:format(webp)/cdn.vox-cdn.com/uploads/chorus_image/image/68656946/SEA-SJ-08573.0.0.jpg)
Jordan Morris is 26 years old, one of the top offensive players in the U.S. national team pool and coming off his best professional season. He’s also helped lead the Seattle Sounders to four MLS Cup finals and two titles during his five professional seasons. By any reasonable metric, he’s achieved everything he could have hoped at this point in his career.
So, it makes sense that he’s constantly being asked if he’s considering a move to Europe. Whenever he’s asked, though, he offers some version of “if it’s the right opportunity, I’d definitely consider it.”
Speaking to the press while at the current national team camp, he was again asked about his European ambitions.
“Definitely some conversations are ongoing with Seattle and in Europe a little bit,” he said. “It’s a similar stance of where I was before MLS Cup: If the right offer and the right team comes forward, it’s something that I’d be interested in
“If things don’t work out and I end up in Seattle, I love being there and I feel like I’m growing a lot in Seattle. I think the league is growing, the quality of play is getting higher and I’ve felt myself develop there really, really well in my time in Seattle. But yeah, if the right opportunity came it’d definitely something that I would look at and we’ll just have to wait and see.”
What does the “right offer and the right team” look like? Morris’ agent, told The Athletic that he had fielded interest from teams in the Premier League, Bundesliga, Ligue 1, Serie A and Turkish Super Lig. That same story speculated that Morris could probably fetch a transfer fee in the $5-$7 million range.
My suspicion is that it would take a bit more than simply any team from one of those leagues meeting that valuation. More likely, Morris is looking to go to a mid- to upper-table team in England or Germany, probably with at least a chance at competing in European competitions.
That’s going to be a pretty fine needle to thread. Could it happen? Absolutely. Is it going to happen before the European transfer windows close in the next few weeks? Probably not.