Per a team statement today, the New England Revolution have announced that they've declined contract options on four players: Fernando Cardenas, Blair Gavin, Tim Murray, and Benny Feilhaber. Murray and Gavin are eligible for the upcoming Re-Entry draft.
"After every season, we have to take a hard look at our roster and make some difficult decisions, both for personnel and salary budget considerations," Revolution General Manager Michael Burns said. "In our case, we'll continue discussions with some of the players we declined options on to see if the potential exists for them to return to the club next year. We have retained a core group of players for next season and we'll continue strengthening the team this off-season."
Fernando Cardenas, who was with the team on a loan deal in 2012, was mostly used in a "super-sub" role, coming off the bench in many games to provide additional pace in the late stages of the match. Though he contributed fairly frequently, he arguably did not make much of an impact with the team and therefore it shouldn't be all that surprising that his option was declined.
Blair Gavin came to New England as part of the infamous Shalrie Joseph trade with Chivas USA. Gavin fought a nagging injury for most of his time with the Revs and was never really able to showcase anything worth keeping him around for, save for an impressive 60 or so minutes against the Chicago Fire.
Tim Murray has been a third string keeper for the Revs since 2010 but never saw any minutes outside of the reserve league. The decision to decline his option may hint at the possibility of New England drafting Andre Blake of UCONN in the 2013 MLS SuperDraft.
The least surprising news is Benny Feilhaber's option being declined, as many have assumed he'd be on his way out of Foxboro for a while now. The writing was certainly on the wall for Benny, and the early off-season additions ofAndy Dorman and Kalifa Cisse seemed to have cemented that reality. Also worth noting: freeing themselves of Feilhaber also gives the Revolution a hefty chunk of their salary cap space back as well. It will be interesting to see what it might be spent on.
With those additions as well as the waiving of Blake Brettschneider, Florian Lechner, Alec Purdie, and Mike Roach earlier this month, the Revolution's roster now stands at 20 players.