Wisconsin Soccer Central

The 2014 Major League Soccer SuperDraft starts Thursday in Philadelphia, and the consensus among writers who cover the league is that former University of Wisconsin center back AJ Cochran will be one of the first dozen players selected.

Cochran, 20, decided to forego his senior season with the Badgers and sign a Generation adidas contract with MLS, meaning that his salary won't count against the salary cap for the first few years of his career. Read more

Here's a look at the predictions and comments from several mock drafts that were posted Wednesday.

Simon Borg, MLSSoccer.com
11. Colorado Rapids: Wasn't among the standout defenders at the Combine, but he is still the best of them all in the air. They add to their center back corps behind Drew Moor and Shane O'Neill, helping their future coach out with the budgetary relief that comes with his GA status.

Matthew Doyle, MLSSoccer.com
10. Montreal Impact: The Impact are still woefully short of forwards, but Frank Klopas' history says he'll look overseas to fill that hole. His history also says he's happy to draft a center back – especially one that's dominant in the air – in the middle of the first round.

Nate Sulat, MLSSoccer.com
11. Colorado Rapids: There aren't enough blow-your-mind quality defensive midfielders or target forwards available in this draft for the Rapids to ignore a Generation adidas prospect at this pick. Cochran is still raw, but he has the physical tools to become a dominant center back.

Ives Galarcep, Goal.com and Soccer By Ives
8. Seattle Sounders: The Sounders need two things badly, salary cap relief and some center back depth, so Cochran fits the bill to perfection. A big left-footed center back with plenty of room to grow as one of the younger players in the draft, Cochran could develop into a long-term starter. The fact that Seattle unloaded veterans Jhon Kennedy Hurtado and Patrick Ianni, and brought back Jalil Anibaba, means Cochran might be sooner to becoming a starter than first realized.

Ben Roth, College Soccer News
10. Montreal Impact: With losing Nesta as a center back, the Impact are desperate for a center back and Cochran may be the best available. Cochran, a natural leader has the size and athleticism to compete at the next level. Impact technical director Matt Jordan made it known, that the team wanted to get “cap-friendly players” so picking up a GA in a needed position is a perfect pick.

Top Drawer Soccer
8. Chicago Fire: A big center back who is good in the air is on the wish list of pretty much every team in MLS, and the Fire lands just that talent in AJ Cochran. The Wisconsin standout and former U.S. U20 MNT defender will have time to adapt to the MLS level as the Fire have a pair of solid central defenders already, but if all goes well Cochran will be able to fight for minutes by the end of the season.
(Note: This mock draft was posted early Wednesday; later in the day, the Fire traded the No. 8 pick to the Seattle Sounders. Chicago now has the No. 13 pick in the first round.)

Many of the mock drafts only list picks for the first and second rounds; however, College Soccer News has midfielder Bryan Ciesiulka (Marquette) being selected by Real Salt Lake in the third round at No. 53.

Soccer By Ives also has a "Big Board" ranking of 80 potential draftees, which features Cochran at No. 11, Ciesiulka at No. 64, midfielder-forward Tomislav Zadro (UW) at No. 68 and defender Paul Dillon (Marquette) at No. 72.

Did you know that to be eligible to be selected in the SuperDraft, a player must be on this list?

MLS clubs must submit names of players who they might be interested in selecting, and those were added to the seven Generation adidas signings and four international players to create the final 267-player list. That list includes 10 players with Wisconsin ties:

• M Bryan Ciesiulka, Marquette @bciesiulka
• D AJ Cochran, UW @Alec_Cochran
• D Paul Dillon, Marquette @PaulyD_2
• M-F Sam Krenzien, UW-Green Bay (Wauwatosa West) @skrenz
• D Steven Perinovic, Kentucky (Kettle Moraine)
• D Eric Pothast, Marquette @Eric_Pothast
• F-M Chris Prince, UW
• D Andrew Stone, UW-Milwaukee (Green Bay Preble) @astonetheory
• D-M Paul Yonga, UW @pyonga4
• M-F Tomislav Zadro, UW @tomislavzadro

It should be noted that Pothast has officially signed with Swedish club Ängelholms FF, which plays in the second-tier Superettan.

The first two rounds of the four-round draft will be televised on ESPNews and streamed via WatchESPN, starting at 11 a.m. The third and fourth rounds will be held Tuesday. Full draft order

Editor's note: This article has been edited from its original version to reflect information that became available after posting.