When Kevin Payne took over at TFC he held two significant assets -- the No 1 pick in the MLS Superdraft and the No 1 ranking for returning MLS players and US internationals in the allocation order.
Typically, those two assets have both yielded starting players in the past. So, it was reasonable to hope for TFC to receive the same now.
The early returns are...incomplete. They are incomplete because of what Payne has done with the assets. Rather than go with what was available at the time, he essentially deferred things by swapping the current assets for assets that will be used later.
Namely, allocation money and, in the case of the returning player allocation, a 2015 draft pick and an international spot.
The claim made by Payne was that the deferring was needed to allow him to clean up the sins of past management. It's a convenient claim as it is next to impossible to evaluate how teams use allocation money. We can only guess by looking at the players that he brings in with discovery signings.
Those evaluations will come in the next couple weeks as the MLS summer transfer window opens and if that allocation gets used to bring in new blood.
At least that has better happen because so far Toronto's yield from the draft -- Kyle Bekker and Emery Welshman -- is below standard even it what was clearly a weak draft class.
Combined the two players have just four appearances for the Reds. When you factor in the fact that TFC left regular starters like Andrew Farrell, Carlos Alvarez and Deshorn Brown on the table (they very likely could have had two of them) the draft isn't looking good for TFC.
That said, the entire first round has yielded just a four appearance median league-wide, with no player taken between No 10 and No 19 having more than four appearances.
All drafts are a crapshoot. MLS' draft is particularly dangerous to rely upon.
That appears to be the thinking Payne had when he traded down to get a chance to cash in later.
Later is now though. How he performs over the next month will go a long way to determining his final grade in his first year in charge.
NOTES: Interestingly, this season might mark the time when the homegrown philosophy for building a MLS club caught up with the drafting philosophy.
In past years, the impact of the incoming draft class was clearly better than the impact of the homegrown class.
In 2013 it's close to even. Both the draft and the homegrown classes have contributed about 5-6 regular starters.
Although there are far more homegrown players that have not made a single appearance (13 vs 3), the average age of a homegrown signing is about two years younger than a first round pick.
The draft is clearly becoming less and less important.