GM has made the most of short winter break

Bezbatchenko focused on keeping Reds’ core together, while looking for new talent It will be a little more than six weeks since their MLS Cup win when Toronto FC players officially report for their medicals Monday. Success has meant a short off-season. The CONCACAF Champions League starts in less than a month.

And while the last month and a half has seemed quiet — wingback Raheem Edwards (expansion draft) and defender Steven Beitashour (free agency) left, defender Drew Moor re-signed and 19-year-old midfielder Liam Fraser moved up — general manager Tim Bezbatchenko saw it differently, calling the six weeks busy, positive, exciting and challenging.

“One thing I’m focused on is keeping this roster together and signing the player that we can sign to keep the core of the group together; it’s very important,” Bezbatchenko said last week.

“Obviously we’re always looking to improve, but I think stability and keeping this core together takes precedence . . . I spent a lot of time in conversation with the players, and their agents, that are currently on our roster.”

While it sounds like the GM is standing pat, Bezbatchenko didn’t stay put in the off-season. His attempts to improve the club included stops in Chile, Argentina, France, Denmark and Holland, and he need- ed few introductions. Players and their representatives know about Toronto FC.

“When you’re talking to them, you can see them getting excited about the possibility of playing with our players,” he said.

Teams have an additional $2.8 million (all figures U.S.) in allocation money this year, which is intended to improve the spots on the roster just below the designated players. The Reds showed the value of that last year when they added midfielder Victor Vazquez. His $700,000 salary was almost $400,000 more than any non-designated player on the team.

Bezbatchenko has to figure out which new market or markets the money opens. And he has to weigh the value of domestic players, with “extremely valuable” experience in MLS, against international options who might struggle to get acclimatized. Not that there’s an urgency in Toronto.

“The good thing about our position is that we might bring in a player (with the allocation money) but that player might not start because we have a really tough roster to break into,” he said. “That’s OK.”

The 36-year-old’s primary focus is to create competition among the players, raising everyone’s level.

“The players on our current roster . . . have every chance to keep and maintain (their starting positions),” Bezbatchenko said. “That’s also the expectation.”

There’s a possibility the Reds could use the money to bring in a younger player. “Given the experience of our designated players . . . we can maybe look at bringing in a little bit of youth that can learn from the experience on our roster and that can grow with our team over the season and over multiple seasons.”

Bezbatchenko can understand that this off-season might seem slow to fans but reminded this team has proven it can pull off special things. “Hopefully they feel, as I feel, that we have a pretty darn good roster now and they’re excited about the personality we have, because we have a really good group.” Toronto added two defenders through the SuperDraft on Sunday, picking up Andre Morrison (69th overall from the University of Hartford) and Ben White (92nd from Gonzaga). They joined Friday’s second-rounders, defender Tim Kubel and goalkeeper Drew Shepherd.