Better luck next year?

By: Melissa | July 15th, 2008

It’s not looking good for Jersey Sky Blue to make the W-League playoffs. The Washington Freedom just clinched berth #2, and The Long Island Rough Riders sit in third place with the same points, but less games played. And since I last wrote, FC Indiana clinched a spot and the title for their Division.

Which kind of sort of brings me to the next topic. It does seem that whether Sky Blue make the playoffs or not, at least part of the organization will be reborn into the new league with new players and a new coach (current Sky Blue coach Denise Reddy will take an assistant role). With all those resources set aside for the new team, will they even field a W-League team at all? And FC Indiana as well – while not participating in WPS, are affiliated with the Red Stars and just signed Monica Ocampo for its 2009 season. But wait – if Monica gets offered a spot on a WPS team for 2009, why would she turn that down? Peter Wilt does make it clear on his blog that despite being an affiliate, the Red Stars don’t have preference to attain her as a player so even though she’s signed to play in the W-League, no one is counting her out of the WPS player pool. Did FC Indiana just sign a player knowing she probably won’t play for them at all? And if so, what kind of compensation should they expect? Would this technically be a trade?

Oh, and here’s the last thing to think about – I’m pretty sure, right now, there are zero answers to these questions. WPS is still in the hashing out the details phase and so far, have gotten the USWNT allocation rules mostly down. But, for example, Philly in 2010? “In due time, processes will be designed for 2010 teams such as Philadelphia to compose their rosters.” Peter Wilt writes in his latest blog entry that he’s off to San Diego to hash out “expansion, marketing, broadcast and player issues.” I expect we will get some new news soon.

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