SoccerWise - Soccerwiser MLS Roster Building w/Matt Doyle & Bobby Warshaw(Bloom Sports)

Episode Date: January 29, 2026

Get your pencils and notebooks out because it is time to get wiser about soccer together! Bobby Warshaw (Bloom Sports) takes David & Matt through the exercise of planning a winning MLS roster. He asks them the same questions he asks some of the biggest clubs CSO's. Listen to the debate and conversation. And you can answer the questions yourself about the club you would build. See the questions below and send the hosts your thoughts on Bluesky or in the Discord!What are your objectives for the next 1-3-5 years? How are we measuring our targets?What’s your thesis on why you will be successful? In 1-2 sentences, tell me why you’ll beat out the 29 other people trying to do the same thing as you?What are your Roster Pillars? What are the ~5 things that you need to achieve with your squad to be successful in MLS? (They do not need to be the same for every team.)What are the categories of players within your roster? How are you defining and measuring them?

We are back for everyone's favorite moment of the month. That is the beautifully titled, the beautifully named soccer wiser episode. Matt Doyle and Bobby Warshot back with me, David Goss, as we are going to once again dig into the deepest depths of NERDM of Major League Soccer. You guys, I got to tell you, we got some great feedback from the first episode, and we made sure to send every nice comment to Bobby just to ruin his day in Doyle. I feel like we did a pretty good job. We did.

We made sure that Bobby knew how appreciated he was among a certain subset of American soccer fans and how excited everybody was to hear his voice and his insights into the game once again. It was exciting for all of us. And Bobby, you're back once again. It didn't turn you away. Yeah, Matt, that was really nice. I was about to give David a hard time for always opening with the bays. But then you said something nice, and I really appreciate it.

I'm as annoyed as you are by the need to always open with a bit. I was told, I think, by someone super wise that it's like, you should be super formulaic. You should always open exact same amount of time, exact same vamp, something completely not to do with your topic and show. Then you move into the topics and then you slowly go along them for elongated conversations and then you close about an hour and 45 minutes in. That's how I was, it was explained to me that I should ideally do a podcast. By who? You're looking at him right now. Nobody's telling the opposite.

You know, I have very strong views on what a podcast should be. And David just said all of the opposites. But I remembered all of the things you said that I don't do. You did. I'm very impressed. This is an incredible thing about you. Whether you're listening or actually hear it or not, you always remember it. It's a phenomenal skill.

It is. And I will always use it to jab you. But I'm excited to be back here once again. I think last time we got a nice wide range in conversation. Bobby, I know this is stuff I talk about with you a lot off there, so I'm excited to bring it on the air. And we were leaning into your professional expertise. So give people a little bit of an idea of what you do and then how this episode's going to go. Yeah, and I'll add to that when we were on before, my daughter was sitting here with us and she was putting my headphones in her mouth.

And now the one that was in her mouth definitely doesn't work. So I only hear David from my left ear, which is really really, the best way to hear David. And I'm wondering, well, so, you know, the way this topic comes up is because I often listen to your show and I'll shoot you notes about what's on my mind. There's nothing like playing Monday morning quarterback to somebody's podcast, as we all know. And I, you know, I'll often send you a message. We chat about it. The three of us talk about this all the time whenever we're together and not together. And I wanted to just have us have a more formal conversation similar to what I will do with clients. You know, what we're about

to do is something I've done, I don't know, a dozen times with executives and clubs across sports around the world. I love to do it. The three of us have never done it in a formal setting, so I'm really looking forward to this. To give a background, you know, at Bloom Sports, where I've been for the last few years, we do two broad things. The first is executive search. So if you need a CEO, a sporting director, head coach, head of revenue, medical performance, a pretty wide range, and that's straightforward is what you expect. The other is advisory. An advisory could be a dozen different things, one of which is this. It is to help someone think through the intentionality of how they build their roster.

And it's not my job to say which right back you should sign or exactly how much money you should spend on a center midfielder. It's just to make sure that you have the full 360, the full picture that you've thought through all the details on how you are going to fully allocate your salary spend through your team. And that's what we're going to do today. Amazing. Yeah, I'm excited. I don't really have to do much now because you're going to lead the show. Did you expect something else was going to happen? I haven't even moved a little bit.

Was there any question about that? Not at all. So I will walk us through a series of questions. You know, there's usually takes several weeks a bunch of meetings because as always, whenever you do something like this, it's not about the final output. It's about all of the thought that goes into it because the final output is basically moot the second you make it. It's like a fact of life.

experience, but it's all the thought and the process that goes in. So we'll speed this up to an hour. Usually take several meetings, but we'll just dig straight into it. And putting meetings out of our lives. Damn it. I know. Big meeting guy. David's in the C-suite now. Okay. So I will lay out the four questions that we will talk through. If you're at home, you want to pause and do it yourself before we dig into it. I sent it to you. We were hoping Tom would be here. He's not. So you have had time to think about it. I certainly have thought about this a lot, and we'll talk about specifically major league soccer. The four questions are, the first one is, what are your objectives over the next one, three, and five years?

And more importantly, how are you going to measure that? And I would like this, as we talked about, to be more specific, hopefully, than just, yeah, we want to win a championship. I mean, really, where do you want to finish and how are you going to measure that? two is what is your thesis for doing that just in one to two sentences explain to someone either a friend the ownership group your staff how are you going to achieve that and it sounds simple but i would challenge you right now say you are going to be a championship contending team two sentences why are you going to beat out the other 29 teams to achieve that question three is what are your pillars to build the roster to achieve your goals. Three to five, maybe seven pieces that if you look

it back at the end of the year and you accomplish them, you will more than likely have achieved your goals. And then question four is, how do you think about the definitions of the terminology of how you build your roster? So more than saying, oh, that player is great or that's a good, good striker, really what are the terminology you're going to use and how are you going to measure that terminology? So those four questions, I've sent them to you in advance and we are going to chat. Yeah, I would add for anyone, if you do this yourself and have some big ideas, you're always welcoming the Discord.

Of course, if you're not already a subscriber, you can subscribe to our Patreon and get there. Also on Blue Sky, hit us up. Soccer wise, myself, Doyle, I don't know, Bobby probably will be searching on the side. And then we will send them along to Bobby and we'll tell you whether your team's going to win or lose. But I would love to get people, if you're interested, to do this yourselves and send us some of your ideas. Or you could just pick off our ideas and tell us why we're wrong. And let me, I'll be clear about this and ding a little bit too. Sometimes when I hear you talk about players, I would say that you do not have a unifying framework to how you are thinking about it.

And I will take the Fokundo Torres conversation, the former Orlando player signs in Austin. I would hear comments like, I really like this, right? Good player, good signing. I'm thinking to myself, well, how do we connect it to a consistent way of thinking about how you're building your roster? I mean, truly, which of the, to question four, which of the designations are they taking? And this is a little deeper than just designated player, Tam player. Which designation are they taking?

Which roster pillar are they hitting for you? How are they going to help you achieve that thesis? Which hopefully we will nail down into it. There's no wrong answers to this. there are a bunch of different ways to approach it. So I'm really looking forward to pulling some of this out. Okay. Doyle, I want to toss to you first.

So talk to me. How do you think about your objectives for your major league soccer team? So over the one three five timeframe that you gave us, like my, my overarching goal would be to build a sort of self-perpetuating, points accumulation machine. There's something where the floor gets raised so high that you can deal with fixture congestion, you could deal with travel,

you could deal with the variety of surfaces, altitudes, climates that you have to play in in Concordcaf, and you can deal with injuries. And to me, the way you do that is three fold you have a defined style of play

you integrate new players new signings into the team in a really measured and deliberate way and three you create

and then avail yourself of a pro player pathway from the absolute bottom, you know, you ate all the way up into the first team. You figure out and spend whatever it takes and however long it takes to make that payoff. Because without that, I think ultimately, you lower your ceiling and you just annihilate your floor. You make it so that your floor is 20 points. Yeah, that's awesome. I want to hold it. So you said build a perpetuating Self-perpetuating, yeah.

