Summer '08: Ins and Outs

Bear in mind that you can't just look at raw G/90, you have to remember that 03/04 and 05/06 were with Palace in the CCC. 04/05 was the only year he had that really good strike rate in the Premier League.

 

I find that you can generally multiply the CCC rates by 0.6 to get a rough Premiership equivalent. And even in 04/05, half of those goals came from penalties, something I can't see ever happening again.

 

Yeah, I understand that, but is CCC vs. PL worth 5 goals per 90? I wouldn't think so, but maybe I'm wrong.

And in any event, I think £10.5 million is waaaaay more than he's worth.

 

What 3 players?

People need to stop arguing the "we could have spent this on these other players". That's not how it works. There simply aren't 3 good players left, with premier league experience, that will cost the same as AJ. AJ's price is high cause there aren't many players available with his experience and youth. If Fulham needs a striker at a certain level and can't convince some guy from Spain to come to London, you have to pay up for the English guy. That is how it works.

I'm just glad AJ wants to come to Fulham. He could just stay at Everton and enjoy winning the UEFA Cup or finishing in the top 7.

 

Kitson (5.5), Carson (3.25 base), Stoor (2 rumored).

I'm not saying we should've bought them, I'm just providing an example.

 

I meant in a vacuum, Lyle. I think £10 million for Andy Johnson is bad business. I'd rather get no one. £10 million spent now is £10 million which won't be available in the next transfer window or £10 million we won't have to pay the wages you're always saying we can't afford (and by the way, I agree with you on that). Why not put that money toward trying to entice Simunic or finalizing the Stoor deal? The defense has been a bigger problem than scoring goals in recent years.

So don't get your hackles up, I usually agree with you.

 

We're still probably going to get Stoor and then I'd be perfectly happy with the current team going into the season. I think Hughes will be fine at CB, and
we'll have two talented strikers in AJ and Zamora.

 

Well, we're still buying Stoor. So Roy actually has more than whatever he's going to spend on AJ. And why would we buy Carson when we got Schwarzer in on a free?

I'm not talking about any players, I'm talking about high level EPL experience. Roy is obviously going after cheap buys abroad. However, if the cheap buys abroad don't want to come, and we have to have some player who can do the business, that means we have to pay for it in England. There just aren't that many quality English players who actually want to come to Fulham. In some ways, if AJ comes, it'll be a blessing.

 

You shouldn't look at this way either. We simply don't know what Fulham will be able to spend next summer. We don't even really know what they can spend on wages. We know there's a budget and it isn't very high, but that's it. Who knows what MAF is willing and able to do?

There just aren't many English players of AJ's quality who want to come to Fulham. If Fulham has to splurge to get him, so be it. Quality players like him, who want to come to Fulham, simple don't come around that often.

The main point is spending 10 million on him doesn't necessarily preclude Fulham from buying Stoor or Siminuc or anybody else. We really don't know if it does or doesn't.

Stoor is also definitely coming to Fulham, he just isn't officially with the team yet.

... and yes, AJ really isn't worth 10 million, but he is in the transfer market this summer or whatever it is Everton want for him.

 

Well, whatever we spend on wages, I'm going to go out on a limb and say £10 million would make a difference. We DO know that money is tight for Fulham, so I would rather they use it wisely. This, I believe, would not be using it wisely.

I guess that's where we differ. I think he's mediocre and I think the money it's going to take to get him is twice what he's worth. Spending twice as much money as a player's worth (and paying for it later) sounds like something the New York Knicks would do, and as a lifelong Knicks fan, that sends up red flags for me.

Fair enough, but I'm willing to bet that it doesn't help. We also really don't know if any of those guys will be good for us or not. ALL of this is speculation, so while we're speculating, I wouldn't think we would have much money left in the kitty if we spent that much on AJ.

 

Because Carson is comparable in quality and 13 years younger. Schwarzer is a perfectly adequate stopgap but we're just going to wind up having the same issue two years from now; spend a bit of money on Carson (I would've expected him to go for twice that amount) and you can have your goalkeeping settled for the next 10 years.

 

Yes, but that's why Fulham also bought David Stockdale for 600,000. Carson's price also only dropped when Stoke and West Brom became the only teams interested in him. Aston Villa would have had to pay twice as much, which is why they went for Brad Guzan and now a cheap Brad Friedel.

 

Stockdale is 22 and has never played a game above League Two. Carson is also 22 (17 days older than Stockdale) and has something like 70 Premier League games under his belt. Maybe Stockdale will turn out to be awesome, but he's clearly nowhere near as known a commodity as Carson.

Villa would've had to pay twice as much because of the dispute about Gareth Barry. If we'd been interested, I have to believe our price would've been closer to what WBA paid than what Benitez wanted from Villa.

 

I'm not sure if it is hurting the kitty though. Stoor is still coming in and Roy has talked about bringing in another CB. That's about all Fulham needs to bring in.

 

Stockdale is 22 and has never played a game above League Two. Carson is also 22 (17 days older than Stockdale) and has something like 70 Premier League games under his belt. Maybe Stockdale will turn out to be awesome, but he's clearly nowhere near as known a commodity as Carson.

Villa would've had to pay twice as much because of the dispute about Gareth Barry. If we'd been interested, I have to believe our price would've been closer to what WBA paid than what Benitez wanted from Villa.

Schwarzer, like most good goalkeepers, can probably play until he's forty. The guy came for nothing. At the time, Carson wasn't even an option to buy. Even if Fulham had wanted Carson, Villa were still interested in him and we wouldn't have beaten out Villa for his signature. So it would have made no sense for Fulham to buy him after bringing in Schwarzer and Stockdale... even if his price had dropped. He wouldn't have even think about coming to Fulham while Schwarzer is here.

 

That's a fair point about the sequence of events, and one I didn't consider. If you've decided Keller and Niemi aren't the answer (and it certainly seems Roy had), then it's better to go out and get Schwarzer for free and have it settled than wait around and see who else might hit the market and risk not getting anybody. At the time it did seem like Carson was going to Villa if anywhere.

Rewinding a bit, though, I still agree with Nick's original point that you can get three decent players for the 10 million pounds we're rumored to be offering for Andy Johnson.

 

If he wears the Fulham shirt and busts his ass doing it, then I'll support the sinner as much as I supported the saint.

AJ is a player who will work hard and put himself in position to score goals. He can create opportunities on his own. He'll run himself into the ground for his club. In those respects, we would be getting a good replacement for what we've lost.

There is a difference between diving and putting yourself into position to either score goals or be fouled. Johnson more often than not gets himself into positions where the defender either has to let him pass or foul him.

Those who remember the old Detroit Pistons from the 80s will remember Adrian Dantley. The guy was a genius at positioning and getting to the free throw line. Johnson reminds me of him.

This reputation isn't a bad thing to have. If a defender knows you've got an ability to get the penalty, then he may very well take a more careful line in trying to stop you. That factor alone would create openings for Fulham.

 

I think I messed it up by how I tryed to quote someone's previous post. Once I deleted the whole quote the page went back to normal. Queer.