Philadelphia Union 2009 Expansion Mock Draft

If I was Piotr Nowak and was selecting from the list of unprotected players available for the Union, I would select as many players with a connection to Philadelphia as possible. Wait, no I wouldn't, because I don't care about that, and neither should Nowak.

Instead, I would be selecting players who have a proven track record in MLS. Many fans are more prone to recommend selecting younger players with lower salaries. But I think the team would have the best chance of winning by selecting more experienced players who are at or near their prime.

Forwards:
DC - Luciano Emilio - No need to elaborate any further than I already have.

Looking at the full list of available players now, I'm leaning even more towards Emilio, because I really don't see any other players on the list that are likely to contribute more than a couple goals. I jotted down Pat Noonan and Calen Carr as other potential targets, but I think PU is more apt to look for help abroad at this position.

Midfielders:
SJ - Bobby Convey - Still hasn't settled in since returning to MLS, and there seem to be rumors floating that this move was already in the plans. Convey only played for Nowak for a brief time in DC before heading to Britain, maybe he'll make up for it now.
DAL - Dave van den Bergh - Third in MLS in 2009 with 11 assists, and one of the most consistent wingers in the league.
SEA - Stephen King - I'd be remiss if I didn't select at least one Terp. King never really had a chance to establish himself with the Sounders, or with the Fire before that. He could get that shot in Philly.
CHV - Mariano Trujillo - Vital part of one of the best defense's in the leauge, and can play either right back or right wing. Can't argue with selecting a player that's been capped by Mexico's national team.

Ok so I actually have two Philadelphia natives on that list apparently. But this group would give the Union a solid set of wingers to choose from, and they would be wise to add a CAM from outside the league. I struggled not to select Amado Guevara, but I don't seem him as being enough of a team-oriented type player to build around.

Defenders:
CHI - Gonzalo Segares - Consistent defender for the Fire over the last four years, and with 13 caps for the Costa Rican national team. I'm actually surprised by the number of quality left backs exposed.
RSL - Robbie Russell - Such is the cruelty of MLS that a player can score the winning goal in MLS Cup one night and find himself on a new team the same week.
CLM - Andy Iro - This young big defender did well when filling in for Chad Marshall when necessary. Could turn out to be great as a regular starter.
KC - Aaron Hohlbein - Looks like Peter Vermes made the strategic decision to sabotage his team by protecting two guys I've barely heard of (Kevin Souter and Jonathan Leathers) over two young emerging American defenders in Hohlbein and Besler.

Philadelphia really has a chance to build a good defensive unit from the group of players left exposed. The four guys I named would all be good additions, but the Union could also do well by selected Matt Besler, Gino Padula, Eddie Robinson, or Wade Barrett.

Goalkeeper
LA - Josh Saunders - I don't think any player helped himself more in MLS Cup than Saunders. He shut out RSL when playing in regulation, and was just an uncharacteristic Donovan miss away from winning the Final.

Philadelphia could do a lot worse than this list of players. And with some additional personnel from abroad, PU could make for a good rival.

Why not Emilio?

After the expansion draft protection lists were revealed yesterday, I wrote on Twitter that DC United is probably the first team in the history of sports to leave two former league MVPs unprotected in an expansion draft. If anyone cares to research the entire history of expansion drafts, feel free, but the point is that there's a lot of talent available to be drafted this year.

I plan on putting together a full list of who I would select if I was Philadelphia's GM either tonight or tomorrow, but looking particularly at the players DC United left exposed, something jumped out at me. The common perception among fans seems to be that one of either Andrew Jacobson, Devon McTavish, or Boyzzz Khumalo will be selected by the Union. But I think we're overlooking a very different possibility.

Why not Emilio?

Luciano Emilio has scored 41 league goals in the last three years, and he's the only unprotected player to score 10 or more goals in 2009. In fact, he's one of only five unprotected players to ever score 10 or more goals in a season. But three of them (Eskandarian, Noonan, and Guevera) haven't done it since 2004, and the fourth (Razov) is five years older than Emilio and coming off a zero-goal season. If I'm the Philadelphia Union, I don't want my top forward to be some project that I'm going to have to wait on to develop. I want a proven scorer. Emilio is just that.

The arguments against Emilio have been age and salary. Age? The dude's only 30! He's three years younger than Juan Pablo Angel, and I haven't heard anybody complaining about him being too old.

And sure, Luciano Emilio comes with a heavy price tag, but that's to be expected for a player that has scored 10 or more goals in every season in MLS. Maybe Philadelphia wants to build their team exclusively around nothing but low priced players. Or maybe their owners have told Nowak not to worry about money, and has given him permission to acquire whatever players will deliver the most victories. Hmm…

It's hard to say what the Union will do. At least with the Sounders last year we had some indication of their needs and desires prior to the draft because they had already signed a few players (Keller, Ljunberg, Le Toux, and Naissey IIRC). But if I was the Union's Team President, I would select a mixture of young promising players and proven veterans.

I would select Luciano Emilio. Would you?

