Johnny Exantus Expects to be Signed

Red Bull Youth Update

Johnny Exantus, or Johnny X as he is referred to by his peers and those scouring various soccer message boards, has quite the bio for a 17 year old soccer player.

Exantus scored a brace in the Fifa U-17 World Championships against Jamaica at the tender age of fourteen. The legend only grew from there.

His profile only grew in the 2006 Metrostars preseason when Johnny, a member of the Metro's youth academy under Gio Saverse, was invited to train with the first team. Johnny quickly turned the heads of the coaches and players. The word was out that New York had a one of a kind prospect in their camp, but league rules kept NY from signing him. If Johnny signed with MLS he would have been subject to the SuperDraft, putting him up for grabs in a pool of MLS talent sharks.

Everyone questioned why New York could not sign the young phenom, but the rules prohibited it. Don Garber realized this, and invented a rule for cases like Exantus, to be signed straight from the academy to the first team. Problem is the rule would not be in effect for New York until after the 2007 season, about two years since Johnny X first burst onto the MLS radar.

Since then, the team name changed, but Exantus stayed in the youth academy, continuing to impress, even with his now famous profile. In fact, many other players from the youth team have grown up with Exantus, who are now impressing in their own right. Walter Hines and Matt Kassel are others on Red Bull's radar.

The Exantus name jumps off the page the most though, due in part to that now famous preseason where he changed MLS for the better.

When this offseason comes, Red Bull will have their first opportunity to sign players from their top-notch youth system.

From a source close to the player, it has been learned that Johnny "expects to be signed by Red Bull, in November". Now that could just mean that the kid is confident, or that there are some signs. This could be the first of many signings that Red Bull makes from their youth system in the future. The youth academy is the most successful part of the club, and the ability to sign these young, talented, local players who are winning all of these youth tournaments will give Red Bull the advantage it truly deserves from their years of hard work. MLS is growing up.

A Few Random Notes and Updates

As the club enters the home stretch towards the MLS Cup Playoffs, the "project" end is put on the backburner a bit. All the focus is on the sucess of the team.

But the ironic thing is that the sucess of the team is one of the most important parts of the project.

Here's a few updates since I last left...

- Red Bull Park's Website is innactive. This is probably due to Red Bull's buyout of AEG, as the site looked to be primarily run by AEG itself. The webcam no longer updates, and I emailed the contact on the website for questions awhile ago and never got a response. In the future at a high publicity time like the playoffs or MLS Cup for Marc De Grandpre and the rest to release a new timeline of sorts and maybe throw up a new, Red Bull only, website.

- Before the site went practically dead, the stadium finally started to be making some good solid progress everyday with a noticable increase in workrate.

- Although the club has yet to win any silverwear in it's history, one way to continue to add to the prestige as they get closer and closer to bringing home the MLS Cup is to take home some individual awards for the Red Bull trophy cabinate. As they head down the stretch, Juan Pablo Angel is considered one of the favorites for the MVP, Golden Boot, and Newcomer of the Year award. Not to mention he already took home All-Star Game MVP. Dane Richards is also in the race for Rookie of the Year.

- The news of the week was that Amado Guevara wants back in to the club that he once called home, but not until the 2008 season. With the increased cap space and Red Bull's desire to make some big moves with the space, look for Guevara to be a "Plan D". With a whole offseasn and boatload of cash, Red Bull should be able to come up with some better punch than an aging Amado Guevara.

Red Bull U-16 Team Reps Brand in Spain

Over the past couple weeks, the Red Bull U-16 Youth Academy team was in Spain to compete in the U-17 Quixote tournament, with the likes of Juventus, Sevilla, PSV Eidenhoven, and Barcelona.

The Red Bull team failed to advance out of their group, but earned draws with Partizan Belgrade and Juventus, before bowing out to Sevilla.

Being the elite club academy in America, this was a great way to represent MLS, American soccer, and Red Bull New York in an important international tournament.

Not only does this signify the strength of the academy (even on a international level), but it promotes Red Bull New York well by showing the quality of soccer that is associated with the name, at least at the youth level for now.

Holding their own and being mentioned alongside these famous European clubs proves that Red Bull New York is continuing to grow on a grand stage.

Although we have to focus on the local side of things in the metro area, it is never too early to start the globalization of the club representing one of the most famous cities in the world, while proving the tremendous skill that is being produced at Red Bull New York.

The senior club needs to follow suit though, and my feeling is that sooner, rather than later, that Red Bull will take the safety off and prove (if there was any doubt) that they can run a first class professional soccer club.

