‘More horsepower’: Sporting KC to spend big over next few seasons

KANSAS CITY, Kan. — Sporting Kansas City is looking to change its losing ways, and sweeping front office moves are part of how they hope to do it.

But an infusion of money always helps and that’s what the club is hoping helps them rise from the bottom of the Western Conference over the past few seasons.

Before the introduction of new sporting director Mike Burns, head coach Peter Vermes gave some significant news after his discussions with the SKC ownership group about the club’s future.

“We’ve been a team that hasn’t been a big budget team over the years. You know, we haven’t spent a tremendous amount of money,” he said on Tuesday. “And sometimes I think maybe myself, the rest of the staff, we’ve been a victim of our own success because we’ve, over the years, have done a lot with a little.

“The owners have committed over the next four years to giving us the largest budget that we’ve ever had in our history. I don’t want to go into those dollar amounts, but I will say that it’s also got flexibility to it as well.”

Vermes said the sudden infusion of cash has to do with the team’s lackluster position in the standings and reminisced on a previous instance where he had a player ready to join the club but couldn’t get approval from ownership.

“We were in first place and it was this time of year,” Vermes said. “I had a guy that I wanted to get in, had worked out the deal. I just got it done. We’re on the road, I just get it done with them meaning everything’s agreed to, get all the terms, everything great.

“I call [ownership] say ‘hey, I’m ready to move on this. This is ready to go. I need your confirmation,’ and little hesitation. I’m like what’s up? [Ownership is] like, ‘We’re kind of figuring why would we do this, we’re in first place.’

“If you don’t think just for yourself, and you know, I mean like me, I can understand why that could be the situation, but the league has changed really quickly. And it’s changing quickly all the time. And there’s other things that are coming down the pipe that are going to change it even more.”

Since SKC won its last trophy, the 2017 Lamar Hunt U.S. Open Cup, they have always hovered in the middle of the MLS spending charts but rose towards the top of the league in some years.

Expansion clubs like Inter Miami, FC Cincinnati, and Austin FC have come into the league since then and contended for trophies quickly in their first few years of existence.

Sometimes spending results in wins and sometimes it doesn’t.

• 2017 – 16th in MLS spending: $6.7 million (guaranteed compensation), finished 5th in Western Conference (out in first round of MLS Cup Playoffs/won Open Cup)
• 2018 – 12th: $9.2 million, finished 1st in WC, semifinals of playoffs/quarterfinals of Open Cup
• 2019 – 5th: $13 million , finished 11th in WC, no playoffs/4th round of Open Cup/semifinals of CONCACAF Champions League
• 2020 – 9th: $13.7 million , 1st in WC, quarterfinals of playoffs/canceled Open Cup/quarterfinals of MLS is Back tournament
• 2021 – 8th: $14.13 million , 3rd in WC/semifinals of playoffs/canceled Open Cup
• 2022 – 14th: $13.63 million , 12th in WC/no playoffs/semis of Open Cup
• 2023 – 13th: $15.5 million , 8th in WC/semis of playoffs/4th round of Open Cup

This season, Sporting KC is 18th in spending at $15.9 million, next to last in the WC at 13th, and set to face FC Dallas in the quarterfinals of the Open Cup next Wednesday, July 10 at home.

Some of SKC’s highest-paid players, like forward Alan Pulido (makes $3.6 million this season) and winger Dániel Sallói ($1.3 million), have failed to produce at their highest level this season as they haven’t surpassed five goal contributions. Sallói is currently out with an ankle injury.

But the additional funds coming in will also be spread through the technical staff as well.

“We need more horsepower,” Vermes said.

“We got to improve our analytics department. We’ll need other people within on the director side, we’ll need more people in there as well. And scouts too as well.”

“Some people have a more robust analytics department than others,” Burns said. “I look at analytics as certainly a useful tool without question, and it’s something that we have to look at here. Whether it’s sports science or analytics and expanding those or scouting, it’s certainly something that I feel like we have to have. It’s an important tool, but I’m not there yet that it’s the ultimate decision maker.”

Burns’s arrival comes at a midway point during the season in a position where he will be tasked with building the roster and overseeing SKC’s development through their academy and MLS Next Pro team SKC II.

Vermes was technical director from 2006-2018 and sporting director since 2019 while also being head coach since August 2009. SKC’s failed hiring of Gavin Wilkinson in January kept Vermes in his role into the season.

Vermes is glad to hand the roster-building part of his job to Burns. Burns will report directly to Vermes but both described it as a partnership where input will be accepted from each other and others including SKC’s ownership.

“It’s not as if somebody’s now coming in and going to you know, they’re going to tell me the ins and outs of this club. It’s impossible,” Vermes said. “For 18 years, I’ve been a part of building three facilities. It’s not about that. It’s about us all collaborating and working together. But he has a tremendous amount of responsibility because he’s going to do all the things that a sporting director does, which is which is great. And I’ll continue to coach the team and also be a part of the vision of this club.”

“I’ve had lots of conversations with Peter and it will truly be a collaboration and it’s the same way that I operated in my previous role, even for people that report in to me,” Burns said.

Vermes was adamant that the sporting director must have a relationship with the ownership group of the Patterson Family, the Illig Family, Greg Maday, Pat Curran, Robb Heineman, and Patrick Mahomes.

“The person that’s brought in needs to have a relationship with ownership,” he said. “If it’s someone I like and I think it’s the right person, they may not agree or maybe they just don’t have that relationship and they don’t feel that they’re a part of that decision. Then when that person needs to go and talk to them, maybe they don’t have the same kind of conversations they would if it was a person that they felt really comfortable with and they were a part of the hiring process. And so everybody is in agreement with that. [Burns] was always a part of that initial process as we went forward. And so it’s taken a long time, but we know we’ve gotten to this place and I think everybody’s really excited about it.”

Burns previously was on the technical staff of the New England Revolution from 2005-2019 for almost eight years and was on technical staff from 2005-2019. He was promoted to Vice President of Player Personnel in 2008 and to General Manager in 2011 and helped the club win four Eastern Conference championships and an Open Cup in 2007.

He has spent the last two years as a consultant for MLS working on projects with Next Pro teams and some first teams.

“It was great, got me back it back involved working on some different projects,” Burns said. “It was helpful to keep me involved and abreast of the changes that were occurring, it was fantastic for me.”

The next transfer window opens on July 18 and there have been reports of players linked to Sporting but Burns said that they will try to add a player once the window opens.

“We don’t have a ton of flexibility from a roster and budget standpoint, but we still have the ability to add a player which we will try to do this summer,” he said. “I’ve got three days of institutional knowledge, right. For me, it’s evaluating everything, it’s getting to know the staff, it’s getting to know the players right and so they can get a feel for me, I can get a feel for them.

“The academy just finished so I won’t have as much time certainly to spend with them. But you know, certainly the second team and the first team I want to spend as much time as possible to get to know everyone.”

The plan is in place for the future of SKC.

As far as the 2024 season, the double blue have 13 MLS matches to get into playoff positioning as they sit 11 points behind that ninth spot.

They also have the Open Cup that they can continue their run in and Leagues Cup play begins on July 28 at home against Chicago Fire FC.

Sporting continues MLS play on Thursday where they face the Colorado Rapids on the road at 8:30 p.m.

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