You are almost certainly closer to at least 3 soccer teams than the Revs. When you support the Revs, you're not supporting your local club. A Revs fan from New Hampshire is like a Liverpool fan from St Helens. They leave their real local team (Seacoast United/New Hampshire Phantoms in your case, depending on where you live it might be Portland Phoenix or Vermont Voltage;St Helens Town FC in the hypothetical) to go see the first division game (Revs/Liverpool). There's nothing wrong with that, I'll be at Revs games when they conflict with my local Mass United, but there's no use in pretending the multi-million dollar company in Foxborough is your 'local' team
Good point. The way to be a "real fan" is different for everyone. I'm one who will choose to be a Revs fans as long as I'm alive and there is a team here to support, but I'm fully aware my type of fandom doesn't apply to everyone.
And I am -and was- fully aware that in my neighborhood, in the 1970's, if I took off my Bruins shirt and put on a Flyers shirt, or if I took off my Red Sox cap for a Cardinals one, I would get the living tar whaled out of me by every kid. Then the offending article would be confiscated and destroyed. Not that I would do it in the first place. This outcome was something we all seemed to know would happen, even though it never did because we didn't ever do it.
Nope, Doc will tell you how to be a "Real Fan." He wrote the guide book, and there are specific rules you need to follow.
I am from Utah, so I could switch to supporting RSL and not feel even a twinge of guilt. I don't see a switch ever happening, but during these lean times, I will get some sustenance from my other home team.
Ya, but at some point maybe you need to fish or cut bait in terms of what team to support. If it's Montreal then, I would guess you will be posting mostly on their board. We will miss your posts though.... they've been informative, funny, scathing and brutal, but always a good enticement to come on here and read.
A guide for those in this thread who have become Montreal fans... How do I get to Montreal? Answer Adieu and good luck.
I thought the answer was going to be something like "practice your French." But that's the right way to go. I foolishly wasn't paying attention on my way home last week and I listened to the GPS that directed me to the route that takes 89 through Vermont. There are a bunch of very rural areas in the Cantons de l'Est area, wide open spaces and dairy farms. There were detours, construction, and a mess of stuff that added almost an hour to the drive home!
Yeah, but even when you go that other route, you end up hitting the same cow pasture nonsense near Granby.
Yeah, it's beautiful up there but you're right, it definitely adds time to your drive home. I don't use a GPS when I drive, except in Vermont. It's a friendly and efficient way of directly the army of "Benedict Arnolds" to their new digs in Canada - enjoy!! Introduce yourself over on the Montreal Board. For the few and proud that actually remain here, we will enjoy outscoring on the field and outsinging Montreal, home and away.
Yeah, while I can't say I'd change to another MLS club (unless it was another local team?) I do have to echo your sentiments. Longtime Revs fan, right from day one. I've gone from regular season ticket holder to non-attender to almost non-existent game watcher even on the tv. Since the Revs were truly pretty bad early on, I don't think anyone can accuse me of being a fair weather fan. Even in the early days with a terrible team, you felt like the organization meant something. And trust me, recently it's not been about the results -it's been about the organization. While starting a family has changed some of my financial and time priorities, the Revs (or rather the owners) have managed to alienate me nicely, thank you very much. While I do think the Krafts are savvy and terrific owners for the Patriots, I loathe the fact they own the Revs franchise, which quite obviously occupies a dregs-at-the-bottom-of-the-barrel status. A long time ago I came to the conclusion the Krafts owned the Revs simply to keep the stadium ticking over in the Summer as well as a good ownership-in-waiting position for Jonathan Kraft (which BTW, I don't have a problem with if there was some enthusiasm tied to it). No, it's the fact that quite clearly the Krafts don't give two flying figs about the Revs as a franchise, and also quite clearly don't want to provide any effort or creativity to improving the franchise. To me, that's a huge message -why should I pay money to buy tickets to a team the owners don't even care about? Really, why should I? I would much prefer them to sell the franchise to someone who will at least give it a go. Please Bob, sell them; I'd prefer this even if it meant the Revs eventually folding. At the moment they are the patient on the table dying of a thousand little cuts, bleeding whatever good will and good fans they had. I think I've also got to the point where following the Revs just doesn't interest me anymore and I'm about to opt out (something I've never done with any sports team). But I too would rather have nothing than what is currently being offered -for me personally, what is being offered and done is just too insulting to a fan. However, I do take you to task on the comment of "they are a third class citizen in their own stadium" -I don't think they are that highly regarded to be third.
I don't understand why he doesn't sell them. If he doesn't care about them, why not just sell the franchise? How much revenue can the revs really be bringing in? Is filling venues at Gillette that important? Is the plan to watch the MLS grow and grow and watch the value of the franchise increase as a result?
I think it's all those things...but more so the fact that with his investment in MLS that by now must cost him next to nothing, he belongs to SUM, the marketing arm of MLS. And with that come perks..like International friendlies! Where Bobby and Co. go and jack up the prices..make it illegal to park an automobile on his property without paying a hefty TOLL and just about keep the cash registers ringing during the 90 min of game! If it were up to Kraft. He'd institute time outs, huddles and be able to handle the ball, "Sometimes"...He wouldn't want to confuse his already, paying through the nose to watch 11 min of action, crowd..! All in all, Krafty has got a great racket going on here!
I don't think he would institute anything because he simply isn't paying attention. I don't think he would have known that the league doesn't end ties in Penalty shootouts anymore if it hadn't been for the successes of the 02-07 Revs. In regards to income, I'm sure owning an MLS team and a huge stadium will have its perks the next time the World Cup rolls in. And International friendlies and the likes of which with Man U are extremely lucrative, correct?
Every expansion team pays a franchise fee (which has risen significantly in recent years from what I understand). That fee is, I'm sure, divided up among the existing owners. This cash cow is a way for him to recoup his own initial investment and any losses accrued along the way. I wouldn't be surprised to see him sell after the 20th team is admitted, since MLS has said that it's going to stop there, at least for a while.
I would honestly be very surprised if the franchise fee were straight-up divided among the owners, and not used towards Allocation Money, Marketing, hosting the All-star, and putting on the playoffs/MLS Cup.
Thank you... No ill will to ex-rev, new-impact Benedict Arnolds, (you have your reasons) but the competitive revs fan in me kinda hopes your new team sucks balls and the 'native' Montreal supporters are skeptical and distant to you guys this year. And every year thereafter.
I was going to say that I hope you are stuck mired in the mud of an apathetic franchise for eternity. Then I realized I didn't have to hope for that. Kraft will make sure you will be stuck in that perpetual state of failure forever.