You're right, I must have seen that at the time and forgot. I updated the post to explain that but still wonder if that wasn't reported until late October 2024, at least a year after the clause triggered, because the the club didn't realize...
Haha or because there aren’t enough shoe-leather reporters sniffing around the team on the regular?
I tend to agree with you though, ‘cause I feel like maybe a trade last summer would have been preferable to this mess. I was also a fan of keeping him for this year with option for buyout midsummer, but whattayagonnado.
Yeah, the buyout situation is another reason to wonder if the club knew Klich's contract was guaranteed. Did they know when they promised Birnbaum a 2025 buyout they committing to Klich's salary?
Maybe so, I mean, the way things played out was actually better for the salary cap than if they had bought out Klich in 2025 and kept Birnbaum's cap hit, which was over twice a DP's at $815K. Just the two actions, buying out Birnbaum and getting Atlanta's cap relief for Klich, freed up $1.1 million in cap space. That's a big chunk of the salary cap, which is effectively $7.6 million when you take the actual cap and add in the standard TAM allotment.
Hmm. I think it's been in discussions for a long time, so Mackay might have known it was coming.
Still, I suppose if you assume that DC ownership's money is limited (a good assumption), call it X, would you want to spend $2m just opening up his slot and then be left with X-$2m to spend on a new DP now? Or wait a year and spend the full X amount?
I suppose in the summer window the buyout amount would be down to about ~$1m, so that's now an option at least.
One good way to compare age between 24 and 25 is to compare the average age of all the 24 players who left with the average age of the replacement players brought in for 25.
I took a quick look at this. Even here, there are a few definitional questions: did Fletcher leave last year or is he still in some sense on the team since it was just a loan? But assuming Fletcher counts as leaving, then the average age of departing players was 25.92 while arriving players are 25.2. So...slightly younger! Of course, the returning players are all a year older.
Fletcher went on loan in August. Due to injury and lackluster performance he didn't factor much before leaving.
His loan is through the summer. I would imagine he isn't coming back. If Forest doesn't make the deal permanent I bet we find a Belgian team to offload him to.
I'd also like to point out an important change from last year is that we'll have some starting as a left back that is a left back for a significant amount of the year. Last year we had a true left back start 6 total games. I am not including Pedro Santos as a left back/wingback since he could not defend standing up.
Yeah, I expect to talk a lot about that in part 3 when discussing the defenders. It's a little tricky to evaluate because Lesesne switched formations once he had a left back, but if I recall correctly, something was messed up with the rest defense in that new formation and they gave up tons of goals. Schnegg didn't stay healthy long enough for the coaching staff to find a fix for it. That's how I remember it, anyway, but I'll go back through the game logs as I write that piece to see how things look.
Our defensive woes are from three things in my opinion. Our midfield just got shredded in transition. As you pointed out in this piece, Klich didn't cover himself in glory defensively. Peltola was often hung out to dry, then the defense.
Second, Our defense didn't have the right personnel. Between Antley getting injured and Schnegg arriving the LB spot was scary. McVey, Tubbs and Akinmboni all missed time due to injuries so our CB corp wasn't very stable.
Third, to play a high risk style like Troy does, you need a great goalkeeper. Bill Hamid level who can really bail you out at times. We didn't have that. Bono was solidly average.
This puts my expectations for 2025 in perspective. I mean, there's got to be a plan to bring in a high-level DP at summer right? For me making the playoffs will hinge on whether we can pick up the creative slack we're losing with Klich's exit (Pirani + Peglow + Leal)>=Klich? Klich was a definite defensive liability to not sure it even has to match him just generate enough goals to improve our goal differential.
One thing to note about the Klich situation is that he could have been bought out, but since we had to burn the buy out on Jeahze last year they had to wait to buy out another contract. [Note: even more spending] This left them with the choice between Birnbaum's contract which still existed until the end of 2025 and Klich's contract. If they bought out Klich, they would only get $683k back or whatever the max is this year. However, since Birnbaum was on an inflated wage due to his time and influence here, they received slightly more $815k or so. So that plus the $350k total they got via the trade made this the best course of action.
Great minds think alike, I just posted something similar in a different comment. I would only caveat that you're right, it's the best course of action in terms of salary cap space, but being down a DP slot for a year is a real bummer. Hopefully the extra cap space will help Mackay build up the rest of the roster, and I'm cautiously optimistic, but it remains to be seen how well that goes.
Glad to see these back! Thanks for all the hard work.
I’ve repeatedly read that Klich hit the benchmark needed for the guaranteed 2025 extension in 2023 and not under Mackay/Lesesne. Is that not true?
