KANSAS CITY, Mo. – With the start of preseason now less than a week away, Sporting Kansas City continued building depth in Tuesday’s Supplemental Draft.
Head coach Peter Vermes and his staff exercised all three of their picks, drafting Ohio State midfielder Sam Scales, Southern Illinois Edwardsville center back Mike Jones (pictured above) and UAB midfielder Michal Mravec.
The three choices – along with Sporting’s SuperDraft picks – will participate in Kansas City’s preseason preparations with an eye towards earning a contract with the team.
“With the roster moving to the reserve league, I think a lot of these guys are going to be players that are going to be developed over time and provide us that depth that we need as we move forward,” Vermes said Tuesday. “We went after certain positions.”
The advent of the reserve league and the luxury of additional roster spots figures to allow players drafted in later rounds to compete for roster spots that haven’t been available in previous seasons.
Vermes said Scales, who scored five goals and distributed 15 assists during his college career, figured to translate to the professional game as a right midfielder or winger.
“He’s got a little pace,” Vermes said, “but he is also shifty on the ball.”
Jones is more of an unknown quantity, having helped SIUE transition to the Missouri Valley Conference in 2010 and earning a place on the all-conference second team.
“We saw him at a couple different places that weren’t necessarily where everybody else was,” Vermes said. “He’s a central defender, left footed and a pretty big guy with pretty good pace. He’s tough in heart, and we think that maybe this a guy that we can groom along without having to put him into the fire right away.”
Kansas City’s third selection is more of a long shot, considering signing Mravec would require an international roster spot if placed on the roster.
Vermes said the Slovakia-born defensive midfielder had the size – Mravec is 6-foot-3 – and the technical and tactical abilities to challenge for a roster spot. He started his career at Slovakian club MSK Zilina before moving to the United States as a teenager.
“We thought with him being available with our third and last pick that it just made sense at that point to take a chance on this kid and see if he can make our roster being a foreign player,” Vermes said. “He has a lot of really good qualities.”
Defenders Brandon Prideaux and Aaron Hohlbein are Kansas City’s most notable previous Supplemental Draft picks.
