So now that we know Team 20 will be NYCFC, what should the schedule format be? I have two ideas: 1. Two conference of 10 clubs with each conference having two divisions of 5 clubs 1 game against each club in the other conference (10 games) 2 games against the clubs in the other division of your conference (10 games) 3 games against the clubs in your division (12 games) 32 games 2. Two conference of 10 clubs 3 games against 1 rival in your conference (3 games) The rivals could be: Colorado-Real Salt Lake San Jose-Portland Seattle-Vancouver Los Angeles-Chivas USA Houston-Dallas New York Red Bulls-NYCFC D.C.-Philadelphia Chicago-Sporting Kansas City Toronto-Columbus Montreal-New England (or Toronto-Montreal and Columbus-New England if you insist on pairing Canadian clubs) 2 games against 8 clubs in your conference (16 games) 2 games against half of the other conference (10 games) 1 game against half of the other conference (5 games) 34 games
I have actually come around and am in favor of a single table 20-team league playing everybody twice for 38 games and that's it. We are already playing over 33 or 34 weeks. International-heavy years (of which 2015 is not one) would be problematic, but I am nearly as tired of the constant switcheroo as I am of the constant "here's how many times everybody plays everybody else" circlejerk. This is not realistic, I realize that, and can't hold past 20 teams anyway.
Can't hold with 20 teams, either. They tried it, and everybody involved in actually playing the games came up very much not in favor. And that was with 18.
I'd go with this one. 38 games in just too much for country as big as the US. It might go if there were no playoffs, but I can't think of an American league without playoffs.
And how much more rest between games does soccer require than those sports? If MLS wanted everybody to play everybody else twice a year and have the U.S. Open Cup/Canadian Championship and playoffs (and CONCACAF Champions League for some clubs), MLS should have stopped expanding at 18 clubs.
Makes me think... should promotion and relegation ever happen, I believe a 16-team top league would make even more sense. Since travel is the big issue with a large league, 30 regular season games a year would limit the quick-turnaround coast-to-coast travels. Single table might be feasible. And of course, a better pyramid would mean a stronger, bigger Open Cup. We would have more room to devote to the CCL, which would hopefully be on a larger, more impressive scale by then. And if Copa Lib ever happened for us... And then you can cap it all off with an 8-team, conference-free playoff, without the boring "everybody plays the same teams again" to qualify for the final. But in all, with a slightly less congested regular season, we could see MLS having fewer issues with international dates. Anyways. If pro/rel ever were to happen (which I find doubtful), this would be the ideal top tier to me.
This isn't bad. I'm sure Seattle and Portland would prefer to be matched up as "rivals" but i suppose there isn't much difference between two games and three. I would guess that New England would prefer to be matched up with one of the New York teams. Wonder how much pull Kraft has these days.
20 team league format? It's not brain surgery. single table league champ is team with most points at the end of season. MLS cup- top 12 in post season cup tournmanent that is seperate from regular season.
We'd have to have WAY deeper, bigger, scarier rosters to handle that kind of congestion. That, or every bit of side silverware is going to get quickly forgotten, like CCL or the Open Cup. Neither of which are things we want to see.
considering the single table format is used by 99% of the countries that have football leagues your concerns are pretty much malarkey.
My concerns I just voiced have nothing to do with problems with single table. It's all an issue of fixture congestion and travel. And especially roster size. Please try again.
I don't see a problem with fixture congestion (anymore than exists now) but if you do then feel free to expand on that. As far as travel goes have you actually crunched the numbers? There's not a huge mileage difference between balanced and unbalanced. Not enough anyway that such a drastic league schedule should be implemented. There are only 18 league road games and with smart scheduling (road trips for clubs going east to west and vice versa) you could manage a balanced schedule very easily.
Well, if we play an English-length season and then add on that additional month+ of playoffs after that, we'd be looking at an 11 month season rather than the current 9 month one we use. Does that not seem like... a lot?
Someone in another thread suggested that MLS' current schedule is peanuts compared to the NHL's 82 games or the 162 game baseball marathon. If we assume that we are all wrong about the turnaround time needed between soccer games, why not play all 38 games in July and August.
They're already playing a 34-game regular season. You only need to add four midweek games - say, on a Tuesday night, once per month - and you've fixed your problem.
Except for the costs incurred to open stadiums for low attendance. Not to mention finding 4 weeks that aren't taken up by USOC CCL, Canadian Championship, the ASG, and international weeks. All for what, so a few soccer fans can feel better about the "real" champion? What are you gaining?
I haven't updated this in a year or two, but it should still be workable. It's the 2013-14 MLS Schedule Challenge: https://docs.google.com/spreadsheet/ccc?key=0As10j-DGAGHzdGs1ZUJvZ0lnN05XOElubERzZnlaVFE&usp=sharing The Challenge is simple. If you think it's so easy to fit four more midweek games into the MLS schedule...knock yourself out. Fill in the fixtures. Don't forget to leave enough midweek dates for the U.S. Open Cup, Champions League, and of course the World Cup.
If only it were that simple. And in some years, it would be. But with the Open Cup, you're basically taking late May and some of June out of play, and in years where there is a Gold Cup or Qualifiers, yeah, you're already probably up against it. We can't have an MLS that stands down for FIFA dates and increase the number of fixtures and have an Open Cup and a Champions League and do everything, not just with the roster numbers teams have, but with the sheer number of days in the calendar that are conducive to selling tickets.