David Lee built a winner out of NYCFC — now he wants to keep them there

Hours after New York City FC lifted its first MLS Cup in Portland last year, sporting director David Lee was back to doing his job as usual.

As the sun came up on the team’s title celebrations, Lee had to inform four players – two of whom started the previous evening (Jesus Medina and Gudmundur Thoarinsson) — that the club would not be exercising their contract options for the next season. It was a “really miserable” task required at that time due to MLS’ roster deadlines, and on a broader level, a type of short-term memory symptomatic of Lee’s job.

“You try to enjoy it, and live in the moment as best you can and enjoy that,” he told The Post in an exclusive interview. “But you know in sports, it’s always what’s next.”

Lee moved quickly towards retooling the roster after the club’s postseason success. Medina’s departure left a hole at winger, and the executive (correctly) assumed James Sands would be gone as well (he was loaned to Scottish giant Rangers for 18 months, with an option to buy). Those needs were addressed with the signings of Thiago Martins and later, Gabriel Pereira.

Still, the executive knows a more sustainable model is needed alongside spending; even if you nail all of your signings, some of those high-performing players will soon be targeted by other clubs.

It’s player development that Lee pinpoints as a key to NYCFC’s success, and he was keen to point out that the team’s MLS Cup starting lineup largely featured holdovers from the previous season. That includes homegrown talent Tayvon Gray, who started throughout the stretch run after an injury to starting right back Anton Tinnerholm. He’d started just three games in his young career before the playoffs.

“If we’re getting player development right, a player like Tayvon is ready to take his opportunity when he gets it, because we’ve been developing him for so many years,” Lee said. “So potentially, he hasn’t played as many minutes as another player, but we know he’s ready.”

Critics may point to the homegrown Gray as an exception in a mostly-bought squad, but it’s easy to find other examples of improvement throughout the team.

Taty Castellanos has blossomed from dangerous winger to league-leading striker, Alex Callens has become a stalwart for Peru over the past year and Keaton Parks has steadily improved in the midfield. Even young attackers Santiago Rodriguez and Talles Magno took on major roles in the playoffs after just joining midseason.

Sands won’t be the last young talent to depart the club. But that’s by design, and Lee hopes the club has an assembly line strong enough to keep winning.

“What I think we’ve been incredibly good at is making sure that we’ve got pathways for young players to develop,” he said. “One way that you can create sustainable success is to have players constantly growing, and getting better and improving, so that as players depart, there are players ready to come into the team and improve.”

As NYCFC have learned, however, it’s not just ability that wins you a trophy. Sands spoke before last season about the team lacking a certain “mentality” to thrive in the playoffs, and the club routinely floundered in the postseason despite regular season success. Even with a title now under the club’s belt, that’s not a fact that’s been lost on Lee.

“I think [personality and character have] been more of an emphasis on players that we’ve brought in, yes,” Lee said. “I think it’s also been more of an emphasis on our daily work, and what we talk about on the training ground, and Ronny talks about with the team, and the culture and the environment.”

Last season especially tested the togetherness of the group. Several key players missed time with injuries, and a late-summer skid saw the team fall to the playoff bubble. Whatever was precisely different about last year’s group – and it’s hard to quantify or pinpoint – it showed during the business end of the season.

“You build that over time,” Lee said. “It doesn’t come – it’s not one meeting when it happens, it’s not two meetings, it’s not one player you bring in that does those things, you build and you work on it day after day after day, and make it important, and then I think you start to see the results of that.”

This season hasn’t quite gone according to plan so far, at least domestically. New York City have just one win from the first five games of the MLS season, including a deflating home loss to local foes Philadelphia. Their knockout success, however, has carried over to the CONCACAF Champions league, where they made a respectable run to the semifinals (their 1-1 draw to Seattle on Wednesday night in the second leg means they lost the tie 4-2 on aggregate).

Still, this is a reigning champion and coach Ronny Deila seems much happier with his roster than a year ago. If they fail to defend their MLS crown, it won’t be for a lack of Lee’s trying.

“Ultimately the job is to have a roster that can compete in all competitions, that’s the goal for us as an organization…. It’s incredibly difficult, we know that,” Lee said.