Minnesota United: A Quick Look, Opara

After giving up more goals than any other MLS team over the last two seasons, Minnesota United added a needed piece to their team yesterday in Ike Opara.

Opara is a decent center-back who has spent the last six seasons working his way into a starting role with Sporting KC. While not a game-changing player, he does add some stability to an otherwise shaky back four.

In order to acquire Opara, Minnesota had to give up about a million in MLS Allocation $. While it's still a little early to say exactly what allocation money is worth, I think if you need a position filled... you need a position filled.

Another quality defensive player was recently added as well, Romain Métanire (Stade Reims, France), who appears to be filling a right-back role. On top of that, they picked up Osvaldo Alonso (CDM) from Seattle this year.

These moves fill huge holes, but I'm not sure it's enough as I think a lot of this comes down to the way the team plays. You can't just through players at a problem and expect it to be fixed. That said, I do think this gets them off the mat and into the middle of the pack if they stay healthy (starting XI is old with only 2 players under the age of 28).

Here is how they stack up against the teams in the East that have been evaluated:

		Player Ratings (avg)		TransferMarkt Value (000)
	Team	Starters	Bench	Starters	Bench
1	ATL	71.0	66.7	$ 66,429	$ 14,484
2	TFC	70.5	65.4	$ 25,027	$ 3,502
3	NYC	70.5	64.6	$ 16,303	$ 4,470
4	DCU	69.7	56.6	$ 21,934	$ 2,990
5	NYR	69.7	64.9	$ 20,192	$ 3,745
6	MIN	69.6	57.1	$ 13,800	$ 4,470
7	MTL	69.6	65.2	$ 13,410	$ 4,876
9	CLB	69.3	66.2	$ 24,671	$ 4,180
9	NER	68.7	64.5	$ 13,278	$ 5,115
10	PHI	68.2	56.5	$ 9,933	$ 5,529
11	FCC	68.1	64.3	$ 11,420	$ 4,790
12	CHI	67.8	63.7	$ 17,022	$ 3,955
13	ORL	67.2	62.2	$ 10,365	$ 3,309

You'll notice that their bench is still suspect and they have average value in their starting XI.