How is the soccer scene in San Antonio? Is youth participation fairly large? How about adult leagues? Is there a decent soccer culture?
Having lived in SA and Houston for about 6 years each I would say Houston has more numbers and diversity in culture which leads to a lot of people playing the game. But San Antonio has no shortage for players and fans. It has a few quality D2/D3 soccer programs at the University level. I think San Antonio has a little bit of an advantage in some ways to filling a stadium, because people there have been begging for more top level sports. If you've ever seen the Spurs support in that city, it is unreal. People also shouldn't forget that San Antonio is the 7th most populated city in the US. And according to wiki, it is the city growing the second fastest of all in the top 15. The city growing the fastest is Austin (11th most populated), which is only an hour away. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_United_States_cities_by_population
How many people physically live within city limits is not an important metric to measure market size. San Antonio and Austin are good and growing markets, but in metropolitan statistical area and TV market size, they aren't not near the top ten.
Absolutely. In terms of metropolitan area though it still ranks about even with Portland and is more than places like Olando, Sacramento, Columbus, San Jose, Salt Lake, and Kansas City to name a few. The TV market is another thing entirely and has to be considered by the league. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Metropolitan_Statistical_Areas
Gordon Hartman confident MLS commissioner sees real potential in San Antonio http://www.bizjournals.com/sananton...-hartman-confident-mls-commissioner-sees.html
Ok, so clearly Don liked what he saw, but we don't hear anything about him saying what was still needed to secure an MLS franchise. Enough is obviously not had. So it's time for Hartman to find investors, now.
Did you think he was going to come out of the meeting and hold a press conference to announce San Antonio as Team #22? Whatever MLS thinks they need, I would imagine they communicated that to Hartman.
I popped into this forum after reading the article on mlssoccer.com this morning to see what's up and if I could learn more. Seems strangely quiet! Honestly, the only thing holding them back I could imagine would be an unwillingness to cut the cheque (or desire to negotiate a better price).
More to do with the owner not having deep enough pockets. If/when they get a deep pocket, they should be green lighted, IMHO.
And when TV markets are taken into account, San Antonio drops to number 36; smaller than the MLS trio of Kansas City, C'bus, and Salt Lake: http://www.nielsen.com/content/dam/...easurement/television/2013-2014-DMA-Ranks.pdf I converted the PDF to this spreadsheet. Put a "1" in a row next to your city of choice. For this case, I added San Antonio. As you see, it adds only 906K TV homes, and a less-then-stellar 0.78% of the country. (In this case, less than 40% of the country is actually covered, with the supposed maximum of 24 teams [21 American teams].)
The TV market is low, but combining that with Austin and San Marcos changes the numbers quite a bit. I'm not sure how well they will draw into those markets, but San Antonio would be the obvious choice for anyone in those cities looking to get into MLS.
Compare that to numbers of 2008-2009 DMA RANKS Market2009 TV Homes2014 TV Homes% of increace Detroit1,926,9701,856,400-3.66% Phoenix (Prescott)1,855,9301,855,310-0.03% Tampa - St. Pete (Sarasota)1,822,1601,827,5100.29% Minneapolis - St. Paul1,730,5301,748,0701.01% Cleveland - Akron (Canton)1,524,9301,484,530-2.65% Sacramnto - Stkton - Modesto1,399,5201,387,950-0.83% St. Louis1,249,8201,254,5300.38% Pittsburgh1,156,4601,181,5402.17% Raleigh - Durham (Fayetvlle)1,080,6801,165,1207.81% Charlotte1,122,8601,157,9203.12% Indianapolis1,114,9701,096,650-1.64% Baltimore1,102,0801,095,240-0.62% San Diego1,066,6801,080,8801.33% Nashville1,016,2901,043,4402.67% Milwaukee905,350916,5901.24% Cincinnati915,570908,440-0.78% San Antonio818,560906,21010.71% Austin667,670733,3909.84%
Indeed, part of the problem most billionaires are over the age of 62 not exactly the demographic who follows soccer.
So if we can claim other markets, Detroit can take in Grand Rapids (#39 with 720K homes), and (to a lesser extent) Toledo (#76 with 409K) and Lansing (#115 with 251K). Net: 3,226,760 homes (Lansing pushes us just over the 3M mark).
That's fair, you have to draw a limit I guess, but it is worth noting that Detroit to Grand Rapids is over double the distance and drive time. Toyota field is on the North East side of San Antonio. For reference, I live in Katy (suburb of Houston), and it takes me about 45 minutes to get to BBVA as a season ticket holder. Its only about an extra 15-20 min. from Austin to the stadium. San Marcos to Toyota field would actually be less drive time than it takes me to go see Dynamo games.
Nice! I live in San Antonio and it takes me 15-20 mins to get there as well. I guess the stadium is located centrally if you take into account San Antonio, Austin, and all the cities in between. (San Marcos, New Braunfels, etc.)
So if Hartman is looking for investors, what about the guy from Italy who was trying to get a Miami franchise before Becks?
Nor are they usually in the demographic that likes to invest in stuff that loses money, for the most part. Bastards.
Why would Butini just randomly pick to move his interests to Texas? Besides, he always struck me as an idea guy, I doubt he has more money than Hartman, certainly not MLS-type money.
why was the Fayetteville stats added to Raleigh/Durham? its nowhere near them it would be like adding Austin and SA together
Those are TV markets. Austin and San Antonio are separate DMAs. By comparison the Amarillo market is the entire Texas Panhandle plus parts of Oklahoma and New Mexico.