So what I mean by that is, like, look at how the sounders have been able to, like, Kalonikosa-Rienzi, right? It was an afterthought of a player, and they're just tossing him out there in huge games against Leo Messi and Rodrigo DePaul. And the goal score in that game, we're talking about the Leagues Cup final, was Osage DeRasario, who came, was tossed aside by how many teams and came from Tacoma. And it was, like, last year, Sounders team was maybe the best example I can find of that. But also, the Red Bulls did it for a long, long time.

That's what I thought you were going to go with this. Yeah. The Red Bulls have been really good at it. The union are really good. I think they're going too aggressive in terms of replacing too much of the roster at once this year. But, like, they all have. or had in the Red Bulls case really defined in clear styles of play a real willingness to go down roster and because of that they're not as vulnerable to the vicissitudes of injury climate travel and the

rest okay i still want to go back your objectives where are you going to finish in the standings are you competing for trophies are you hanging around to be entertaining to your fans and on So talk to me about where you expect this group to finish. If I have the ability to go out and spend $15 million on a DP every three years, then I expect us to win two trophies every three years. I don't care what two. Could be Open Cup, could be Leagues Cup, Shield, MLS Cup. I would want two every three years and I would be pissed if we didn't.

If I don't have the ability to go out and get ceiling raisers, match winners, at that level, I would never expect to win a trophy. I would be happy if I did, but I would aim 55 points and home field advantage in the first round of the playoffs, qualify for Champions Cup,

maybe half the time. For the sake of the exercise, tell people what team, give us the type of team and spend that you want to meet here. This is Columbus? Just a level set for... Oh, I want to be Miami.

I know. 100% want to be Miami. Why would I want to be, anything but what Miami is doing because Miami is going. But is Miami's expectation not to win four trophies every three years? Well, they have messy, right? So, and that confounds all other expectations. If I'm Miami and I'm only winning one trophy a year and I have messy,

I feel like I failed that I haven't built the perpetual, the self-perpetuating points machine, right? But I do think that Miami to their credit have been open to, kicking over every rock to find every bit of talent, including from their academy, including from the draft. And I think last year, they really moved a lot closer to identifying a style that's not just give the ball to Leo and hope he could solve everything. Like I thought Mascherano was really, really impressive.

Part of that was as a tactician, but then obviously the bigger part, I think, was as a culture setter because you could see everybody. buy in over the course of the season. Okay. I like that. I also want to say one thing I don't think has been given enough of a shout out for Miami and three of us talked about this, the work that Megan Cameron has done there helping build that team. There's a lot of conversation and nobody really knows and I just want to point out that I do think Megan, who is incredibly impressive, deserves a lot of credit for what she's been able to do with that spend. She might be the second most impressive person in that

org. Right. If you look at it, because she's the one who's raising the floor by giving them all this sort of flexibility in terms of how they build the roster because she just understands the cap so damn well. And I didn't know that that was, I thought it was going to fall apart when Chris Henderson left. Right. And the fact that it's maybe even gotten better over the past. There's a through line between great, I almost want to say great legacies for a while sporting Kansas City and now Miami. And that through line is Megan. So we can transition. I just want to point that out because I don't think people have. mentioned that enough. David, what you heard from Matt. So Matt is what I would say, you know,

there's clear categories for me on how you think about your objectives. I think that there is you consistently win trophies. The truth is in Major League Soccer, I don't think anybody could have had that designation really until Miami right now. And Europe, it's a real thing. Man City needs to consistently win trophies. You're saying across an existence or across the time span? Like, wouldn't you've said that about Toronto from 13 to 17, Seattle from 14 to 22. Right. A cork of Major League Soccer where it does adapt.

I mean, most clubs have a brand and a legacy where you do hope that exists forever. For the sake of this. No, I want to say forever. I'm going to push back on that. That wasn't Toronto. That was Bez, right? That wasn't the galaxy.

That was Bruce. The only one that's a little bit different is Seattle, because that was under multiple different CSOs, but also as league-wide spend has increased and parity has decreased, Seattle's, like Seattle added a trophy to their cabinet last year was the first time in, what, four years? So, or three years. So it's, like, it's changed, right?

It's a different, like, it's very easy. to, I think, pin it on and correctly to pin it on the sort of org leadership in the past rather than this is a club doing a thing. What I would say, though, Matt, if this one, when I've done this in an ownership group, what I would say is we're trying to move beyond that. I think you know that, but I'm just saying it. The point of what we're trying to do in an exercise like this is we are creating club IP that survives any head coach, any executive staff, so that ownership, who are the generational

multi-decade custodians of the organization have that through line. Obviously, it doesn't happen that often, but that's the thing that's worth pointing out that what David's saying is, if you do this properly, this is hopefully a forever thing. This is who we are. This is how we approach it because we do have the consistency in how we operate. So that's how I would think about it, David. But for Matt, I would define Matt as we are going to win a trophy every season. And we'll talk about what those numbers look like. And again, I think Miami is really the first organization in league history that can pin that on themselves.

Alexi were close. LAFC, Toronto were close, but I don't think they got there. I would say the next tier as I define it for Major League Soccer is you will consistently compete for trophies. You will hang around, right? It feels like LAFC is the only organization that's in that category and has been for the last five years. After that, well, David, why don't you take over?

So that's where Matt's hanging out. Where am I hanging out? Yeah, where are you going? How are you thinking about it? And I'm curious if you have any impressions of what Matt said as well. Mine's a little bit more of loser mentality because that's how I operate as a lifelong Nix messenger. Go Nix.

Yeah. So when I saw this, my first inclination was I want my team every year across five years to be in the conversation for a top four seed. I looked back through. So back to 2021, you either had a four seed or lower in the conference finals every year except for 2022. And in 2021, you had three. you had NYCFC in Portland who were both four seats that meant in a final and RSL who were a seven seed.

Obviously NYCFC this season, Red Bulls last year as a seven seed in Orlando was what a three seed hosting that final as well? So kind of a lower one as well. And then Houston the year before where my theory is that if I set that floor and I'm competitive and good and I'm in the conversation around that four seed, there is a chance I could be going to a conference finals or MLS Cup every year. And I would hope the way I build it is not I'm maxing out to the four seed, but I have flexibility. So in the years that I look at it and say, oh, this is the year, then in August, I can then go make maybe a big move that I feel like jumps us that year. But I, so my goal is to have a consistent core that keeps us in those competitive moments, which is what I put as my sort of ideas,

our core and our consistency will be our winning attribute. And I look at the sounders when I talk about that. Even if you're changing some of the names out, the identity of the team from like a culture point of view and expectations point of view has stayed high. And I think part of that is because even when you bring in new pieces, they're around for a while with the old pieces. And the trade-off or hand-off of culture and identity from Ozzy Alonzo

to Zhao Paolo from Nico Lodero to Roosnack and obviously Raldon and Jordan Morris and Stefan Fryer key to this. That's what I want to build, which is anyone who comes into our environment, can immediately understand what the expectations are, where we sit and I think, and I feel it when I'm in markets,

I think the expectations internally from clubs elevates their performances consistently in Major League Soccer. I think there are some teams in MLS that don't feel high level, and part of that's like their reality and their environment. And I think it's, I think you feel it on the inside. I think you feel it in the way they perform week in and week out. And the Seattle Sounders go out and they're like, no, we're the biggest team in the world. This is the most important game of the year.

And we're going to do that all the time. Yeah. Everything you said, this is a yes and something that's slightly off topic to that. But one thing that always felt like helped the Sounders tremendously to me was the very useful, productive pressure from the fan base. they've never in their existence, how do players show up and not give their all? Because it's the one market in the country, and correct me if I'm wrong on that, where someone will stop you at the farmer's market and say,

David, I didn't think you were good enough this weekend. And not in a way that they're attacking you, but in a way when you really show up to work every day, which is not true about the other 29 markets in Major League Soccer. So aside to that and a credit to the culture that Seattle has. And you're right, the standard is not just the club, but the city has created for. them. And I would say

expanding out on that, I think part of it is the domestic core that they've built as well, which is not domestic, I think, is the Let's come back to this. Let's hold this. Hold that because I want to come back to it. I think that's my guess a roster pillar for you.

