As much as I would love to see Alaska and Hawaii have pro sports teams in any league, it won't happen, especially in a D2 soccer league. The travel expenses and time involved are just too much. Vancouver and PR are enough of a stretch already. Someday when some new, super fast, cheap mode of transportation is invented, then it may happen .
Well, only if the NASL wants to live up to their namesake's level of financial sustainability. If travel costs weren't an issue, Honolulu would be a viable market. The Honolulu MSA is ranked only six spots below Salt Lake City on the 2000 Census. Unfortunately it's really far and nobody needs that. Besides, Puerto Rico would never join the NASL in that case... Anchorage is a even more ridiculous suggestion. Its metropolitan area (360,000) is in the range of Peoria, Montgomery, Tallahassee, and Fayetteville.
It'd say put an Anchorage team in the NW PDL league and see how they did, but then I look and see it's closer to Texas for all those teams. Oh hey, County Cork! Do you know the Kerns clan? Some of them relocated to the Boston area. Big Revs fans.
I'm telling Pete, dude. It's "Kearns." You can always sign the petitionfor the University of Alaska to add soccer to their athletic department.
Why do you hate the potential Bermuda-Hawaii-Puerto Rico rivalry? It's going to be great. You know, you could fly from the Azores to Lisbon to the Azores and back to Lisbon and cover the distance between Honolulu and Los Angeles. Of course, Santa Clara has it easier being in Portugal's second division -- they aren't expected to pay their players.
You know, you could fly from the Azores to Lisbon to the Azores and back to Lisbon and cover the distance between Honolulu and Los Angeles. Of course, Santa Clara has it easier being in Portugal's second division -- they aren't expected to pay their players. [/QUOTE] Yea they are now in the second division but back in 2002-03 when they were in the Liga Sagres they were professional and had to pay wages. I would love to see Honolulu and Anchorage in the league i know it's not possible this year and maybe next 5-10 years. Just a suggestion wanted to see what kind of feedback it would get
Hawaii: Unfortunatly I just highly doubt it would happen. You have to have someone willing to part with a great deal of money with the slim chance of success. Also you need every other owner to be okay with that trip a few times a season. If you see several teams pop up in California then its a tiny maybe. Alaska: Anchorage is a long way up there too. It is... 1350 miles from Vancouver 1440 from Edmonton 1435 from Seattle, WA 3467 to Cary, NC Again gain 4 teams in California and maybe a few more western cities and then the conversation talks. IMO 20 years if ever.
I'd like to see Alaska and Hawaii form state leagues, so they aren't excluded from the American soccer picture. If they want into a nation-wide league, have the winners of the state leagues play each other for the chance to play a home-and-away against, say, the last place team in NASL or MLS. Win and they're in. I think they'd be so limited in their talent that they wouldn't be able to even come close, but if they managed, then they deserve it.
The playoff itself would be a decision made by the winning teams of the Alaska and Hawaii, along with the NASL or MLS and the USSF. The playoff would be subject to a team's financial ability, and if they didn't have that or proper facilities, then the playoff would be a no-go. If they did, then at that point, funding for the playoff wouldn't be an issue, as the teams involved would certainly have the ability to cover it.
Not financially posible... but this one was more extreme (just 1 game) First Chilean Cup soccer game played in Easter Island http://en.mercopress.com/2009/08/06/first-chilean-cup-soccer-game-played-in-easter-island 2000 miles from Chile
I was making a joke about the financial "issues" that sometimes crop up among small Portuguese clubs... I think the most extreme situation is in France. Unlike the FA Cup, which limits entries based on facilities, the Coupe de France is open to pretty much any club in the country, including teams that play on parks. It also includes clubs from their overseas territories and departments. In the seventh round, the FFF flies the champions of places like Guadeloupe, Martinique, New Caledonia, Reunion, etc and they play Cup matches in Paris. Now, the FFF pays for it, but I think it's pretty cool.
So we go from zero teams capible of making Alaska work.... to several that need a playoff? You're probably on to one thing though For Alaska or Hawaii to work, you'd almost need two teams in that region just to make it work. Same thought with Puerto Rico. Add a second team and you at least make the trip forth it. Play one on friday, another on Sunday, and come home. However I haven't quite yet pulled that horseshoe out of my bum so we'll have to keep dreaming for now. Won't work people.
I think you misunderstood me. I'm not suggesting that there would perennially be a team from Alaska/Hawaii in any league. I'm suggesting that each state have a state league (i.e. - just teams from Alaska in the Alaskan Premier League or whatever, and just teams from Hawaii in the Hawaiian League). The winners of those leagues would play in a playoff if and only if both teams had the financial and structural capabilities of competing in a nationwide league. The winner of that playoff (or, if there isn't a playoff, the team capable of playing in a nationwide league) would play the worst team from the NASL or MLS to determine their level of quality. If they can win that matchup, then they earn a spot in the league, and future teams who demonstrate the financial wherewithal to compete in the league would have a playoff against the Alaska/Hawaii representative. This idea makes it so you don't have a team going bankrupt halfway through a season because of travel expenses. Additionally, the other teams in the league would only have to make one trip to those places a year, so while it would add to their expenses, it wouldn't be the death-knell of any. In order to keep things economically viable, there could only be one team from either Alaska or Hawaii playing in a nation-wide league, otherwise it would be too much for teams to handle. Any team in Alaska or Hawaii would have to have a really strong financial core to make it in a nation-wide league, but if they can do it, there's no reason to exclude them. It could work, but only under those very specific economic conditions.
Problem is... that this isn't even close to being possible. There is only one city/town in Alaska that could possibly handle pro teams and that is Anchorage. A league is not possible. The entire state of Alaska only has 680,000 people (roughly 1 person per square mile). Pop centers of Alaska: Anchorage: 359,000 Juneau: 31,000 Fairbanks: 30,000 None other over 8,000. Anchorage, Alaska pro teams and attendance: Alaska Wild - indoor football - 2,300 Alaska Aces - hockey - 4,000-5,000 Alaska Dream - basketball - low enough to cancel 2009 season
I disagree heartily with your assertion that only one city could support a team. I'm from Elmira, a city of 30,000 in upstate New York, and the ECHL team that plays there has, at this point in the season, an average attendance of 3,799, and if there were a soccer team in the city, I can almost guarantee that it would pull similar numbers. That attendance number would have slotted in right above Charleston in USL-1 last year, and would have been 5th highest in the league. So, using that precedent, you have at least three cities that could potentially support a team on the USL/NASL level. But that's NOT the level I'm talking about. I'm talking about an Alaskan league. This would absolutely, 100% NOT be a professional league. It would be a league akin to the Sammarinese Football Championship, an amateur league that covers a very small portion of the soccer world. In this Alaskan league, you could absolutely have teams from places like Wasilla or whatever. Sure, they would never make it to the big time, but that's not important. The team(s) from Anchorage would be the ones with the best shot at making NASL, but without the sort of system that I'm suggesting, I think they'll be excluded no matter what, and I don't think that's particularly fair to soccer fans in either Alaska or Hawaii.
If the NASL developed a premier amateur tier, I could see an amateur division covering the Great North. Perhaps teams in Anchorage, Fairbanks, Wasilla, Juneau, Valdez, Ketchikan, either Barrow or Nome, and Yellowknife (Yukon). They could play a slightly later schedule, April to August, though most places would require FieldTurf pitches since most of those places are on permafrost. But I still maintain my position, which I stated in the expansion thread, that any pro team for Anchorage would require an indoor stadium. That's something I doubt the people of Alaska would go for.