make a deal?  We saw a number of keepers move inside MLS this offseason.  Maybe Pickens' salary was too large to get a deal done, but this was pretty much the worst-case scenario to resolving this situation.

Pickens leaves as one of the top two keepers in team history, with his only competition for that title being Joe Cannon.  The team had more success with Pickens, but Cannon might have had better individual performances.  You couldn't go wrong choosing either one of them.  Pickens, of course, was in the nets for the MLS Cup victory and had a huge blind save very late in extra time to preserve the 2-1 score.  The only remaining players from the MLS Cup team are now Moor, Mullan, and Wynne, but of course we've got Pablo as head coach and Smith as an Academy coach.

Colorado now has 4 open roster slots, 2 of which can be filled by internationals.

Rapids Sign One, Cut Two, Keep One?

A number of player announcements today.  The big one is that, as expected, Jose Mari was officially signed today.  Mari has returned to Spain to work out his paperwork for his permanent move to Colorado and is expected to rejoin the team later this week.  He'll be eligible to play once his visa and ITC come through.

Today the Rapids also announced that trialist Juan Guzman and draftee Albert Edward have been released from camp.  This leaves Arsenal youth player Samuel Galindo as the only unsigned player in camp.

Thanks for this one go to regular reader and frequent commenter Jester who noticed that Michael Stephens just signed with Stabaek, filling their last international spot.  That means that Matt Pickens won't be moving there, so presumably he'll be returning to Colorado and the Rapids will have to figure out what Plan B with him is.

One last non-player note.  C38 has announced that Pablo Mastroeni will be the special guest for Saturday's season kickoff party at the Celtic.  They have also said the Rapids will have a big announcement at the party, with the leading fan theory being the official announcement as Pablo as head coach.  We'll see what happens.

So now that preseason is wrapping up, here's our roster.  We've got 29 players signed against a cap of 30 and 6 of our 8 international spots filled.  We've got probably 1 too many goalkeepers, so you have to assume something is going to be done with Pickens, and probably too many attackers, though a number of them can drop into midfield.  The big depth issues are at right back (Wynne and then...?) and target forward (Buddle and then...?).

Goalkeepers:

John Berner

Clint Irwin

Joe Nasco

Matt Pickens - On "Excused Absence"

Defenders:

Davy Armstrong - Homegrown Player - Will start season on IR(knee)

Mark Burch

Brenton Griffiths - International

Chris Klute

Drew Moor

Brian Mullan

Shane O'Neill - Homegrown Player

Grant Van De Casteele

Marvell Wynne

Midfielders:

Samuel Galindo - Unsigned trialist, International

Marion Hariston - Generation Adidas

Nick LaBrocca

Jose Mari - International

Dillon Powers

Dillon Serna - Homegrown Player

Nathan Sturgis

Jared Watts

Forwards:

Deshorn Brown - Generation Adidas, International

Edson Buddle

Martin Chavez

Charles Eloundou - International

Kamani Hill

Danny Mwanga

Vicente Sanchez - International

Gabriel Torres - Designated Player, International

Matt Pickens On Trial In Norway

It appears Matt Pickens "excused absence" from training camp has taken him to Norway:

Matt Pickens in goal for Stabaek in today's friendly. Stabaek trailing 2-0 late in the first half. Streaming live. http://t.co/yNjbB9Au0p
— Jeff Bradley (@JerseyJBradley) February 15, 2014

Stabaek recently named Bob Bradley as their manager and he's obviously using his MLS connections to find some players.  It was pretty obvious that Pickens was going to be moved before the roster deadline on March 1st, but it appears that he's more likely to leave MLS than be traded.  Assuming he's sold and not just cut so he can go to Norway (or wherever) the Rapids would get some allocation money in exchange for selling him.

Back To Our Regularly Scheduled Programming

OK, after a couple of days to enjoy the Super Bowl Champion Seahawks its time to get back to the Rapids preseason.  One Colorado team managed to win on Sunday as the Rapids beat the Dynamo 3-2 in a scrimmage in Houston.  The teams played 3 30-minute periods with the second one split up with a normal halftime after 45.  Here are the rosters the Rapids used:

First period:

Nasco
Edward - Casteele - Moor - Klute
Guzman - Galindo
Chavez - Hill - Serna
Buddle
​

Second period:

Nasco
Edward - Casteele - Ibikunle - Kindle
Ayarna - Guzman
Eloundou - Galindo - Serna
Brown
​

After half:

Nasco
Edward - Watts - Ibikunle - Kindle
Ayarna - Hairston
Eloundou - Galindo - Serna
Brown​

Final 30 minutes:

Berner
Wynne - Watts - Ibikunle - Burch
Sturgis - Hairston
Sánchez - LaBrocca - Eloundou
Torres​

The goals were scored by Dillon Serna, Deshorn Brown, and Gabriel Torres got the game winner.  The first Houston goal was scored by Rapids-loanee Tony Cascio.  Ayarna is Ghanaian midfielder Reuben Ayarna who joined the team on trial in Houston.  He's been playing in Sweden the last 5 years after attending Boston College.

