28, sooner or later

You're pretty angry for a brand new poster. Welcome to BigSoccer. Introduce yourself. And I'm curious how someone from Dortmund is so wound up about MLS expansion in Saint Louis.

I'd commend you on your use of English, but my professional experience is that the German nationals I've worked with have better technical proficiency with English than most native born Americans. Having studied German grammar, I'm not terribly surprised. But I digress.

Again, welcome to BigSoccer. It's not Twitter, and it's not Reddit.

 

That isn't correct. MLS hasn't had a problem with teams playing in non-SSS if the stadium was special built for soccer and has a way to "hide" the non-occupied upper deck. As an example, Mercedes-Benz Stadium and BC Place both of an internal "roof" that hides the view of the upper deck. MBS has never used theirs, but it is there.

 

With only 7 yards around the field part of that seven yards is concrete.

Do you really want players running into walls because they can’t stop?

If it is wide enough then why doesn’t mls4thelou use that as their stadium instead of building a stadium?

Why haven’t there been more games there?

https://www.stltoday.com/news/local...55e233bb-1c20-596d-b6cd-725266875bdc.amp.html

Kitty Ratcliffe who runs the Dome at America’s Center says it would cost hundreds of millions of dollars to retrofit the Dome for soccer.

 

Was Seattle built with soccer in mind like Atlanta?

New England?

 

I think the upcoming media rights deal is an underrated factor in who gets in or not.

https://www.google.com/amp/amp.awfu.../mls-local-deals-2022-packaging-national.html

I'd say MLS is vetting the next team based on stadium, biz support AND what sort of deal they could work media wise.

 

FWIW and I probably don't have the whole context, but I don't really see how Lothsor's questions and positions and points are so out of line.

For example: SSS standards, and standards for NFL stadiums are relevant. And good to know - St Louis would have controlled game day revenues. But clubs can get more out of their own stadiums than game day revenues. Etc etc.

Do you think he's trolling to mislead or just annoy people? Sorry if I'm not helping - but some of the dialogue he's engendering enlightens the situation for me.

 

The trolling comes in when a person who has a long history of posting on this forum with other accounts keeps bring up the exact same points that have already been knocked down and proven to be false and keeps bring up inane counter-arguments that have already been explained to them (ie, why Seattle, Atlanta, and New England are "okay").

In this case, it has been long established that the requirement isn't a SSS, it is a SSS or a stadium specifically designed for a MLS team. MLS has a stadium size of between 20k and 30k in mind when they are approving new teams and if a larger stadium has the ability to be "shrunk" to that smaller size for an MLS game, then they are perfectly happy to accept that situation.

 

Well, there is good and bad in everything. Yes, they would have controlled game day but not concerts or other events. But conversely, they would not have had to pay for the stadium.

Now they will pay for and own the SSS and keep all the revenue. The made an offer to the city to own it, but they declined and will now get very little.

 

Ok. I'll try not to ask the same questions again but I assume the point is "every situation is a little different" - including St. Louis.

 

Are the requirements written down and published?

 

The City already owns two stadiums. They can't afford another one.

There will be sales tax revenue that they will get plus ticket tax revenue I would imagine.

 

Are you asking about MLS expansion or trolling on Big Soccer?

 

The last were published in 2016:

https://www.mlssoccer.com/post/2016/12/15/mls-announces-expansion-process-and-timeline

If you'll notice there is no reference to a SSS, rather a "comprehensive stadium plan".

 

Then why is Detroit seemingly out of the running then?

Ford Field I would think would qualify under a "comprehensive stadium plan" ( whatever that is) as opposed to a SSS?

The owners would control revenue. Much more than the stadium plan back in 2015 in Saint Louis which unfortunately didn't come to fruition.

Doesn't make sense to me.

 

Detroit's issue isn't necessarily the stadium (although, that may be an issue as it is more of a "open bowl" set-up and not conducive to visually shrinking for smaller crowd sizes), rather it seems like the issue is more personal because they performed a bait and switch with their stadium and burned MLS. MLS put a lot of political capital and money into getting Detroit's city council to approve a SSS on the jail location. To have them switch at the last minute to Ford Field pissed off MLS and made them feel like they were used to get the owners' a piece of property for personal development rather than a stadium.

 

You imagine? Please provide some evidence that this is true.

 

There is no seemingly. They are.

 

So technically Ford Field could be used MLS is just mad.

It seems like MLS needs to update the requirements for public consumption. Three years is probably outdated.

 

Not necessarily. As I noted, there are issues with Ford Field's design in that, unlike BC Place and MBS, it can't really support an interior roof to hide an unoccupied upper deck.

MLS's expansion requirements are not necessarily meant for public consumption. They also haven't necessarily been changed..

However, being able to work with and rely upon an ownership group is important. Detroit's ownership damaged that trust factor and, barring a relationship repair, it may result in them not getting a club even if Ford Field did work.

 

I think it would help fans see that the process is transparent.

That way we can discuss before, during and after whether the guidelines were followed.

Also, when we discuss we discuss from a source of knowledge.

Not guessing.

Because now we are all just guessing.

 

Those criteria were put out for the cities/ownership group expansion from 24 to 28 teams. MLS has not yet officially added team number 28.

Once the league publicly announces that they are definitely going beyond 28 then maybe they will list new "priorities". Or maybe not. BTW, they are not called "requirements." The league never said that teams had to meet them or that groups just had to meet the minimums. They were factors that the league would consider.

 

MLS is never going to put out a checklist that the public can use to determine whether or not the guidelines were followed. That is not the point. The league is letting the public know the things that they want to see. We can never really discuss this topic from a source of knowledge since we don't really know how the league weighs each factor. The process is not "transparent" and never will be.