Way, way back in the misty early days of 2009, Toronto FC entered the MLS Super Draft © ® TM with three first-round draft picks, and a toxic waste crater in the centre of defence.
Draft picks are always a gamble, so it was clear that one or two needed to be dealt to FC Bouncy Castle for Canadian international defender Adrian Serioux.
But TFC square-dance caller Mo Johnston didn’t get an offer he liked, so he went ahead and made three picks. Understand, the NCAA is not a world-class football factory. It reliably serves up players who can fill out MLS rosters, but that’s not exactly a ringing recommendation.
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And just because a player is a prospect doesn’t mean the prospect will ever become a player. All three top picks usually gives you is a reasonable certainty one of them will start for you for five years. Most won’t.
What Mo did next – startled people. He grabbed a midfielder (Sam Cronin) and a badly injured striker (O’Brian White). He then got luckier than even luck would feel comfortable with when “one-in-a-generation” goaltender Stefan Frei plummeted all the way to the 13 spot.
Three picks – and no central defender. It was about the sixth of a continuing series of last straws for Johnston’s vocal legion of critics.
So much has happened … since then.
For starters, suddenly flushed with young talent, Mo immediately dealt a low-priority 2010 draft pick – to FC Bouncy Castle – for Adrian Serioux. Then it turned out Frei and Cronin were the goods. Frei seems certain to have Europe in his future, while Cronin looks like he can play productively in MLS for a decade.
None of this looked good for O’Brian White. Even though the kid could flat-out score and was a lock for the pros, he decided to play his senior season at the University of Connecticut. Then, one of his major knee ligaments got connected with and cut.
He’s been healing, rehabbing and working out ever since. He got his first look at the field in the TFC-River Plate friendly. Tons of energy. He runs funny. Injury damage? Just a quirk?
Cut to this past Saturday, and TFC’s vital home fixture against the swirling dark-winged menace that is DC United. Love him or loathe him, Trader Mo sure looked like a genius in this one.
Cronin: All over the field. Great vision. Good patience. Puts in a gorgeous cross for Dwayne DeRosario’s opening goal.
Frei: Not needed much, but makes a hugely brave and perfectly timed slide run outside his box to deny DC the kind of clean, unnecessary breakaway that has, so often, been Toronto’s downfall.
White: The ball comes to him, late, on the edge of the DC area. The situation matters, and the play is breaking down. Like his flashy South American teammate Pablo Vitti, White creates room for himself with a good little stutter step. Unlike Vitti – he scores!
O’Brian White’s first pro marker is a pure goal-scorer’s goal. Create the space, and hit a magnificent out-swinger that eludes all opposition and nestles into the netting just a fraction inside the far post.
Can Johnston really have gone three-for-three? Out of a globally weak talent pool?
And – if you order in the next twenty minutes (‘cause you know we can’t do this all day!):
Emmanuel Gomez: Young Gambian defender. Has this great trick. Puts his foot down. Ball stops dead on his foot. He did it over and over against DC – just as he had against Real Freakin’ Madrid.
Amadou Sanyang: Young Gambian midfielder. Just days older than the legal MLS limit. Got the start and did just fine. Ate turf three times late though. Hope it was cramp, and not some West African version of the Hated Honduran Hula Dance.
Nana Attakora: Young Canadian defender. TFC player of the month for June. Huge composure. Sealed the back on at least three dangerous DC strike-bids.
Basically, the kids killed. Gomez and Attakora look like they could bolster a good professional back line for years. Cronin and Frei have to be on anybody’s all-rookie team, and White quite deliberately scored a top-drawer professional goal.
It’s getting harder and harder to be a Mo Johnston hater in this town. Knowing Mo – and this team – the chance will come again … soon. But for now, soccer fans:
How ‘bout them TFC kids?
Onward!