but i am not too proud to say that they are F’ing confusing and i know that i am not alone in this opinion. many of them are unlike any other sport, many of them aren’t published (or at least not up to date) and i can say with confidence, that most fans cannot explain them to another fan. for a while, i hung my head down in shame, not able to look another fan in the eye…. what if he asked me what i though of our use of our allocation money in order to secure montero??? what would i say? but then, about a month ago, i sat in a room with Joe Roth and Drew Carey and they too were asking for clarification from Adrian… so, if the owners don’t always know, well, you and i can be forgiven as well.

so let’s take a look at 4 of the most talked about rules and try to break them down… .

oh, and you are in luck, i am not going to be the one explaining.

last week, i was on the goal seattle board, and for the first time, i read a clear, concise and easy to understand description of all the rules around allocation money. it was so easily digestible, that again, i felt silly for not knowing all of it, but then again, maybe this was the first time in the history of the earth that it had been written in such a simple way. anyway, i reached out to the poster of such fine words and asked him if he would write up a few posts for us. he said sure, and hopefully it is as useful and informative to you, as it was for me. btw, he asked us to call him Gilby and he even uses capital letters… so those of you that hate my punctuation, or lack there of, enjoy.

• Part 2 – The new collective bargaining agreement
• Part 3 – How MLS negotiates and signs contracts
• Part 4 – The new home grown player rule

and without further wait…

Part 1 Allocation Money the Abridge version.

By Gilby

In the world of MLS Jargon one word causes more confusion than any other; Allocation.  It doesn’t help that MLS uses the word to refer to two separate an unrelated roster rules.  The first is the Allocation list which determines the order in which MLS teams can pick returning U.S. National team players.  The Second which I’m going to go over today is Allocation Money.

What is Allocation Money?

Allocation Monies are funds that teams can use to exceed the set cap of 2.55 million or to exceed the individual salary maximum. They are provided by the league and paid by the league. Teams can use the allocation funds on one of three ways:

1. They can use those funds to pay a onetime transfer fee to acquire a player.
2. They can be used to buy down a player’s salary either partially or to pay their whole salary.
3. They can be used to buy down a designated players cap hit reducing their impact on the overall salary cap.

There are some caveats Allocation Money cannot be used to reduce the cap hit of an existing contract and in most cases you cannot use Allocation Money to resign an existing player unless approved by the league.

How does a team get Allocation Money?

When you look up the official regulation about how Allocation Money is the dispersed this is what you get:

A club receives allocation money for (1) poor performance during the preceding MLS regular season; (2) the transfer of a player to a club outside of MLS for value; (3) roster purposes due to expansion status; and/or (4) exceptional circumstances as approved by the Competition Committee.

So you can receive allocation dollars if you are a. Bad b. sell a player to a foreign league c. are an expansion franchise or d. any reason the MLS sees fit.   The other problem here is that although we know Allocation Money exists MLS does not publish when Allocation Money is granted or how much it is. The only specific amount that is published revolves around the Allocation Funds a team can receive by selling a player.  In this case the team typically receives 2/3^rd of that fee and up to $650,000 can be used as Allocation Money.

Why is Allocation Money important?

Allocation Money has a number of advantages in addition to being able sign a player over and beyond the cap and salary maximums.  Allocation Money can be traded , last year Seattle reportedly gave up a 100k in Allocation Money to acquire Tyrone Marshall.  It can also be used to buy down the impact and cost of a Designated Player.  In the past a Designated Player would take up $415,000 in cap space almost 20% of a team’s total cap.  The new rule has lowered that number to $335,000 and now allows teams to use Allocation Money to buy down that cap hit to $150,000.  What this all means is that if you can acquire enough Allocation money you can basically have three Designated Players while taking up same cap space as one player last year.

All the highlights from the entire season at your finger tips.

• Jose Romero notes that Sigi is “happy to have that chapter behind us” and that if there is any penalty for the Swede’s absence, it will be handled internally.  Schmid also plans for Ljungberg to become more of a scorer this season.
• Don Ruiz has 5 Quick Notes from Fred10′s Return. According to Freddie, he “really, really likes it in Seattle.”

