The Price of One Ruiz - FanHouse - AOL Sports Blog

Coverage of a major trade wouldn't be complete without following the money. Not counting the allocations FC Dallas received from LA Galaxy in exchange for Carlos Ruiz, they gained 435,000 in salary cap in the deal. His initial contract, signed in February 2006, could be spent much more efficiently in today's MLS. Assuming current "free agents" were available at their 2007 salaries (courtesy of MLSplayers.org), let's take a look at what one Carlos Ruiz ($435,000) could buy in the current market:

Luciano Emilio-$250,000: The league's leading scorer in 2007 is penciled in for a move to Mexico's Morelia, but his contract alone picks up the slack with cash to spare.

Pat Noonan-$227,500: The American forward has had injury problems recently and is looking to try his chances to play abroad, but you could do much worse than New England's second leading scorer (tied with Dorman at 7 behind Twellman)

Brian Ching-$220,000: The 27 year-old has really come into his own in recent years and has been part of the Dynamo's deadly attack that has won back to back MLS Cups.

Alecko Eskandarian-$175,000: Esky has bounced around the league lately. Currently landed at Salt Lake, he is thought to be headed out soon.

Juan Carlos Toja-$100,008: Of course, Toja is still technically on FC Dallas but has yet to extend his contract. The MVP candidate could still get a healthy raise from the cleared cap space.

Patrick Ngwenya-$70,000: The young winger has definitely earned a raise based on last year's stats, tying teammate Brian Ching with 7 goals and Dwayne DeRosario with 10 points.

With a brief glance, you could replace Ruiz with 3 (or 4) quality front men just cruising the expired contracts. Take into consideration similar numbers being thrown about for new imported talent fro South America, and the purchasing dollars get even stronger. Soccer Insider Steven Goff has a quick rumor that DC is quietly sitting on 1M in cap space, and from all indications, it looks like they could do much better than 2 Ruizs (or 1 Landon Donovan).

(HT: MLS Rumors)