Today’s Purple Press is going to be a hybrid news aggregator/NEW PLAYER ALERT post! I should’ve done the NEW PLAYER ALERT yesterday but I was out of pocket and y’all don’t click on our stuff past like 2:30 p.m. Eastern anyway. So, important things first:
Louisville City announced yesterday that the club had signed 6’3″ defender Taylor Peay to an undisclosed deal. Elsie’s in the habit of signing players to either two year contracts or one year with an option to extend, so I’d bet the latter is what we’ve got here. Also, because Peay is a former MLS player and their players’ union publishes salary data, we at least know what he made last year with Real Salt Lake: $67,500.00.
Oh, yeah: Peay, a RSL academy product, played college ball at Washington and was originally drafted by Portland Timbers in 2014. Portland loaned him down to Orange County that same year, where he made 14 appearances. Peay then spent the 2015 and 2016 seasons with Timbers 2. Those were some bad T2 teams. In 2017 he signed a new deal with Real Salt Lake but only made one appearance with the senior team, spending the rest of the season with Real Monarchs. His MLS scouting report says he’s a capable passer who’s comfortable in a back three or back four, and can play central defender or right back.
Phil Durbin, who reported last week that Louisville City might sign Peay for 2019, noted with some concern that Peay might be an injury risk, never having made more than 20 appearances in a season. Paco Craig, still unsigned and whom I’m guessing Peay is going to replace, was a bit of an iron man for Louisville City, appearing in 32 of 34 league games last season. If we’ve learned anything about Scott Ritter and Louisville City’s medical staff these last few years, though, it’s that they’re basically miracle workers of near-biblical proportion. Peay will be fine. Welcome to Louisville!
ALSO:
- USL League One’s already got its schedule out. Granted, it’s a lot easier to put together a schedule when your league’s only got ten teams, but COME ON CHAMPIONSHIP, GIVE US A CALENDAR.
- Speaking of schedules, we can probably expect to see Swope Park Rangers and St. Louis FC on ours again for 2019, as Nipun Chopra says they’ll be coming to the Eastern Conference. We’ll find out whether there will be a Central Conference for 2020 sometime in the next six to ten months, I’m guessing.
- Memphis is going for controversy in their inaugural season, signing two Trinidadian players to its 2019 roster. While the move is probably going to bother some thinner-skinned American Outlaws members, it’s a good move for the club as those guys were obviously good enough to beat Christian Pulisic and therefore should have no problems in USL.
