Major League Soccer released its list of players available and protected from the expansion draft as New York City FC and Orlando City FC look to build their teams.
The draft will be held at 2:00pm ET on Wednesday, and will provide each team with the opportunity to select up to 10 current players in the league for their new clubs.
Teams were allowed to protect up to 11 players, and all homegrown and Generation adidas players are automatically protected.
There are a few rules with the expansion draft that will help teams from being completely ravaged. Once a player is selected, his now former team will be allowed to protect an additional player, and they will be compensated with allocation money. If a team loses two players, that team is eliminated from contention for any other selections. In addition, Designated Players are not automatically protected (as you can see with Eddie Johnson) unless those players have no-trade clauses, which then force the team to protect them.
Any player selected will move along with their current contract and salary. Players with an expiring contract were still required to be protected or unprotected, and can be selected.
You can see the complete protected and available list here, from MLSSoccer.com.
Among the notable available playeres are DC United striker and designated player Eddie Johnson, Philadelphia Union goalkeepers Zac Macmath and Rais Mbolhi, Portland Timbers goalkeeper Donovan Ricketts, New York Red Bulls goalscorer Tim Cahill, Sporting KC attacker Claudio Beiler, and LA Galaxy defender (and new father) Dan Gargan.
The New England Revolution also did not protect strikers Patrick Mullins or Diego Fagundez, but the club announced they had a trade with NYCFC and Orlando City that states neither expansion club is allowed to select Fagundez. The Revs gave up allocation money in exchange for Fagundez’s protection.
We executed a trade with Orlando and NYCFC which will restult in Diego not being taken in the ex draft. He'll be with #NERevs next year
— Brian Bilello (@RevsPrez) December 8, 2014