Okay. So David, you want to be a top four team. Matt, you want to consistently win trophies. It depends on the budget. If you give me the budget to go out and get son, you know. Doyle, it's wiser. We're giving you Miami's budget.

You've asked for it. All right. Great. Yeah. I want to be trophies then. I would say David has Orlando's budget, roughly mid-league, and Matt has. I want to get, does this shock any of the listeners? If you would ask him for who do you want to be, I assume 100% of listeners would have exactly

expected this is the tiers that they put themselves in. Yeah. Okay. Matt, you alluded to it. For what it's worth, I actually want to back up and just give some context here, because I think context is really important, especially when you think about how you're going to tear yourselves and how often you are going to try and achieve those goals. So, Matt, I know you know this answer off the top of your head. And for what is worth, I am also a top four. I want a home

playoff game. I think basically every team and every league in America, really your goal should be a home playoff game. I am a floor guy where let's set the floor and create decisions that could elevate us above that. But let's be sure about what our roster can at least achieve on the median season for us. So I am a top four. But what's hard about this is, Matt, over the last five full seasons, 21 to 25, how many

teams have finished top four in all five seasons? Can I pause? Let me actually back up a step. How many teams have made the playoffs in all five seasons? Two. Do you want me to name them? Yeah, RSL and Orlando. Okay. Spot on.

And that's a little bit because they were both ninth place this year. So, you know, that's like, They didn't actually make the top eight. How many teams have finished in the playoffs in four of the last five years? What is it, eight more? Nine more. Yeah. Okay.

So it's doable, right? I think it's fairly fair to say, you know, four out of five seasons, which, you know, again, to what we're talking about, Matt wants to be a trophy winning team. David wants to be top four. There's only two teams that even make the playoffs every year. And they're actually probably not the teams we think of as in this top tier. So I think that's useful. So now let's get to the next. point how many teams have finished top four and all five of the last five seasons none yeah

none yeah yeah correct how many have done it in four of the last five Cincinnati's done it three times at least off the top of my head yeah Cincinnati has done it three times the Seattle Sounders have done it three times I see LAFC in Philadelphia have done it four times okay So, you know, back to the point, right? You think to yourself, I can set my expectations. And I think it's very fair logically that for most teams and most sports in America, you should fight to be a top four, basically a home playoff team. And yet we can just look at the data.

Four teams in Major League Soccer for the last five years have accomplished that. Like, that in itself is a huge accomplishment that is hard, right? So all of a sudden, as we level set on it, I find interesting. So not counting Leagues Cup or Open Cup, and maybe someone, there's no team that's won two trophies in the last five years. If we look at just a Porter Shield and just MLS Cup, you've won one or the other. I don't think anyways won both.

Miami. Miami's done it the past two years. Sorry, Miami, you're right. And LAFC. Sorry, ignore that point. I'm just wrong on it. So two teams out. But two teams, Matt, to your point, you want to win a trophy basically. You know, this is really hard to do in Major League Soccer intentionally.

Whether it's good or bad, another soccer-wise or conversation. But I think that's important. I would talk about the knock-on- I would add to. I would add to. But none of them have one MLS Cup in that span. So it's not useful. It's true.

What I would talk about too is what is the best way to measure that? Because I do think, as we all know, there's the real table and the proverbial table of truth. You know, sometimes ball don't go in. So how do you make sure that you're measuring your actual performances? There's pretty cool, um, algorithmic ways to do this. On a simplest way, I usually nudge people to use expected goal difference. Right? We're all familiar with expected goal difference, goals four minus.

100% of the people who would listen to this podcast are familiar with expected goal differential. Very fair. Yeah, if you've made it the 26 minutes in, very good point. I would say that usually the top four, the cut off is roughly plus 15. That matters to me, partially because it helps show actual performance on the field minus the luck of being able to hit the ball in the goal. but it also helps us connect back to roster pillars and what we're not going to talk is a roster template and the roster composition because what I do believe is what's funny is you guys are all experiencing this now you're talking to front office people around the league and you say how you're going to do this year and their answer is we're feeling pretty good right in their mind they're going to be a playoff if they miss the playoffs last year they're going to step into the playoffs this year if they're in the playoffs they're going to step up to be a home playoff team right it's pretty predictable and you say oh how do you know that I just got the sense.

You know? My instinct tells me. And you just think to yourself, well, give me like one data point. Give me one other thing to back that up. So what I often try and nudge people do is let's actually create a model. The most basic and famous people listen to this will be a goals added, right? Traditionally a VAEP, an OBV, some metric that equates a player's value. And truly what the actual scale is, doesn't matter.

But let's just do some objective measurement to, know if our players can add up to what I just said, we want to be top four in our conference. Top four in our conference usually requires a plus 15 goal difference. I therefore need my players as they are rated to equal plus 15. And there's, I've worked with clubs that actually don't buy or care about data. And I would say,

then that's fine. Literally pull up a list and rank everyone in every position in your, in your league. Let's at least know that we're going to have top third, top 25% players to our positions. And if you don't trust the data, that's fine. Let's trust your eye. But let's even just do the counting to make sure. So that's what I would say.

Top four and plus 15 and expect a goal difference. Does that make sense? Am I tracking here? It does. Yeah. Okay. Okay. Awesome.

Next up, Matt, you kind of talked about your thesis a little bit, which was, is this is this fair to say this is your thesis how are you going to accomplish that how are you going consistently compete for trophies i would add one spend money that's pretty clear for you spend not just in the roster two yeah no no no no detailed style you can't have all the money you get most of the money no then i don't want the job i want to come back to this later because i'm actually surprised slightly surprised that you actually do on all the money because i think you would actually have a lot more fun if you had philadelphia for Orlando's budget and not Miami's.

And you would be so stressed having to go to Seriala games and pick which Maroonchuk to buy. That's not the existence you want, Doyle. Everyone knows that's not what you actually want. It's true. But like we're aiming for the stars here. And I don't want to get in David's Lane anyway. We all know what Lane David's driving in for the second.

Doyle wants to get a suite at Flaflu and he wants them to come and try and convince him to overspend on their game. This is also that this is a. little bit off topic, but maybe there's sporting directors listening and there might be laughing in their head. But this is a serious question. If you went in, right, and you have the job and you are having this conversation with ownership, there's really two angles. David, to your point, you set expectations high and say, this is who we are. You know, welcome to the team. Get on board or get out of here. We're going to win a trophy regularly. Or you can, as most people in the world do, level set

their expectations. It's going to be hard. We've got a young team. The last GM didn't give me much allocation money give me a break here right really which do you think you would do would you say this is the bar get on board or admittedly it's going to be a hard couple years i guess what i would say is those are two conversations ones with my owner and ones with my players and i think i would talk to them differently i wouldn't tell my owner like i would challenge i would challenge that point therefore you are not the organization you just talked about do you think do you think brian and craig are given a different answer to adrian and they are giving to christian rodon no but i think adrian might be training himself just giving the answer to Christians sometimes it's just part of maybe the problem

maybe the advantage there um but yeah I guess that's fair and I would say I get I think I would take the pressure you know I thrive I'm a diamond okay I'm formed under pressure so I would put it out there but I think it's hard to say to your fans like we're going to win something and then I can tell you how many times I've gotten the James Dolan quote sent to me over the last two months of like this the championship team where's the championship so I understand the expectations that go there, and which is why everyone's always trying to tamp it down, especially if you're the GM of the Buffalo Bills, and then you're just playing games. Don't understand that reference.

