Daily Local News (West Chester, PA)
Low-stakes gamble on Przybylko paying off
CHESTER » It was nearly two years ago that a transaction warranting little attention came across the wire: On Sept. 16, 2018, the Philadelphia Union announced the signing of Kacper Przybylko.
The deal wasn’t secured with a designated player contract or targeted allocation money. It barely beat the roster freeze deadline (the deal was announced two days after, but apparently the fax was sent in time). It amounted to little more than an extended, compensated trial: Przybylko would get a contract for the rest of 2018, six games for which he wasn’t healthy, with a team option for 2019.
The deal looked like a shot in the dark, an extra body if the Union had won the U.S. Open Cup final that month and gained entry to the CONCACAF Champions League. It looked like a signing that could soon be forgotten, nothing ventured, nothing gained.
Two years later, it’s one of the most brilliant pieces of business in franchise history.
Przybylko’s milestones are twofold: He’s just competed a full season of games, and emphatically so, in Saturday’s 4-1 thumping of D.C. United, which earned Przybylko MLS Player of the Week honors Monday. The return for the Union taking a chance has been monumental: 34 games (33 starts), 19 goals, five assists.
The totals are slightly cherry-picked, since they exclude three empty games in the MLS Is Back knockout stage; even swapping those three games for the three league matches since, he’d be at 16 goals and four assists. Also notable is that none of the goals is from penalty kicks, a usual embellisher of tallies.
“What he does is score goals,” manager Jim Curtin said Saturday. “We know that with him, he gives us so much more with his assists, with his defending. … He played a great game. He dominated tonight and that’s what top strikers do in this league.”
It seemed the Union knew that when no one else did. The 6-4 Przybylko, with a nose for goal and deceptively soft touch, had produced mainly in the lower divisions in Germany: 15 goals in 13 games for Arminia Bielefeld’s reserve team; 10 goals in 17 matches for Koln II; 11 goals and seven assists in 20 matches for Koln II in 2012-13. His return over 114 2.Bundesliga games was a pedestrian 20 goals and eight assists.
He finally found a groove with Kaiserslautern, with seven goals in 30 appearances in 2015-16. But then injuries intervened: A series of foot ailments, starting with a metatarsal fracture in April 2016, required multiple surgeries, including one to repair damage done by the first. He played 14 games in 2016-17, interspersed between four foot-related absences. The following season brought only four games, three on a rehab stint.
By the time he arrived in Chester, still not matchfit, he was just a practice body. He started 2019 with Bethlehem Steel, pumped in three goals in two starts, and forced Curtin to elevate him. Przybylko scored in his first Union start, then his second, then his third, then an assist in his fourth. It would take 26 games and a foot injury for him to leave the lineup.
Przybylko has had one of the most productive 34game stretches in franchise history. His 19 goals rank seventh-most in Union history, with three targets – Ilsinho with 20, Conor Casey and Fafa Picault with 21 each – not far away. He was rewarded in February with a contract extension until 2023.
The easiest route to MLS relevance is via a striker who can reliably put away goals, whose finishing papers over the cracks of the team behind him. The Union have done one better in Przybylko. Not only does he finish chances, not only does he create them for others, but he does so while delivering tireless work as the first line of defense, a dynamic option for counterattacking and shocking durability (he’s gone the full 90 minutes in 29 of 33 starts).
Przybylko also carries a rare sense of responsibility. He castigated himself for going five games, including the last three in Orlando, without scoring. He accepts the full onus to score, then reflexively deflects credit whenever he does.
That humility was on display this week, Przybylko ending his drought with a goal against New York Red Bulls Tuesday, then pumping home two goals and setting up Brenden Aaronson’s marker against D.C. United.
“I think it was very important, the goal against Red Bull,” Przybylko said. “But against Red Bull, I scored a goal. Today I scored two goals. But in Orlando and in all the other games, there were other players that scored goals, and it shows how much quality we have in the team. It really doesn’t matter who’s scoring the goals. What matters the most is collecting points, and recently we’ve been doing a great job together.”
They’ve been doing it with someone that two years ago would’ve seemed an unlikely figure to lead.