Real Salt Lake primed for today's draft

The Real Salt Lake soccer franchise is in a much better position for today's MLS SuperDraft than it was a year ago.

The 2008 draft was the first for a new general manager in Garth Lagerway and the first for coach Jason Kreis. Besides the two leaders' front-office inexperience, the team itself could only be described as being in a rebuilding mode after failing to make the playoffs for the third consecutive year.

That is not to say the draft was not successful. After all, the team did come away with Tony Beltran, Alex Nimo and Brennan Tennelle, all of whom were on the roster and contributed either to the senior squad or reserve division. But with RSL picking 12th, it is probably a good thing the team is not looking for immediate help this time around.

"I think that if you look at our team now, and all the players we have brought in, I just don't think the 12th-best college player is going to come in and start for our team," said Lagerway. "What we are going to be doing with the pick is looking for someone that can help the team in the long run, someone that can come in and progress so that it adds depth to our roster."

The 2009 draft is considered to include a much stronger group of players than last year, and Lagerway was quite pleased with the quality of athletes he saw at the MLS combine, which concluded on Tuesday.

"It was much, much better this year," he said. "Last year was historically bad, but there were some outstanding players there this time.

"Overall, I would say that most of the ACC players stood out," he added. "It is the best conference in the country for soccer. It had three of the final four teams at the NCAAs, and I think you could see a difference in those players."

Lagerway understandably would not tip the team's hand as to which players the team was hoping would fall their way.

"We are sitting at 12, so we are going to be waiting there hoping that 11 other teams pass on the guy, or guys, that we really want," he said.

There are nine Generation Adidas players available in the draft, so chances are pretty good that at least a couple of them will be available when it comes to Real's selection.

"I don't think we are going to see them go boom, boom, boom one-though-nine," said Lagerway. "We will probably have a shot at an Adidas player if we would like."