Yesterday's update included this statement from GK coach Chris Sharpe in discussing Berner and Nasco:

"We're looking for somebody to compete at that #2 spot, to push Clint day in and day out, and to be comfortable and ready to play,"

With Pickens still on "excused absence" from preseason that makes it pretty clear he'll be traded/sold/cut before the roster deadline on March 1st.  So here's our current camp roster:

Goalkeepers:

John Berner - Unsigned draftee

Clint Irwin

Joe Nasco - Unsigned trialist

Matt Pickens - On "Excused Absence"

Defenders:

Davy Armstrong - Homegrown Player - Will start season on IR(knee)

Mark Burch

Albert Edward - Unsigned draftee

Brenton Griffiths - International

Tolani Ibikunle  - Unsigned draftee

Kory Kindle

Chris Klute

Drew Moor

Brian Mullan

Shane O'Neill - Homegrown Player

Grant Van De Casteele

Marvell Wynne

Midfielders:

Reuben Ayarna - Unsigned trialist, International(?) 

Samuel Galindo - Unsigned trialist, International

Juan Guzman - Unsigned draftee

Marion Hariston - Generation Adidas

Nick LaBrocca

Dillon Powers

Dillon Serna - Homegrown Player

Nathan Sturgis

Jared Watts - Unsigned draftee

Forwards:

Deshorn Brown - Generation Adidas, International

Edson Buddle

Martin Chavez

Charles Eloundou - International

Kamani Hill

Danny Mwanga

Vicente Sanchez - International

Gabriel Torres - Designated Player, International

Players Leave For Houston

The Rapids left this morning for their week long training stint in Houston.  Everyone in camp traveled except 4 players.  Mullan, Mwanga, and Powers stayed behind to recover from their injuries.  Matt Pickens is still excused from camp and hasn't joined the team yet.  That screams "working out a trade" to me.  The Rapids and Dynamo will scrimmage this weekend, no streaming coverage.

Oh, and Marc Burch, stay strong fellow Seahawks fan, don't go to the dark (orange) side.  Go Hawks!

Player Of The Year

No surprise here as Matt Pickens was the run away winner for my Player of the Year award.  Looking back at my Player of the Game awards I gave it to him 9 times, over a quarter of the games.  The next closest player was Mullan with 6 awards.  No other player got more than 2.  In a disappointing season where most of the team struggled to get on the same page Matt was a steadying influence in the back.  He saved the teams countless number of times this year, preserving 1 goal leads and draws for the few points we managed to get.  Even in games we got blown out of he was the best player, keeping 3 goal losses from being 5 or 6 goal losses.

Last off-season I question if Pickens was worth keeping around long-term after his play dropped off at the end of the 2011 season, suggesting that if we got a good offer we should trade him.  That's why I'm not the coach or Technical Director as I was badly wrong with that suggestion.

Pickens, Casey, Maybe Others Shut Down For Season

Today the Rapids announced that along with Pickens, Casey will also be shut down for the last two games due to his nagging knee injury.  Mullan may join them, and Larentowicz will be watched closely to see if he needs to be added to the list.

This will also allow Pareja to play some of the younger players like O'Neill, Armstrong, and Cascio in their place.  That's really what Colorado should be using these last two games for anyway.  Since we're out of the playoff race there's nothing more for the veterans to prove, so letting them start their off-season recovery and conditioning early will help them going into 2013.  Getting a good look at the young players will help us with off-season roster decisions.

Pablo, Pickens, and Salaries

Some news and notes for the off-week:

• Today's update on Pablo's condition is encouraging, but long-term.  He is practicing with the team multiple days a week but he's not yet ready to play.  Apparently he'll make a decision about retirement once the season is over.  It sounds like he wants to continue playing but I still believe that he'll decide to retire.
• Matt Pickens' groin injury on Saturday night appears to be season ending.  It seems like Steward Ceus and possibly Ian Joyce will get the start in the last two games as the longest consecutive game streak currently in MLS and in Rapids history will end at 75 games.  Smart move by the team, being out of the playoffs Pickens has no need to risk injury and this gives Pareja a chance to evaluate Ceus and Joyce  before the off-season.
• Last week the Players Union released the updated salary list.  This includes salaries for Klute, O'Neill, Thomas, and Wahl.  No real surprise for anyone other than Thomas, who's making $187K this year, which is a bit higher than I expected.  We'll have to see what his number is for next year, if he returns, but odds are he'll be one of the higher paid members of the team.
• The other note of interest is Cummings' and Moor's new contracts.  It appears that they both took a        bit of a pay cut in exchange for extending their deals.  Cummings gave back $9K and Moor gave back $30K.  An interesting move by both of them.

