Thursday starts the 2016 MLS College Combine in Fort Lauderdale, Florida, where the 20 MLS teams will converge to watch some of the top college talent in the country as they ready for next week’s MLS SuperDraft in Baltimore. We talked with Craig Waibel about the Combine, what he expects to see there and how he views the No. 5 overall pick.
RSL has the fifth pick in next week’s SuperDraft. What kind of things, going into the Combine this week, do you hope to see down there?
Waibel: “We’ve done a lot of homework up to this point. We’re pretty familiar with the talent pool involved. We’re just kind of waiting to see – there’s always a lot of extracurricular activity involved with the clubs in terms of traded draft picks and movement and interest in players. Some guys show really well at the Combine and spark interest as well. We’re waiting to match up the performances that we see there as well as the conversations we have away from the field and the homework we’ve already done. With the fifth pick we’ve got a really good opportunity to draft a player that might be able to contribute sooner than later.”
We don’t know the Generation adidas players yet and they tend to have a big impact on the draft, particularly in the top five picks. Is there a group within those guys that could shift this draft a bit?
Waibel: “There are probably seven or eight guys that are probably GA contract quality players. Within that group of seven or eight I think there are probably three that stand out more than the others. It’s a matter of if they agree to contracts and we don’t know that yet. We’ll find out and get that information the same times every other club does, hopefully sooner than later. Inevitably it will affect the way we look at the draft.”
Are there any positions of strength in this draft and how do you view the players that are available in the top five and how you move into the second round into the 25th pick? What kind of talent does this draft have?
Waibel: “I think with the fifth pick we can look a little bit position specific. But in general, my mindset is the best available player regardless of position. There are so many routes a professional career can take and there are so many risks that are involved with any athlete in the professional game – how they’re going to develop; do they fit; do they enjoy it; do they translate into professional sports? All these things come into play. My mentality is usually the best available player as opposed to position-specific. I think we can be a little bit more picky this year with the fifth pick, but at the same time, many positions have maybe one standout player and not two or three so they’re pretty easy to identify.”
RSL has a lot of veterans all around the field in the starting lineup. Does that make your job harder or easier at the fifth pick knowing that that guy might not play in year one unless he really wows you in preseason?
Waibel: “It makes it both. It makes it harder in terms of knowing that we’re going to draft a player and commit to them every minute and develop them every minute. We also have the USL to develop players. The greatest strength in having a locker room full of veterans is the leadership that they provide and also the teaching moments they provide to young players. While the playing minutes might be altered, the overall learning curve will be expedited and accelerated because of the environment and the people that are around.”
The Combine is such a difficult avenue to judge players because it’s so …
Waibel: “It’s an All-Star Game.”
Yeah. How do you view the Combine and what can you take from those games?
Waibel: “What we’ll really take from the Combine is the speed and agility testing and the individual meetings and the personality that we get. For the performance, we really genuinely see 98 percent of these players. There might be one or two guys that we haven’t been able to watch enough to have a solid opinion. But from the perspective of most of the Division I athletes that are there, we’ve seen enough of them already as players. We just need to see them as people. From the perspective of Division II, Division III and NAIA players, we might not have been able to see them as much so there is a little more homework to be done in terms of performance. And there are a few international guys. Realistically, the majority of our homework now is the personality and the fit.”
Give us a peek behind the curtain and what that week is like in Florida. You’ve got coaches and GMs from 20 teams. What is that week like and what was it like for you last year?
Waibel: “Well it was a lot more fun two years ago when I was an assistant coach. There is a lot conversations in terms of player movement, in terms of draft pick movement and in terms of roster movement. It’s a really busy week. Everyone is trying to look for an angle to improve their group. For me last year and this year, it’s a whole bunch of conversations from sun up to sun down between teams to work a deal that helps both teams improve. Trying to find that middle ground is a long, arduous process, but down there it’s about six days that we’re all together and it’s the only time during the year, so there are a lot of conversations and activity that happens.”
How much of it is serious and how much is poker being played?
Waibel: “Oh, I think there’s a lot of poker being played. I think for me, the way that I work and the conversations I have are serious. When I talk about a player … I played and I understand the repercussions of trading a player and negotiating a new deal with a player and a player moving their family or moving themselves. I don’t tend to waste time in conversation unless it’s real. I don’t see any reason to talk about a player fictionally or speculatively. If you’re interested in moving a player, we talk. If we’re not interested, we don’t. It’s as simple as that.”
