FRISCO, Texas -- At least in the eyes of FC Dallas head coach Schellas Hyndman, two players were left unprotected for Wednesday afternoon's expansion draft with a good chance of being picked by Seattle Sounders FC: goalkeeper Ray Burse and defender Aaron Pitchkolan.
But after the league's newest entry had made its 10 picks, neither player had been chosen, and while surprised, Hyndman was pleased with the outcome.
"I thought we had two very good players out there on that expansion list -- Aaron Pitchkolan and Ray Burse. They were two that we continued to fight over on whether we put them out there or not put them out there," Hyndman said. "We took a heck of a risk. [Pitchkolan] had 17 games for us this year. He is getting better and better and more experienced. I really think that Ray is the future goalkeeper of FC Dallas. I'm glad that Seattle has gone in a different direction, for sure."
The other big name that FCD left unprotected was center back and captain Duilio Davino, who has a guaranteed contract for next season, though his effect on the Sounders salary budget might have been a reason why he was not selected.
"Duilio is an extremely talented player and has a good resume," he said. "Saying that, he's also an expensive player and I just felt that putting him out there, Seattle would, 1) have to meet his salary demands, which I don't know if they were capable of doing that or 2) somebody else in the league may trade for Duilio and they would also have to meet his salary demands. I felt a little bit better about that one than Pitch to be honest."
When Davino missed seven games late in the season, it was Pitchkolan who filled in admirably and even scored his first goal since 2006. So, Hyndman is pleased that the four-year veteran wasn't chosen by the team from the Emerald City, especially since he is looking forward to having him for the future.
"No doubt about it, I still feel that Pitch is a person that we want to move forward with," Hyndman said. "But the interesting thing with expansion is that they will only let you protect 11. We went back and forth on the list and knew that there were some players on the list that Seattle wasn't interested in. What we didn't know is whether somebody else in the league would trade for something to Seattle to get somebody that we were trying to protect. It was a difficult choice but a gutsy call for us. We were forced to make a decision and now, it was the right decision because we didn't lose any players."
As for Burse, FCD might have signed starting 'keeper Dario Sala to a contract extension right after the season but that doesn't mean Hyndman won't expect to see the former Ohio State standout challenge the veteran Argentinean for the starting job in preseason.
"Absolutely, one of the things that Ray and I talked about was that he wanted to be some place where he felt he had a legitimate chance to be the starting keeper," Hyndman said. "And he didn't know if he was going to get that here because we had just re-signed Dario (Sala). I assured him that should not be what he worries about. What he should worry about is his performance. We have re-signed Dario because he is our 'keeper and we didn't want to throw a burden on Ray without him having the opportunity to play many games. But going into preseason, my message to him was to be prepared to be at his best and opportunities would come."
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