Rant for a Friday Afternoon

Mo Johnston is absolutely single minded.

He cares about results on the pitch, this season – period.

He is not concerned about future TFC squads.
Come May the 8th (when Jim Brennan turns 31) TFC will have 8 presumptive starters aged 31 or over; the average age of the likely starting eleven will be 30. Since the start of the season 3 of the 4 new players signed have been aged 32 (Laurent Robert will soon be 33). The average age of the four – including Rohan Ricketts – is 31.

He places no value on the development squad – except as a repository for deep depth players.
This is evidenced by his refusal to fully staff the 10-man squad and his summary dismissal of most of last year’s squad.

He could not care less about developing the game in Canada. Evidence on this point if rife: among other things; he petitioned to have his ‘Canadian quota’ reduced; he has been seen to drag his feet at every turn in the creating an academy; he turns every stone in England looking for an assistant coach, when the impressive Canadian coach Nick Dasovic is available.

On each of these points Mo Johnston takes the wrong approach for the future quality of the squad and success of the franchise.

Successful franchises in MLS – that is franchises that succeed year-after-year – simply do not build by recruiting older, pricier players. Perpetual finalists New England and Houston were both built on a core of players who were recruited young and who spent their peak years with the club.

In Houston, Wade Barrett; Brian Mullen; Eddie Robinson; Ryan Cochrane; Dwayne De Rosario; Craig Waibel; Ricardo Clark; Brian Ching; and Brad Davis were recruited to the squad at an average age of 23. Only Davis had a previous track record of success in MLS. Having built this nucleus, Houston simply added a couple of established veterans to form the squad that won the MLS cup.

In New England, Taylor Twellman; Andy Dorman; Pat Noonan; Adam Cristman; Shalrie Joseph; Jeff Larentowicz; Khano Smith; Jay Heaps; Michael Parkhurst; Wells Thompson; James Riley were recruited to the squad also at an average age of 23. Only Heaps had a previous track record of success in MLS.

Successful MLS squads are built, not bought.

As for building the game in Canada, this may or may not be a necessary element to building a successful franchise. Perhaps, Toronto FC could continue to rule the psyches and wallets of a band of fans large enough to fill BMO Field without building the game in Canada-at-large one iota. But, there is strong evidence against this model – dominating a small, devoted market without expanding general interest – working in North American sports.

The stagnation of the National Hockey League in America is perfect evidence of the failure of this approach. Without an abundance of home-grown talent, without the game taking root in local soil, Hockey has always been a niche sport in America. A guest sport, hosted by Americans, played by foreigners. This is the future for TFC if they do not move beyond token efforts to include Canadian players in its future plans.

When Mo Johnston waived Tyler Hemming it was clear that he was working at cross purposes to what is best for the franchise long-term, and the game in Canada. His goal is to win now and protect his own position.

For what its worth, this likely will not hurt Hemming, there are two teams – in Canada alone – that would be better suited to developing his career. By European standards, at 22 Hemming may not be as advanced as a player as he should be. But this is precisely the age when well run MLS franchises begin their player development process. Unfortunate then, that Mo Johnston is in the self-protection business, rather than the player development business.