Story by
The 5 biggest offseason priorities for Nashville SC, BJ Callaghan heading into 2025
- Story by
- The 5 biggest offseason priorities for Nashville SC, BJ Callaghan heading into 2025
Nashville SC closed out its worst-ever season, in which it missed the MLS playoffs and won just 11 of 40 games across all competitions, on Saturday with a 3-0 win over the Chicago Fire .
While Nashville won't play another official game for four months, coach B.J. Callaghan said the club has no intention of taking a break after going 9-16-9 and finishing 25th out of 29 teams in the 2024 Supporters' Shield standings.
Advertisement
"There will be no rest," Callaghan said Saturday. "We'll immediately turn our focus into (next season). Players will have a week off, we'll obviously go through, not right now but early next week, some of the evaluation period. Then we're going to get right back and start training."
Major League Soccer's structure lends itself well to rapid turnarounds. The LA Galaxy finished second-to-last in the Western Conference in 2023 and head into the playoffs tied for the third-best record in the league. In 2020, Sporting Kansas City earned the West's No. 1 seed a season after it finished 10 points outside the playoffs.
Can Nashville author a similar comeback tale in 2025? As the club enters a pivotal offseason, here are its biggest priorities:
Make roster decisions
Teams are required to submit their decisions on players with contract options to the MLS office on Nov. 27. Nashville has pending options on Forster Ajago, Brian Anunga , Julian Gaines , Aníbal Godoy , Lukas MacNaughton , Ben Martino , Amar Sejdić and Joey Skinner . Josh Bauer , Brent Kallman and Dru Yearwood are out of contract. Anunga, Godoy, Sejdić, Kallman and Yearwood are eligible for free agency.
Advertisement
Work on Walker Zimmerman 's contract
Team captain Walker Zimmerman is headed into the final year of his contract. The United States international remains Nashville's best defender and one of the top center backs in MLS, even at 31. He's coming off two straight seasons in which he dealt with significant injuries.
Finding a way to keep Zimmerman in Nashville beyond 2025 is crucial for the front office. Throwing a wrinkle into things is that Zimmerman is one of the club's three designated players , which lets him earn more money ($3,456,979 in 2024) than the league's salary cap would normally allow. Nashville could sign him to a new DP contract or look to sign him to a long-term, non-DP deal and free up that slot to use elsewhere.
Sep 18, 2024; Nashville, Tennessee, USA; Nashville SC defender Walker Zimmerman (25) kicks the ball in the second half against Chicago Fire at Geodis Park. Mandatory Credit: Casey Gower-Imagn Images
Continue youth movement
Under coach Gary Smith, Nashville relied almost solely on its veterans. But after Smith's firing, interim coach Rumba Munthali started giving more opportunities to younger players, a trend which Callaghan continued. Gaines and Jonathan Pérez , both 21-years-old, played important roles down the stretch.
Advertisement
With an average age of 29.4, Nashville had the second-oldest roster in MLS in 2024. The club will still have plenty of players over 30 next season, but further development from Pérez, Gaines, Ajago, Skinner, Isaiah Jones and others will be critical even as veterans like Dan Lovitz , Teal Bunbury and Sean Davis remain effective contributors.
MLS introduced a rule this summer that allows clubs to sign three U-22 Initiative players, meaning their contracts will count against the salary cap at a reduced rate. That could be a boon to Nashville's youth movement.
MORE: Many things went wrong as Nashville SC missed MLS playoffs. Here are 5 biggest
Succession plan for Joe Willis
On the subject of age, goalkeeper Joe Willis is Nashville's oldest player. He'll turn 37 next August, but has still been a stable presence, earning the club's MVP honors this season and recording nine shutouts.
Advertisement
It's typical for goalies to enjoy lengthier careers than outfield players, but age isn't the only factor here — Willis' contract is up after 2025. How much longer will Nashville continue with the only starting keeper they've had in MLS? And is a potential replacement currently on the roster? Panicco , 27, has shown promise as a pure shot-stopper, while Martino, 22, has started the last two seasons for the club's MLS Next Pro affiliate Huntsville City.
Retool midfield, attack
Nashville's forwards and defenders struggled in 2024, but the pillars of those respective units — Hany Mukhtar , Surridge , Jacob Shaffelburg in attack and Zimmerman, Lovitz and Shaq Moore on the back line — are under guaranteed contracts. However, the midfield was Nashville's weakest point and ripe for retooling.
With Godoy, Yearwood, Anunga and Sejdić either having options or facing free agency, Nashville has flexibility. The signing of Patrick Yazbek in July was a good starting point in fixing Nashville's ball-progression issues, but the club still has a ways to go in finding players able to fit Callaghan's high-intensity game model .
Advertisement
Nashville could also look to bolster its offense with one or two clinical presences in front of goal. Shaffelburg, Alex Muyl and Tyler Boyd (who will miss at least the first half of next season as he recovers from a torn ACL) provide plenty of speed and energy on the wings. But the team's scoring depth sharply tailed off after Surridge, who scored a team-high 15 goals in all competitions, and Mukhtar, who scored nine.
Jacob Shames can be reached by email at jshames@gannett.com and on Twitter @Jacob_Shames.
This article originally appeared on Nashville Tennessean: Nashville SC priorities for offseason, 2025 MLS season
