DeAndre Yedlin becomes Seattle Sounders FC's first Homegrown signing

By Money Mike


Over the past couple of years, since they have formed a youth academy team, the Seattle Sounders have developed a lot of impressive young talent and continue to do so right now. Earlier this morning, we have learned that one of the youth academy players will be joining the MLS club. The Seattle Sounders have signed local boy DeAndre Yedlin as their first Homegrown player in franchise history. I first heard about this like, five minutes after the Sounders announced the move on Twitter and have followed this move ever since. The former O’Dea High School standout joins the Sounders after two seasons at the University of Akron where he was a two time All-MAC first team honoree.

Yedlin, like I said earlier, is a former standout at O'Dea High School. He also played a couple years of club for Crossfire Premier before joining the Sounders FC Academy for a year. In 2011, Yedlin committed to the University of Akron and all he did was pick up where he left off with the Sounders U18. In his two years with the Zips, Yedlin appeared in all 45 games and finished his career with a goal and 12 assists. He also spent last summer with the Sounders U23 team in the Premier Development League where he led the club all the way to the semi-finals, appearing in 16 matches and recording a goal and an assist each.


My thoughts:

I'm real excited to see this kid go out there in front of his home town crowd and just kill it on the pitch. I highly doubt he's going to start at right back this season, but he will be a starter in the near future for sure. This teams likes its backs to get forward, which is something that DeAndre has done a lot in college and will continue to do in the professional level. Definitely the first of many Homegrown signings for the Sounders. Sean Okoli from Wake Forest, I believe will sign a Homegrown contract. We also have Aaron Kovar from Stanford who was named PAC-12 freshman of the year. Nick Palodichuk and Jalen Markey could also be future Homegrown players. And also U17 international Paul Christensen, I think will be a future Homegrown player and quite possibly a future no. 1 goalkeeper for the Sounders. We'll just have to wait and see what happens. But again, one Homegrown signing has been made and it surely won't be the last. So on a personal note, I just want to say congratulations to DeAndre and looking forward to seeing you in MLS.