This is how important USWNT "stars" are to this league and attendance. Abby Wambach is hurt and she is day to day from what I've read. But I'm praying that she gets better for this game between the Red Stars and WNY Flash at Toyota Park in Chicago. Clearly she is important for this showcase in front of Red Stars fans but more importantly, Fire fans and Chicago soccer fans in general. Abby's name alone will draw hundreds more if not thousands to Toyota Park on Saturday.
I for one think they played pretty well yesterday and with lots of signs for encouragement. They certainly provided a much more entertaining game for their fans than what they were used to from last year.
I kind of "missed" the first weekend, but apparently I wasn't the only one judging by the attendance numbers. I'm really sorry, but outside of Houston, I can't see how we can find any way to paint this into a pretty picture. The numbers were pretty abysmal for an opening weekend as far as I'm concerned. I can understand Washington a little bit, although their following in the past has been quite loyal. But Seattle, which is supposed to be a soccer mecca and Kansas City, which has one league's best teams??? This is just not good.
KC was 97% of the initial capacity announcement. And even though they haven't confirmed the number of seats, I believe that they were over the seated capacity (from what FCKC's tweets said), so it should be considered a sellout.
Yep. And the closer Abby gets to retirement, the more people will go out to see her in other stadiums. It could be their last chance to see her play in person. "Scarcity" sells. And the number of matches that she has left in her career becomes less by the day, hence it has become scarce.
Yes, only one expanded stands game in 2013 (and it was miserably cold). It will be interesting to see if the Breakers can get over the 4400 or so they averaged in WPS. The Harvard Stadium capacity is 30k for football, so it's not easy to use % as a guide for success.
It would be nice if the Red Stars could strike a deal in 2015 and beyond for a few matches per season to be held in Toyota Park. The action there was always intense, and it was a nice soccer environment. For those that didn't watch WPS, this is what the scenic action looked like playing in Toyota Park.
Ah the memories! Those two years were so much fun. And the team we had was awesome. Too bad Emma Hayes didn't know what to do with them. Carli Lloyd, Karen Carney, Megan Rapinoe, Cristiane.
I didn't realize it...thanks for pointing it out. But quite frankly, that depresses me even further. That means they don't think they can draw much more than that (or they would add even more seats...right?). That's even scarier.
I'm not sure how much more room there is to add seats. They already expanded it from 850 to somewhere around 3,000. I think they made a cost vs demand decision to get the ticket prices to a level where they will make just as much if not more than they did last year, so the reduction in capacity vs last year won't hurt financially. I do agree that the reduction in capacity is a little depressing, though.
Last year ownership was talking up plans to build a medium size soccer specific stadium...any word on that proposal?
I'm guessing that will depend on how things go at Durwood for the next 2 seasons. If they're doing well there financially with no indication that they'd have a huge increase in attendance (like a season ticket waiting list), why move?
If there's some kind of revenue sharing, which has been reported on BS to be the case (for what that's worth), then it seems to me that sooner or later the teams that are generating positive revenue are going to insist that teams that aren't generating revenue make changes to generate more or move to where they will generate more.
Well NWSL will have to follow MLS and build soccer specific stadiums if they plan on growing. I think the NWSL will follow the MLS model, it works, they understand what works and what doesn't. In MLS there is revenue sharing but that the league is owned by MLS and the teams in the league are sort of partners in the league. Probably where I think NWSL will be heading too.
NWSL is already single-entity, like MLS. That's why player contracts are with the league, not with the teams.
I am pretty sure that is not right. The National team players do have contracts with their respective federations, but not the other players. The League has no contracts with any players as far as I know.
You sure? I was strongly under the impression that the league did hold the contracts to the non-NT players.... Or, at least, if not the contracts, then some other similar official agreement.
You have it backwards. Trades, waivers, and the discovery process are only possible with a single entity structure. From the Reign Facebook page: https://www.facebook.com/ReignFC/posts/383048385136599
Also, CONCACAF touts the single entity model in this report: http://issuu.com/concacaf2013/docs/nwsl_cstudy2014_final The report is a must read. As I read that page of the report, allocated players sign with their respective federations. Other players sign with the league.
So why do the Canadian players complain that they are not getting paid by the Canadian Federation (well that they want a pay raise)? Should they not complain to NWSL about that pay raise?
Which players? If they are allocated, it would seem that their beef is with the federation. If it is other players....well, about 12 player on each team have to split $200K. It seems that since the Canadian federation only allocates 16 players, some Nat players aren't allocated. Maybe that's the beef. I think it's interesting that the report includes the stream viewership for the Reign - FCKC match as almost 97K. Must be a pretty recent report.
Well, one, the compliant is that they're not getting paid enough by the CSA, not that they're not getting paid. Second, essentially all the Canadian players are allocated, so their contracts aren't with NWSL, so they can't complain there. =edit= Gah, 'd!
I've been working all along on the idea that the nwsl is closely modeled on the MLS, and the report seems to confirm that, acknowledging that the MLS provided templates during the formation of the league. It is a lot easier to find MLS information.
Alright, just to get talk back on attendance... I haven't seen anyone crunch the numbers yet, so here's what I have: Total so far: 16,531 Average: 4,133 Median: 3,064 Obviously, half of all NWSL attendance so far was just in Houston; with such a small sample size, most 'statistics' are worthless. Interesting note: I would not be surprised this year if Portland no longer falls more than two standard deviations above everyone else, as Houston will probably fill the gap. Try to separate Portland's attendance, and you have to ask why not toss Houston in Portland's category - but Houston's attendance will likely be close enough to the rest of the league that there isn't a good mathematical reason to do so.