Use context clues, Bobby. Use context clues. The, okay, so Matt, spend money, which is the best, the main answer in most soccer leagues in the world, right? It's very clear. There's a strong correlation between spend and most leagues and performance. MLS, a little more spurious, but you're going to spend money. detailed style of play

I would say an intentional onboarding integration so that the player you scouted and you really liked is a player that shows up in your uniform which is hard and rare and a clear player pathway including player development of I would imagine

for you first team players yes I would that would not be the last of the pillars I would mention that might be the first of the pillars I would mention there's no success in this league without player development David, what's your thesis? How do you give something to sync to get someone fired up for you?

Am I going from a thesis to pillar or I'm just on thesis? Sure. I'd say my thesis is focusing on our core and our consistency. And the insistence that that consistency is our winning attribute. I think jumping in different directions is what hurts professional sports teams. I would keep on a line and that would be my advantage. And I think in that one of my pillars is having the highest average quality of player on the field or never having the worst player on the field.

Like that's the side of things I'm looking at in that rather than I need to have Cucho tomorrow. It's like I want the losing player on the field to be on the other team. Okay. How does this then, David, layer into your roster pillars? And admittedly, roster pillars always get a different answer. The meaning of it doesn't actually land in the way I want it to, which is fine. I'm curious to hear how your brain digested it. So what are your, and again, the roster pillars are, tell me three to seven things that need to happen in your league to be successful.

Where if you say, hey, if we accomplish this group of scouting and executives and roster building, we will therefore finish top four. and it's going to be different for the Philadelphia Union as it is going to be for the LA Galaxy. But what's right for you? Can I say in this I would lean into a possession style, which I think helps affect some of this. So I will say one of my pillars would be,

I think I would have one of the more even spending rosters across the league. So I would have more players at a higher level without having key players maybe at the highest levels. and then in that positionally wise, I would lean into centerbacks and having what I would hope would be the two best centerbacks on the field every game. And then trying to acquire players who have attributes that fit my possession style, even with flaws in their game that mean that they struggle to play on other teams, which I think the clear example would be Vancouver. and like going out and getting A.Z. Jackson right now, if that's what ends up happening, similar to a move of going and getting Jaden Nelson and Ali Ahmed, like, that's the type of thing where

maybe they don't have the explosive speed to be breakaway guys like we thought they would, or maybe they're not as clean in the final third as expected. But the things they're good at will be amplified in my system, and then I can continue to hunt for more of them to then flip them for the next player. Does that work at all? Democratic spend Democratic spend two certain type of centerbacks which we're going to come back to

and a profile player profile to game model match and fit across the group which I think is not a full outlier but somewhat of an outlier compared to other teams. Matt, any follow-ups to that? It looks like you have followed. No, it's the exact model

that I would look for. And like the difference is, you know, at come, come open the transfer window. I say the owner give me a $20 million check to go out and get the perfect number 10 to put into my group to buy someone from, you know, Barcelona if I want. If that's the type of money that you're giving me, then like that's the type of player I'm going to get. But it's going to be targeted. The groundwork is going to be laid so that I'm, you know, bringing Laminia Mall over, right?

and I'm not going to ask him to do everything. I'm going to make sure that he's getting the ball on his foot at a sprint in isolation or, God, with him, sometimes one V3 is good enough. But like, you know, my right back is going to understand. Sometimes that means it's underlapping. And there's going to be built in flexibility and understanding in the game model that is sort of resonant in terms of allowing the best players

to be the best version of themselves, but also using the best players to sort of rise the tide for the rest of the boats. Easier said than done. So there's... Yeah. So two conversations in here, and they're more relevant

when you're an expansion team are really rebuilding. So two adjacent questions are one. Do you think about your team from the cores leading to the DPs, or do you think about get the DPs? The truth is, in this league, you need that at least one player.

you probably need two and then everything else filters down from that. That's question one and question two is, do you acquire talent or do you have very specific profiles for the team and the style you want to play? So it's one thing to say, David, you want to be possession based. But obviously there's ways to do that, the types of outside backs,

the types of midfielders. Are you going out and just getting the 14 best players? Or are you saying, no, I know exactly what I want to write back. I know exactly what I want to say. I think on that either of those questions energize you guys yeah I think on that last question I would go with the 14 best players like the feeling I've gotten from watching max arfston succeed and aliadmed and shan zawatsky and all of this is like if you give me technical quality then I can make the rest of it work and it won't hit 100% of the time but nothing will so that's where I would lean with that and then on the DP side I think I would say I would do it last like I would build a the structure and the foundation to then go find the piece. The only caveat in that is sometimes something's available that shouldn't be. And I would like to believe that I live in a world where, okay, here's the dream list of

10 guys. Oh, he's not playing for three weeks. The January window's up. They need a new left back. They're looking for money. Like maybe this guy's available now when he shouldn't be, which was, I think, what Atlanta thought with Moran Chuck, for example, when they did it before. the new coach and blah blah blah and all of that was like oh shit we can get him so let's get him now

and then it will be for next year obviously they got that one wrong but i would want to be open to that idea of like this guy so far off the charts that we can't let it go but i would say i want to know what my team is to then look at the type of 10 the type of nine the type of winger does it turn out that jaden nelson and ali admen and man alsabi are better than i expected so i'm actually going to go for nate because i don't actually need to spend the money on a winger and stuff like that I completely agree with David on the second part that it would be core first and then you add very targeted at the top of the roster unless something so good comes by. You're like, I just have to change a big chunk of the model and the talent is too good to pass up on. As for the first question, I am adamant that I wouldn't just add talent.

because the three guys you mentioned were Max Arifton, Sean Zawadski and Ali Ahmed. What are they have in common? In terms of their career paths or what they're like as players? Any MLS team could have had them. Any MLS team could have had any of those players. And all three are excellent players. And if I'm not producing guys like that out of my organization,

then I have failed to build my organization. to the specifications that I want, right? And if I am producing guys like that and they're not getting first team run so I don't know if they're good enough, my coach is fired. I don't care how many games you're winning, how many points are collecting.

If you're doing it because you're running our 34-year-old DPs into the ground and the guys that we're producing aren't seeing the light a day, you're fired. So I would never go out and collect talent. I would produce talent. And the players I would shop for are, like, it would have to be very, very targeted. And I hate to bring this back to the Sounders again.

But like, since they signed Ledero, I think they've had, they've only spent a million dollars or more on like nine guys. And eight of them are hits. Like that is, that is how you do it. You don't just go willy-nilly, oh, I'm going to get him because he's too good to pass up on. unless it's like a you know MVP caliber player should never ever do that like we thought we all thought lucho accosta was too good to pass up on 12 months ago and he was a disaster man i want to respond to that just one nugget based on what david said on whether you go for the dps first or second you actually get pretty split answers when you talk to chief soccer officers around the league

some will tell you that they're the hardest deals to get done there's not that many elite players or want to come to major league soccer for the right price point and you just have to get that deal done and you figure out everything else later. Other people will tell you that there's actually a ton of players that can fit into that category and it's too many to properly think through. So you need to put a pretty clear profile around that based on what's already in your team. Then go for those players. And it's interesting how there's two pretty different points of view, but the CSOs around the league could see it either way. Matt, to what you said, so would you have signed Arfston and Zawadski and Ahmed?

In what context? They're on the market. Would I have drafted in that's Arfston? Yeah, absolutely. Right? Would I have signed Ali Ahmed for like nothing for free? Like yeah, I absolutely would have. And I would have treated those players and Sean Zawadzki who came through the homegrown

program for Columbus like developmental projects. Right. But what I'm saying in like, look, I'm being absolute about this because we have the luxury of doing it as an intellectual exercise on a podcast. But what I'm saying is that if my academy and next pro team is not producing those players, I have failed as a chief soccer officer. I have failed. I have not done my job. I think that's absolute. I think that's spot on. And the exact, if I'm in an interview, that's a type of thing I want. And you're smart enough to adjust off of it. But I don't think that's outside. I think that's a very good comment to make.

