Colorado Rapids SuperDraft Preview: Can Mile High Club find a contributor late? | Armchair Analyst

Matthew Doyle

Ahead of the 2015 SuperDraft, MLSsoccer.com is breaking down each team's needs and potential draft targets. What will the Rapids look for with the No. 19 pick?

Usually when you have a season as miserable as Colorado's 2014, your reward is a potential-laden, top-five pick of the "Dillon Powers" variety.

But Colorado's 2014 was not the regular sort of "man, we had a bad season" misery. As if to drive that point home, there's this fact: the Rapids have no top-five pick because they traded it two seasons ago. For Danny Mwanga.

Mock Draft: Pre-Combine Edition

They do, however, have the No. 19 slot, which was part of the price of Oscar Pareja's defection to FC Dallas last winter. Any/every draft pick is a crapshoot to some extent, but Colorado's done good work with later picks in recent years – including Jared Watts, who lasted all the way to No. 33 in 2014, but looked very much like a future starter if not necessarily a star in his rookie campaign.

Rapids SuperDraft selections: #19 (1st round), #26 (2nd round), #67 & 78 (4th round)

Rapids Depth chart: 21 Players

Goalkeeper (3):Clint Irwin, Zac MacMath, John Berner
Left Back (2):Chris Klute, Marc Burch
Center Back (4): Drew Moor, Shane O'Neill, Bobby Burling, Zat Knight
Right Back (2): Michael Harrington, John Neeskens
Defensive Midfield (2): Jared Watts, Jose Mari
Central Midfield (2): Dillon Powers, Marlon Hairston
Winger (4): Vicente Sanchez, Dillon Serna, Charles Eloundou, Gabriel Torres
Center Forward (2): Deshorn Brown, Caleb Calvert

Primary Need: Midfield depth

Take that central midfield depth chart with a grain of salt, since it looks like Jose Mari will not return in 2015. That leaves only three central midfielders on the roster, all three of whom missed time due to injury last year. If you could pencil in Powers & Watts for 34 games a piece, then you'd like Colorado's chances. But the MLS season is a grind and this team needs more than just Marlon Hairston to back them up.

To that end, expect at least one overseas target (rumors have them poking around Argentina) as well as a couple of MLS veterans pulled off the scrap heap. And if the right guy falls to them in the draft... well, maybe the misery of 2014 will be a thing of the past.

Targets: Leo Stolz (UCLA), Fatai Alashe (Michigan State), Nick Besler (Notre Dame), Dan Metzger (Maryland), Eric Bird (Virginia), Seth Casiple (California)

Secondary Need: Creative wing play

Of the four wingers listed above, three of them (Sanchez, Eloundou, Torres) may actually be better as "underneath" forwards. Only Serna is a true wide player.

Targets: James Rogers (New Mexico), Akeil Barrett (Tulsa), Connor Hallisey (California)

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