This is probably the one question every FC Dallas fan from here to Indonesia has been asking themselves these last couple of months. It has been a wild ride and we’re only now at the start of the preseason.
Wild few weeks for Burn fans. #DTID #fcdallas #MLS pic.twitter.com/4mar2eJKUC
— Hubertito Lowry (@SenorHubertito) January 11, 2025
I'll admit off the bat, I'm along for the ride here with what they're doing these days. In some cases, I agree with the moves (the latest with selling Velasco and trading Tafari come to mind), but in other cases I'm frustrated that we haven't seen any viable rumors of replacements coming up.
The last two months have been kind of laughable when you consider what was said the club’s end-of-season press conference with Dan Hunt and Andre Zanotta. Both said this team needed defensive help this winter and that it wouldn’t be a full rebuild of this roster. I'm fairly certain Zanotta said he felt at the time the roster didn't need a full overhaul, just some tweaks to improve.
What is the old adage, never tell God your plans because they always change? Or something along those lines.
Some of the reasoning then was how the team performed down the stretch under interim manager Peter Luccin. It was logical, though I also think at the time we all didn't fully believe it.
If anything, we're in full rebuild mode with the likes of Alan Velasco, Jesus Ferreira and Paul Arriola gone from the roster. I'm not sure what you'd even call it if Peter Musa joins this group.
To lose potentially all three Designated Players and a former DP-turned-TAM player in one offseason is tough to overcome. The amount of regular starts from the last three seasons leaving is rather astounding.
This also doesn’t even get into the number of former academy players that have ‘needed to move on’ from Frisco as well. That feels like another article for another day.
So, back to the initial question...what exactly is FC Dallas doing here as we get into the preseason? I've had a lot of time to think through this the last few weeks, and while this piece has been rewritten a couple of times after more moves have happened, and could be dated the second I publish it, it’s a good starting point for a discussion.
I think the best place to begin, may be with that insane load of General Allocation Money that the club has picked up in recent weeks.
About that GAM collection and offseason deals
The nearly $8 or $10 million elephant in the room, huh? I'll attempt to get into some of the math in a second. I'm not expert in the understanding of GAM in this league, but I do know like you all, FC Dallas has a lot of it these days.
To understand how we got here, its pretty simple. The club made their roster moves, hired Eric Quill, did a little free agent shopping and then saw where they were going to be in terms of salary cap, contracts and what Quill would wanted for his roster.
The dumping of one or two big contracts from there was likely to happen. FC Dallas knew they likely needed to get out from under some bad contracts for some older players that former boss Nico Estevez had here. As much fun the 'new era' was in 2022, the contracts went bad in a hurry once we got to 2024. Then you factor in how Quill is with younger players, it makes sense to see some older players go.
There is always a lot of talk in MLS about cycles with teams and in a way, FC Dallas was at the end of a cycle with Estevez (and then former interim manager Peter Luccin) on the way out. They're entering a new cycle with Quill in charge.

I already went into why they made the Ferreira and Arriola moves. I've discussed why they were fools not to take Boca Juniors up on their kind of insane offer on Velasco. If they are able to get some European team to be dumb enough to purchase Musa for north of $18 million this month, I'll be on board.
Why? This is MLS and furthermore, this is FC Dallas. They are the classic buy low and sell high team. Sure, Musa and Velasco were purchased for a pretty penny or two, but to earn a profit on one or both of them in a short order is exactly what MLS wants its teams to do.