You're right, I must have seen that at the time and forgot. I updated the post to explain that but still wonder if that wasn't reported until late October 2024, at least a year after the clause triggered, because the the club didn't realize...
Haha or because there aren’t enough shoe-leather reporters sniffing around the team on the regular?
I tend to agree with you though, ‘cause I feel like maybe a trade last summer would have been preferable to this mess. I was also a fan of keeping him for this year with option for buyout midsummer, but whattayagonnado.
Take that back, just realized tee don’t have a 2025 buyout.
Yeah, the buyout situation is another reason to wonder if the club knew Klich's contract was guaranteed. Did they know when they promised Birnbaum a 2025 buyout they committing to Klich's salary?
Maybe so, I mean, the way things played out was actually better for the salary cap than if they had bought out Klich in 2025 and kept Birnbaum's cap hit, which was over twice a DP's at $815K. Just the two actions, buying out Birnbaum and getting Atlanta's cap relief for Klich, freed up $1.1 million in cap space. That's a big chunk of the salary cap, which is effectively $7.6 million when you take the actual cap and add in the standard TAM allotment.
Oof, the change allowing a second buyout is a bad surprise vis-a-vis Klich decisions.
https://bsky.app/profile/stevengoff.bsky.social/post/3lfpmnulvbs2u
Hmm. I think it's been in discussions for a long time, so Mackay might have known it was coming.
Still, I suppose if you assume that DC ownership's money is limited (a good assumption), call it X, would you want to spend $2m just opening up his slot and then be left with X-$2m to spend on a new DP now? Or wait a year and spend the full X amount?
I suppose in the summer window the buyout amount would be down to about ~$1m, so that's now an option at least.
One good way to compare age between 24 and 25 is to compare the average age of all the 24 players who left with the average age of the replacement players brought in for 25.
I took a quick look at this. Even here, there are a few definitional questions: did Fletcher leave last year or is he still in some sense on the team since it was just a loan? But assuming Fletcher counts as leaving, then the average age of departing players was 25.92 while arriving players are 25.2. So...slightly younger! Of course, the returning players are all a year older.
Fletcher went on loan in August. Due to injury and lackluster performance he didn't factor much before leaving.
His loan is through the summer. I would imagine he isn't coming back. If Forest doesn't make the deal permanent I bet we find a Belgian team to offload him to.
I'd also like to point out an important change from last year is that we'll have some starting as a left back that is a left back for a significant amount of the year. Last year we had a true left back start 6 total games. I am not including Pedro Santos as a left back/wingback since he could not defend standing up.
Yeah, I expect to talk a lot about that in part 3 when discussing the defenders. It's a little tricky to evaluate because Lesesne switched formations once he had a left back, but if I recall correctly, something was messed up with the rest defense in that new formation and they gave up tons of goals. Schnegg didn't stay healthy long enough for the coaching staff to find a fix for it. That's how I remember it, anyway, but I'll go back through the game logs as I write that piece to see how things look.
Our defensive woes are from three things in my opinion. Our midfield just got shredded in transition. As you pointed out in this piece, Klich didn't cover himself in glory defensively. Peltola was often hung out to dry, then the defense.
Second, Our defense didn't have the right personnel. Between Antley getting injured and Schnegg arriving the LB spot was scary. McVey, Tubbs and Akinmboni all missed time due to injuries so our CB corp wasn't very stable.
Third, to play a high risk style like Troy does, you need a great goalkeeper. Bill Hamid level who can really bail you out at times. We didn't have that. Bono was solidly average.
This puts my expectations for 2025 in perspective. I mean, there's got to be a plan to bring in a high-level DP at summer right? For me making the playoffs will hinge on whether we can pick up the creative slack we're losing with Klich's exit (Pirani + Peglow + Leal)>=Klich? Klich was a definite defensive liability to not sure it even has to match him just generate enough goals to improve our goal differential.
One thing to note about the Klich situation is that he could have been bought out, but since we had to burn the buy out on Jeahze last year they had to wait to buy out another contract. [Note: even more spending] This left them with the choice between Birnbaum's contract which still existed until the end of 2025 and Klich's contract. If they bought out Klich, they would only get $683k back or whatever the max is this year. However, since Birnbaum was on an inflated wage due to his time and influence here, they received slightly more $815k or so. So that plus the $350k total they got via the trade made this the best course of action.
[apobassuiapsduf] why is this in my brain
Great minds think alike, I just posted something similar in a different comment. I would only caveat that you're right, it's the best course of action in terms of salary cap space, but being down a DP slot for a year is a real bummer. Hopefully the extra cap space will help Mackay build up the rest of the roster, and I'm cautiously optimistic, but it remains to be seen how well that goes.
Great Read! Thanks! Vamos United!!