So, I'm watching Los Angeles and Real Salt Lake on Sunday night and who do I see scoring for the Galaxy? None other than Edson Buddle, at which time I say to myself, "Edson Buddle?" Shame on me for not getting alerts to my cell phone, but I had no idea. I thought, man, for a good player, he sure is getting moved around a lot. Then, of course, I saw Alecko Eskandarian running down the field for RSL and I thought, man, Mo Johnston is not afraid to pull the trigger on a trade, is he? So, anyway, here's a First XI of Buddle-a-likes, good players who were moved within 10 games of their acquisition.
11. Paulo Nagamura. Let's start out current. After playing only four games (almost 90 minutes per match) for Toronto FC, Nagamura is traded to Chivas USA for a SuperDraft pick. Nagamura is instantly inserted into the Chivas lineup and looks to be a fixture for the team moving forward. Seems Nagamura was just a victim of circumstance in Toronto, but as we said up top, Mo's not afraid to move a guy on short notice.
10. John Wolyniec. We all know that in recent years Wolyniec has been shuttled around a lot, from New York to Columbus, to Los Angeles and back to New York again. But Woly's strangest career move may have occurred back in 2001, when he was dealt from Chicago to New England, straight up for Eric Wynalda. In New England, Woly played exactly one match and was released. He didn't surface in MLS on a full-time basis again until 2003, when he joined the MetroStars, where he had a 10-goal season in '04. That's as close as Woly came to stability as he spent 2005 to now representing three different teams. Being a solid, good team player certainly makes a guy ... tradeable.
9. Alecko Eskandarian. Seems it always circles back to Mo, doesn't it? Almost identical to Nagamura, Esky got four games (360 minutes!) of time with Toronto before he was shipped off to Real Salt Lake for Jeff Cunningham. Can't say I fault ol' Mo for that one as Esky did not score a goal in his first four starts and Cunningham, well, he always seems to score, even if he can't stay put in one city for more than a season or two.
8. Cornell Glen. Must put Glen in the mix for giggles. This guy's debut for the MetroStars, back in 2004 was amazing. Two highlight reel goals in San Jose and I was thinking I'd seen the future of MLS strikers and his name was Cornell. Uh, no. Sure he scored a few more goals for Metro, but he was soon on his way to Dallas and then Columbus, Colorado and then L.A. and then ... anyone know where Cornell is these days?
7. Mamadou Diallo/Diego Serna. The Contraction/Dispersal Draft of 2001 had many fans wondering who'd cash in big with top scorers Mamadou Diallo and Diego Serna. Well, the Revs got Mamadou and the Metros got Serna, and then they traded them for each other before either got to 10 games with their respective teams. Good fun all around.
6. Richard Mulrooney. Back to Mo, who brought in Mulrooney and played him for all of two games before shuttling him off to Houston. Yours truly rated Mulrooney as a "reason why TFC will compete" a few months ago. Sure looks like TFC will compete, at least at home, but Mulrooney turned out to be just a blip on the radar screen.
5. Edson Buddle. The inspiration for this column, Buddle has been touched by Mo a few times the past few seasons. First, Mo and Alexi Lalas trade Eddie Gaven to Columbus for Edson, who scored in his Red Bull debut at RFK Stadium and also struck for a hat trick in a 6-0 win against Real Salt Lake (after Mo'd been let go). By the time the dust settled on the Red Bulls' season, Buddle was left unprotected for Mo to snap him up for TFC. Which brings us to the present and his new team ... this week, anyway. His goal on Sunday at least shows that Buddle is always good for a goal in his debut match.
4. Raul Diaz Arce. An all-time great MLS striker, for sure, but Diaz Arce rates highly in my First XI book for being a part of some of the craziest trades in league history. Before the 1998 season, there was a three-way deal, with Metro trading a draft pick to the Revs for Alexi Lalas and D.C. trading Diaz Arce to New England. Diaz Arce spent a year in Foxborough, but in 1999, the Metros trade Giovanni Savarese for RDA, only to send him to San Jose with Marcelo Vega for future considerations ... (keep following along)
3. Eric Wynalda. The future considerations for the MetroStars became Eric Wynalda, who then got packaged with Welton (acquired for Roy Myers on that day) and Arley Palacios to Miami for the Lothar Matthaeus allocation. I don't want to short change Waldo, who was later traded from Miami to New England for Ivan McKinley and only played eight games for the Revs before being traded to Chicago, where he finished his MLS career in style, scoring 10 goals for the Fire, before becoming a broadcaster.
2. Dante Washington. In the inaugural MLS season, Dante Washington played three games for Columbus before he was dealt to Dallas for Brad Friedel, who played 38 games for the Crew before spending a decade in England. Dante, by the way, would basically divide his eight full MLS seasons even down the middle between Dallas and Columbus. My greatest Dante memory is, however, his ESPN commercial, when he was hanging out in some dance club in New York, in full uniform. Someone can e-mail me the details of what was said, but I remember thinking it was pretty clever and funny.
1. Ariel Graziani. If there was ever a sign and trade that backfired it was the Revolution signing Ariel Graziani in 1999, giving him three games and trading him to Dallas for Leonel Alvarez. Graziani went to Dallas and lit it up for two seasons while Alvarez pretty much played out the string. That trade worked out only slightly better for the Revs than Oscar Pareja for Damian.
Jeff Bradley is a senior writer for ESPN The Magazine. Send your comments and complaints (200 words or less, please) to Jeff at jbradleyespn2003@yahoo.com and he promises to read (but not respond to) all of them. The views and opinions expressed in this column are those of the author's, and not necessarily those of Major League Soccer or MLSnet.com.
