Arturo Galletti at the blog The Wages of Wins and Journal has crunched the numbers to see what cities could economically support professional sports teams. Using this chart I will put together a pro/rel pyramid. I will take only the cities with Yes marked next to them. I will not include cities with Marginal marked next to them. For Div #2 I will just combine nasl and uslpro teams into one league 18 team league. I’ll just number all divisions from 1-4. For League 3 I will divide the teams into conferences. The 4th division will be divided into regional leagues. Just for fun I will include the promotion/relegation rules and for clarity I will give each league under MLS a generic name. This post is just to see how such a pyramid would look if we slotted in the most viable economic soccer markets into a pro/rel system. I hope it doesn't turn into a flame war and i hope i don't get nasty PM's because of it. 1. MLS LA Galaxy Chivas Chicago Fire NY Red Bull Columbus Crew Portland Timbers Seattle Sounders Vancouver Whitecaps Montreal Impact Toronto FC San Jose Colorado Rapids New England Revs Houston Dynamo Real Salt Lake DC United Philadelphia Union Sporting Kansas City (relegation zone) FC Dallas 2. MLS League 2 NY Cosmos (promoted) San Antonio Scorpions (2-5 promotion playoffs) Tampa Bay Rowdies Fort Lauderdale Strikers Atlanta Silverbacks Carolina Railhawks Minnesota Stars FC Edmonton Puerto Rico Islanders Charleston Battery Charlotte Eagles Dayton Dutch Lions Los Angeles Blues Pittsburgh Riverhounds Rochester Rhinos Harrisburg City Islanders (relegation playoffs with 3rd tier) Richmond Kickers Wilmington Hammerheads (relegation zone) Orlando City 3rd tier United Soccer Leagues East: Providence (promotion) Boston (promotion playoffs) New York #3 Chicago #2 Hartford,CT Trenton, NJ Detroit Long Island,NY Miami (relegation) Akron (relegation) West: East Los Angeles (promotion) Boise (promotion playoffs) Tucson Sacramento San Diego San Francisco Tacoma Austin,TX Colorado Springs (relegation) Corpus Christi (relegation) 4th tier - National Soccer Leagues Eastern Soccer League Scranton,PA (promotion) Bethlehem,PA (national promotion playoffs for 1 3rd tier spot ) Poughkeepsie,NY New Haven,CT Manchester,NH Lancaster,PA East Lansing, MI Syracuse Albany Lancaster,PA East Lansing,MI Western Soccer League Santa Rosa (promotion) Riverside,CA (promotion playoffs) Modesto Long Beach,CA Fresno, CA Santa Barbara/Ventura El Paso Phoenix Albuquerque Bakersfield Southern Soccer League Chattanooga (promotion) Columbia, SC (promotion playoffs) Baton Rouge Pensacola, FL Louisville Lexington Knoxville Jacksonville Jackson Memphis Pensacola,FL Little Rock Greensboro Durham,NC Birmingham,AL Greenville, SC Mid-Western Soccer League Tulsa (promotion) Omaha (promotion playoffs) Madison,WI Grand Rapids, WY Des Moines Toledo Cleveland St Louis Indianapolis Cincinnati
The two I noticed right away are Tampa Bay and Pittsburgh which are both in the 2nd tier. whereas the Riverside/San Bernardino/Ontario and Oxnard/Ventura/Thousand Oaks + Santa Barbara/Santa Maria/Goleta combined as one (which are both separately "Yes," btw) are in the 4th tier.
I would venture to guess that is because Tampa and Pittsburgh already have existing professional D2 (NASL) or D3 (USL Pro) teams. Whereas Riverside et al do not.
Well the OP did say: "I will take only the cities with Yes marked next to them". And I figured the MLS 2 would require more support than the current NASL and USL Pro.
yes i just took existing teams and put them in 2nd tier rather than divide them up. Eventually the better teams would be promoted to MLS 2
also...i'd just add that just because these cities could financially support a professional team it doesn't mean that there would be fan support for the teams. That would take for the sport to grow and some good marketing. The data from the link i provided just shows the potential cities for professional soccer. For instance, how big is soccer in the south? I think most people would say not very big at all. Optimists would say its an untapped region. If you included the marginal teams from the chart as well as cities that could support lower tier clubs you could in theory fill out a pyramid that is several more tiers of regional soccer leagues.
This would be my dream come true. I would make MLS 20 teams by having NASL champion be promoted and after that 19-20 auto relegation with 18 going into playoff with #3 in NASL. LOVE IT!
LOL @ CCSUltra Enjoyed reading this thread, as I always do threads about promotion/relegation, good to see what actual cities would be included in something like this. What about the idea of having regional leagues, with each league having its own system of promotion and relegation. Each league could have a "European flavor" based on the history and culture of each region NY/NJ (Italian) Boston/New England (Irish) Pennslyvannia/Maryland (German?) Virginia (English) St. Louis/KC Texas (Mexican) Socal/SW US (Mexican/Spanish) Norcal Colorado/Utah (English) Chicago/Minneapolis (German/Scandinavian) Michigan/Ohio/Western PA (German/Dutch) Florida (Spanish) Deep South New Orleans (French) From this rough group of leagues, the top teams in each league would play a national schedule similar to the Champions League. The Champion of this tournament, would pay the MLS Champion to start the season, similar to the domestic cup winners against league winners. Maybe also have a League Cup similar to England where the top teams of each league play against MLS teams in a season long tournament.
Regional leagues that held national playoffs would take off before pro/reg with MLS involved. Ok, I admit I just made up that bit of trivia.
How can anyone argue against this pyramid? I live in a city with a 3rd tier team. I would be there every game supporting them to the top!
Because Don Garber has zero interest in my city unless a brown paper bag shows up on his front door step. Still swinging from Don Garber's nuts HTK?
I was ripping off Brazil, actually. I'm sure the PDL does something similar, but, will never have MLS involvement.
So in reality you're only interested in top-level play. So why add a bunch of non-top-level teams? What about all the other people who are only interested in top-level play in markets currently in MLS that would leave the fanbase when their team is relegated?
Had to be swinging from them in the first place in order to still be doing so ... sorry to disappoint you. I support my lower than MLS level club. I go to their matches. You don't even support the club you do have ... your involvement in any discussion on the matter is as legit as as a blind man being called as an eye witness. You don't give a rats ass about anything other than you getting what you want. EDIT - what Jasonma said.
This is a common problem, all these people want promotion/relegation, but then they don't even support their local team. You want to know the only way to get promotion/relegation? Support your local club (regardless of whether it's NASL, USL Pro, PDL, or NPSL) so well that MLS is forced to compete with them. I support my local NPSL team. $30 for a season ticket plus I get a free shirt. Can't beat that value.
yes i think support for lower division clubs even if they are not in pro/rel system is important to create a soccer culture in that city.It can be demoralizing supporting a team that cannot be promoted and attendance is obviously stunted by this reality. I don't really see this as a common problem however. If team A doesn't get the support then they will just eventually drop to the lowest league.
I just bought season tickets for my hometown D4 team. It doesn't matter if a team can get promoted or not. I'm going because I support my team. Attendance is not stunted by the lack of promotion and relegation. It's stunted by people not caring that much about their local team.
I don't mean that it's a problem for teams individually, I mean it's a common problem for those that want a pro/rel system in the US and then don't even back it up by supporting their local lower tier teams. Even if there isn't official pro/rel, if a team in a is doing well financially and getting good support, they could probably easily move up a tier until they get to NASL if the ownership were so inclined. btw, I wasn't saying you personally are one of those people, just in general it's quite often the case.