You know those old superhero comic book or cartoon episodes where some hapless side character found themselves hogtied to a cartoonishly large bomb with an oversized timer counting down to their doom? I bet that’s what Hank Stebbins feels like right now.
Without reinforcements, Minnesota will miss the playoffs, but he has been handed the reins with just two weeks to figure out who to bring in and get the deal done. According to Andy Greder, the team is still working on a deal for Callum McCowatt, but the Silkeborg man has only gone and notched a goal or assist in three of their first four games. Assuredly this has shown the team that he’s not that valuable and should be allowed to leave…
According to reports out of both Germany and the US, however, the Loons have completed a different signing! Maurice Malone — his middle name is Maximillian and I will be pushing the 3M nickname at any and all occasions – is headed to Minnesota from Sturm Graz. The Austrian giants finished runners up last season, but won the Austrian Bundesliga in both seasons before that.
Malone is a 26 year old, left-footed striker, who scored three goals and notched an assist in 1567 minutes last season. He has one season of double-digit goal scoring for a first division team: he scored 11 goals in 2024-25 for Austria Wein, falling one short of the team high 12 scored by… Dominick Fitz, though eight of his came from the spot.
He’s tall, 6’2”, and per SofaScore, he’s quite quick: faster than Yeboah or Mamadou Dieng and nearly as fast as former Loon Sang-Bin Jeong. He missed a significant portion of the 23-24 with a meniscus tear, but has been largely healthy otherwise.
So he’s fast, he’s tall, he’s healthy, but he doesn’t have much of a goal-scoring record. Even if that’s not the worst foundation to build from, the lack of top-line performance is going to disappoint the casuals. Let’s see what’s beneath the surface.
The good news is: He gets into the box well, he’s a willing shooter, and he passes well in tight spaces. While he only scored three goals, he racked up 8.45 xG and 8.15 of that came from shots on target. 41% of his 69 shots last season were on target, almost identical to Kelvin Yeboah’s current rate and a bit ahead of the median for MLS shooters with 10 shots or more, 36%.
As discussed here, xG doesn’t provide all the context necessary to say whether he was more unlucky or ineffective, but the team is clearly betting on the former.
The bad news is readily apparent. He’s a willing shooter but not a good one. He’s tall but not good in the air. He’s an accurate passer but not an effective one. He’s quick but can’t beat defenders with the ball at his feet.
Point blank: If last season is the only data point you’re looking at, this is a gamble in the same way penny stocks are a gamble: It’s not going to work. If it did, you’d look like a genius, but it’s not going to.
Minnesota isn’t just banking on last season being an aberration in terms of finishing, but also in terms of fit. Last season, during the Austrian Bundesliga’s winter break, Sturm Graz changed managers. Gone was Jürgen Säumel and his 4-4-2 diamond where Malone played the left-sided forward and in came Fabio Ingolitsch, who coached 17 games and used five different formations.
Malone went from being a bolted-on starter to being part of a rotation — he started 10 times and came off the bench seven — which makes sense given the high-pressing tendencies of Ingolitsch’s system. Nevertheless, for a player that was already struggling for form, the constant change in tactics and role were an additional challenge he didn’t need.
By contrast, in 2024-25, Malone started all 31 matches he played in for Austria Wien with a well-defined role. The team’s offense ran predominantly through Fitz, allowing Malone to find open space in the box or be available to win headers near the penalty spot.
The difference between the two seasons shows up not only in Malone’s heat map, it shows up in every aspect of his game.
If last year never happened and Minnesota was getting a double-digit goal scorer with strong secondary traits, coming into his prime off the back of a season that looked like this, there would be more excitement about his potential impact.
But last year did happen and concerns are warranted, even if there may be an underlying explanation for his poor performance.
The other thing that gives me pause is that the team currently has a pair of players that came to Minnesota from Austria. Both commanded multi-million dollar transfer fees and both are among the team’s highest paid players. Neither is producing anywhere near the kind of value one would hope given their cost. Neither is giving Minnesota anything that should have them looking for similar players.
It’s unfair to judge Malone by the poor standard Fitz and Yeboah have set, but it is eminently fair to wonder if the Austrian Bundesliga is a step or more below MLS, setting players transferring in from there up for an uphill battle. If that is the case and Malone struggled to make his mark there, why should anyone expect him to come to a more difficult league in an entirely new country and do anything but flop?
Like Dieng last summer and Mauricio Gonzales this winter, there are aspects to Malone that are compelling, or at least intriguing. If he comes in as one part of an active window, I’ll be interested to see what he can do. But with time flying by and money apparently tighter than usual, he seems like a lotto ticket rather than the kind of floor-raiser Minnesota badly needs.
I dislike this deal substantially less than the general commentariat does, but even I can’t fully explain why Malone is the right player for the Loons. Between Yeboah, Dieng, Gonzalez, Marcus Caldeira, and now Malone, Cam Knowles has no shortage of options at striker. What he doesn’t have, and what Malone doesn’t seem to fix, is any reliable options at striker.