DC United 2009 expansion protection list

With MLS Cup 2009 now behind us, the league turns immediately to 2010. While congratulations are due to Real Salt Lake, with a nod in particular to two of my favorite non-DC players Nick Rimando and Kyle Beckerman, the celebration won't last long for that club, because they are likely to be losing a player just three days later. Each MLS team will submit a list of 11 players today and the Philadelphia Union will be selecting 10 players in the expansion draft on Wednesday. Generation Adidas players (Rodney Wallace) and homegrown players (Bill Hamid) are excluded.

I've been thinking a lot over the past few months about which players DC United should place on their protection list. My conclusion was that I was thinking too much. There are really only two questions that should be asked about each player on our roster:

1. Is he likely to play an important role for us in 2010?
2. Is he likely to be an attractive pick for Philadelphia?

If the answer to both of these questions is YES, then that player needs to be protected. If the answer to both questions is NO, then the player should not be protected. That much seems very simple.

I answer YES to both questions for: Bryan Namoff, Dejan Jakovic, Clyde Simms, Santino Quaranta, Chris Pontius, Julius James, and Jaime Moreno. Any surprises there? I don't think anyone is going to disagree with me on the first five. Others have left James off of the "Must-protect" list, but I think he has proved to be a valuable member of our team and could also be seen as attractive to PU. Moreno is the only guy I've seen missing from some other lists, but he is definitely still an important player for this team. Even if he doesn't start every match, he raises our level of play when on the field. And despite his advanced age, you're crazy if you don't think Piotr Nowak would strongly consider taking the MLS all-time leading scorer who was at his best when playing in Nowak's system.

I answer NO to both questions for: Josh Wicks, Milos Kocic, Avery John, David Habarugira, Greg Janicki, John DiRaimondo, Ely Allen, Tiyi Shipalane, Brandon Barklage, Boyzzz Khumalo, and Ange N'Silu. Any disagreement? Some have mentioned Wicks because of his shot-stopping or Kocic because of his age, but I don't think United is sold on either one being our #1 GK next season, and I don't think either is likely to be selected by PU for the same reason. Habarugira may have a lot of upside, but he's years away from being a regular starter, and I don't think the Union are going to take a flyer on him when other proven defenders will be available. How about Khumalo? He is sometimes important to our team as a reserve forward, but hasn't made enough of an impact in MLS yet to be considered a building block for a new team.

So then we are left with 4 slots remaining to be awarded among the following 8 players: Lawson Vaughn, Marc Burch, Devon McTavish, Danny Szetela, Andrew Jacobson, Fred, Christian Gomez, and Luciano Emilio. Let's look at each player a little closer.

Of the three defenders, Marc Burch has been the most valuable to the club over the past three years, due mostly to the extreme lack of quality left backs in MLS. Surely DC United will hope to upgrade at that position in the offseason, but I question our chances of finding a more skilled replacement. If the team is able to upgrade though, then Burch would be relegated to defensive depth, putting him in the exact same category as Vaughn and McTavish. McTavish was drafted by Nowak in 2006, so there might be a little bit of sentimentality there, but probably not. The good news is, if we happened to decide to leave all three unprotected, we're only going to lose one at most.

The competition for starting holding midfielder for DC United just got a little bit more intense with Olsen's retirement, and so we have to consider whether Danny Szetela or Andrew Jacobson is more vital to the team's future plans. Both have shown good promise at times for us in 2009, but neither has fully established himself as a capable starter. So without really knowing which one is more likely to win a starting job in 2010, we're just left to question which one would look more attractive to PU. Got to give the nod to Szetela there.

Lumping Fred, Gomez, and Emilio all together, we have a few very serious unresolved questions. And while others have disagreed with me, this is where I'd really hoped that we would have a new head coach in place prior to the expansion draft. Deciding between keeping Burch, Vaughn, and McTavish might not be a critical decision that will have a huge impact on our season, but deciding between keeping Fred, Gomez, and Emilio is. All three have been great players for DC United at some point in the past, and any one of them might be great for us again in the future. It's just hard to say which. So again, without having further insight into the mind of Dave Kasper to determine if any of these players is even going to be offered a contract for 2010, we're left to look only at what value Philadelphia might place on each player when starting from scrach. Could Fred be deemed as an important building block and allowed to play in his most natural position with the new club? Probably. Gomez had 14 goals and 11 assists and was named the league MVP when playing for Nowak in 2006, but is the coach likely to select a player that has so obviously lost a step (or two)? Probably not. And then there's Emilio. No one knows yet if he'll be back in MLS next season, or what salary he will command if he is back. But if he is left exposed, he will undoubtedly be the only 2009 10-goal scorer exposed.

I honestly didn't have a list in mind when I started writing this, but the right choices are starting to become more clear to me. I'm set on 10 out of 11 players: Namoff, Jakovic, James, Simms, Quaranta, Pontius, Moreno, Szetela, Fred, and Emilio. And finally, an argument could be made for either Jacobson or Burch, but this just wouldn't be the DCUMD blog if I didn't settle on Marc Burch in the end.