A world of pure imagination: Guessing the next Austin FC sporting director and head coach candidates

Willy Wonka sang of a world of pure imagination in various movie versions of the eccentric chocolate entrepreneur running a candy factory I'd be wary of sending my child to, though the song itself positively talks about manifesting wishes, hoping to transform what matters to you for the better.

That's where Austin FC fans find themselves in the days following the dismissal of sporting director Rodolfo Borrell and head coach Nico Estévez. While the immediate matter at hand is Saturday's match at St. Louis City SC, as interim head coach Davy Arnaud and All-Star contender Brad Stuver discussed in a Thursday media availability, they're also thinking about who might be the successors to spin a new vision for the club, and have brought in Excel Sports Management to help (though we're pretty sure the club has designs on who it wants already).

We're thinking about it as well, so let's discuss five candidates for each position and get you excited and dash your hopes but lift them up again.

You may wonder why we are focusing on candidates for both roles with significant MLS experience. Why not Big Ange? Where's shooting for the heights of European coaching excellence? In the previous coaching search, MLS experience was cited as a major priority for the club, and we don't think that has changed in terms of their big priorities. It could be that we miss big on that front in both roles, but MLS has become such a particular sort of bubble that we feel confident in ownership focusing on looking inside of it for well-seasoned veterans, with track records and actual silverware brought to trophy cabinets.

It could still be wishcasting, but we are confident that all the listed names are within Verde's ambitions and actual reach. Austin FC is still a desirable destination, and should those candidates become hires — and a source told us one sporting director and two coaches are under consideration already — we'll be quick to remind everyone that we had source-augmented hunches. But which ones are they? Perhaps the next Emergency Podcast will hold some clues!

Sporting director

Tim Bezbatchenko, Corey Wray and/or Jaime McMillan

Phil: So this perhaps had its origin in a video still shared among Austin FC fans, in what turned out to be a MLS-hosted Virtual International Player Workshop. In that, Ilie Sánchez shared on Instagram (and then deleted) that he was peeking in on a fireside chat with Wilfried Nancy and former Crew VP of Soccer Administration Jaime McMillan. McMillan, in addition to being instrumental in DP signings — the good ones — while with Toronto before coming over the Crew, just so happens to be married to Corey Wray, who was high up with Tim Bezbatchenko at both Toronto and Columbus, before taking the St. Louis City SC sporting director job to succeed Lutz Pfannenstiel.

Bezbatchenko's currently with a Bournemouth-affiliated project called Black Knight Football, and even if he doesn't want to come back stateside to bring the band together, perhaps Wray and McMillan would want to reunite with Nancy in a city that's, let's be honest, a more desirable city than St. Louis. There's also the bonus, for those who still hold a grudge against Crew fans, of taking the architects of two MLS Cup wins and making them Verde.

Moisés: This is the choice that says "give Nancy who he wants," but they could pair just as well with, say, a Jim Curtin. In an org that saw massive sporting department turnover under Rodo (from the first team down to the Academy), bringing over a staff leadership that is already a well-oiled machine makes all the sense in the world as they work rapidly to realign operations. They will have to do all of that while they also figure out how to work with a majority of their first team being on longer-term contracts that may be difficult to do anything with until the 2026 post-season.

I see Austin wanting a coach who is comfortable with a "team of not-rivals" (to counter the Abraham Lincoln strategy) situation following Rodo, where the previous sporting director's experience was primarily in coaching and not sporting operations. Even if Bezbatchenko is not in the cards, the search firm bringing in McMillan in the staffing and operations VP role, and Wray more on the technical side doing what he's doing now (but in Austin) signals a team who values and respects proven performance between an ideal coach candidate and the people making sure the entire tree stays healthy, from roots to canopy.

(Note: Within 90 minutes of this publishing, the Crew announced that it has hired Bezbatchenko to be its new sporting director. Told you it was a good idea!)

Garth Lagerwey

Moisés: I don't think there is a more respected name on this list than Garth Lagerwey, executive-wise. If the goal is MLS experience and relationships working with and being part of this league, with an eye on building for the future in a sustainable way, you could not do better. I think that overwhelmingly in this search, this front office values and is focused on proven MLS relationships and experience in the trenches alongside actual results, which Lagerwey has across working at multiple clubs. He's something of a theoretically perfect connector to a variety of solid coaches.

