UNITED SOCCER LINKS:

• Seattle Sounders 2 is now Tacoma Defiance. See y’all never.
• In one of the more convoluted offseason transfers you’ll see, IU’s Andrew Gutman refused to sign a Homegrown deal with Chicago Fire, did sign with Celtic, and yesterday was promptly loaned to Nashville SC.
• Celtic also loaned USMNT U20 Manny Perez to North Carolina.

I did the links first today because Celtic’s transfer business could be a sign of things to come on this side of the pond. Players transferring into and out of MLS tends to be messy business because the non-MLS club has to not only deal with the MLS team’s front office brass in negotiations, but also with MLS itself, which actually own the contract and have the final say on the deal. That doesn’t even begin to touch on MLS’s other weird rules that tend to dis-incentivize MLS clubs from selling players in the first place.

For example, when Atlanta United sold Miguel Almiron to Newcastle, MLS gets a chunk of that transfer fee rather than all of it remaining with Atlanta. If a team doesn’t get to keep all of the fee it negotiated for the sale, then there’s less reason to sell.

Independent USL clubs, however, don’t have that problem. “But Nashville’s in MLS!” you might be saying. Their USL club and MLS franchise are two different businesses, which is why NSC can move its players on USL contracts wherever and whenever they want without MLS being able to say boo about it. Same goes for loan deals. That’s why it’s probably a lot more attractive for a club like Celtic to negotiate a loan or transfer (especially in the short January window) with a USL club: a lot less red tape and fuss. I seriously look forward to more moves like this in the future.

Have a great weekend!