KC Current trade Alex Loera to NWSL expansion team in the Bay Area: details of the deal
The Kansas City Current are sending midfielder/defender Alex Loera to Bay FC, an NWSL expansion team based out of San Jose, California.
Bay FC is set to join the National Women’s Soccer League for the 2024 season.
In return, the Current received $175,000 in allocation money and protection from losing a player in the upcoming NWSL Expansion Draft.
“Alex is an incredible talent who has helped this club tremendously over the past two seasons,” Current general manager Camille Ashton said in a news release. “This was not an easy decision, but we wish her all the best moving forward.”
Loera, 24, came to the Current via the NWSL Draft in 2021. She joined the team full-time in 2022 after finishing her college career at Santa Clara, just a few blocks from PayPal Park, where Bay FC will play their home matches. In fact, she won an NCAA championship with Santa Clara and was named the NCAA tourney MVP in 2020 on that same pitch.
But she, like a number of KC Current fans, expressed surprise and sadness upon learning she’d been traded. In an interview with the San Francisco Chronicle that was posted Wednesday afternoon, Loera said she’d been told she’d be protected by the Current in the expansion draft, only to be traded a few days later.
“I was not expecting this trade,” Loera wrote in an Instagram post Wednesday afternoon. “It is incredibly disheartening to know that this took place after I had expressed my feelings about the kind of loyal person I am and my desire to finish out the contract I had agreed to with KC.”
This is not the first time that a suddenly-former KC Current player has expressed feeling blindsided by a move out of Kansas City. Lynn Williams was traded to NWSL champion NJ/NY Gotham FC during the last NWSL Draft while she was attending U.S. Women’s National Team Camp.
Williams said in an interview after the fact that she had learned there was a possibility she could be traded just two hours before it happened; then, she said, she only learned the details of the trade as they were reported in real-time.
In a news release distributed by the new Bay Area club, Loera looked at the bright side of her unanticipated move to Santa Clara.
“It is an incredible opportunity to be on the roster of a team that is new to the league but has a deep, rich history of soccer excellence,” she was quoted as saying. “The Bay Area played such a significant role in my soccer career and development, and I could not be more eager to get back to my roots and onto the pitch for Bay FC.”
Loera had been a frequent starter for the Current, only missing some playing time early in the 2023 season due to an injury. She scored a goal and assisted in the Current’s 2022 postseason run to the NWSL Championship match. After her breakout rookie season, she signed a contract with the Current through 2025.
With their newly acquired NWSL Expansion Draft protection, the Current will only have to worry about potentially losing one player in the Dec. 15 expansion draft.
Bay FC and the newly reborn Utah Royals are joining the league for 2024, so both new clubs can select one player from each of the league’s 12 existing player rosters — minus a list of nine protected players.
The Current could also work a trade with Utah for complete protection from the expansion draft. The NWSL’s free-agency period opens next Monday (Nov. 20), allowing teams to announce and sign new player contracts for the 2024 season.
KC Current sign Gabrielle Robinson through 2026
While one promising midfielder/defender is on her way out of KC, another has been locked down through 2026.
The Current clearly liked what they saw from Gabrielle Robinson in her rookie season and signed her to a contract extension Wednesday.
More moves are expected to follow as the Current prepare for the 2024 season, which begins in March at the club’s new CPKC Stadium at the Berkley Riverfront park near downtown.
Daniel Sperry covers soccer for The Star. He can be reached at sperry.danielkc@gmail.com.
This story was originally published November 15, 2023 at 2:07 PM.