Case Study: Angel City FC

As many of you know, the NWSL is expecting the new expansion team of Angel City FC. They turned heads with not only great branding, tone, and message, but also from their ownership group that includes the likes of Natalie Portman and Abby Wombach. Lots of eyes will be on them when they take part the their expansion draft for 2022. So, I thought I’d try to help them out and give it a go, based on my analysis.


So the challenge is:

- Pick up to 18 players that would be unprotected (based on this past expansion draft)
- Pick no more than 2 USSF players, 1 per team
- Pick no more than 2 players per team


Things to keep in mind:

- 22 total roster spots
- 4 picks in the College Draft
- 4 International spots available
- Salary Cap is $650,000, plus $300,000 in allocation money
- Minimum Salary is $20,000
- Maximum Salary is $50,000



Now, I’ve analyzed all of the NWSL over the past two years (2018 and 2019). For the sake of space and interest, I decided to only show the top players that would be available to pick.

Again, my analysis is based on lots of metrics (45, to be exact) and can be summarized in this article. For the record, I’m not as well versed as I’d like to be with the players I am analyzing. I made sure to include notes to highlight any weirdness in the data, although I may have missed one or two weird cases. Also, I know some players on this list are now retired.

So, based on SOLELY on the analysis above, I’d look to choose the following players with the following salaries:

- Katie Stengel: $45k
- Rachel Hill: $40k
- Megan Rapinoe: USSF
- Desiree Scott: $35k
- Christine Nairn: $40k
- Caprice Dydasco: $45k
- Erica Skroski: $40k
- Adrianna Franch: USSF


Total Cap Hit: $210,000
Remaining Cap: $440,000



The other players to fill out the squad, I believe, would be a matter of preference. The four college spots would also help find talent and be on lower salaries. Also because there’s allocation money, maybe they could look abroad to find a top quality goalscorer? A Vivianne Miedema immediately comes to mind…one can dream! However, there are lots of talent internationally.

Finally, this is an extremely quick analysis for expansion roster picks of Angel City and their eventual expansion draft for 2022. Based on past players available, they can put together a pretty strong team which includes several internationals and a Ballon D’or winner to get some bums in seats!

Reach out to me on twitter to tell me who you would pick for Angel City!

If you’d like to see all of my values for the players or a more thorough analysis, along with other analyses, for your club, league, or organization, please get in touch.

I encourage you to check out my consulting page, here.