The Necessary Evils of Expansion

The Expansion Draft. That double edged sword that tells us that MLS is indeed a success and drags one or more players away from DC. There have been 4 expansion drafts in MLS’s 12 seasons. To support the 1998 expansion (Chicago and Miami), the 2005 expansion (Chivas USA, and Salt Lake City), the 2007 expansion (Toronto) and most recently the 2008 expansion (San Jose:The Return).

Eight players have left the fold in the various drafts. Players taken from us to populate teams, or to be used as trade bait.

1998: David Vaudreuil, John Maessner, and Kris Kelderman all went to Miami

2005: Ezra Hendrickson and Thiago Martins went to Chivas USA. While Kevin Ara went to Salt Lake City.

2007: Rod Dyachenko went to Toronto. (Well not really. He got as far as Buffalo.)

2008: Brian Carroll was taken by San Jose ver 2.0

Really? Is that all? All the talk and hand wringing over expansion drafts and easily the top two players ever plucked from the DC United roster is John Maessner and Brian Carroll? No disrespect is intended, they’re quality players and quality individuals, but United’s roster has hardly been raided over the years. Sure, it helps that you can usually protect 10-11 players. But let’s throw a little hindsight into the mix and we see that at one time or another Troy Perkins, Devon McTavish, Brian Kamler, Jesse Marsh, and the entire 1997 Goalkeeping staff (Garlick, Simpson, and Presthus) were left unprotected and were passed up, so maybe United is just lucky in this regard. (Of course, if we really want to apply some hindsight, maybe the post 1998 expansion draft trade of Jesse Marsh to Chicago for AJ Wood wasn’t among the best for United.)

So as Brian Carroll, BC, Demo, etc, packs his bags for San Jose, Columbus. Another expansion draft looms on the horizon to stockpile the new Seattle franchise (and maybe Philadelphia?) with some human capital. Brace yourselves, we may be losing the next Kris Kelderman or Kevin Ara.