Oh, I'm certain that's it (which is why best-of-three ain't happening, either.) Just saying the Blast did that BOGO offer that included the title game (?) a few years back. I don't think that was terribly effective, either, but I'd have to look.
Ok so that is the baseline. If you have 2 days to sell a game. If you have limited resources to sell a game. 3225 is the number of fans you will get in an established market.... Fans vs attendance There are 4000 people in a city the size of Baltimore who are fans. Fans that want a team to win. Fans vs people in the seats are. We might be screwed here. This game might be f*&**d in terms of a professional league
See, this is what I'm saying. Now, the way the PASL was going, you could sorta make it work because the players didn't make much and you didn't play many games and you didn't travel much. But as soon as you start getting ideas about a national league and some bright boys start talking about seeding the playoffs 1-8 and having best-of-three and all that...it falls apart. Simply not enough interest. There is interest. You can't kill this sport, despite a lot of folks' determined efforts. But there's not sufficient interest to even make it back to the NPSL days. You can't generate enough revenue to do all the things people think should be done.
I agree with Ken at this point. If I had to predict where indoor soccer end up 5-10 years from now, it is likely existing, at that point, in smaller arenas in a PASL-type league. There will be a mostly regional focus in scheduling. As many examples such as the Chicago Riot, Omaha Vipers, and Wichita have proven, plenty of guys are willing to play for free or not much more than that. Some guys are attempting to chase the dream of playing pro soccer, or maybe just enjoy playing for family/friends and/or promoting themselves for local soccer coaching gigs. The PASL model was working; despite the poor pay for players, they showed up to play. No teams are bringing in 10,000 a game, no signs of major sponsors coming in. Local sponsorship often consists of vouchers, gift cards, and/or exchange of services rather than lots of money given to teams. There are few star players for fans to get excited about. Outdoor soccer's rise has taken the most talented players. Larger arenas for indoor soccer will be a thing of the past within a decade.
It's hard to say where this league will be in 5 to 10 years, they could be playing in PASL type facilities or they could still be playing in big arenas too. They might not be playing at all, who knows. Since 1979, indoor soccer continues to play in big arenas even though it has endured poor attendance, poor business/general decisions, good number of poor ownership, poor financial decisions, teams folding, etc. and yet almost 40 years later they are still in big arenas. Even some PASL teams played in larger arenas when the PASL was in operation. Kenn said it best, pro indoor soccer is comparable to a zombie, neither dead or alive, but existing. We said it before and I don't believe that we will see 10000/per game again like in the 80's and 90's. But that is ok with me. If for some reason it did happen, the same people on this board who wanted it, would then be complaining about the higher ticket prices. So enjoy this league for what it is, a small market, low budget, fun to watch and affordable to go to, league. It's not for everybody, but I still enjoy it. This year, I have seen a good number of very good, long overdue, changes to this sport, Such as a great website, You tube, improved leadership, and much improved talent/competition throughout the league. This is a better product than last year and it gives you a little more optimism for the future. Don't know the actual numbers, but it seems the league is making better financial decisions and starting to operate within their means. Also, the MASL also states that it is operating as "not for profit" and not a profitable league. Which is something can't remember reading. Not to say some teams aren't profitable, but in this league your more likely to get a tax benefit than a profit. Who knows, maybe the MASL is working on some bigger sponsorships. It would be less than "a drop in the bucket" for lets say Under Armour, Amazon, WWE, Pepsi, Coke, etc. to drop a million/millions into this league for tax benefits alone. Could also serve as another small source of advertising for them. So, hopefully things will continue to improve and I look forward to more smart decisions/ideas from the MASL. As for the Playoff attendance, lower playoff attendance is nothing new for indoor soccer. It happens every year, teams don't know when they will play, scramble quickly to find dates(especially weekends if available) and then are stuck with less people going to the games, Take the Blast for example, their true fan base is between 3000 and 4000 fans, which greater than the rest of the other team's average attendance alone. They depend on group sales, which they do very well with, big time during the regular season. Maybe what the league could do, for example, is possibly shorten the season to 18 games and go ahead schedule 3 or 4 more home dates per team ( opponents TBA). Then have every team or a number of teams involved in some type of playoff elimination format. Maybe have the teams that aren't in the playoffs have fan appreciation/ promotional games. This way they can have an opportunity to promote the games ahead of time (group sales included) and possibly increase attendance. Also, teams could do better promos for the playoffs, for example make all seats $15, food/parking discounts, sponsored giveaways, etc. I was watching the playoff game in Ontario recently and could not believe how many people were in the upper deck. I think the upper tickets were $12 and lower $16. Why not make all tickets $13 or $14 and fill the lower concourse first. I've seen this happen a lot over the years (regular season games included) and it would look much more attractive on You tube with the lower concourse filled first!
Ya but they aren't charities. They want results for their dollars, not a vibrant sport of indoor soccer. They want a return on investment
They arent charities but I'm sure they donate plenty to charities, Just think of the MASL as a charity or a donation. As far as a return on investment, your right, forget it.
To be fair, there are only two PASL-type facilities left. If anything, the MASL is trending away from that. Could there be another collapse that sees indoor soccer crashing on people's couches again? Sure. But it's assuming facts not in evidence to predict that they'll be back to that in 5-10 years. Also, we never saw 10,000 a game in the 90s, or any other time, because indoor has never averaged more than 8,717 a game (in 1985-86). No team has averaged 10k since 1992. We can't get back to a place we never were. The bright boy who suggested we could easily see multiple teams averaging 5k was overly optimistic, too. We are not even likely to get there anytime soon. Can teams get to 5k? Sure, somebody can. (Baltimore does and Sonora is close, Rochester might if they return and Monterrey did almost 9k one year, though it was 13 years ago.) But not easily and not many. It costs money to generate crowds. Sales, marketing and ticket sales folks are usually the line items that suffer when anxious owners look to cut costs.