Jose Romero made a passing note in his article yesterday about the MLS Cup being awarded to Qwest Field.

Sounders FC forward Fredy Montero has left the team to travel to South America, where he is sorting out personal contract issues with his agents. Montero will not play in Thursday’s exhibition finale but is expected to return to Seattle on Friday.

Simple. Straight forward. He’s gone. He’ll be back. Right?

Well, ESPN writer Ives Galarcep who is tuned in to the American Soccer Scene wrote this Where in the World is Fredy Montero article with hints that things are bigger than they appear. And not with a positive spin for Sounders FC fans.

As a point of clarification, it is true that Fredy is adorning billboards and been in many photo ops for Sounders FC promos, but he has never been on the roster on SoundersFC.com.

We don’t have any inside information on this. We do know that Montero is not with the team and is headed to South America. We can only believe what the Sounders FC Front Office is telling us and that he will be back this weekend and ready to play next Thursday.

• Sounders FC Training Camp Glance: Day 3 [Seattle Times]
• Keller, Jaqua shine in first intrasquad scrimmage [The Olympian]

Photos

• GOALseattle has a number of galleries from this week. Here, here, here, and here.

First, on the Advertising side, the club has inked a deal with Wexley School for Girls to “create an integrated advertising campaign that covers TV, print, radio and web, with a focus on building a fan base using grass roots and social media tactics.” If you’ve driven down 5th Avenue in Belltown you have probably seen their offices and wondered about the “school”. The owners (“headmasters”) Cal McAllister and Ian Cohen were named two of the city’s Most Influential People by Seattle Magazine.

Wexley School for Girls is irreverent advertising firm that has made a name for itself through multiple touchpoint branding and seriously silly viral marketing campaigns. Its recent move to Belltown has received all sorts of press: McAllister and Cohen staged a faux Chinese restaurant in the front, and ripped a hole in the back so they could bring in a full-size camper. “Why would you be in this business,” Cohen asks, “if you are not going to have fun with it?” Despite this, both McAllister and Cohen repeatedly say the same thing: “We are funny, but we are not a joke.” They’re not.

For another Advertising Campaign, they built a two-story Being John Malkovich–style Dwyane Wade head for T-Mobile, where people could go inside and see how the basketball star’s mind works.

It will be interesting to see what types of stunts the Wexley School for Girls comes up with for Sounders FC.

From the marketing side, Digitara was selected to build a new Sounders FC website that will create a more compelling experience for fans online. The site “will feature fully integrated and interactive applications, social networking tools, and more multimedia content. The new platform will allow for the implementation of a new content management system that will expedite information to the team’s growing fan base.” [Press Release]

The new site will launch in February 2009.

These are two huge steps in gaining awareness of Sounders FC and creating an incredible and un-matched experience for the fans. We’re excited to see what comes about in the near future.

In building the team, the team announced they were using Scout7 for its recruiting information delivery system. [Press Release]

Sounders FC will be the first North American club to use the “ProScout7″ system.

Sounders FC will use Scout7 systems to assist in monitoring player prospects outside of the United States. Senior management staff can track the progress of both established and emerging talent across the world through the largest player database in world soccer, in addition to managing their own report information and personal notes on specific targets centrally and securely online.

• The Swedish Paper Expressen is noting that Ljungberg will make $20m SEK ($2.52m USD)
• Former Hammer Ljungberg set to sign for Seattle [ESPN]
• Sounders FC ready to sign Freddie Ljungberg [Seattle Times]
• Report: Seattle to announce Ljungberg signing next week [Soccer by Ives]
• Ljungberg: Latest MLS Recruit [Goal.com]

And a GoSounders.com first… Freddie Ljungberg Desktop

Freddie Ljungberg 1600 x 1200

Then followed up with, “Hanauer indicated the club isn’t likely to sign more players until after the USL Sounders return from an October trip to Argentina.”

Hat tip to GOALSeattle.com who was up before the break of dawn to post this too.

• Sigi Schmid-5:1
• Paul Mariner- 10:1
• Brian Schmetzer- 12:1
• Fernando Clavijo-30:1

What do YOU think?