Even that question can be misleading with stadium/equipment depreciation and other Hollywood accounting tricks. The value ($m) of the Rapids seems to be going up steadily, which is a good sign though. For the Rapids, per Forbes.com Year Value ($m) Revenue ($m) Operating Income ($m) 2018 155 18 -6 2017 135 19 -6 2016 110 16 -4 2015 105 15 -3
Time difference is something else to consider. As an alumni of a school that frequently made trips to Hawaii for both football and basketball, the 3-4 hour time difference from Utah (depending on whether Utah was on DST. since Hawaii hasn't used DST since 1945) was a killer. Imagine the six hour difference between Honolulu and the East Coast.
That's nothing compared to the time difference between Seattle and London (8 hours)., but the NFL is ok with that. Again, consider Super Rugby with teams in New Zealand, Australia, South Africa, Argentina and Japan. And finally, back to soccer, the Asian Champions League has many more time zones than that. And if you think a 3 hour time difference is a killer, then I've got news for you, the East Coast is 3 hours ahead of the West Coast. These are all simply excuses. Obviously Honolulu won't get a team because the metro area is small (#56 or something like that), but all the traditional excuses people provide are nothing but excuses.
I don't think that's completely accurate. The fact is that it is more expensive for a team to travel to the islands. Flights, hotels, etc. add up. The NBA/MLB/NFL can handle that. The NHL could too but I can't think of a bigger misplaced idea than a hockey team in Hawaii (well, maybe a hockey team in Phoenix ). Can MLS? Probably but I'm not 100% sure its a sure thing. Can a league smaller than MLS? No. And, as has been pointed out, colleges manage but they do so by allowing another revenue source to make up for it, and the business case of college athletics isn't the same as pro leagues. But the rest (time zones, travel times, etc) I agree, not really an excuse not to do it.
When the Seahawks play in London, the game is at 10 am Pacific just like many of their other road games.
I agree that many of the issues with Hawaii are not very strong but the NFL in London thing is not a great counter-argument. NFL teams individually rarely play regular season games in London. Since 2007 when they started playing regular season games there 17 teams (including Seattle) have only played there once. Another 9 teams have played there twice. Jacksonville (6 times) and Miami (4 times) go relatively often but most teams don't. Houston will go for the first time in 2019. Green Bay has never went. That is nothing like having a league team in a place like London or Hawaii where teams would be going all the time. NFL teams also usually get a bye the week after they go to London. It would be hard to do that for an entire season.
Because Phoenix is literally in a desert. Not exactly conducive to ice (though, yes, I know, ice can form in a desert, but we're talking about the general cultural view of deserts) But mainly it was a joke that of course somebody on BigSoccer wants to over-analyze.
Phoenix is in the Sonoran Desert and Las Vegas is in the Mojave Desert, but yeah, both are in deserts.
And yet RSL and Vancouver can play preseason games in Honolulu. Again, 1 possible trip every two years for Eastern teams, and 1 trip a year for Western teams.
Has any city granted an MLS team ever built a new stadium on entry into the league or soon thereafter?
Orlando, Miami (ahem), Austin, Cincinnati, Minnesota ... It was a rhetorical question to highlight that Aloha stadium wouldn't be an issue because, if we look at the past, a new stadium would be built.