Performance Evaluations: Midfielders

There's depth, but is there MLS Cup-caliber talent?

Atlanta United players are set to report for preseason on Saturday after a long offseason of like two weeks. Before they arrive, I wanted to take a look at the current roster and answer two questions: How did their 2024 go and what could their 2025 look like?

We already talked about the forwards, so we’re onto midfielders. We’ll keep rolling throughout the week or until something more interesting happens.

Alexey Miranchuk | End of 2025 season age: 30 | 2024 g+/96: 0.03 in 852 minutes, eight starts | Probable cap hit: Designated Player | Contract length: 2027, Option for 2028

Hmmm…well, that’s not quite…it’s kind of………..

Hey, so you know how the 2023 summer signings came in and set the world on fire for a few months then ran face-first into a wall Wile E. Coyote style in 2024? Maybe this will be the opposite of that?

The bottom line is that Miranchuk didn’t impact games the way you’d hope a $12 million signing would impact games. He didn’t play poorly, he didn’t make the team worse, he just didn’t provide the elite production you’d expect from one of the league’s sixth-most expensive signings ever.

[checking]

Oh…oh no.

Ok, look, Miranchuk clearly has a lot of good traits. He has a good understanding of space, he doesn’t demand a million touches each game, his ability to generate precise interplay around the top of the box is maybe a little too good for MLS, and he produced a respectable three goals and four assists over his first 13 MLS starts. That includes three assists in the playoffs.

On the flip side of that, he tends to fade a little too deep into the background and he offers absolutely nothing defensively. I mean…nothing. Eye test, numbers, vibes, you name it. We aren’t talking about Lucho Acosta here. We aren’t even talking about Thiago Almada.

Among attacking midfielders who played 800 minutes last season, Miranchuk finished dead last in “Interrupting”, the defensive aspect of ASA’s goals added metric. Almada finished fourth.

He is a piano player who won’t even lift a finger to help you move the piano. And so far in Atlanta, he’s been a proficient but far from virtuosic pianist. That’s concerning!

There’s reason to believe that might change in 2025 though. First and foremost, Ronny Deila’s possession-based tactics are going to benefit Miranchuk in a way Rob Valentino’s counter-attacking setup didn’t. He’ll also benefit from being in a team with other high-level attackers around him. A DP No. 9 and a DP winger should go a long way toward taking the defensive focus off of Miranchuk and allow him more freedom and opportunities to create. Teams were locked in on Miranchuk last year because other threats were limited.

We still don’t have any real idea what his ceiling looks like in MLS. I do still think there’s a decent chance the team is better in attack with a No. 10 like Miranchuk that isn’t as ball-dominant as a player like Thiago Almada. But he isn’t the kind of all-around player I thought Atlanta would benefit from. For him to live up to his price tag, he’ll need to be Atlanta’s answer to Maxi Moralez, the NYCFC No. 10 who helped guide them to an MLS Cup under Deila. A chart more like this is the hope.

Jay Fortune | End of 2025 season age: 22 | 2024 g+/96: -0.03 in 1525 | Probable cap hit: Nothing, he’s a homegrown | Contract length: 2025, Option for 2026

It’s important to remember that