It’s Officially St. Louis CITY SC’s First Offseason, Here’s What To Expect

The chaos of last weekend’s LAFC-Union MLS Final still hangs in the air, but out of that carnage comes roster moves and hard decisions for the other 28 MLS clubs ahead of Friday’s St. Louis CITY SC Expansion Draft. In this piece I’ll give you a timeline of this week’s deadlines, recently completed roster moves and, ultimately, what I make of the roster ahead of Friday’s draft.

MLS teams have until Wednesday to make trades ahead and finalize their rosters of the expansion draft, and we’ve already seen some interesting moves come out of this period. St. Louis CITY SC has acquired veteran MLS midfielder Jared Stroud for $100k in GAM from Austin FC and 21 year old midfielder Aziel Jackson for $150k in GAM from Minnesota FC. Stroud is a decent depth MLS pickup while Aziel Jackson is seen as an unproven young player with big upside.

More moves will happen as the day moves on but we can make some hay out of the amount of allocation money that moves ahead of Wednesday’s roster freeze. Teams with players picked in the draft receive $50k in GAM, so this can be a way to protect your roster while ensuring you don’t lose a valuable player for below your perceived market value. There are also 5 teams completely protected from Friday’s draft in Austin FC, Atlanta United FC, D.C. United, LAFC, and New York…