Bring the Hulk to Foxboro

I believe it was last week, while tuning into a replay of the Porto-Nacional Portuguese Liga match, that, as I am wont to do while watching Portuguese football, began to fantasize about a player lacing up his boots for the Revolution.

Last week, the player of my affections was a scruffy Brazilian striker named Givanildo Vieira de Souza. During the match, he scored a goal and nearly clinched another minutes later after putting ball inches wide of the right post.

Yeah, ok, so you may have gathered by his surname that he's Brazilian. He's supposed to be good. But, due to his uncanny resemblance to actor Lou Ferrigno, de Souza is better known as "Hulk."

And the Hulk is quite a talent. The 22-year-old was just signed by Porto over the summer, after spending three years in the J-League with Tokyo Verdy, Consadole Sapporo and Kawasaki Frontale. He racked up goals by the bushels - he scored 70 goals in 104 matches. In his first twelve matches for Porto, mostly off the bench. He's scored five goals already. I'll say it for you: Wow.

Considering that J-League competition is often considered on par, if not higher, than that found here in MLS, you can only imagine the kind of stats he'd put up Stateside. He'd make Landon Donovan look like a pub league player. His name would create instant buzz. Boston loves larger than life characters. See David "Big Papi" Ortiz and Glen "Big Baby" Davis.

Of course, a player of Hulk's talent won't come cheap. Porto just paid eight million Euros to Kawasaki for the Brazilian. But hey, aren't that what designated player allocations are for?*

(*Unfortunately, I cannot confirm or deny that Revolution brain trust knows what a DPA is.)

Forget another mediocre, non-eventful draft where the Revolution scrape together another freshman class. After Marcus Tracy elected to bypass MLS, there isn't a bona fide star in the making in this year's draft.

So, if I had any say in the matter, here's what I'd do: trade the picks - all of them - to the rest of the league for allocation money. Use the money to go buy a colorful character like Hulk. Come early March, I'd guarantee you'd find alot more navy blue seats filled in Foxboro, and bunch of goals being fetched out of opponents' nets.

Not that Porto would ever give up Hulk less than a year after signing him. It would make absolutely no sense. The Dragaoes would have to be Rusty Pierce crazy to do something like that. Like I said, the whole premise of this post is based entirely on pure fantasy...

Then again - why not negotiate a summer loan?