I don't see anyone on the coaching list below I think he'd be an ill fit working alongside, and they all know and respect him. What has he not gotten a chance to do yet in MLS? Something shaped like the potential of Austin, if you ask me. The Salt Lake, Seattle, and Atlanta metros all have other pro sports franchises outside of soccer. It would be incredible to see a former Dallas Burn player (who left on waivers!) properly build Austin into a siege engine ready for all comers in the 100-year war. There's something I like spiritually about the idea of a former goalkeeper joining a club that has become so defined by its goalkeeper during it first decade thus far.

Phil: Lagerwey's also got a fantastic personality, as former Striker writer J. Sam Jones was able to attest from Lagerwey's time with the Five Stripes, and would provide a culture-shift 180 for a club that — the more we're learning — is hungry for one. My one concern is that he recently battled cancer, putting his status with Atlanta in limbo while he dug in for the fight, and then that club announced in December that he wouldn't be returning. He's still just 53, but given what he's gone through, is reviving Verde the answer to the "What do I want to do with the rest of my life?" existential question I imagine him asking himself?

Neil McGuinness

Phil: After 5 1/2 years with the Crew (including during the Nancy years), plus three years with the Qatar Football Association before that (!!), Neil McGuinness went to LAFC, where he's been John Thorrington's No. 2 in that club's continued run of success. While I have questions about the Black & Gold Empire of late — I assume it was in the Griezmann sweepstakes and don't know how they got beat out by effing Orlando — they still do MLS roster rules better than any other franchise. Getting someone into Austin who was instrumental to such a successful organization — we know, for instance, how jealous Borrell was of all the GAM they cultivated — just makes sense.

Moisés: McGuinness represents hardware and consistent results. He has been part of sporting operations that reflect a proven track record within MLS and has otherwise shown that those trophies were not flukes. He's the perfect connecting piece for a Nancy hire, but ought to work well with any of the top names on the list of potential coaches. He's got the scouting and recruitment track record and has gotta be eager to climb from Technical Director at LAFC to his first Sporting Director post. He's consulted for top flight teams across Europe and Mexico and has a built-out international reach. My No. 2 pick behind Lagerwey.

Chance Myers

Phil: He is the Nashville SC No. 2, and Nashville did bring in Cristian Espinoza in the offseason, which is quite the feat, but also, this is his LinkedIn profile, which a photo that screams "drunk bridesmaid snapped this with one of the disposable cameras strategically placed at the reception dinner table." He's 38, but also building something great in Music City and would have a chance to build longevity in Austin and get along famously with Anthony Precourt and Andy Loughnane.

Moisés: The question for me is what additional freedom Myers could want for that he would be getting at Austin. Things are going well for him at Nashville, so how ambitious is he and how eager is he to leave a project he is part of that is on a heater and then some.

Oscar Pareja (in a dual SD/HC role)

Moisés: I just don't see running the clock back (in MLS terms) to two roles for one person. Austin can be intentionally vague about how they word press releases and talk about the business side, but I think I take them at face value in wanting separate troves of experience for separate roles. Is there a sporting director he might pair well with? Sure, but he is going to want some heavy say and involvement on that side of things, and that may conflict with some of the MLS vets we project Austin to want to target on that side of things.

Phil: I don't see this either, and I don't necessarily see him pairing with a sporting director. He's got an impressive resume with some MLS success (though he doesn't even have a LinkedIn profile), but I also don't think this fan base is ready for another former FC Dallas coach given the current vibes. (Though he clearly knows how to get the best out of Facundo Torres! Or, at least, better than we're seeing now!)

Note that we did not suggest Peter Vermes in a dual SD/HC role.

Head coach

Wilfried Nancy

Moisés: With a change in sporting director, Phil's fondest wish can finally come true! There's some expectation that Nancy may be reluctant to move right back to the States, but the right fit in a league he knows well is a great way to get back on the horse after what happened with Celtic. Despite that bruising eight-game run, and unlike how he may be viewed in Europe, I still think he's one of the best coaching minds in world football, not just MLS.

The unintentionally leaked photo of his participation in an International Players webinar for MLS just makes for good luck in his having recently watched Austin's team captain in action off the pitch, alongside former players who love the club (Gyasi Zardes and Felipe Martins). Nancy has been known to clash with sporting departments and ownership groups when he does not feel supported, so I'm confident that to land him would require a truly harmonic match of sporting director. He'd be worth it. If Austin has been quietly working on coaching and sporting director contingency plans since the Open Cup bounce out, expect that they would have been carefully and meaningfully courting him as one of any top three names on their list.