The full list of salaries, with new/updated numbers bolded.

Player Position	Base	Guarenteed
Akpan Andre F	57,200.00	57,200.00
Armstrong David M	44,100.00	53,564.29
Cascio Tony M	44,000.00	77,750.00
Casey Conor F	400,000.00	400,000.00
Castrillon Jaime M	50,000.00	68,375.00
Ceus Steward GK	44,100.00	44,100.00
Cummings Omar F	81,996.96	95,999.96
Freeman Hunter D	105,000.00	110,792.50
Hill Kamani M	44,004.00	44,004.00
Joyce Ian GK	44,004.00	44,004.00
Klute Chris D	33,750.00	33,750.00
Larentowicz Jeff D	200,000.00	206,000.00
Marshall Tyrone D	90,000.00	93,250.00
Mastroeni Pablo M-D	240,000.00	245,000.00
Moor Drew D	200,004.00	212,004.00
Mullan Brian M	152,000.00	160,335.00
Nane Joseph M	44,100.00	44,100.00
O'Neill Shane M Palguta Scott D	44,004.00 63,670.00	55,504.00 63,670.00
Pickens Matt GK	178,538.00	181,038.00
Rivero Martin M	50,004.00	50,004.00
Schmidt Luis Eduardo M-F	120,000.00	139,458.33
Smith Jamie M	148,992.00	158,992.00
Thomas Hendry M	187,800.00	197,800.00
Wahl Tyson D Wallace Anthony D-M	65,000.00 63,394.00	86,086.67 63,394.00
Wynne Marvell D	250,000.00	326,666.67
Zapata Luis D	65,460.00	69,043.33

Swans And Keepers

No full review of last night's friendly, but some odds and ends that I observed. First though, the news of the day. Colorado signed goalkeeper Matt Pickens to a multi-year contract extension today. As always terms were not released but we'll see the new salary when the Players Union updates its salary list. Pickens joins Mullan, Moor, Larentowicz, and Cummings with new multi-year deals since the end of last season.

Now, onto last night's game. The Rapids won 2-1 with two great goals from Andre Akpan and Kamani Hill in the first 15 minutes before Jonathan De Guzman scored directly from a free kick with 12 minutes to play. With the exception of the last 15 minutes or so Swansea wasn't really trying hard, and after 30 minutes their players were obviously struggling after their long flight from London on Monday and playing at altitude. Despite that there were some interesting notes:

• Swansea players laid a wreath at midfield before the game and both teams held a moment of silence in memory of the Aurora victims which was very much appreciated.
• Oddly there was no British/Welsh flag flying and neither God Save The Queen or Hen Wlad Fy Nhadau (the Welsh anthem) were played, though the Star-Spangled Banner was sung like any other game.
• Hill looked good last night.  Pareja's post-game comments seemed to insinuate he may have read Hill's place wrong and he's reassessing.  Its will be interesting to see if we see more of Hill now.
• On top of that his goal was an absolute bomb off the post from outside the area.
• Thompson had a harsh tackle that would have been questionable for a league game, much less a friendly.
• Great combination work between Smith, Zapata, and Akpan for the first goal within 5 minutes.
• De Guzman's goal was good, but Joyce completely misread it.  Most keepers probably could have stopped it.
• Great to see homegrown players Davy Armstrong and Shane O'Neil get their first home playing time (for Armstrong) and first playing time of any kind (O'Neil).  Armstrong played RB while O'Neil took Larentowicz's spot in midfield.
• Unfortunately the attendance was only about 6500.  I have a feeling that's going to lead to the Rapids not bringing in a big European team again for a while.  They'll probably revert to Mexican teams where they know they'll get good attendance.

Rapids News 12/21/2010

I was going to do the final part of the season review tonight, but a few pieces of Rapids news have pushed that to tomorrow (hopefully).

• Larentowicz, Pickens, Wallace, and Wynne have all received invites to the annual January National Team camp in LA.

This will be the 4th of the last 5 January camps that Pickens has attended, but he has not yet been capped. Let's hope he gets at least that honor as with the depth at goalkeeper he's not looking at getting any serious playing time. Wallace will get a shot at the left back spot as there's nobody who's really claimed it yet. Wynne will probably be a sub somewhere on the back line at best but I don't see him as a starter yet. Larentowicz has the best chance of really making an impact as the team has been looking for somebody to partner Michael Bradley in the empty bucket formation, and Ginger Ninja partners Pablo in a similar formation in Colorado.

