One of the interesting things about this draft was how prepared just about every NWSL team seemed to be. This draft being deep with talent likely helped, but despite tons of offseason turnover (from coaches to club ownership) teams seemed to draft players who will be specific and fun fits.

It sounds obvious, but this isn’t always the case, especially with selections outside of the first round. In fact this draft still had some curious decisions, like Vlatko and Kansas City drafting two goalkeepers, but overall I’m hype about lots of player/team combinations.

chicago red stars + leilanni nesbeth + bea franklin

One of the very first things Nesbeth said as a Red Star is that she’s “just gotta be an animal” on the pitch. Chicago followed her selection by adding Bea Franklin, a 5’10 midfielder who dropped nine goals and nine assists for Arkansas in 2023 and decided she was bored so is now a member of their 14-5 basketball team.

Lorne Donaldson coached Jamaica to one of the best defensive records in the entire World Cup. They faced Panama, France, Brazil and Colombia and only conceded one goal. One! AN GOAL! (And this is what it took.) Nesbeth plus Franklin is a vicious foundation.

And behind them will be NWSL vet Sam Staab who taught herself how to backflip simply because her dad said she couldn’t. The Red Stars conceded a silly amount of goals last season, but months ahead of the 2024 season it already looks like they’re going to be extremely not fun at all to play against.

orlando pride + ally lemos + cori dyke

The Pride are building a fun team. They have a well-balanced center back pairing, solid outside backs, a very good and very hungry young center forward, and 400 Brazilian players, including Marta and the biggest 2023 MVP snub, Adriana. They just need to get their midfield right.

Ally Lemos is only 19, but she’s been a regular starter at powerhouse UCLA since she arrived in 2022. She dropped nine assists as a freshman but sat a bit deeper and only notched two in 2023. That’s not necessarily a bad thing, it shows she can handle multiple roles – something the Pride need.

Cori Dyke is another midfield pick who showed range in college. She was a mainstay in midfield for each of her four years but slotted in central defense her final season. Both Lemos and Dyke have really good delivery from corners and free kicks as well.

Basically, my hype about them is that if they come good in the pros, one or both could be the solution to Orlando’s midfield problems. The Pride now have Abello, Listro, Luana, Angelina and Morgan Gautrat, plus now pro-ready talents in Lemos and Dyke. There absolutely must be some combination of those players that’ll give them what they need to let Marta, Adriana, and Messiah Bright cook relentlessly.

seattle reign + sam meza

Seattle brought the queen back but lost Rose Lavelle and Emily Sonnett in free agency. A real ‘I’ve won but at what cost’ moment. Laura Harvey and her fire ass jacket needed to reinsert a measure of creativity in her midfield, and Sam Meza is a very good start.

Meza is a smooth, dynamic player who sees the pitch well and never stops moving. She loves an outside of the box shot, which naturally brings her game closer to my heart. She’s not in love with distance strikes though, she’s just as comfortable hitting 1-2s and passing and moving through tight spaces, especially in the box.

This was such a deep draft that she somehow dropped into the second round, but don’t get it twisted, Meza is very much a first round talent.

(As with most soccer highlight reels for some reason, remember to watch on mute.)

gotham + maycee bell

Alright dammit. Yael is too good at this. I need them to up the difficulty. A cheat code ain’t supposed to apply to a day job, let alone general manager. I’m calling the police.

Anyway, Maycee Bell is a hell of a prospect, and given that defensive stalwart Ali Krieger just retired, this is all just too perfect. Bell is a nimble and athletic 5’11 center back who’s comfortable enough on the ball to have also featured as a right back.

A staple of Juan Carlos Amorós’ system has been positional fluidity, often within the same sequence. Somehow Gotham managed to get the most versatile center back in the draft with their one, lone pick. It’s sick I tell you.

But also Gotham were fun as hell last season and somehow upgraded. It’s tough to meld personalities, especially that of stars, but there’s real potential for this to be one of the most fun teams in the world. And that is not hyperbole.

angel city + felicia knox

HI FELICIA. Sorry, had to. Anyway. This one is fun because I have no idea what will happen. Knox’s two most recent college seasons were extremely different. Like, down three goals and fourteen (14!) assists different.

This could be read one of two ways. Either once the talent around her dropped defenses could focus on not letting her pull the same strings, or her gigantic year is an outlier and more representative of those teammates a year ago cookin.

Reyna Reyes has been dope with Portland, but Riley Parker, who scored seventeen goals and dropped seven assists that same season has yet to show a similar promise in the professional realm. Though her ballin with Panama will always delight me, the same can be said of Riley Tanner’s pro career so far too. (It still makes me so weak that the team’s nickname for her is ‘Frozen’.)

Basically, I have no idea what to expect from Knox. The good news for her is that Angel City have an all-star attacking squad plus attack-minded fullbacks. All of this should place her in a familiar position, except this time she’ll be up against professional caliber midfields and defenses.

If 2022’s seven goal, twenty (20!) assist Knox is the one heading to Los Angeles, Angel City will have stolen the exact player they need with a third round pick.

north carolina courage + ashley sanchez

So, yes obvs and of course Sanchez was not a draft pick. But rumors of her heading to North Carolina circulated before the draft and by the time the Spirit were on the clock with the 5th overall pick, it was official¹ .

However, assuming she either has made, or will make, enough peace to be excited about it, it’s an extremely good destination. What I hated most about Sanchez’s 2023 is that a lot of things were done to her by people with authority, bad ideas, and worse communication. Despite her making common appearances and even starting, Vlatko somehow managed to play her zero minutes in her first ever World Cup. This was also in the midst of Mark Krikorian’s dicey squad building leaving her with the sole burden of creativity in midfield.

With the style of play and squad Sean Nahas has built, those worries won’t exist in Cary. North Carolina played some of the most fun and attractive soccer in the league in 2023. They moved the ball quickly but remained patient and used off ball movement to start and finish sequences.

The key was the space they could create and then exploit, which is a perfect environment for Sanchez. Sanchez has seemingly been around for a while, but she’s still only 24 and entered the league as a left winger. Nahas’ system creates space and ways for the ball and a dangerous player to arrive in the same place at the same time. The more space Sanchez has, the less predictable she is. In Nahas’ system she’ll be a full on Loki variant.

¹We saw yet another argument for abolishing the draft as we know it. Since the order is weighted, picks – inanimate things – hold an inordinate amount of value, which becomes further incentive to treat existing players as commodities in exchange. This was the case with Sanchez, who stated she was ‘shocked’ to have to leave Washington. If incoming college players could negotiate with teams rather than be plucked by whoever is up in the draft order, the Spirit might have been incentivized to communicate with Sanchez and Bethune equally.