Vocal Minority

SuperDaft: Observations From The 1st Round

This mock draft is going....swimmingly!
This mock draft is going….swimmingly!

MLS SuperDraft. About as “super” as Aquaman on land.

While my learned colleagues here at The Vocal Minority were busy doing “research” and “serious writing” regarding Toronto FC’s dealings, I went on assignment on the sidelines. When you troll the spaces in between the picks, you find the weird and wonderful “other stuff” that happens which makes this day so “super”. Alas mere mortals, if you didn’t get your shiny cape back from the dry cleaner in time and missed the show, here are some observations that won’t likely make the highlight package. Super!

  • Commissioner Dong Grabber gets the classic “booooooo” job from the Philly crowd. No word if anyone was saying “Booo-urns”.
  • Landon Donovan is as effective a motivational speaker as he is an erotic water sipper.
  • Orlando City superfan “That Purple Unicorn Guy” went full horn when Canadian U-20 starlet Cyle Larin was taken 1st Overall by The Lions.
  • Montreal management were immediately horrified after realizing their 3rd Overall pick is named “Romario” not “Mario” and is NOT a 35-year old Italian.
  • Bow ties are very hot right now!
  • TFC punners breathed a sigh of relief as it turns out that 4th Overall pick Fatai Alashe’s name is NOT pronounced “Fatty Eyelash”. No great loss.
  • Everyone taking time to thank God. Few have thanked Kreis.
  • In true hipster fashion, Portland supporters immediately claimed that “Nick Besler is the new Matt Besler”.
  • With the 6th pick, Toronto FC take Syracuse keeper Bono. My online scouting report revealed he has recently had major reconstructive elbow surgery, has glaucoma and his last album, which was forced onto iTunes subscribers, was a PR nightmare. His nickname is of course: “The Edge”.
  • New Houston Dynamo manager Owen Coyle totally thought that The SuperDraft was a Major League Soccer pub night.
  • Every university is apparently “the best” university according to the draft picks. No one has had the balls to big up The Sorbonne yet.
  • TFC takes a dramatic time out… the room falls silent… Don Garber prepares to announce the pick… he mutters something vaguely foreign. It sounds like “cinnamon”. Heads explode.
  • The Reds went off the range and took French defender Clement Simonin who wasn’t projected to… get drafted… and was not invited to the Combine. Wheeeee! Sounds fun and has been given the layered nickname “Pinball Clement”. Still, #NoArgosAtBMO
  • Saying “The MLS” is still a thing apparently.
  • Broadcasters losing their minds that guy that almost sounds like Cristiano Ronaldo still undrafted.
  • TFC Support Local Football and draft Durham Region defender Skylar Thomas. Nickname pending a quality Breaking Bad gag. For now he is simply “1st Round Pickering”
  • MLS SuperDraft time outs are the leading cause of getting up and going to take a piss break… and little else.
  • First trade of the day. Some nonsense about pick swapping between the league’s two glamour clubs Columbus and Colorado. How I heard it: “Columbus Crew have traded the three construction workers from their old badge to Colorado for ex-mascot RapidMan and futures.” Solid deal.
  • 6’7″ Swedish defenders look hilarious next to league commissioners. Fact.
  • Robbie Earle’s son just got drafted. I’m old.
  • Real Salt Lake trade their pick blah, blah, blah to Seattle for their pick blah, blah, blah and an Xbox. Seattle use that pick to put broadcasters out of misery and draft Almost-Cristiano Ronaldo.
  • Leo Stolz looks NOTHING like Eric Stoltz. Disappointing. #Mask
  • Mock drafts have proven to be exactly as valuable as mock chicken loaf – not very.
  • MLS Cup winners LA Galaxy end the 1st Round in the most “super” way possible – drafting a guy that almost sounds like Magneto from X-Men in Ignacio Maganto.
  • For SuperDraft lower round coverage, refer to this past Monday’s Starting 11 and figure out why this ends right here. Up, up and away!

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5 Responses to “SuperDaft: Observations From The 1st Round”

  1. Altidore arrives, Chapman signs, 5 get drafted. Busy day for TFC | Vocal Minority

    […] up before all the SuperDraft nonsense (for all the highlights of that, click here.) there was the signing of Jay Chapman. Highly touted young player, who’d have been right up […]

    Reply
  2. C to the D Avatar
    C to the D

    Ives reporting some interesting insight into the Simonin pick up.

    Now, what are TFC going to say – “Man! What were we thinking?” – but the details are interesting as to why they value him highly when no one else did, and also why they picked him where they did. I always thought it was a weird pickup at #9 when you’ve got #11 pick sitting there.

    C.

    PHILADELPHIA– Toronto FC’s approach to Thursday’s draft may not have been what was expected but, in the end, the team got exactly what it wanted.

    With its first three selections, TFC added goalkeeper Alex Bono and defenders Clement Simonin and Skylar Thomas. The addition of Bono made sense, as head coach Greg Vanney reiterated the widely-held belief that the Syracuse goalkeeper was the “best, most well-rounded goalkeeper in the draft”. Bono’s Syracuse teammate Thomas was also a logical choice, given the team’s history with the Toronto native.

    “He was a target for us,” Vanney said. “We watched him over the season with Syracuse and we obviously knew of him growing up in the Toronto area. Not only that, but we saw him in two consecutive combines and over the six games we watched him, for me, he was by far the most consistent centerback in all six of those games.

    “I think he has a maturity about him. He understands what his game is and very much plays within himself, which I think is a massive quality for a centerback. We saw some leadership on the field from him, too, at times, so we’re very pleased.”

    The addition of Simonin, however, was for many a puzzling one. Not heralded as one of the top prospects in the draft, Simonin was Thursday’s first big surprise, but Vanney knew that the center back, who missed most of his senior year, was drawing interest from other teams.

    “His senior year, he started three games and then he had a hernia surgery, so nobody saw him over the course of his senior year,” Vanney said. “We saw him a bit, so we knew about him. We spoke to a lot of people that had seen him before that and rated him high. He’s a left footed centerback who is outstanding on the ball.

    “We didn’t necessarily think Clement would be the second in that, but when you get into draft dynamics, the one thing we didn’t know is that Seattle knew about him. He played on their U-23 team. To be fair, they were all around us and trying to trade with other teams around us, so we knew he was a guy we wanted to get and decided not to take the risk of losing him.”

    Overall, Vanney left Thursday more than pleased with TFC’s haul, as the club got exactly what it wanted out of draft day.

    “We said if we get these three guys, these three picks, we did exactly what we needed to do today and we’re out,” Vanney said. “We looked at and listened to the possibility of trading down and doing different things, but nothing was more important than getting the three guys we targeted coming into today.”

    PS. Cross-posted from WTR.

    Reply
    1. Kristin Knowles Avatar
      Kristin Knowles

      Thanks C.! Appreciate the info and the comment. 🙂

      Reply
      1. Duncan Fletcher Avatar
        Duncan Fletcher

        they didn’t know seattle knew about him? they didn’t know he’d been with their under 23’s? that seems shockingly lax. I mean I didn’t know either but I imagine if it’s your job to really research a player that might have come up.

        Reply
  3. Mark HSV Avatar
    Mark HSV

    “Few have thanked Kreis”

    CLASSIC!

    Reply

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