Short of the team building a private tramline from the loop to Toyota Park, I'm not sure that even a $$ and marketing investment is going to change much about the lack of MLS culture in this city. Winning would help (and crowds were decent last season when the team was doing well, but fell off in the fall) but with so many other sports and entertainment options in this city why spend your $$ on a team that plays in a stadium that forces you to spend almost as much time sitting in traffic getting to and from the stadium as you do watching actual gameplay. I'm probably overly optimistic about the Lincoln Yards stadium site, but it's not like the future of the alternative is great. In a lot of ways I almost can't blame Hauptman for not spending much on his team since it's not like he's going to get much back for his investment.
That's the fvcking problem, he hasn't spend ANYTHING on the team. If it wasn't for all the accumulated TAM/GAM, help from the league and Adidas last year we wouldn't of happened that kind of year and we probably would have won the Wooden Spoon again (Three-peat). Under his ownership we have made the playoffs 2 times the last 8 years. If he sold the team today, he probably would make close to $200,000,000. He bought the team for $35,000,000 back in September 2007, value of the team is as of 2017 is $240,000,000. The reason he hasn't is because the league isn't done expanding, once the league gets to the 28th, 29th or 30th team he'll consider selling. https://www.statista.com/statistics/477837/team-value-of-mls-soccer-teams/