One of the best?

Based on what? Your personal feelings for him? Your personal opinion of his abilities?

This has nothing to do with “those of us who know a little about goalkeeping.” Most of us “know goalkeeping.” This has to do with what Dario Sala has been in MLS, and if you compare his career with those of other keepers, he is not “great.” He is “good.” And he missed significant time to knee problems two of the last three years.

And while you may consider his knee problems to be “minor”, they were major enough for him to not be able to play – and while you may think you can just blow that off as irrelevant, I’m fairly certain that Nowak isn’t going to take a risk like that.

Back to the numbers for a second. Let’s see how he compares to some of the top end keepers in MLS.

Has he had numbers near Matt Reis? Pat Onstad? Jon Busch? Hell, Will Hesmer? Zach Thornton?

No.

And not being born in this country has nothing to do with it. (Really? You’re going to play that card? Come on.)

Look, let’s not make more of this than it is – to US, he is great. No one should be surprised that part of the resurgence we had in the last half of the season came when Dario got back. He certainly is a good enough keeper to win a championship if he has the right team in front of him.

But from the lens that Philadelphia is going to use, Dario is not going to be high on their radar screen. They will take Kevin Hartman before they take Dario.

As for John – Dario is over 30, John isn’t. Dario is on more of a salary than John, and there are – statistically – much better keepers available than central defenders with as much potential and upside as John.

So if the coach explains it well, makes each player understand the plan and why they were risked or not, then you can hope they take it in stride. You hope they buy into what the coach is selling. Most players know only a limited amount of people can be protected.

I’m sure there will be a few ruffled feathers. It almost can’t be avoided.

That is true, and I’m not trying to argue that point.

But Nowak and co. have no need to pick up what is, as perceived in the general MLS community, a good but not great keeper when they probably feel like they can develop one through their US Youth Team contacts for cheaper.

Trade value to another MLS team? For a keeper with a history of knee issues and one who hasn’t played a full year in a while? We know Sala’s value, and I’m assuming that the team staff is confident in his physical ability, but from afar, I think there are too many question marks about him to think that Philly would feel they would have value if they picked him up – either to themselves or to another MLS team.

Now, if there is nothing else out there to pick up, and Philly wants to take something WE value to see what we would trade back to get him…

But I think that unlikely as there is more than enough to pick from that Nowak will want.

As Buzz said, this is their shopping day. They need to make every pick count.

How do players react to being exposed? Specifically, when you have exposed the MLS assist leader and the keeper who stood on his head after you made him captain, do they take it personally?

I get that it’s professional soccer and there are no guarantees. But that doesn’t mean Dave and Dario would be happy about it. Will we see these two refuse to get on the bus come spring?

CHV:Razov, S Thomas, Victorine, Conway

CHI:Banner, Carr, Woolard, Washington

Crew:Garey, Iro (only if domestic player, not SI), Elenio

COL: Dalby, Harden, Noonan, Ceus

FCD:Burse, Wallace

DC:McTavish, Vaughn, (will almost surely lose a player given that Nowak is former DC coach and Gros as asst, w/possibly Ben Olsen coming on too)

HOU:Barrett, Chabala, Mulrooney, Cochrane, Thompson, Waibel, Ustruck (got some good players available. IMO will definitely lose one player)

KC:Cristman, Holbein, Watson

NE:Albright, Heaps, Igwe, Phelan, Thompson (will almost surely lose a player also)

LA:Dunivant, Esky, Saunders, Marshall

NY:Boyens, Cepero, Rojas, Sassano, Wolyniec

RSL:Grabavoy, Horst, Mathis, Campos

SJ:Pitchkolan, Salinas, Wondolowski, Roberts, Convey (even though i dont like this pick, he’s a Philly native and Nowak knows him well)

SEA:Eylander, Graham, King, LeToux, Riley, Sturgis, Scott, Wahl (will lose a player here as all come cheap and have MLS experience in some form)

TFC:Edwards, Guevara (?$$$?)

Also with Sala out there he might be ripe for the picking. I didn’t factor in his trade value to other teams in MLS. FCD may have hosed this one.

Why not Richetti?

But I was fairly sure SH wasn’t going to.

I also don’t think Philly will take any FCD players.