After missing the 2018 season due to an ACL tear, Jordan Morris has signed a new five-year contract with the Seattle Sounders.
The contract, which was first reported Thursday by The Athletic, is worth nearly $1 million per year. The first three years of the contract are guaranteed, with two more option years. The deal may likely have been helped along by the fact that Morris was entering the final deal of his rookie contract and the striker was able to sign a pre-contract elsewhere if he wished to leave.
Morris scored 12 goals and four assists in a 2016 campaign that saw him named Rookie of the Year and lift the MLS Cup, but he saw a downturn in 2017 that limited him to three goals in 23 games. The Stanford grad had been hoping for a rebound in 2018 after working on revamping his game with newly-added assistant coach Preki, but Morris tore his ACL in El Salvador during a CONCACAF Champions League match against Santa Tecla Feb. 22.
Morris’ new contract may not eat up too much cap space. If the contract is significantly back-loaded and the club uses allocation money, the forward may have a small initial cap hit in the first few years of the contract.
Either way, Morris will now be registered as a senior player on the roster. The Mercer Island native was given the highest-ever Homegrown Player contract, worth roughly $250,000 a year when he made the decision to play for Seattle.
With his new pay bump and his knee close to fully recovered (the forward said days after the 2018 season ended that he was done with his rehabilitation), Morris and the Sounders will now prepare for 2018 after missing out on the title match for the first time in his professional career.