Random Wizards News

Not a lot of big news today, but some different random bits of news about the Wizards.

First, Wizards President, Robb Heineman has an update on what's going on out at the Wizards stadium site out at the Legends. No big news on that front, other than they continue to move dirt around and are getting ready to start moving dirt away from the site. Below is the video from Hillcrest Road.



Also from Hillcrest Road the past two days, Kerry Zavagnin has been providing practice updates over at the Wizards blog. Yesterday was the first day of those updates and today he added even more to the report on practice. Today's report provides a lot more information on what the team is doing in practice, but yesterday gave more thought to the belief that goalkeeper Kevin Hartman will not be back in KC. Yesterday Zavagnin said that the #1 shirt is wide open that there's not really a #1 at the moment. You could say people are reading to much into it, but some people, including myself see this as a sign that Hartman likely isn't going to be in KC next season.

On the US national team front, no Wizards were named to the US roster for the upcoming friendly against El Salvador in Tampa in late February. This move doesn't bother me at all, I'd rather Wizards players be in camp right now preparing for the 2010 MLS season.

Finally, a little delayed news from before the signing of Kei Kamara was completed. According to Soccer America before the signing was completed the Wizards were apparently contacted about former MLSer, Stern John, who has been playing in England since leaving MLS after the 1999 season. There isn't word on whether the Wizards were actually really interested in signing John, only that they'd been contacted about him. The signing of Kamara, as the SA article says, likely took KC out of the running to get John, as the Adam Cristman trade showed the Wizards already had too many forwards on the roster.

Allocation List

The MLS transfer window is about to open up and that means rumors of players coming to MLS or coming back to MLS. Today, Steven Goff had rumors of 3 former MLS players returning to MLS. Danny Szetela, DaMarcus Beasley, and Stern John are all being rumored to returning to MLS. With these 3 potentially returning, the MLS allocation list could see a shake up. Four teams have already used their allocation this season, Seattle used theirs on Kasey Keller, Toronto traded their spot to Houston so the Dynamo could get Felix Garcia, San Jose got Bobby Convey, and LA grabbed Gregg Berhalter. With these moves, the Wizards are likely in 4th on the list, and the full allocation list probably looks something like this now. So the Wizards potentially have the chance to grab one of these players if Dallas, DC, or Colorado pass on 1 of these players (if they sign with MLS).

Honestly if this all holds true, I'm not overly interested in any of the 3, except maybe Szetela. The Wizards have already done plenty of work on the offense lately and neither Beasley or John would help enough to make them worth an allocation. I'd rather see the Wizards use their allocation on a defensive player.