And it gets me fired up. Yes, Bolly's ready to play. I don't know that they're mutually exclusive is what I would say, right? Like, Arfson's a draft pick, but in theory, if you were running a team, you're drafting Arfston for a skill set because you don't think he's going to play center forward for you, right? When he came into the draft, that's what he played. Like, you're just drafting talent, which then goes to what are you looking for from people you bring into your organization. I assume you're drafting him because it's for his technical quality.

to MLS exceptionalism, right? Because in MLS, you have all these different ways of acquiring players, whereas in the rest of the world, you're either buying them or you're developing them. And that's pretty much it. And so when Bobby posed this question,

you know, and here, how, you know, would you err on the side of talent or would you err on the side of fit, essentially, was what Bobby? and what I heard is would you err on the side of talent when you're spending on players? Because in my mind, a guy who comes through the super draft and a guy who comes through your academy or a guy you could pick up on the waiver wire just to have an extra body in preseason,

which is I think what Ali Ahmed was for the caps when he first signed with them. I think you were two signing. Yeah, okay. So basically the same thing. like those are all developmental players. Those are all guys who I have to put into my system. So you're thinking like St. Louis where the question is like Hardell and Toitland, like they're all just good soccer players.

They all cost money though. Like that's sort of what you mean, which is you wouldn't do that because you've got 12 of them or 10 of them or seven of them, whatever they are and you don't know what they are. And there is no. You don't know how they fit. They don't raise the floor because they don't sort of, they have skill sets that are sort of mismatched.

And yeah, It was just a collection of talent. I think most of those guys are, I don't know most. I think some of those guys are actually, you know, really good players in this league. But it's also like a cautionary tale

on how not to assemble a roster. Yeah. The counterpoint to this is, and I'll say for the, we'll get to the roster categories, I probably would not have signed any of those three players because there's no conceptual part of my roster

they fit into to maximize the full spend and all of that. So it's not that I like them as players, obviously. I think I would have liked them before we know what they are now. You're talking about Hartle, Toyland, but I can say they would not. Louvin, those guys? Oh, no, no, sorry.

Zavatsky. Yeah. Ahmed. Yeah, yeah. Great players. I just wouldn't have signed them because they don't fit in my perception. But so I'll acknowledge that. But I think the counterpoint to what you said, Matt, would be the Bob Bradley, L.AFC teams.

I would say those were broadly built on talent. I mean, you wouldn't have thought that Lee Wynn was going to be yours. Like, like there's no archetype of a six to which Lee Wynn is, or Benifail Haber, that player, right? You don't really know where Carlos Vela is going to play in your front three. Is Diego Rossi or nine? So I just want to say that there's, I think there is a very clear reason and positive examples. Of course, Bob is largely a genius in this stuff. And we could talk about acquiring talent.

He's like, no, I just know talent plus profiles. But I do think there's a counterpoint to what you just said, Matt. Yeah. So with a. Yes. But also, if you talk to Mark Anthony Kay or Lateef Blessing, who were, like, in that team didn't, that team didn't really find fifth gear until Blessing was dropped into the midfield with Mark Anthony Kay. and those two guys kind of in front of Eddie Atouesta, both those guys will say, yeah, Bob worked with us

on a really granular level to develop us. So even though it is a talent collection, it's also like a development, and he saw how the piece is fit. Right, but the building block was, they brought Lateef in, even though they didn't have a clear winger spot because they believed Latif was good at soccer.

And if it wasn't here, it'd be there. And all of that's a gamble, as Bobby said on Bob and his ability to create that. But the starting point there is like, I'll figure it out because he's got the thing I want, which is he can trap the ball under pressure. He's clean. He can explode into space and like, we'll do the other players. Have the right coach.

Yeah. At the end of the day, talent beats, you know, Kevin DeBrona, wherever you put him on a major league soccer field and his pride is going to be good enough, right? Pick the eight positions and at some point talent is better than not. Obviously, that's a slippery slope. And I just want to say for Bob real quick, people always think is Bob as a tactics or a game model guy. but really his value add is he is incredible at doing the small details with players and make them better the footwork the body shape how you check your shoulders how you strike a ball

how you move and it is really cool to watch him work and i can't think of any other coach who does little things he does so just a small piece there to go back i do want to say i want to get the back of the no card thoughts and another point that you each brought up david you said you want democratic spend through your roster. Socialism, baby. My follow up to you to think about for a second is, so what does that mean? We also know the truth in Major League Soccer that you need a elite top player. And we're going to quantify that in a second, but you need for like, well, you need a great

DP. Okay. As David thinks about that, Matt, you were like, yeah, I agree, Democratic roster. And then you asked for $20 million. So square that for me. I mean, because there's a difference here. We see this throughout history of Major League Soccer where I make 90,000, David makes 320, you make 450, and then there's a guy making 20 million, and it just rarely works.

And what I would say, to tie this back, two of my roster pillars are concentrate, so A, a small roster and B, a concentrated roster. What a lot of people will tell you, and Matt, I'm kind of talking now to give you time to think about this, so I'm really excited to hear your response. is a lot of people when they build a roster would say, I want too deep at every position. I really dislike that for a variety of reasons. One is that you are protecting yourself against injuries. I think the flip side to that is you have issues with culture.

And I would rather set up a periodization and training load that knows how to protect against injuries. You're not going to be 100%, but at least you do your best. And to Matt's point, it gives you forced moments to put young players on the field, which I think whenever we talk about roster construction, we always have to acknowledge that the heavy majority of humans, even when they say they will, will hedge their bets and not do the hard thing to put the unproven younger player on the field. So how can you put as many forcing mechanisms as possible? So if I have a small, and I would say, really, I say, I think about this, I always say, I want 13 first team outfield players, you know, basically, depending on how we structure, I want 13

starters with an extra one in every layer, defenders, midfielders, attackers. And everyone considers it to the starter. No one's mad if they're on the bench and wants the team to lose. And I also want those to be relatively concentrated. So obviously, it's not going to be everyone makes the same, but I want everyone to feel like they are in this equally because I do think in Major League Soccer especially, and this is part of my thesis, which my thesis is basically about accumulating small gains, culture and vibes are incredibly important.

and people so often I hear we are going to have a great culture and most strategic or thesis based for lack of a better phrase ideas fall apart when the person not fall apart they manifest and how you think about your roster composition I want to have a great culture I want to play young players I want to really focus on player development okay then talk to me about how you're going to distribute your money through the 20 spots that you have all of a sudden there's no spot for a young player. All of a sudden, there's a pretty big gap between the well paid and the not well played. There's a ton of fighting for playing time. And I would just point out these are where the discrepancies that come in that take a well-laid-out strategy and make it fall apart in week 12 when the hard stuff happens. So those are just some of my thoughts that I toss back to you to Matt, you first on how you square a democratic roster with a good culture. and also you're going to tell me you're going to sign the $12 million striker. Yeah, I think that's just part of building a winning soccer team.

But I'm not going to overpay for 32-year-old proven veterans in that upper-middle salary band. And so that's what I mean. Like I am going to spread it, but we're also going to have two or three match winners who everybody, you know, Everybody knows. They're either players who have been sold for $10 million in the past or will be sold for $10 million in the future. And they're going to get paid like it. And I think that most players would be mature enough to understand that. And if they don't, then that's a cultural problem.

And you have to either address that with the player or you have a coach that addresses that. And if it can't be fixed, there's a transfer window. You know, like, that's the way it goes. I think I disagree. And like, I've never been in a locker room. So, like, I can't tell you what it's like over the course of the season. Yeah, right? But, like, I, like, I think I disagree with you on the, the small roster thing.

Just because players run, what, 15% more than they did 15% more than they did 15 years. years ago. It's like it's not exponential the increase but it's it's linear the amount of sprints and that takes a toll on the body. So I think it's just like if anything you need a bigger roster than you used to but you can still do that and have those forcing mechanisms in terms of making sure that your young players have a pathway and your development of players have a chance to actually get on the field in high leverage moments. I do just want to add a data point to this because I'm not sure. Most people disagree with me.