Phil: To boil it down to two words: Yes, please. As I said on our most recent Emergency Podcast, I think he's the one coach who could take this current Chopped basket of a roster and turn into something delicious — say, a 5-2-3 in which Joseph Rosales is finally flourishing as a left wingback and Facundo Torres is finally scoring goals, plural.

He's woefully behind on maintaining his LinkedIn profile, though. If he added Austin to it, I'd be over the moon.

Vanni Sartini

Moisés: I don't think there's a chance in hell that Vanni Sartini is especially eager to coach in this state at this time, politics-wise, but he is eager to come back to MLS, according to various sources. Would an avowed European Socialist fit in at a club that welcomes Greg Abbott as an honored guest? The fanbase would love him, and he had a solid track record at Vancouver. He's an ultras-conversant guy on par with Estévez before him, even wearing SG-created merch on the sidelines at games.

But is the post-Vanni run of form for Vancouver a result of what he built finally fully maturing, or showing that he held them back just enough to keep them from greatness?

Phil: In addition to loving his personality and his willingness to share with media — with the Whitecaps, he once hosted a preseason lunch with reporters where he walked through his tactical insights for the coming season with them — I love that his background is in methodology. Estévez is certainly a student of the game, but I believe that Sartini's on a whole different level.

Plus, I imagine every press conference being a joy to cover.

Jim Curtin

Moisés: What Tom Bogert said about Jim Curtin a while back was that he was in serious contention for New England, but that family reasons would keep him out of coaching "through 2026." My question is whether those family reasons meant calendar 2026 or school year 2025-26. He wants back into coaching in MLS and has long been the top name on every list of who teams want to fill their coaching vacancies.

He's big on player development, and very serious about pushing American soccer forward. He'd be a dream hire. What can Austin offer him to make this project more enticing than his pick of others across MLS? Meaningful input on a sporting director selection that he is as comfortable with symbiotically as they are with him would go a long way, and this "hard reset" point for Austin allows for that. Him or Nancy as the coach hire means that Austin and Excel are, indeed, cooking on the sporting director front.

Phil: The fact that he spent almost a decade at Philly and has consistently good teams during that time speaks to his solidity and his ability to create lasting culture. He's also great with media and seems great with players. Going from Josh Wolff to Nico Estévez did underscore that being bilingual helps, but that's also something that a well-placed assistant can help. I'd be delighted with a Curtin hire.

He did stop a conversation with the Revolution to be its new head coach when they were looking to move on from Caleb Porter, but you'd probably do the same. (The Revs' job becomes truly desirable with a new stadium, which happens in 2027 at the earliest. The Verde job is desirable now.)

Gio Savarese

Phil: Prior to 2023, it's a great resume for Austin: Venezuelan player with a long journeyman career giving him lots of perspective on coaching, more than five years with the legendary (though not quite what they once were) New York Cosmos, and then five and a half years with the Timbers, taking them to two MLS Cup finals (though losing both of them).

After 2023, though? He's been an Apple TV analyst talking about MLS rather than coaching in it.

Moisés: He's been out of coaching for a while, which could be for any number of reasons including that the longer a coach sits on the shelf, the harder it is for them to be seen as an exciting hire. Austin doesn't need a hire that is perceived as "splashy" so much as that can be seen by players, staff, and fans as people who can work together.

Gonzalo Pineda

Moisés: Pineda would be a great departure from the Berhalter coaching tree that many hardcore fans and watchers of Austin want to get as far away from as possible. His work learning under Brian Schmetzer and I guess you could say that the style of football he coached at Atlanta and Atlas would bode well for delivering the "absolute scenes" style of play that Austin fans have hungered for, provided he has the right roster to work with.

Phil: On the positive side, he's a former Mexican player with time spent in both Liga MX and MLS, transitioning from player to assistant coach with the Sounders, which is arguably the best club for absorbing winning soccer culture in MLS. On the negative side, he had a less than optimal tenure with Atlanta United (with a Wolffian 1.32 points per game) and an even more dismal 24 matches with Atlas ending last August (at a sub-Wolffian 0.92 points per game).

Yes, a departure, and I could be talked into the logic for such a hire, but the head coaching track record might be hard to sell fans on.

Verde All Day is a reader-supported online publication covering Austin FC. Additional support is provided by Austin Telco Federal Credit Union. For more coverage, check out Emergency Podcast! (an Austin FC Podcast) wherever you get your podcasts.