re: MLS SuperDraft Thread

Atlanta United guys, here is a quick overview of your newly drafted players from Matt Doyle:

Miles Robinson

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Robinson makes a ton of sense for a team that's clearly going to be spending big importing talent its midfield and attack, which means they'll have to be a touch thrifty on the backline. And as it stands in MLS, there is nothing thriftier than a Generation adidas contract.
Robinson is big and athletic, and has drawn comparisons to both Walker Zimmerman and Steve Birnbaum (though he's not as dominant in the air as those guys). He's a regular in the US U-20s, competing with the likes of Justen Glad, Erik Palmer-Brown, Tommy Redding and Cameron Carter-Vickers for playing time.
Robinson was mistake-free in central defense at the Combine, and showed a bit of his athleticism in the air with a wonderful headed assist on Day 3. He may not be able to walk right into the starting lineup, but he's not all that far away from getting meaningful minutes.
For a team that's spend serious cash elsewhere, getting a GA defender who can do real work on the backline makes a lot of sense.

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Julian Gressel

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I think Gressel projects best as a central midfielder, but he's also excelled both on the wing and as a No. 9 -- the dude solves some problems.

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Doyle seems to think that Robinson was right on the money while Gressel was a reach at #8.


Here is another opinion from Will Parchman:

Miles Robinson

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Miles Robinson was, without much doubt, the best defender in college soccer in 2016. As a sophomore. He burst onto the national scene with a rousing performance in the 2015 College Cup as a freshman, and his follow-up season in 2016 was something to behold, like watching a young lion come into his claws. Robinson, like Van Damme, is a rangy, high risk-reward center back who likes to step into challenges and form the base of the spine during attacks. He’s probably the best possession center back to emerge in the draft since Matt Polster, who was so good on ball the Chicago Fire moved him into the midfield. Don’t expect the same for Robinson, who has the frame and technical ability to be a special center back for years. It’s no surprise he’s firmly on the US national team radar.

The more talent evaluators see of Miles Robinson, the more he tends to shoot up collective draft boards. Robinson’s been playing up in age for the majority of his career, which will no doubt help him cope as a precocious 19-year-old defender in a sea of veterans. The US have always struggled to produce pro-ready creative midfielders - especially wingers - but defenders are a different story. It’s the “easiest” transition from college to pro in the sense that outright skill is less important than IQ and athleticism.

Robinson, who still has an uphill battle for minutes, has both in ample supply. He has the frame and skill set to be ready in 2017. The question is whether an enterprising coach will give him a chance.

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Julian Gressel

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It isn’t so often that a midfielder cracks the top five nationally in goals, but then Julian Gressel isn’t your typical midfielder. As it happens, midfielders tend to march backward a step in the transition to the pro game: No. 10s fall back into box-to-box roles while those in-between midfielders (like Seattle’s Cristian Roldan in 2015, for instance) often become roving shields for the back line. So it is with Gressel, whose largesse in possession and technical ability will almost certainly make him more of a withdrawn No. 8 and ball-tracker in defensive space at the next level. Gressel scored 15 goals last year, so he knows how to finish, but it’s his unerring consistency in prodding possession and hard-headedness on ball that will likely woo an enterprising MLS front office into making him the connective tissue between defender and creator.

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Parchman, like Doyle, has a high opinion of Robinson while holding Gressel in higher opinion than does Doyle.