Matt, not everyone likes my small roster. They also see it the way you do. But one data point that I think is really important is when you think about your marginal, you know, we all, as humans, we're going to be scared of worst case scenario. But the 15th,

how many percentage of minutes do you think the 15th highest usage player in your team plays? I will say that across all competitions, I would expect the 15th highest, like the 15th most minutes among field players. So the median team, just an MLS. So the median team. So you're right. It'll vary if you add in.

Just in regular season? 1%? More than that. No, it's way hard. It's about 28%. 30%. Your 15th highest user player plays about 30%. Okay.

If you just think about your marginal dollar to the fifth player plays about 70% of minutes, right? Sorry. I don't understand the way you do this. I thought this was out of 100. Like the team's total minutes played is out of 100. And you're breaking up every person's. Sorry, sorry.

There's 11. So it adds up to 1100. I thought like the average was everyone's paying 8% of your minutes of all 11 played every minute. Yeah, yeah. I apologize. Good. I should have phrased that better. So that's the other way to think about it, Matt, is just on your next

dollar spent mathematically, I think one of the things, and I don't have the numbers in front of me, really the worst thing can happen to you, a measure of bad teams is they just waste money on the bench. They're either hurt or they just did a bad job. If you have a bad bench, you have to play your top five players until they're no longer as effective. And then you come to the end of the season and you're like the Columbus crew, who over the past three years played beautiful soccer, but Wilfred Nancy wanted a small roster. And that team wore out. after winning Leagues Cup in 2024

and then never got their feet under them in 2025 and I think in part, obviously no Cucho, but like in part it was they had a small roster and they didn't have the ability to keep their top players healthy enough to be their top players. I think it's also fair. I accept the risk with it.

I think those are all good points. I'm not, this is, it's not an infallible approach here, but I think the counterpoint is bad culture, players aren't happy, they're not competing for each other. So for sure, I think everything Matt said is right and fair. It's just the side of the bet that I'm going to take it.

Can I ask a question and everyone can respond short because I don't want to take us too far from Bobby? But in the young player will play in your dream club, fake thing, whatever. Do you, would you be planning positionally a year or two out saying like we've got a good young d-made, we've got a good young centerback? Or would you say young player comes through and always plays at fullback and always plays at winger? and I leave that spot open for, it doesn't matter if they're my best centerback or winger. They're going to make their pro debut at fullback

because that's where I can isolate them and protect them the most. Would you do that? You're teeing me up because you know my answer to this. We talked about this. Oh, yeah, yeah. One of my other roster pillars is flex right back. Oh, nice.

Effectively, I don't fill, I never fill the right back roster spot for two reasons. One is I always wanted to be open from my best young player coming through. No matter what position in that young player plays. Well, I think it works for basically everyone that's not a striker, right? Center midfielder has moved outside back pretty well. I can set up my right back well enough for a centerback and a, you know, a wide attacker can move back, which they probably will in their career anyway.

So give me anything but a striker and it's fine to fill them in. So I do have a flex right back, so I basically never sign them. I mean, you also look at Major League Soccer just list through some of the top right backs in the league right now. And I know the exact number right now, but I'm pretty sure the majority of it. them are converted in their professional career. Alex Roll-Dons, Griffin Dorsey's of the world. Yeah. So literally find me the center midfielder who has a decent budget number and is the last person out on their team. And because center midfielder is just naturally better at soccer than right backs, it's a, and I'll explain it. It's a real thing in the world, right? Why on earth

we put an inferior player right back when we could just literally put the better soccer player in a better budget number for a better number and put them a right back. I can save money. I can get more players through my system. And to Matt's point, you know, I would say you want more protection. But like at what point then how do you intentionally find the spots for young players? If you, if I only have 14 first team players, you know, I basically have two to three culture players. I have a couple of appreciating assets. But other than that, Academy kid, sorry, every two players are hurt. You're getting 90 minutes this week, whether I think you're good enough or not, frankly. So that's part of the other reason I do this.

Do you have an answer on the position thing? Or should we go back to Bobby? No, I'm the opposite of Bobby, but I haven't given it. I haven't given it enough thought to make a coach an argument against it. Like his argument is pretty good right there, right? That's the right bag. The central midsend field thing is like the Little League shortstop thing. Yeah.

Like every major league baseball player was a Little League shortstop because that's the most important position and it's where the best player plays until you're 16. You know? GM's being a hack, they can say something like, oh, well, they'll be good at defense because they grew up as a shortstop. Right, right. Thanks. Yeah, exactly.

And so, you know, he can play right back. He's a central midfielder. I like the theory behind it, but I don't know. Like, I need to think about it. All right, Bobby, you go back. Well, do you answer your own question on, David? Yeah, I'm the same. I would say, I would look at my team and say, especially depending on who my,

my attribute or who my staple players are. So if I have Chad Marshall, I would say, yeah, I trust that I can put most kids in that right back because I can help them enough to make their life easier and keep them alive. So I would pick a position or two where I would say all of these kids would get their opportunity there to taste professional soccer and to experience professional soccer for the first time. Yeah, well said. The only I would add here too is most people overestimate the value of any single player in any given game to the win probability of that game, more or less over a full season. Mathematically, the best way to show this is, I don't know, do you know the average,

so let's say the average XG in MLS is basically 1.6. So you take two teams, the same quality, take home field out of it. You would expect a 1.6 XG on both sides. If you flip that, so that, you know, they each have equal win probability, an equal number of expected points. You give one team an extra 0.01 or an extra 0.1 XG, 1.7 to 1.6. Do you know how much that win probability increases? I don't know how you would.

I wouldn't know this unless I have. Seven, it's, yeah, yeah, it's something like 7%. You extrapolate 7% times the way you think about this is, what's our win probability, three times the probability of a win, one times probability a tie. That gives you your expected points for the game, right? you then will multiply that times 34. You can think about how much any given player adds over your season. Yeah.

Okay. You add one one expected goal. Sorry. Point one expected goal in a game that extrapolates out to roughly two and a half points on a season. Okay. How do you think about, okay, what's one point one expected goals? Like that's a really hard thing for the mind. It's basically a shot.

And shot in MLS, the average XG on a shot, is basically 0.12. So we'll say it's 0.1. So, you know, if you really even think about any player's impact, mathematically, which maybe this is a flawed framework, we'll have to get Devin's feedback,

Devin Plurler's feedback after he listens. But, you know, you get, if you want to really think about a player's impact, do they add a shot or they improve the quality of a shot? Improving the quality of shot. Or decrease the opponent's quality. Right. Right.

Exactly. I mean, even MLS, the gap, according to, according to ASA, something like 10 to 15 shots on average, per game. Like, it's not a big thing here. And obviously, there's overperformance, overperformance, so that's all to just say that I think people grossly overappreciate the impact any given player has on a game or at the same time. If you compile those, if that player causes an increase two and a half to three points is probably one to two spots in the standings over this season.

It is about, yes, exactly. It's about, it's one, you're exactly right. It is one to two spots, probably about two. But if you have, so these things compile is the key point here, right? Bad teams aren't bad because they got one decision wrong. They're bad because they have a compilation of those two points. That's what takes you from the median eighth place down to 12th place or 13th or upward. It's a compilation of those small decisions, which is what I think is really hard to grasp. There's basically nothing I can do.

Mathematically, messy, the top player in league is only worth five or six points a game or five or six points a season. I do not believe that. Mathematically they are. I mean, it's really hard to show a model where they're worth more. I understand that, but I simply do not believe that that is correct. From a leadership and culture point of view or from an effect of the game on the field point of view? No, I'm asking to all. I'm not going to disagree.

