Jim Curtin is happy to have Julián Carranza for good, and for not much money

It turns out that there was more to the Union taking Julían Carranza’s purchase option this week than just the team wanting to.

Manager Jim Curtin revealed after Wednesday’s 2-1 win at Inter Miami that the loan deal had a clause that would automatically trigger the purchase if Carranza hit 15 goals and assists combined this year.

The former Miami player started this week with seven goals and three assists this year, heading into his current team’s visit to his old team. So on top of the Union wanting to have him for the trip, his approaching the benchmark made the decision to spend the money easier.

And it wasn’t all that much money: $250,000 in allocation cash this year, another $250,000 next year, an undisclosed percentage of any future sale, and presumably a raise. Carranza is earning $900,000 this year and is of the Union’s two current Designated Players, with a guaranteed contract through 2023 and a club option for 2024.

“A team decision — ownership obviously is involved as well, and I thank them for the commitment,” Curtin said. “I thank Ernst [Tanner] for the creative way he found an incredible deal to get a top striker in here that — I’ll just say it, I guess — somebody else paid for, to be honest. And now we have a guy that is ours, and is a great striker in the league.”

That was a reference to the $6 million Miami paid to acquire the Argentine striker before the club’s expansion season in 2020. Carranza didn’t live up to the hype there, and became one of the big casualties of a roster blowup after MLS slapped a multimillion-dollar punishment on the Herons for breaking league salary-disclosure rules.

» READ MORE: Union retake first place in Eastern Conference after taking purchase option on Julián Carranza

Now Carranza is in a place where he said he’s happy to be.

“I’m happy to be in this team, with these people, and I feel lovely here,” he said. “I feel that this is the place that I want to be.”

Although he admitted, understandably, that playing in Miami “feels weird, I’m not going to lie.”

Curtin also revealed that the Union made the decision a few days ago, but the paperwork wasn’t all completed until late Tuesday morning. The coaching staff had feared it wouldn’t go through in time for Wednesday’s game, so Curtin ran the last few practices planning for Cory Burke to start instead. That’s what ended up happening.

“From the moment we made the decision to the moment it got approved by the league was something totally different,” Curtin said. “It was really late in the game. I just didn’t think it was right to change there.”

It worked out in the end. Burke scored what ended up being the winning goal with a fine header off a Kai Wagner free kick, and Carranza played the last half-hour as a substitute for Mikael Uhre.

“I’m going to hold [Carranza] to the standard of being the next Taty Castellanos,” Curtin said, referring to the New York City FC scoring ace who has 39 goals in 59 games over the last two seasons. “I’m going to keep saying that name and it’s going to probably drive him nuts, and I hope it aggravates him. But I’m going to keep saying it until he becomes that, because he has the talent to do it.”

» READ MORE: Julián Carranza came to Philadelphia with a chip on his shoulder

When Stuart Findlay walked into the Subaru Park media dining room to get dinner last Friday, he expected to be moving back to Europe two days later to join England’s Oxford United.

But then Jack Elliott suffered a minor knee injury, and suddenly the Union needed Findlay to stick around. So he agreed to stay here for another week, and ended up playing every minute Wednesday in south Florida’s summer swelter.

“He’s such a professional and such a man and a great player that he agreed to stay on to get us through these two games,” Curtin said. “The open dialogue we had with Stu, he’s a guy I trust a great deal. ... I can’t say enough positive things about him in the locker room, what he’s done for the club every time he stepped on the field.”

There will be some kind of official farewell Saturday night at Subaru Park when the Union host the New England Revolution (7:30, PHL17).

“We still have one more party together,” Curtin said, “and I hope the fans can send him off the proper way.”

» READ MORE: Stuart Findlay will leave the Union later this month