The Thursday Three: What we learned about Nico Estévez's All-Star picks, a sneaky night of MLS play, and the Austin FC roster

While Austin FC news on Wednesday was dominated by the MLS All-Star roster selection – finally giving Brad Stuver his due and returning Brandon Vázquez to the All-Star ranks after he backed in three years ago — it also coincided with the long-awaited first 2025 edition of MLS Christmas.

MLS Christmas is, of course, the MLS Players Association Salary Guide release, in which we learn the information about player salaries that we don't get from MLS front offices. For nerds like us (and perhaps like you — that's a compliment), it gives us perspective on a given team's current roster build (and how the sporting director is constructing the team), and which players might be able to fit (or not fit) in future transfer windows.

Estévez will start Messi

Austin FC head coach Nico Estévez went on MLS Countdown on Wednesday evening to talk about the 12 players he selected and the entire 26-man roster. Among the most salient points he made in the short interview:

• His first two picks were his players. "The exercise that we did as staff is we start[ed by] picking players that are doing really well this year, and then we stopped when we had 40 ... I'm gonna take my guys, Brandon and Brad, because I know them and how hard they work ... but obviously I'm going to be the bad guy, because there are a lot of players that haven't been selected that should be also here. Sorry about that, to be a coach, but a lot of players deserve to be in this roster."
• He acknowledges the roster is attacking-heavy. "There are a lot of good attackers that can make the fans enjoy, and everyone that is watching the game enjoy, and even the players playing with each other, enjoying a little bit the game against a good opponent."
• He's not going to not start Lionel Messi, even coming off a heavy stretch of matches including the Club World Cup knockout phase. "I don't think there's a coach in the world that would put Messi on the bench. I think he will play, and then when he's tired, he will get out." Where in the formation he'll slot in, or what formation Estévez deploys, will be an intriguing question for those intrigued by the All-Star Game.

Personally, I'm waiting for a bit of pundit and other teams' fan fallout over Vázquez's selection; after all, seven of the 10 leading goalscorers in the league heading into Wednesday's matches, including Kévin Denkey, Dejan Joveljić, and Sam Surridge (more on him in a second), were passed over in voting and selection. Also personally, I'm hopeful that he scores enough goals between now and the actual All-Star Game to where Vázquez is among the upper echelon of goal scorers right now.

About last night

Wednesday brought a slate of Club World Cup games, including Inter Milan's win over River Plate, in which we learned that former Austin FC designated player Sebastián Driussi's new teammates are a bunch of jerks, but it also brought significant MLS action.

Surridge got a hat trick in Nashville's win over New England to get up to 15 goals in league play, moving into the Golden Boot lead and likely putting himself in contention to be an All-Star replacement should a starting forward be injured.

More germane to Austin, though, is San Diego beating Vancouver 5-3 at BC Place to move into the Western Conference lead on the goals scored tiebreaker. One-time Austin FC trialist Milan Iloski scored four goals in the goalfest to bring his season total to nine; between his performance and Sebastian Berhalter's All-Star selection (remember, Berhalter was loaned to Verde in 2021), it was a bad night for hindsight. Was former Austin FC sporting director Claudio Reyna a genius to bring them both in or a fool to let them loose? Let the debate begin! (Or not.)

We have some more numbers

We learned what new Austin FC players are making on Wednesday, and how they fit into the overall roster budget, thanks to MLS Christmas. Highlights included:

• Midfielder Besard Šabović, currently on the cusp between regular and rotational starter, is making $550,000;
• Fullback Mikkel Desler, back from an injury taking him out for a difficult stretch of the season, remains on the $550,000 he was on last year;
• Robert Taylor, brought in to bolster Austin's midfield but whose role has been limited so far due to injury and acclimation, is on $575,000;
• Ilie Sánchez, who started the season as team captain but has failed to crack the starting lineup in recent matches, is making $600,000, down considerably from the $1,267,875 he was making at LAFC last season.

While none of these players are at the TAM threshold of $743,750 — only Julio Cascante is at present — they're all a salary tier up from Guilherme Biro ($275,000) and Brendan Hines-Ike ($325,000). Just keep this all in mind, if not when summer transfers are announced, when the roster gets its inevitable end-of-season shuffle.

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