Seattle Sounders confident to stay in title contender despite Jordan Morris and Chris Henderson moves

In just a few short weeks, one of the most stable and consistent clubs of this era in MLS found themselves in the midst of a transformative offseason.

After their fourth MLS Cup appearance in five years, the Seattle Sounders saw two essential cogs in their recent dominance over the Western Conference go: Homeowner star winger Jordan Morris moves to Swansea City in overseas, and longtime sporting director Chris Henderson has joined Inter Miami CF after a 13-year run in Seattle.

Speaking to reporters in a video call on Friday, Sounders general manager Garth Lagerwey spoke about the two departures, saying that while they undeniably made it difficult for the club in the short term, he didn’t see this offseason as a full – on the reconstruction scenario.

“We are not rebuilding anything,” Lagerwey said. “We’re re-tooling around our core. It’s not a rebuild. We’re going to be contenders this year.”

That core Lagerwey alluded to is certainly still strong, with players like Nicolas Lodeiro, Raul Ruidiaz, Cristian Roldan, Joao Paulo and Yeimar Gomez Andrade all returning in 2021. But as he contemplates a future without Henderson, the One of the most-respected talent assessors in MLS, Lagerwey has said he hopes this will be the season where some of the club’s young local talent make names as consistent first-team contributors.

Academy products Danny Leyva, Alfonso Ocampo-Chavez and Ethan Dobbelaere could all endure seeing more minutes this season, and Lagerwey said the focus on player development would be something he says will be stressed when it comes to finding Henderson’s eventual replacement.

“I think we need to change our focus now in the salary cap cycle that we are,” Lagerwey said. “We’re still going to play championships every year, but now we need to focus a little more on player development and overcome that last hurdle. We had the players, we signed them in the first team, we have not yet integrated them into the first team.

“We’ve seen other teams, Kansas City, Philadelphia, the teams that won the West and won the East, face a number of good young players in those two teams. So we know it’s possible to both to compete and to use young players. and I think that will be part of our challenge which can inform what we are looking at in [Henderson’s] role to come. “

Screening and rostering have become complicated for every team due to the COVID-19 pandemic, but Lagerwey also said recent developments have given it a more degree of flexibility than before. Morris’s move to Swansea is one factor in easing the salary cap, but there is also the transfer of former Sounders Henry Wingo, who moved from Molde’s Norwegian side to Hungarian club Ferencvaros TC on a transfer valued at over $ 900,000.

“We ran out of money before that,” Lagerwey said. “But the two things that happened this week, and this is the world we’re in this week, my plan that I had been talking about for the past two months, everything has changed, because now Jordan is going on loan to Swansea and they’re going to cover his salary, which is a big salary cap saving for us, for hundreds of thousands of dollars, so we have that, and Henry Wingo was sold to a Champions League club in Hungary.

“We get a sales figure from that so two elves landed from a salary cap perspective this week and I got two bags of gold. So we have to sort out exactly how much it’s going to be and some details there. -low, but now we have the ability to do things.

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– Seattle Sounders FC (@SoundersFC) January 22, 2021

As for the thinking behind the Morris movement, Lagerwey said it was something that was ultimately player-driven. The 26-year-old became one of the league’s most dangerous forwards in Seattle, winning two MLS Cups and becoming the league’s top XI last season, and has long been the subject of speculation about a move to abroad.

It was Morris who decided that now was the time to test himself, Lagerwey said, and that the Sounders will back him as he seeks to help Swansea earn his promotion from the championship to the Premier League.

“In the end, it depended on Jordan,” he said. “That’s what he wanted. Are we hopeful, are we optimistic that Swansea is currently second and that they have a good squad and that they will move up to the Premier League? Of course that’s it that everyone is hoping for. But it will be on the rise. to Jordan and it will be up to this team to decide how they play and we know the coach is really excited to have him. Their version of a sporting director is really excited to have it. So I think it’s a place where football people on this side want it, business people on this side want it and we think it’s a good environment to send it .

“So I hope all the elements of the recipe are there and it depends on what Jordan wants. Look, it could be that Jordan goes in there, tears it up and decides at the end of the day that he wants to go home. home … But we’ll cross that bridge when we get there, we’re excited for Jordan and hope to see him succeed all the way. “