Year in review: Sebastien Le Toux

Sébastien Le Toux

Forward/Midfielder

2013 Stats – 3 Goals, 12 Assists (team leader), 34 shots, 13 shots on goal, no yellow or red cards in 2222 Minutes played, also appeared in 32 games starting 25 of them.

Salary - $200,000 Base Salary / $212,812.50 Guaranteed compensation

Review of 2013 Performance – The Union’s biggest name in its first two seasons, Le Toux’s return to PPL Park was greeted with much fanfare by the Philly faithful. However, what caught many off guard was the decision to deploy Le Toux to the midfield rather than up top. But for a good chunk of the season Le Toux was actually an assist machine, leading the league for a nice stretch of it. He fell one assist short of MLS assist leader Portland’s Diego Valeri. Now I’ve heard some people argue that Le Toux was benefited by free kicks and easy goals by McInerney and Casey, however, an assist is an assist no matter how you get it. While he trailed off in the latter half the season its arguable that the entire team also did and to solely blame Le Toux for his lack of performance is ignoring the entirety of the work he put in throughout the season. Also to his credit Le Toux handled the change of position very professionally and never publicly complained about being moved from his preferred striker position.

Expectations for 2014 – Assuming that they keep him in the midfield, Le Toux should continue to accumulate assists though it’s probably unreasonable to expect him to be in the leaders of the league. However, Le Toux does need to continue to be a leader on the team due to the fact that his salary ranks him as the 4th highest paid player on the team behind Kleberson, Jeff Parke, and Roger Torres. A player making that kind of money needs to be one of the guys who steps up during the big games and helps his team win.