Brek Shea and FC Dallas

FC Dallas stood out to me after spending some time with MLS teams and player performance in relationship to salary. Marvin Chavez, George John, Fabian Castillo and Andrew Jacobson are among the top under valued players in the league in that the are playing well beyond what their salary might dictate.

In all, FC Dallas only has six players performing below their current salary. From what I've found, this is superior team management/planning then all the other teams in the MLS. It could be argued that if it were not for the injury to Designated Player David Ferreira earlier this season the team might be even better at appropriately paying it's players.

One interesting piece of info to take a look at is how much a Point is worth currently in the table. In adjusting player salaries to reflect their teams point in the season I can see that FC Dallas (47% of season complete) is getting the most points out of monies paid out to players. Each point taken from either a win or draw is only costing the team ~$46,000.Under paying players isn't necessarily a virtue. In fact it can get a team in trouble next season. Will Dallas be able to hang on to players out performing their salaries? Or will they have to shed a few in hopes that they can bring in new talent at lower levels of pay. Time will tell.

In a league without relegation and limited funds paying players appropriately is a high wire balancing act that has a net if you fall. In the English Premier League, where relegation does happen, there is no net. In fact if you fail there, you and all your spent money, fall into a vat of acid.

One of the reasons I mention Brek Shea in the post title is that he is one of the players in the MLS being paid appropriately for is outstanding play this year ($133k salary, $205k value). The tall Texan is 21 years old and has six goals on the season to date. He is playing lots of minutes on a winning team. To put his goal scoring in perspective. His six goals are more then any Crew player had last year except for the one and only Guillermo Barros Schelotto (9 goals) had all last season. Ironically, for Dallas last year, their leading scorer was Jeff Cunningham. Yeah, that Jeff. He had 11 for them.

Let's keep an eye on Mr. Shea this season. He is having an MVP year. It'll be interesting to see what other teams (foreign and domestic) come calling later this year. Where he ends up could be a bellwether moment for the rapidly growing MLS. A league that is now able to compellingly stand on the same level as, say... Turkish leagues and lower division European ones.

Is it possible that we might see a USMNT in the near future that isn't loaded up with players riding foreign pine? Recent results by the MNT may suggest that picking players based on the simple fact that a club outside the US saw something in them almost seems antiquated at this point. Almost. When you throw in the fact that some US players are getting picked out to play elsewhere based 1st on the fact that it brings attention (rich) US viewers (revenue) and not player talent? American's gobbling up foreign teams are doing so for a reason folks. Ohhh, it's getting interesting.

Young Mr. Shea's future may answer that question and prove some of those statements.

For now, pull up the FC Dallas game tonight on your computer while the USMNT game is on the TV. You might see the future US mid-fielder putting one in the net at Pizza Hut park and wish it were him putting a much needed one in at the Rose Bowl against Mexico.

MoneyHoney, Part 2: The Battle of Attrition

I've heard fans of struggling teams in Major League Soccer accuse or excuse team play on thriftiness. I've heard Crew fans toss that out this year more then a few times. And rightly so. The team shed many top players with top salaries last year. But were the decisions the team made actually thrifty ones?

All of the teams in MLS are asking the same question. Money questions in this league or any league are always going to be asked. An injury to a Designated Player here, a breakout league minimum salary rookie there. It's a difficult balance. But it doesn't have to be. Not for a league like Major League Soccer anyway.

Salaries in the MLS are not out of control as they might be in the NFL or NBA. Swing and miss on a player and the harm done isn't as devastating. For the Crew the lightning rod example is Andres Mendoza. His DP guaranteed salary is near $600k. That's a hefty sum for a team in the MLS like the Crew. I had to ask myself... Is any player in the league worth this much?

The answer to that question is, No.

In fact, there isn't a player in the league worth more then $210,000. At least not based on performance.

It can be the Castrol Player Rank, PowerStats101 or even my own player rank. It doesn't matter. No player is worth, based on performance, anywhere near what Mendoza makes. Players like him make what they do because that salary is what it takes to get a player like him to play in a town like Columbus. Same goes for a player like Henry. He has been magnificent this year. Best offensive player in the league by a long shot. But in no way is he worth the 5.6 million to get him to play in NY. That's more then some teams as a whole. Good for the league, yes. Watching Henry play against MLS talent is a thing to behold and should be appreciated. It's not in his individual talent that winners are made though. Pay all you want to Henry... You still have a Sutton in goal. It's balance that teams need.