The reason I like this stuff, Matt, I'm not someone that has to make the decision based on the data. I think it's a good starting point to think about the, you know, in math, the bays here. and I won't be able to give us feedback. I am not sure I'm right about this. There are people, Elliot McKinley will say, actually, Bob, you just have the math wrong. I would deeply appreciate to hear all of that. So that's just some of the starting points.

So one of the things about XG data is that it only reflects on attacks that result in a shot. Right? and we all know that not all good attacks, meaningful attacks, result in a shot. Which is why something like goals added would, which should be better or more effective than anything that just looks at. Right. And then there's also, you know, we're only measuring events data at this point. We're only measuring the on-ball stuff. And the off-ball stuff is 95% of the game, if not more. And I remember back when we had second spectrum we I would always look at the off ball sprints behind a defense like literally just like attacking the space behind an opposing back line and we we had it in like 21 and 22 and in 21

the best in the league was NYCFC almost entirely because of Tati Castiano's and in 2022 the best in the league were LAFC and Philadelphia because they were just always attack space behind the opposing back line and like all that stuff like if you look at um if you look at what nycFC were before and after tati um it was it was worth a lot more than just two points on the season and then the other thing um to think about in in this picture is like how organized are you And that doesn't always show up in measurable data, but sometimes it does. And the best example I could use is the Matt Miosga injury. In the 70-odd games that he played for Cincinnati from 2022 until his injury in 2024,

their XG allowed was like 1.06 or 1.07. It was top three in the league over that time span, I think, with L.AFC and the Red Bulls. And he got injured in July of that year. And it's been about the same number of games since that injury. And they allow, I think it's about 1.45. And they've gone from top three to like just solidly mid-table. And we're talking about a half a goal game. Is Matt Miazga worth that?

Is that all Matt Mia? Like I don't think so. But also we all know that the most valuable least underst understood player archetype in the game is the organizing centerback. And it's impossible to identify those guys. It's just like you have no idea. And so one of the places I would spend if I was, you know, CSO of your fake team is I would have, I would kick over every stone in the world to find someone who could coach that.

someone who could coach a young centerback to become a veteran centerback who thinks of the job, not just in terms of here's how I have to stop this guy, but holistically, here's what we as a defense has to do to stay organized and cut off service and actually start launching attacks in the other direction and put the opposing team on the back foot. I have no idea how to coach that. But to me, that is like if you could figure out how to do that, that's the ultimate value add because you're making everybody on the team a better defensive player. Yeah, very well said.

I agree with all that. I think all those challenges are good. To bring it back to the original point, just about how integrate. I think it doesn't change what is still probably true that any individual player does not change the probability of a game that much. As long as they are surrounded by enough other good players, this is the San Diego. as long as you have Sfereskov and Godoy and nine players, all of a sudden you can have... Bambino.

And yeah, yeah. How do we control then? And I do want to say, though, David, sorry, Matt, I just want to add to it. This does go away from Davids. I think what I'm saying is counter-David's. I don't have the worst player on the field. What I'm saying is I'm comfortable,

I mean, do you have the worst player in the field? Like, that's an intuitive thing. I'm comfortable taking that risk as long as the other pieces are right. Again, to what Matt always says, because I do want to have to have. this, I don't know, virtuous cycle of player development opportunity, and you just can't do that without risk. Yep.

You know, there has to be something. I hope I'm very, I'm not positive. I'm right about this. There's bets and risks that I'm taking. And one of my bets is having the worst player on the field is not a dooms for you, because it doesn't matter as much as we currently can think about mathematically. So what were you going to add to that? I just, I think fit and clarity of purpose matters more than best or worst player on the field.

And I think that's probably the, the, the, the lesson we should take from. Wilford Nancy instantly turning around the crew or Esper Sorensen doing what he did with last year's Vancouver team that nobody thought was going to be anything other than 46 points and sneak into the playoffs again and he turned him into my opinion one of the great MLS teams of all time without turning over a huge amount of the roster until getting Thomas Mueller down the stretch

but like even before that this was like the caps last year were the best team in the league unexpected goal differential and they did that while making it all the way to Concaf Champions Cup final and you're not supposed to be able to do those two things you're definitely not supposed to be able to do those two things

with a 46 point team that's battling injuries and lost their best player and we're making no super meaningful additions until the summer window when it comes to roster pillars and then kind of explain this to us Matt, how do you, effectively the same roster, no, no real pieces changed, no Mueller showed up

and that was, it was already moving then. So is this just about style of play? Are you telling you can take any bad team in MLS and make them a very good team with the right coach? Are there ingredients, you know, summarize what we learn from that? I think it's that. I think if you get the right, like I do think that there's a pretty narrow band for MLS. Like we were talking about before how the expectations for Manchester City is that they win a trophy every year. And like until the last two years or three years, that was because they were one of three teams in the Premier League that spent at least twice as much as anybody else, right?

Like it was just raw capitalism. In MLS, it's a narrower band. There's nobody who, even with Miami doing what they're doing, there's nobody who has that much of a built-in talent advantage over the rest of the league. So I think more of it does come down to coaching. And coaching to me is, you know, tactical clarity is one, but also understanding how players fit together. And using that to sort of get the best out of the players on the roster.

And I think that that is what Yester Sorensen and Mikey Veras and BJ Callahan last year, it's what they all did so well. It's what Wilfr-Nan-Ci did so well with Columbus. And a lot of it, in all of those cases, looks very free-flowing and improvisational. But if you talk to any of the players on the team, they're like, no, we have very clear tactical instructions and we drill that stuff until everybody on the roster

knows how to do it. So I think it's kind of a hand-in-hand thing. And you can speak at this, Bobby, because you know, you were a pro. So when it is that clear and it is that well drilled and you are like, yeah, we're going to be brave with the ball, I'd imagine all of that gets most players pretty amped. Like most guys want to play like that. If you ask, I think, 95% of MLS players, would you rather play like the crew or the caps or would you rather play like Minnesota or Philly? I think most would the 95% would say crew or caps.

Yeah, absolutely. I think that was all well said. I'm going to transition us to the last piece here when we talk about roster categories. I'll give you my roster pillars to summarize. And I'm curious here where you guys would change, then we'll move forward. So my roster pillars are one, you need above median goalkeeper. I think first and foremost, you can't be good at soccer and ship goals. That's basically impossible to overcome that to a certain extent.

I've heard from smart people that if you're going to make any big bet on especially in major like soccer you should make it on the goalie because it's the one thing you can actually measure and it's the one thing that matters the most i mean to the point about you want to get to plus 15 there's a world where andre blake probably gets you like nine of those goals by himself got huskies um yeah okay fine well one of my one of my things is just i would bring in three domestic goalkeepers that no one cares i mean i would help i develop help develop one but not i mean andre blake was a super draft pick like i don't yeah it's a great point how do you manifest above median I think it's fair that if you bring in three that are broadly close to that,

one of them will be above it. I actually don't need Andre Blake. I think there's a case of whether do I get the person that has the upside. I would sign Louis-Borazza and Luca Gavron. I agree. I agree with that. That's what I would do too because I think the downside. I would just draft guys from the Ivy League.

Matt Freeze, Michael Collodi, Danny Sapero, bring him back. So above median goalkeeper, concentrated roster spend into the top 14 field players. win the boxes. Again, you just can't be someone, you can't prioritize good soccer. All the value you're trying to create on the field, the locus of that value happens in the boxes.

