Saturday, February 27, 2016

New Jersey, New Keeper?

Two interesting but unconfirmed pieces of news in the last 12 hours.  First the Rapids apparently (I didn't see it) tweeted out the following promo last night and then deleted it:
That appears to be the new home/primary jersey.  Here's a close up.
Pretty similar to our current jersey.  The stripes have moved from the shoulders to the sides, as seems to be the new Adidas standard template.  Also blue and burgundy trim has been added to the end of the sleeves.  Otherwise no big change, which is to be expected.  If I felt like I needed a new jersey this year I'd have no objections to buying this one, but I'll probably pass due to not really needing a new burgundy, I've got 4!  Besides, I need a new Tenerife jersey and I might add an Ireland Euro 2016 jersey to my collection if Doyle makes the roster.

This morning ESPN FC is reporting that the Tim Howard deal is all but done.  Sounds like they just need to cross the t's and dot the i's.  It would be about $2 million a season with a $600K-$750K transfer fee to join after the EPL season (which means when the secondary transfer window opens in July).

We've seen the pros and cons of this move so I won't go over them right now.  I'm still in the camp of this being an unnecessary move that could tie up resources better used elsewhere.  Apparently the original plan was Everton was going to let Howard go on a fee and their demand for a transfer is what's delayed the negotiations.  If that's the case then I would like to see the Rapids push to get him now.  If we're going to pay a fee lets make it one that helps us this whole season, not in July when there's a good chance we could be out of the running.  Howard has already been demoted from the #1 spot so they should be more willing to negotiate.  Everton knows that this allocation spot is burning a hole in our pockets though.  They have the stronger position in this negotiation, especially since this seems to be our backup plan after Bedoya fell though.

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