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Lider Marmol signs with the Chicago Fire

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The Chicago Fire signed Paraguayan defender Lider Marmol, the team announced on Tuesday. The signing ends a three-month long saga that saw Marmol train with the Red Bulls for two months before eventually joining the Fire and agreeing to terms.

"We are excited to hae Lider join our organization," Fire technical director Frank Klopas said. "He is a good young player that is going to make our team stronger."

Marmol is expected to give the Fire depth both in central defense and defensive midfield. His strength on the ball, sharp passing ability and strong shot from long range could make him an ideal defensive midfielder, but he could also help provide a steadying force in central defense.

The signing is a victory for Chicago, which not only kept Marmol away from the Red Bulls, who also filed a discovery claim on Marmol, but also signed a young player with the talent to start at multiple positions.

Marmol is not without his own question marks. He has bounced around to various clubs at a young age (the Fire will be his sixth club at age 22, and that is after spending the past 10 months without a team) and also had a drunk driving arrest during his half season with Spanish club Hercules a year ago.

What do you think of the signing? Love it? Hate it? Think he’s the missing piece to the Fire puzzle? Just happy to see Juan Carlos Osorio not get his player? Angry that the MLS discovery process cost the Red Bulls Marmol? Share your thoughts below.

Comments

  1. (oops, finishing sentence)

    … this money can provide a core of players to build a great team around. The main rebuttal from detractors seems to be “past (under-)performance is a guarantee of future (lack of) success,” which is the formula by which stupid people lose all their money.

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  2. Brett, yes, every penny Red Bull is allowed to spend on salary will be spent on salary. Their willingness to spend money isn’t the issue– they’re not the Krafts, looking to pinch pennies to supplement their NFL team’s income. If I were you, I wouldn’t waste time doubting the fact that there will be a lot of money coming in that will be spent on the player payroll.

    Your second point is much more valid. I think Osorio did a poor job signing players in the off-season, and hasn’t improved the squad. THAT is what I’m concerned about, not the fact that there will be a ton of money available to improve the squad. Of course, Osorio has coached all over the world, and he did bring in a couple players that Chicago was delighted to sign. I suspect that his mistake was assuming deals could get done to the extent that there was no plan B. Not a mistake likely to be repeated.

    With Reyna either taking a massive pay cut or leaving the team (freeing up a DP slot) next year,

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  3. haig- in the case of MB, do you think his money would be used in allocation?? or just reinvested into the team (seeing as the club is getting a new stadium perhaps RedBull would like to receive some early money on the venture)

    id be careful with how you word things… “That’s why no one is terribly worried about replacing Jozy’s 9 goals”… Jozy is an proven MLS player, but once he leaves you’ll be spending the money on a player(s) (most likely) who is not MLS proven… id be worried, if only cautious, especially with all the unfilled promises over the off season (for you guys at least)

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  4. Brett, I forgot to note that there’s also likely to be money for a Michael Bradley sell-on clause when Heerenveen sells him this summer. If the £5.5 million fee rumor from earlier this spring is true, and if the percentage is 10% (and it won’t be lower), at current exchange rates that’s $1.1 million. Two-thirds of that is over $700k, so that’s ANOTHER half million dollars we can use on players.

    If you’re keeping count, we have around $400k under the cap, and can reasonably expect another $1 million that can be used to pay players. It’s windfall money, but the transfer fee alone would pay for two maximum salary players for two years.

    That’s why no one is terribly worried about replacing Jozy’s 9 goals.

    As for Martha, the best you can do is semantics. The Fire used to play in Chicago? They also played in Naperville, and the Metrostars actually DID used to play games in the Open Cup in both NYC proper and Long Island.

    Please. You’re digging yourself deeper into that hole.

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  5. Haig,

    So are the Red Bulls trying to fool people into thinking they are playing in NY city or the State of New York?

    Your argument is indefensible. The Chicago Fire BEGAN playing in Chicago and moved 3 blocks out of the City.

    The Metro Stars never played in the city of New York, the STATE, of New York and theres really nothing NY about it.

    The Metro Stars SOLD OUT literally, changed their name to Red Bulls who again never played in NY city or state.

    And it will be funny when they current owners sell which will necessitate another name change.

    Nice try.

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  6. so technically allocation doesnt inc. the salary cap but could in fact be used as bonuses or Transfer fees to pull from other teams??

    i agree with you on that without Jozy RBNJ would not be doomed…. lets be frank here… RBNJ were doomed from their first year of existance 😀 a cursed team…..

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  7. My understanding is that the money is applied to increase the cap, so it could be used for transfer fees, salaries, bonuses, etc.

    Jozy is nearly everyone’s favorite player here, but to say that RBNY is doomed when he gets sold is wrong.

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  8. haig- nevermind, i reread the article and saw what i missed… how do allocated players work?? is it a 1 time fee then its down to the player’s salary or is some of their salaries comped??

    and could they spread that allocation out?? or do they have to spend it on 1 player to replace the player traded??

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  9. Haig – i have pointed out that my “claims” were nothing more then assumptions…

    your example proves nothing… NE are notorious for not spending the entire cap… so if they had an additional 175k cap space not spent (which has happened before), plus Tightshirt’s 325k, then the example is accurate…

    are you saying that teams who trade can exceed the Cap Space?? again, until im proven wrong, a team can only spend it’s cap space…

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  10. Wrong, Brett.

    http://soccernet.espn.go.com/columns/story?id=503146&root=mls&&cc=5901

    “Recently, MLS has made rules changes to provide more money for teams losing players to transfers.”

    Example:

    “Of the transfer fee, the Revolution would have received two-thirds and MLS one-third. So, the Revolution would have gained about $1.7 million, only $500,000 of which could have been used for an allocated player. That makes it very difficult to find a replacement of equal value to Twellman. A league official noted the Revolution could have applied to use more than $500,000 toward bringing in a player.”

    Twellman did not make $500k last year (or this year). He made $325k. So apparently you are wrong.

    If you have anything to back up YOUR claims, provide them now.

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  11. Haig- yes you could apply that money to paying your players, but you would only have the cap space Jozy takes up to play with (along with the remaining cap space you havent used at that point)…

    ie) jozy takes up 100k (made up number) and you have 50k cap left… i would only assume that regardless of how much you get from the transfer you would only have 150k cap space to play with….

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  12. I love you guys….

    except the new york/new jersey metro red star bulls of the non greater east coast.

    you, not so much.

    toronto fc over rb 3-1

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  13. Word out of the Chicago front office is that Marmol signed with the Fire because he wants to play in front of more than 500 fans every week on a regular grass surface.

    The Pink Cows did not meet this criteria.

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  14. Not true, Brett. Half a million would be available to be applied to the salary cap, which would give RBNY about $900k to play with. Look into it.

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  15. haig-you may get loads of money but you’ll only get the cap space Jozy takes up on new players… lets not forget that Jozy was also with the U20’s for at least a month, and also played out left for a good part of the season….

    eek, im backing up Jozy and im not even a redbull fan O.o

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  16. Man, if you guys are this upset about Lider Marmol, what the heck are you going to do with yourselves when Jozy leaves in another couple months?

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  17. Matt- i already pointed out that the reason i call it RBNJ is not b/c of physical location, its b/c of the whinny pricks in NY who complain about the team not actually being in NY…

    IM NOT SAYING ALL NY FANS ARE LIKE THIS.. simply saying the ones i have talked to have turned me off from associating it as a NY team…

    Reply

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