If I told you at the start of the year that there might be a question about keeping Austin FC starting goalkeeper Brad Stuver with the club by season’s end, you might have looked at me funny. And you still might.
Stuver has had another excellent season, on wages that might even undersell what he means to the club. He got a raise in the offseason, more than doubling his base salary from $175,000 to $408,000, but that’s still less than Nick Marsman (getting nearly $475,000 as an MLS Pool ‘keeper currently with San Antonio FC), Carlos Coronel (the Red Bulls’ goalkeeper), or Steve Clark (on $560,000 from the Dynamo).
What’s more, Stuver played every minute in 2023, one of only three MLS players to do that in a season crammed full of extra tournaments (Coronel, incidentally, is one of the two others), and led the league in saves with 132, in a top five including four other excellent goalkeepers.
But we’ve got to talk about Damian Las. Las was the MLS Next Pro Goalkeeper of the Year in 2023, didn’t give up a goal in open play the entire championship run, and came up big in PK shootouts in the West final and the MLS Next Pro Cup final.
In the process, Las spent time with the first team and eventually supplanted veteran Matt Bersano as the club’s number two goalkeeper. From a developmental process, that’s great.
But is it sustainable? It’s perhaps worth noting that 2022 MLS Next Pro Goalkeeper Patrick Schulte, who played last season with the Crew 2, is now the Crew’s first-team starter, ascending past veteran Evan Bush and former Austin FC expansion draft pick Brady Scott.
Granted, the Crew’s situation, with Eloy Room and all, was a lot more unsettled than having Brad Stuver as your number one keeper. But, also, Schulte shows that it’s possible for a best-of-league goalkeeper to go directly from MLS Next Pro to MLS.
Let’s explore.
