2016 Orange County Blues Player Postmortem: Tyler Feeley

Tyler Feeley entered his second season as a professional soccer player in 2016 still a prospect. 19-years-old this season, he was coming off a rookie season with the Orange County Blues where he scored a goal in very limited minutes.

So it seemed like 2016 could be a real opportunity for the former Real Salt Lake academy player, especially with leading scorers Chris Cortez and Christofer Ramirez departing in the offseason. Sure, Feeley may not have been ready to lead the striker corps for his team, but he might find considerable development as a professional after getting his sea legs the first year.

As it turned out, that didn't really happen, as Feeley did surpass his minutes total from 2015 with the Blues, barely, but there wasn't much else to be said about his time on the field this year.

Here were Feeley's statistics for the 2016 season with the Blues:

*I have been trying to track down 2016 U.S. Open Cup stats for the Blues. When I get them, I will fill them in the players' stats.

Feeley officially remained on the active roster all season, but his appearances this season all came in April and May. It's hard to tell if he suffered a major injury, with USL teams not in the habit of disclosing any injury information, or if he fell out of Barry Venison's plans. A social media post in the summer from Feeley vaguely seemed to indicate he was departing the team, but again, the circumstances surrounding such a departure were unknown.

So we'll see what happens with Tyler Feeley moving forward. Obviously if he suffered an injury, he could very well return next season, either to the Blues or another club. If he didn't, then he's probably not coming back to OC, although you never know. While there were higher, if still muted, expectations for Feeley's sophomore season as a pro, he didn't see a lot of playing time this campaign, and the future is something of a question mark, at least from the outside.

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