MLS Draft: Rosters Announced For Combine, Darlington Nagbe Among Those Skipping

One of the only shallow positions in the upcoming 2011 MLS SuperDraft is fullback, specifically left back. That position gained some depth as UC Santa Barbara’s Michael Tetteh became the 10th player to be signed to this year’s Generation Adidas class. The news was first reported by Presidio Sports and confirmed by Soccer by Ives.

Tetteh had been expected to return to UCSB for his senior season, but has long been considered a quality pro prospect. He has scored six goals and registered eight assists during his first three years, while helping lead the Gauchos to Big West championships in each of the past two years and into the NCAA Tournament all three years. Last year, injuries limited Tetteh to 15 matches, but he’s now fully healthy.

Like the Major League Baseball and NHL drafts, hardly anyone outside the closest observers know almost anything about the players being picked in the MLS SuperDraft. There’s not much that can be done about that, but the Jan. 7-11 MLS Combine will at least give us a glimpse of many of those players. More than 70 players have been assigned to four teams that will play six games against one another, which will be broadcast at MLSsoccer.com.

Unfortunately, several players expected to be among the first selected will not participate. Perry Kitchen, Zac MacMath, Omar Salgado and Zarek Valentin are all going to be in the United States U-20 camp and likely first pick Darlington Nagbe has elected to opt out of the combine.