D.C. United president Kevin Payne also spoke after practice this morning, both about the decision to let Jaime Moreno go at the end of the season and the larger context of where it falls into how the team is expected to change in the offseason.
“It was a collective decision that was unanimous,” said Payne of ending Moreno’s United playing days. “I don’t know if he agrees, but I think that management and team management all felt that this was the right thing to do.”
Payne declined to elaborate on specifics – they’re pretty obvious – but said, “It’s time, that’s why. It’s never easy for a player to end his career, and it’s particularly difficult for a player who’s been such a great player, as Jaime has. It’s not easy for us. It’s not easy for him, and as he points out, he’s only ending his career here. We obviously hope that he does well at Blooming, and he knows he’s got a role here when he’s ready to step into that kind of role.”
In one aspect, it is still a little premature to talk in specifics about the offseason, but not really. So I asked Payne how the decision on Moreno fit into the larger context of anticipated offseason changes: “It is a little early, but we clearly – Jaime leaving is kind of the last real link to the past. We need players that will step up and write a new history.
“Clearly we need some pieces. Somebody’s got to answer the call of scoring goals. Whether that’s a player on the team now or a player that we go out and find, that remains to be seen.
“I think we need a little more depth in the back. It’s a little hard to judge this year. You don’t really expect to lose your top two left backs and your top right back in the same year, for long stretches of time. It’s pretty unusual to have that concentration of injuries. We feel like on the left side, we’re in fine shape with [Marc] Burch and [Rodney] Wallace. The right side, we’ve got to figure out where Jordan [Graye] is, we’ve got to figure out Jed Zayner, Devon [McTavish], and then we’ve got to also got to look at center back. We’ve got Dejan [Jakovic] and Julius [James]. I think we’ve got to make some determinations about whether that’s going to be the pair that we’re going to try to go forward with, or whether we need to be in the market for a starter.”
Did you notice Payne didn’t mention Juan Manuel Peña or Carey Talley in that statement? Yikes.
“We’ll talk about that with him, but I think that Juan’s probably ready to retire,” he said. “Carey, we’ll see how the rest of the season goes. Carey’s a little bit younger than Juan.”
Tough times for everyone.
“We have a lot of work to do, obviously,” said Payne. “We don’t really feel our record is reflective of the way we have played, but regardless, we would be looking to make some significant changes. We thought this year was kind of a transitional year. We always assumed that Jaime, this likely would be his last year. That’s a big hole to fill. You can’t really fill it, but you have to find a way.”
