The Ascendancy of Victor Ulloa

Coming out of spring training in 2018, Victor Ulloa had dropped to fourth on the FC Dallas holding-mid depth chart behind Carlos Gruezo, Kellyn Acosta, and the player arguably playing the best, Jacori Hayes.

At the time, I said to several soccer people that I thought Ulloa was in danger of MLS passing him by. At the age of 26, I had seen little progression in his game over the years.

During the season, after one notably flat performance, I wrote: "Victor Ulloa was just playing in the game, not actually playing the game." Ulloa at that time was playing one-dimensionally. Sitting deep and mostly completing passes in a side to side, horizontal fashion.

This deep lying, one-dimensional type game…