Red Bull Bought Out AEG, A While Ago

The Red Bull buyout of AEG's stake in Red Bull Park is a done deal according to Ives.

"Red Bull buyout of AEG update?
The mayor of Harrison said it was in the works, how close is it?
IVES- It already happened. For some reason Red Bull is keeping mum about it but it's happened a while ago."

"With the Red Bulls buying out AEG, anything is possible as far as the stadium is concerned."

So apparently Red Bull didn't find it necessary to spread the word. Interesting to see the effects that come from this. One thing I am looking forward to is the effect this will probably have on Red Bull's bottom line, as they will now reap total benefits from all games and other events held at the Park I would imagine.

The AEG Red Bull Park website is still up, and there is no new, Red Bull's only site. I would imagine the brass will release a new timeline soon, as De Grandpre said he hoped would happen after he announced the delay to 2009.

Here Comes the Effect

The cause was a 66 thousand plus crowd witnessing the best game in MLS history in which the home club took home the victory.

Marc De Grandpre is hoping the effect shows big time in the last four home games, and I think he has reason to.

Thanks to a little bit of luck and Don Garber's scheduling, RBNY will have a great opportunity to carry over the attendance momentum from the instant classic Saturday night. The Red Bull's next home game falls on Sept. 1 when the Chicago Fire role into town with Mexican hero Blanco and Costa Rica hit man Paulo Wanchope.

The enormous Mexican and Costa Rican contingent in the Metro area should turn out in large numbers for this one. The much less recognized Blanco tour has been paying big dividends in the attendance department everywhere the Fire have gone.

Now role them into this area, after that game, and we could really start to see the beginning of an attendance revolution on the road to RBP in 2009. But it is only a start, and De Grandpre knows it needs to continue, even more next year.

The Brass wants, needs, to make constant and visible progress every year in every department on the road to Red Bull Park. That means attendance, results, promotion, buzz, players, everything. De Grandpre and the rest know what a huge year 2008 will be on the way to 2009, and they are hoping to get that ball rolling at the back end of this season and on into what will hopefully be a successful playoffs.

What we Learned from Beckham's Visit to Giants Stadium

One of the greatest games in MLS history played in front of 66,237 at Giants Stadium.

It was one of those sometimes rare moments in this country's soccer landscape when you think that this sport is going to make it big one day.

What did we learn from Saturday night at the Meadowlands?

- 66,237 people will come out for a game in an awful location such as the Meadowlands between simply two MLS teams. No doubleheader, no European super club.

- Although you had more than your fair share of primarily Beckham fans, a ton of the crowd supported the home team when all was said and done.

- There was a large portion of the "non-regular crowd" who were Red Bull fans. If you didn't know this all ready, there are a ton of supporters of the club who simply don't go to allot of matches for one reason or another. The event of Becks coming gave them the reason for this to be that one game to come out to.

- This crowd varied greatly from the one that showed up to pack the house about a year ago for Ronaldinho and Barcelona. The crowd at the Barca game had a much more Latin feel to it then this Saturday did. Becks seemed brought out more of those with European heritages. This was great to see the differing fan bases because it proves that the local club has two differing local soccer fan bases that it can draw from.

- There is no doubt that this game turned some first-timers as well as timid fans who only come out every now and then into fans of the Red Bulls and fans of MLS. You know this to be a fact if you were there.

- Now, the game obviously did not turn every one of the 66,000 + into Red Bull fans, but it proved that the people will come out, in very large quantities, if the club gives them that "in". For some that "in" is consistently winning, for others it is the new stadium. For many though, they won't get that "in" until there is a world soccer star suiting up for NY.

The fans are there, and it may not be as hard to convert them as we might have thought a year ago.

Red Bull Hoped to host Super Club Pre-Season Tournament

It appears that Red Bull was hoping for Becks not to be the only big crowd draw at Giants Stadium this summer.

An interesting piece of information from Ives Galarcep's preview of the Beckham game this Saturday night:

"Red Bull attempted to plan a tournament featuring the likes of Manchester United and Barcelona, but that didn't get very far."

A tournament like that would have done wonders for increased international visibility of the club and to draw more fans to Red Bull New York games and events. Not to mention that a tournament like this would have done alot of good for the Red Bull bottom line. It's nice to hear that Red Bull had plans for something like this, even if they didn't "get very far".

Hopefully Red Bull will be able to host something of the like in the future.