Sporting KC loses Latif Blessing in 2017 MLS Expansion Draft

The 2017 MLS Expansion Draft is completed and Sporting KC is one team that lost something. Young forward Latif Blessing was claimed in by LAFC in the draft.

It was highly unlikely that the 2017 US Open Cup winning Sporting KC squad wouldn’t lose anyone in the 2017 MLS Expansion Draft. New MLS team Los Angeles FC added five players in the expansion draft, including SKC’s Latif Blessing. Losing the young forward will be a tough blow to Kansas City.

Latif Blessing emerged for Sporting KC last year, especially in US Open Cup play where he scored three goals. Blessing was considered a player with a ton of potential for SKC to build around along with some other young talent. His athletic talent is an incredible asset for any team to have.

It was a smart decision for LAFC, especially since Latif Blessing recently got his green card. That means the talented youngster will not occupy a highly valuable international roster spot. All in all, this could end up being one of the best moves the new MLS club makes in their initial offseason.

Tough Roster Decisions

Sporting KC had to know that they were going to lose one of their young and talented players. The club had the option to protect certain players from the expansion draft. For the most part, Sporting chose to use those protections on their veterans. That makes a lot of sense for an organization with so much success from that veteran corps, but it still hurts to lose talented youngsters.

Losing Latif Blessing is definitely a blow to the future of the organization, but it can be overcome. Other youngsters like Colton Storm, Diego Rubio, and Seth Sinovic may have been harder to replace for the club. So this is not a dire circumstances scenario.

Kansas City would have also had difficulty in replacing a lot of the veteran talent that would have had to be unprotected in order to keep Latif Blessing. There is no doubt that any of the protected players would have been claimed if Sporting allowed it. That is the struggle the SKC front office was presented with in this decision.

Offense Remains The Question

The biggest concern coming out of this for Sporting KC is that the offense remains a question mark for the team. Latif Blessing wasn’t yet a major presence for Sporting, but he had emerged as a dynamic striker that defenses were struggling to account for. Losing his speed on offense is going to be one less weapon.

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Sporting saw a late season emergence in their young strikers this past season. After trading away Dom Dwyer, there were a lot of questions about how SKC would put points on the board. The answer came from a combination of Gerso Fernandes, Daniel Salloi, Diego Rubio, and Latif Blessing.

Not having a developing Latif Blessing to look to in the future is one less piece to that puzzle. Sporting KC will have to find another young talent to fill in that role. That won’t be easy for them to find, but that’s life in professional sports. Hopefully the SKC front office already has their eyes on another talented youngster that can score.

Sporting KC is going to have some big expectations for the 2018 season. SKC is coming off of a US Open Cup in 2017, but took an early exit in the playoffs. This is a team that should be very hungry this upcoming season. They’ll need to overcome the loss of Latif Blessing, but the talent is there. It’s time to get back to the MLS Championship.