Winners and losers from the MLS transfer deadline

Who won and lost the transfer window, including Portland, Philadelphia and a number of hometown reunions.

The MLS secondary transfer window ended Wednesday night, at 11:59 p.m. CT. This window opened intra-league trades (of which there were a few) and player acquisitions from other leagues. Teams can still sign out-of-contract players until September 14, the roster freeze deadline. The rules are complicated. Par for the course.

Let’s look around the league.

Winner: Portland Timbers

Portland are quietly the hottest team in MLS. They’re on a 15-game unbeaten streak and sit second in the Western Conference with two games in hand. They only got better at the deadline.

Jorge Villafana is back in MLS to start at left-back. He was a starter for years in the Rose City and played himself in the US National Team there, so he is an immediate upgrade over Zarek Valentin.

Lucas Melano, who had been on loan at Belgrano and Estudiantes in Argentina, will reportedly return to Portland. He had been a disappointing Designated Player in 2015 and 2016, when he compiled just four goals and eight assists in 3,000 minutes, but he was a notable part of the MLS Cup run three years ago, and he’s a “why not?” type of acquisition. You can always use more attacking options.

When he was an every-game starter in 2016, Melano played like Sebastian Blanco before Blanco adjusted to MLS. Maybe a year and a half back home will help him acclimate.

Giovani Savarese also dealt out-of-favor left-back Vytas Andriuskevicius to D.C. United for $50k Targeted Allocation Money. Vytas had played sparingly in MLS this season and spent much of his time playing for Timbers II.

Loser: Philadelphia Union

In the long-term, it was a good window for the Union. They hired Ernst Tanner, former head of Red Bull Salzburg’s youth academy set-up, as their new sporting director, replacing Ernie Stewart. His background — Salzburg are historically effective talent developers — fits the Union’s recent dedication to playing their kids.

But in the short term, which admittedly matters less for this Trust The Process Union team, they failed to sign a goalscorer. After Cory Burke scored another two goals in the US Open Cup semifinal on Wednesday, it’s reasonable to have been persuaded out of investing money in a striker. Given David Accam’s severe struggles, though, they needed more attacking production.

Philly are battling for the playoffs in the Eastern Conference, looking worriedly over their collective shoulder at the slowly rising Toronto FC. They’re playing a lot of young players in the process, mostly on the backline, and while they’ve had some growing pains, they have a shot at winning a trophy in September. They’ll hope that they have enough top-end scoring to beat a Dynamo team that has loads of it.

Winner: Homecomings

Krisztian Nemeth finally escaped the Jay Heaps-induced purgatory that was the New England Revolution, mercifully getting traded to Sporting KC, his former stomping ground. The Revs signed Nemeth midseason 2017, and everyone except them knew he was a square peg in a round hole. He never made sense for that team.

Nemeth makes loads of sense for an SKC team that lacks the scoring from the wing that he once gave them. In 2015, he scored 10 goals and six assists in 2,000 minutes for Kansas City before moving to Qatar after that season. He will presumably enjoy actual playing time now.

Bill Hamid will return to D.C. United on a year-and-a-half year loan from FC Midtjylland. He’s been on the bench in Denmark and DCU need a goalkeeper, so that’s a win-win.

LAFC brought SoCal native Christian Ramirez back to his hometown. Ramirez had been phased out of the Minnesota United attack pretty much since the Loons came into existence — a legitimate gripe for a frustrated fanbase — but Minnesota had to deal him at the deadline, and they got a good return. LAFC, flush with expansion allocation money, paid up to $1 million for Ramirez. No one knows how he’ll fit, but no one doubts Bob Bradley at this point.

LA also signed young American Josh Perez (from SoCal) after Perez struggled to break into Fiorentina in the Serie A. Bradley has, uh, a lot of forwards to play with.

Loser: Teams that didn’t improve

It was a relatively quiet deadline day outside of the Montreal Impact making a few small-ish moves.

(So the Impact get their due attention: they traded out-of-favor winger Dom Oduro straight up for Quincy Amarikwa of the Earthquakes, adding forward depth; they traded a 2020 draft pick for depth midfielder Michael Azira of the Rapids; and they signed 35-year-old right-back Bacary Sagna to compete with Chris Duvall.)

A few MLS teams stood pat. Orlando, the LA Galaxy, D.C. United and Houston neglected to add defensive help. Atlanta and the Red Bulls, understandably, will roll with what they have. Seattle signed a depth right-back, Brad Smith on loan from Bournemouth, and stuck with the Raul Ruidiaz signing otherwise.

To be fair, moves can be made for out-of-contract players until September 14. But no one traded for players like Marco Urena, Kelyn Rowe and Tommy Thompson, and some teams could have used some reinforcements for a playoff chase.