Photo Credit D. Laird Allan/Sportswave
As the Whitecaps head into the 2022 MLS season many were surprised to hear that they had moved out Maxime Crépeau to LAFC and getting in return $1 million in General Allocation Money as well what is described as additional incentives plus a first round pick in the 2025 MLS SuperDraft.
The clubs $1 million, which is guaranteed General Allocation Money plus a natural first round pick in the 2025 MLS SuperDraft comes to Vancouver if certain performance metrics are met from Los Angeles FC.
The club will receive $250,000 in 2022 GAM, $250,000 in 2023 GAM and $500,000 in GAM between 2023, 2024 and/or 2025 based on the player’s roster status. As part of the trade, Whitecaps FC will retain a significant percentage of the fee if Crépeau is transferred abroad.
After watching Max play for the past season, many are wondering why the move to which Whitecaps FC Sporting Director Axel Schuster told the media “Max came to us with a very personal request.”
He continued “Although he has been an important player, of course we made the decision to support Max as best we could, as long as his value was acknowledged in the deal. We have managed to finalize the largest trade in league history for a goalkeeper, and one of the biggest overall. We would like to thank Max for his three years here. He has put his heart and soul into the team and he has the respect of everyone at the club.
“We are fortunate to have another talented Canadian goalkeeper in Thomas Hasal who deserves an opportunity to prove himself as an MLS starter,”
Schuster continued to mention.“As we said throughout last season, we are very confident in Thomas, and we will continue to evaluate goalkeeper options to add to our group as we get set for this coming season and beyond.”
Crépeau first became a Whitecap player just prior to the 2019 season from CF Montreal in exchange for $50,000 of Targeted Allocation Money along with Vancouver’s natural third-round pick in the 2020 MLS SuperDraft.
He started in 57 MLS regular season matches as well as one in the MLS Cup Playoffs followed by three Canadian Championship matches.
He calls Candiac, Quebec home and this talented “keeper” was voted the 2019 and 2020 Whitecaps Player of the Year followed by a third mention in 2021 after he registered a six (6) clean sheets, which is his best to date.
Crépeau told the media “From the bottom of my heart, I want to thank everyone within the Vancouver Whitecaps organization for all of their support since day one. Furthermore, I am extremely grateful to the amazing fan base and supporters in the great city of Vancouver, you always had my back.”
Crépeau continued and added “Thank you to everyone for the wonderful messages you have shared with me, as this is personally the hardest decision I’ve had to make in my professional career. I’m extremely thankful to the club for working together on finding a solution.”