It's not easy. For a lot of teams it is a battle against attrition. Case in point could be the Columbus Crew. The team made some bold decisions this year. Picking up rookies in the draft and paying the modest salaries. Balchan is a perfect example. He is paid a modest salary of 59k. But he has logged 1255 minutes this year (1350 being the max possible). Columbus is 3rd in the East, doing well. My estimated value on him is near $160k. Well over double what he makes now. Thrifty to a T. The Crew have a few other examples like Balchan. Heinemann, even though he hasn't scored, is one. His league minimum wage presence on the pitch for a winning team is enough. He has opened up things for Mendoza. Don't believe me? Check the Chivas game and the one against Houston. The only two times the Crew has had more then 1 goal during the run of play this season. James and Burns are other good examples of getting the most out of players.

Columbus isn't the best example of thriftiness though. San Jose and Dallas are the best at it this year. The only two teams on the positive side in terms of getting the most out of under paid players based on performance. Columbus clocks in around 10th. A lot of that due to our controversial friend, Mendoza. But to be fair, Dilly Duka has a lot to do with it as well. Injuries have kept this talented player off the pitch.

So how do all the teams stack up this year in terms of player performance and salary? Here is the list.

+239,911.25 : San Jose
+217,235.15 : FC Dallas
-026,259.45 : Chivas USA
-064,181.55 : Seattle
-126,720.58 : Portland
-129,487.31 : Chicago
-168,033.66 : Los Angeles
-177,943.76 : Colorado
-280,203.82 : Philadelphia
-323,530.49 : Columbus
-406,675.12 : Real Salt Lake
-497,496.95 : Toronto FC
-513,671.71 : Vancouver
-527,199.11 : New York
-576,779.20 : Houston
-593,696.51 : D.C.
-677,921.59 : Sporting KC
-727,345.60 : New England

I capped the DP's to what their salary counts towards the team cap. There are hundreds of other things to take into consideration when valuing player worth. That's just a list showing how teams are doing in terms of paying players based on what they are doing on the field only.

The biggest take away from this is that team management across the board are paying the wrong players too much. It is indeed a battle of attrition. Maybe the best players will get taken by European leagues. But it doesn't make sense to pay a lot of these players what they are making. Reward players like Balchan. Keep them in Columbus. Let deeper pockets take the others.

Tons of opportunity for informed teams to succeed here.

Nobody said it was easy. It wasn't easy for the Crew to cut loose some popular players. But in the end has it hurt the team and its standing? Difficult questions to answer right now. But so far, not too bad.

MoneyHoney, Part 1: Columbus Crew

The chart at the top shows only the Columbus Crew. In gray is the individual players current guaranteed salary. In dark blue, is true value based on my player rating model.

With my (still evolving) player ratings I've had the bug to match them up with player salaries in a way that makes sense in a way that might make Billy Beane happy.

So here goes nothing.

Using the statistics available I've attempted to assign a score to each player. It's impossible to really go beyond maybe a letter grade or descriptions like; Great, Good, Average, Poor, Disaster - but I'm fairly satisfied with what I've got. Sébastien Le Toux is probably not the best player in the league. He is, however, one of the best. I'm confident in this because no matter how I play with the numbers he always finds his way into the top 10%. Why? He is on one of the best teams, their GA average is great, he has a handful of assists, one penalty and he plays loads of minutes.

I weight each category with a multiplier and HEEEYOOOHHH out comes a usable aggregate. In Le Toux's case: 88.50. The best in the league. Each player has a score like that. Players can actually receive an negative aggregate because of weighted GA. Shavar Thomas for Sporting KC has the lowest number at -38.84. I slide the difference between these two and out comes my score on a 100 pt. scale (on right).

So, looking at it this way, where does this leave the Columbus Crew to this point in the season? Well, let's get to that.

- 401 players have seen the pitch this year
- 24022.1 is the total number of points all players have earned in my model
- $49,290,780.79 is the total salaries off all those players (using a rounded cap number of 350,000 for the DP's). Less then Fernando Torres transfer this past season.
- Divide the points into the total salaries and I get a single point value of $2,052

On my sliding scale (to get rid of negatives) Le Toux has 127.34 points. Use my per point factor of 24022.1 per point and that gives him a value of $261,282.60. His actual salary is $179,000.00 making him a value.

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In the chart for the Crew we have 10 players performing at or above their current salary. Of course a players worth is not only in performance, as the case with team captain Chad Marshall. And of course the player market dictates how much a player is paid.

Overall, the soccer market in the US is small so we don't see a whole lot of wasted spending by many (if any) teams (yet). Major League Soccer is going about this the right way.

Moneyball-ing it, so to speak.