Updated 2024 Colorado Rapids Player Salaries: What’s Reggie Cannon Making?

BETHESDA, Md. – It’s the second edition of one of my favorite MLS holidays of the year. Player salary release day. The MLS Players Association announced the 2024 fall player salaries today. Find the whole list here. Burgundy Wave reacted to the initial release of Rapids player salaries back in May. Find that information here.

Let’s start with some basic takeaways. The total salary compensation for currently rostered Rapids players is around $14.4 million, down from the spring’s $16.3 million and close to last fall’s $14.5 million. The dead money due to the team parting ways with Sidnei Tavares, Sam Nicholson, etc. contributed to that. The salaries listed in the spring and fall don’t necessarily reflect the dead cap implications. That may have also limited their flexibility to spend more and bring in reinforcements this summer. On just these payroll numbers, Colorado are third-to-last in MLS ahead of Montreal and Philadelphia.

It’s worth noting this is the amount these players are getting paid by MLS for the year under the single entity structure. These numbers don’t necessarily reflect the total spend by the Rapids. This information also does not include transfer fees. Colorado spent reportedly between $6-7 million on transfer fees to bring in Mihailović in the winter and make Navarro permanent in the summer. Navarro did get a salary raise of almost $100K annually compared to his loan salary for what that’s worth. Colorado spent big by their standards in 2024. They’re still in the bottom half of the league in net spend.

Kévin Cabral is the top earner on the team, making almost $2 million. His compensation is more than Luis Suarez. Remember as part of the trade from LA Galaxy, they’re picking up about half of his contract. So the Rapids are only on the hook for about $1 million. The final year of his contract is 2025.

Rémi Cabral is still on loan at Phoenix Rising and Miguel Navarro is with Talleres in Argentina with an option to buy. The loan clubs are surely picking up some of that salary.

The new information is that recently signed free agent Reggie Cannon is on $750,000. That’s reasonable given he was coming from Europe (albeit not getting paid sometimes) and given what other fringe USMNT players coming back to MLS are getting with Colorado and elsewhere.

Zack Steffen is still one of the top earners for goalkeeper in the league. He’s worth it as I’ve written previously.

This team doesn’t have a lot of dead weight, thankfully. Bassett and the DPs are all pulling their weight. They’re paying 50 cents on the dollar for Cabral. It’s fair to say at this point Sam Vines has had an underwhelming year. Hopefully he can raise his level and get over what happened at Royal Antwerp. He Colorado’s got $2 million in salary invested in their top three fullbacks. That position needs to become a strength.

If there are any bad contracts on the team, it’s Jonathan Lewis and Lalas Abubakar. Lewis is on $435K, which isn’t huge by today’s standards. There are younger and cheaper wingers on this team who have produced more. Lewis is out of contract this year.

Abubakar got a big raise from last year and is making over $700K. That’s probably more than he’s worth. Abubakar has a team option for 2025. If he was making $500K, I would have no complaints about his value this year.

Lastly, the young cheep kids at the bottom of the roster have value. Calvin Harris and Oli Larraz are regular starters. They’re on $100K. There’s a bunch of young players with upside on that kind of money and under club control for the foreseeable future. Pádraig Smith doesn’t just cook. He plants seeds.

Photo Credit: Mark Shaiken

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