Like every other team in Major League Soccer, Dec. 1 meant one thing for FC Dallas: the club would have to decide to which players it would offer contract options and to which it wouldn't.
The Hoops, who finished the regular season atop the Western Conference with a club-record 52 points but lost to Colorado in the opening round of the playoffs for the second consecutive year, had several such decisions to make.
"We have exercised some options and not picked up some other player options," said FCD president and general manager Michael Hitchcock. "To not pick up options gives you the option to renegotiate with them if they fit into your plans but it doesn't lock you in to necessarily having that player on your roster. The majority of the player personnel decisions will be made once we announce the new head coach."
FC Dallas did not pick up the option on goalkeeper Jeff Cassar, a 10-year veteran of MLS. With two No. 1 'keepers on the roster in Shaka Hislop and Dario Sala, who started the bulk of the games last season, Cassar became expendable.
Cassar came into the 2006 season expected to challenge for the FCD starting 'keeper job, but an injury suffered during preseason kept him on the shelf until May 20, when he played in the second half of a 4-0 win against New England at Pizza Hut Park. He suffered a torn right quadriceps muscle in that game and didn't play again until the first leg of the battle for the Rio Grande Plate with Mexican Primera Division side Tigres UANL on July 19, when he played the second half. He started the second leg a week later and re-injured his right quad, which shelved him for the rest of the year.
Also not having his option renewed was Simo Valakari, who just finished his third year with FCD and second wearing the captain's armband. He played in 31 of FCD's 32 regular season contests, 30 of those starts. The feisty Finn was a rock in the central midfield and brought some much-needed toughness in the middle of the park. Last month, the Hoops acquired defensive midfielder Adrian Serioux from Toronto FC in a trade for Ronnie O'Brien, and the arrival of the MLS Cup winner with Houston Dynamo likely spells the end of the road for Valakari.
Hoops striker Roberto Mina is on loan from Ecuador and with his loan now expired, the Hoops face a decision about whether or not he will be back for 2007. Mina spent much of the 2006 season on the sidelines after tearing his left MCL in early July but he did have three goals and one assist while playing in only 16 games.
Justin Moore, who completed his first season with the Hoops after being drafted in the second round of the 2006 SuperDraft, had his contract terminated. Moore, played in two games with the first team as a rookie, one of them starts and was expected to challenge Bobby Rhine for the starting nod at right back, but that battle never materialized. He could return in 2007 as a senior roster or developmental player.
Rhine's contract has also expired, and as of now, he is not a member of the Hoops fold. Rhine, FCD's longest tenured player having been with the club since 1999, finished a second season at right back and had two goals and two assists after moving back from a more forward role early in the 2005 season. His status will depend on how the yet-to-be-named new FCD head coach feels about Rhine -- and more importantly, how much he will cost.
Replacing them on the senior roster will be center back Drew Moor, midfielder Ramon Nunez, midfielder Aaron Pitchkolan and striker Abe Thompson.
Moor, who just finished his second season with FCD, emerged as a starter in the back early in the year and saw time in 27 games for the Hoops, 26 of those starts. He scored his first career MLS goal on May 6 at Houston and his first career assist a week later in the return match against Dynamo. The Dallas native, who was the sixth overall pick in the 2005 SuperDraft, graduated from the Generation adidas program.
Nunez is also a Dallas native who played one year at Southern Methodist University before being taken with the sixth overall selection in the 2004 SuperDraft. He comes off a year when he set career highs with six goals and four assists in a career-high 25 games, 20 of those starts.
Late in the season, Nunez fell out of favor with the FCD coaching staff and his normal starting spot wide in midfield was filled by Hoops second-leading scorer Kenny Cooper, who moved back from forward once Thompson emerged as a quality strike partner for leading scorer Carlos Ruiz.
Pitchkolan, who spent last season on the developmental roster, played in 10 games last year for FCD and had the game-winner in second-half stoppage time of a 2-1 win against Kansas City on April 23 in Frisco. He will now have to make the FCD senior roster since he is no longer considered a developmental player.
It's the same story for Thompson, who found the going rough early in the year, suffering a stress fracture in mid-May that sidelined him until July 8. But after that, the second-year forward out of Maryland found his stride, netting a pair of goals, including the game-winner on July 22 at Real Salt Lake in second-half stoppage time, and a career-high six assists. He started both games in the playoffs.
Generation adidas players Dax McCarty and Blake Wagner remain on the developmental roster, while goalkeeper Ray Burse Jr., defender Michael Dello-Russo and Dominic Oduro, who were all drafted in 2006, will compete for senior or developmental contracts next year.
Making these decisions was Hitchcock along with current FCD interim head coach Steve Morrow.
"We evaluate the team throughout the season and looked at the changes we might need to make after the season was over. I felt confident working with Steve as the interim head coach to make those decisions because nobody else knew the team better than he did," Hitchcock said. "When we looked at the options that we needed to pick up, we knew what we needed to do and were confident that we were going to make the right decision."
Morrow is one of four finalists to be named FCD's next head coach, a process that Hitchcock said should come to a close early next week.
"As soon as we announce the new head coach, our trop priority will be to look at the roster, evaluate everything and decide what we are going to do," Hitchcock said. "We will look at players not offered options, other players in the league and players from outside of the league to look at bringing into FC Dallas."
Steve Hunt is a contributor to MLSnet.com. This story was not subject to the approval of Major League Soccer or its clubs.
