More Details on Nashville Acquiring Medranda and Zendejas

On Tuesday Nashville SC acquired goalkeeper Adrian Zendejas via a trade and Jimmy Medranda via the 2019 MLS Expansion Draft. At the time, fans were miffed to find out that Sporting Kansas City had lost two players instead of just one in a single day. Many fans and pundits questioned why Sporting KC didn’t just protect Medranda and let Zendejas go if they were sending him to Nashville anyways. Or why it wasn’t agreed upon that by giving them AZ that they wouldn’t select another player from KC.

Well it turns out, there was more to the story. Ben Wright of Speedway Soccer confirmed on Twitter that the two players were essentially a package deal. So instead of looking at it like SKC ripped off Nashville by trading Zendejas for $50K in General Allocation Money (GAM), $125K in Targeted Allocation Money (TAM) and an international roster spot (worth probably at least another $100K in GAM), think of it as all that plus another $50K in GAM and they got Medranda in return. It feels much more like Nashville wins in that trade.

On top of that, Medranda, by virtue of being selected in the Expansion Draft will go on the Senior Roster but Zendejas will head to the Reserve Roster. A shrewd bit of roster maneuvering by Mike Jacobs to not be forced to put AZ on his Senior Roster.

Another “perk” to Sporting KC is that they will not be subject to losing a player in next year’s Expansion Draft. That will be the draft where Austin FC enters the league. Austin are coached by former Kansas City Wizard Josh Wolff. The real bummer is they’ll be off the exempt list for 2022 when two more teams enter the league in St. Louis and Sacramento. Teams have a 50 percent lower chance of losing a player when only five draft picks are made instead of 10.

The Blue Testament will bring you more SKC offseason coverage as it unfolds. Look out for the list of players who’s options are declined or picked up to come out tomorrow as that is the deadline.