So yeah, win the boxes. For me, that would manifest in MLS and NWSL with three centerbacks and two forwards. I think when you have a talent distribution like you do, at some point just numbers matter. So I would build my roster pretty clearly. It also gets rid of, of a and doyle crumbles inside the little bird inside of them dies when i say that i just wouldn't

play with a 10 because i think it's a huge waste of money um and again remember we talked to last show if i if i were to fail at this because i just mis underestimate talent like truly the players i sign aren't good enough and all of that um when the box is two you need two difference makers within your team and those difference makers in mLS need to hit 28 non-penalty expected goals plus expected assists. And when I do this exercise, what I often find is, one, you say you're going to play young players, where are you going to play young players, right? It's nowhere in your roster composition to have intentionality. But two, it's that for the most point, there's not actually evidence that the two players can do that. So when I would talk about Fukuna Torres, I went back

and looked at his numbers. You were assigned Fukuno Torres at that number to be one of your top two players. For this phrase, we'll call it a difference maker. Okay, I call it elite. But for this, There is no evidence that he can hit that number. You know, at its core, like, you have, you almost certainly have to hit this. It's not one of these things where if you hit it, you're guaranteed to be top four. If you don't hit it, you're definitely going to miss. But in terms of benchmarks, you need your, you need to have some confidence of your top two players can hit that level. They each hit 28, expected goals combinations?

No, combined. Wasn't he at 13 to 15? Isn't that half? Look back. There were a lot of penalties. Oh, okay. Bye. So.

that's all and then flex right back and engines and retention on the two star player things do you have the band globally of what it costs is it seven million dollars to twelve million dollars is it 20 million dollars okay i don't that's a good this is one of the things i was going to ask you on your democratic spend is what are you willing to spend on a dp i mean how do you have a democratic team and this is what i think nashville has done a beautiful job of where you know even surich and muc I would still say are relatively democratic within that group.

There's no stars, right? They found the price point to get the right talent. Yeah. Mooktar is a star. You get what I'm saying, though.

He's a star, but in a mold. There's between a Mookturon Chuk or Al-Morone or Kuiper's. Yeah. And how you think about this? I don't know.

I, um, are you just talking in terms of his salary band? Or you, I would say that the salary band, the transferring the salary band is connected to the type of player, the type of influence they will have in the locker room. Okay. Yeah, I can't, again, you have so much more knowledge of that than I could ever have. But it does say something to me.

Like, teams with big stars do tend to win stuff in MLS. But one of the issues we have seen. and I'm struggling a little bit with specific names. I'm just going to say Jonathan Bomba here of like, you are not a star anywhere in your career until now, and some of those players are not prepared to be the leader of the locker room. They're good enough, but making sure that's part of what you buy as a DP, which is why I think some of the number 10s have worked,

because there's just stark quality to that, even if they weren't, even if Alejandro Prasuela wasn't that his whole career. He believes he is, ready to operate inside of a locker room that way. And I think that's one of the spots that's hard right now for MLS teams as DPs have gotten younger is who are the 24 to 27 year olds around the world who are willing to come and then are prepared to be the face of the franchise rather than just the best technical soccer player on the team. And it's also to the number 10 discussion, it's also the only attacking position or the

attacking archetype in the world's game. that the amount of money you pay for number 10 hasn't gotten skewed out of all proportion because no one else uses them because I mean other leagues definitely do it's just the premier league doesn't there there are very few true number 10s in the premier league so number 10s as a whole aren't overvalued in the way that goal scoring winger or true number nines um are are overvalued because the the primary league has has moved away from that play never really appreciated that that player archetype whereas like if you look at you know the er davisier or i mean even la ligate is starting to come back like the true number 10 we're seeing some of that so i just can't wait for doyle

to tank his entire team to sign papu gomez for like 14 million dollars today in 2026 i am going to go by grillo pizaro three deep contracts as my U-22 signing. He's going to run the show. But the point is, number tens have been more affordable for MLS teams on the transfer market

than other attacking archetypes specifically because of the Premier League skewing. What's an example of that? So who's a 10 recently? I mean, they paid what? $2 million for Honey Mukdar? Less than that for Coliseel?

Waki Pereira. Waking Pereiro didn't cost much. Yeah. Yeah, like it's so much more affordable to get a guy who will be an elite number 10 in MLS than it is to get a guy who will be an elite winger in MLS. Like, John Thornton deserves all the praise in the world for finding Denny Bewanga for $5 million, whatever it was. This is an amazing pull. But like, if I was building the team and I had all the money in the world, I would say, okay, one of my D.P. is going to be a 10,

and the other two are most likely going to be goal-scoring wingers. Well, one will be skewed a little bit more towards playmaking, because... And then Brian White. Yeah. And then Simon Becher, right? Then... Patrick Azumar.

Taylor Kalera, who was, like, won the US old golden boot last year. If I find any number nine with good movement and have a DP-10, and two DP wingers. Like, I'm going to score 75 goals. Is that Marco Arraniard's music? Is his music playing? No, absolutely not. Not Tom Barlow's either.

I give credit from Jordan Farrell used to be at the Oakland Roots said something once it stuck with me. I always think about signing my striker last because there are more profiles and options for that. So tell me what the wide players look like and I can find a striker to match them. I know broadly the type of player and the quality level I want, but it's actually easier to find a striker that fits a mold at the end. And I'm not positive I would do, but I thought it was an insightful take. That's kind of what you're saying, Matt. It's, let's just find a certain mold, but after we've already figured out who the other two players are, which is not exactly what most people do. The other point I would make is that if I was balling on a budget, David Goss style with this, I would definitely play a 352 because tens are relatively cheap.

wing backs are dirt cheap, right? Whereas wingers are super expensive, wingbacks are dirt cheap. Second forwards, right? Tweeners, they're dirt cheap as well. And like, okay, you need three centerbacks. Actually, no, you need one real centerback and you need two tweeners. Totally. All of a sudden you have natural, numerical.

This is a simple thing that I think about often, but if you think about the math of the sport, why do you ever have four people in the Y channels? The Y channels don't matter. You always have to come back to the middle of the field. So why do most teams start with four players out there with two outside, you know, four outside backs? I would go get two solid fullbacks who are now elite wide centerbacks. I draft every center forward from the Big Ten and play them at wingback.

Oh, except for the ones that you, except for the ones that you put into your developmental program to teach how to play centerback. And I do think that that is a, that is a market inefficiency. I think there are a lot of college forwards. and fewer but still some central midfielders who should be pro centerbacks. Aaron Long, Nat Bortgers, Andrew Privet. Totally agree. Also, centerbacks, worse. Worse is the soccer.

If you can find the right athlete, the right, and this is a great, you know, like, Iqapara would say, like, I just knew where the ball would be. I was phenomenal with the air and everything else didn't matter. I figured out the rest. I have to, I've got to jump to a Bloom meeting, but I do want to finish this. We're not going to get the roster categories. the reason I find this been really important is if most people at a club ask me for their player evaluation scouting player personnel, I usually say the one low-hanging fruit is make sure that you have your terminology, right?

That when you sit around watching a player to the point, be like, oh, I like him, he's good. Like, what does good mean, you know? And how do you actually create specific terms to what they are, right? How do we think about our roster? Because that then links to the plus 15 and the plus 15 links to the salary distribution spend. and then I just said, how do you quantify that? So we're not going to go through what all of ours are, but that's the reason I find this to be really important

is there's a lot of waste and efficiency. If we think we're saying the same thing and we don't, and all of a sudden you clear that up, it both improves the communication, but it also improves your ability to make decisions on the margin. And there's a Luke born quote that's really good. Luke is the founder of Zellis who's at Toulouse and he would say, it's not that hard to identify a good player.

It's hard to identify the margin. on actually how good they are and how much to pay them. And that's always stuck with me. So just food for thought, which maybe we can discuss next time. You're worth every penny, Bobby. Thank you for doing this. Yeah, true in podcasting as well. Bobby's a DP podcaster, though.

And anyone who runs a team should hire him and Bloom to do it for them as well. We hope to have everyone back to do this once again on the next soccer wiser. Thanks for landing the plane there for us. And we'll send us everyone on social media, your thoughts, how you'd build stuff, and then we will do this again. We got a cliffhanger. We've got a whole fourth set of pillars that we could do on the next show. Send your entries into Discord.

If you're not in the Discord, it's one of my favorite things in the world. David and Tom, Matt's in there often. They do an amazing job. And we'll come into troll. We'll talk to you all again. Very, very soon.