Due to Barbara's great form, he had been heavily linked with a move to the MLS or another high level league. Due to a MLS discovery claim, the rights to sign Barbara in MLS belonged to Montreal Impact through the 2012 season meaning that the club would be the only team in MLS able to sign him unless Montreal trades his rights, according to the league's discovery process. In an interview on 10 January 2012 Barbara revealed that talks with Montreal had stalled because he did not feel Montreal's contract offer was fair and that the club was stalling in signing him. Of the situation, Barbara said, "I felt they were wasting time because they were signing other players but they were in no rush to sign me because they already own my rights. They just weren’t getting back to me. It was frustrating...Now we are in January and as far as I'm concerned we are just wasting time. Plus, I can't talk to any other team because they own me. The problem is in the rules. America has everything that any other country in any other sport should envy. You have facilities and everything in your favor and then you have rules like that. Montreal made me a bad offer. Look, I've scored 20 goals and had 9 assists and I won the best player of the league. And for what? For nothing in America. Because I'm stuck with Montreal and they don't want to pay good money. From what I understand, they are just holding my rights to try to get the best offer from somebody else. How can Montreal own my rights without even talking to me or paying me anything? If they don't want me they should just release me but obviously they want money for me. But who gives the right for that club to own me? That happens only in America. To own me without even talking to me or paying any money to me?"