• Jeff Plush talks about a likely jersey sponsor and a possible friendly against a German club.

I'm glad to hear that a sponsor sounds close. I'm hoping its the long-rumored Chipotle deal. I would love to see a German club in the Dick for a friendly. I much prefer watching the Bundesliga to La Liga or Serie A but I'm limited to what I can find on ESPN3.com. My sister and brother-in-law spent some time in Heidelberg this summer and brought me a TSG 1899 Hoffenheim scarf back so I've been following them this season. I'm crossing my fingers that we get a German friendly and I'm hoping it might be Hoffenheim. ;)

• Rapids in talks with Ulrik Lindkvist

This report is from Tribal Football, so take it for what it's worth. If true I'm guessing he'll fill the need for depth at center back that Gary Smith has talked about. Think of him as this year's Julian Baudet.

And on a final note, Happy Birthday to my wife Hope. :)

A Different Type Of Season Review - Goalkeepers

Well, after a couple of weeks off to catch my breath after that great run (and get some non-soccer stuff in my life done) I'm back. Normally after the season I've done a season recap and a post about what I think the Rapids should do on a player-by-player basis. Things are a little different this year, obviously, with the MLS Cup win. While I'm sure I could find other grades than A to give to the various parts of the team, I still haven't come off my high from winning it all and I don't want to kill the buzz.

In the same way I think the player decisions this offseason are fairly obvious. There's maybe 2-3 players that i would consider making any moves with, the others are obvious keepers or didn't get enough playing time for me to judge. Instead I'm going to do a player-by-player season recap. I'll also include what I expect form the player coming up, but it won't be the same sort of review I've done in the past. Today we start with the goalkeepers.

Matt Pickens - Jesus was the undoubted number 1 this year, there was never even a hint of anyone else being the starter. Back spasms kept him out of the home game against Houston but he played every minute of the other 29 games and the 4 post-season matches. Pickens was the only keeper to have 2 post-season shutouts and was 3rd in shots faced this year. Of course his biggest save was in the 120th minute of MLS Cup when he appeared out of nowhere to stop what looked to be the tying goal from George John.

Matt is a solid if not flashy goalkeeper. That save in MLS Cup is the only really big save that stands out from the season, but at the same time I only remember one blunder from him all season too, the disaster at the end of the final regular season game against FSL. Pickens is just where he needs to be when he needs to be there most of the time. His big problems have been his injuries (back spasms and groin strains). I also don't expect him to jump start an offensive attack ever (unlike Tim Howard against Algeria), but that's as much about our style of play as Pickens. I seen no reason to make a change unless somebody like Brad Friedel falls into our laps. Certainly our time is best spent finding help elsewhere.

Ian Joyce - A 'Yank Abroad' that I'm not sure any American fans had heard of when the Rapids brought him home last offseason, Joyce had a quiet season. He was only called into action twice, once in a U.S. Open Cup qualifier and once in a league match. Oddly enough both games had the same 2-0 scoreline, once with the Rapids winning and once with them losing. The 3-0 loss to NY in the USOC was largely due to Drew moor having a horror of a game and leaving Joyce with no chances. In the Houston home game the Rapids were up 3-0 after 23 minutes and the Dynamo never really generated a serious threat.

Its hard to tell based on 2 games, but Joyce seems a capable backup. Assuming that Pickens returns at a similar level (and at age 29 you would expect that) we don't need a second number 1 keeper. We need a clear number 2 who can fill in when necessary. With the expanded rosters next year we can have a 3rd young keeper who's training to be our keeper of the future while still have a solid more experienced backup option. Joyce seems to fill that role. Plus it doesn't hurt that I won his jersey in the season-finale "Jersey Off Their Backs" promotion. ;)

Steward Ceus - Ceus is in his second year after being drafted by the Rapids in the 2009 Superdraft. Last year he spent much of the season with the USL-2 Charlotte Eagles, taking them to the USL-2 championship, and he expected to do the same this year. Unfortunately he broke his wrist soon after arriving in Charlotte and returned to Denver to spend the rest of the season in rehab. He did play in the first U.S. Open Cup qualifier for the Rapids, but that's the only significant game action he got with the team. Steward did get to spend time during the playoffs with the Haitian National Team in their pre-Digicel Caribbean Cup training camp in Brazil. He then got the start for all 3 of their second round group stage games before Haiti was eliminated.

I'll leave it up to the training staff that got to see him play this year to make the judgement. If the lost time due to the injury didn't set him back he seems like a young keeper that we could be training for the future. Haiti may not be a great team (especially now when there are so many more important issues in Haiti) but the fact that he's at least starting at times for them in competitive matches (the Digicel Cup is the Caribbean qualifier for the Gold Cup) is a positive sign.