Go back through the thread. Our dutch friend tried to make a link between pro/rel and the transit system in the Netherlands. You were here for it and even liked one of my responses.
I think he still has me on ignore for calling him out on his presumptions that kids of African immigrants were being tricked into signing for English clubs, because despite being born, raised and educated in the Netherlands, they somehow didn't speak good Dutch. And that's the nice version that assumes his final explanation was sincere and not just desperate backpedaling.
By their MERIT of not being rich enough to have a deeper squad the pro/rel system would rightly punish them.
This is also why successful parity measures or strict roster budgets aren't a great fit for open leagues. When teams are close enough in quality that an injury crisis can be the difference between a run at the Supporters Shield and finishing near the bottom of the pile, it's not only harsh but may also be inappropriate. A goal of pro/rel is to dynamically sort teams into competitive tiers. If you're relegating a team that when fully fit could be a title contender, is the system failing in that goal?
And even when you show interviews with players who state that injuries played a part in relegation, the true believers will just say "well of course a player will say that". I can make an argument against this. Not saying you're wrong but here we go. Pro/rel theory 101 states that promotion and relegation should be made on sporting merit. This gets tossed out the window once you allow owners to spend their way (of go into massive debt in some cases) clear of any chance of participating in the pyramid. I'd argue that a true pro/rel system should have parity measures at each tear so that truly the best team wins rather than the current system where the richest team wins the top flight at the recently-relegated teams from the top tier have extra parachute money to play with thus giving them an advantage in payroll. Each level should have a salary cap and salary floor to preserve the sporting merit of the competition. Most pro/rel leagues, however, operate in a system where the deepest pocket book or credit line rules the roost. We see that in Major League Baseball where the richest teams are far more likely to win their leagues and pro/rel isn't even a factor. It's a symptom of an open system. But that still doesn't eliminate factors like injuries. You could build a redshirt rule where if someone is injured for a certain amount of time, you can replace that player without taking a salary hit.
Spurs ownership made a decision to make absolutely 0 investment in players during the summer transfer window, so while you could argue the injuries themselves are a bit unlucky, not having appropriate cover is their fault. The same way the owners of clubs know that a bad run of form, injuries or a S*** manager could get them relegated, it's their job to take that reality into account and not mortgage the club. And here's the thing, while relegation is painful for a club financially (at the moment it shouldn't be critical if it is the blame needs to be placed at the owners doorstep), quite often it's a breath of fresh air for supporters. My friends a Blackburn supporter and is enjoying following the club now more than he was in the prem. I have heard Swansea, Villa, Sunderland and WIgan supporters on Podcasts all say they have enjoyed the seasons out of the prem more than their last ones in the prem.
What proportion of Spurs 38 league games will Kane miss with this injury? What proportion of MLS playoff games would he have missed had the injury occurred at the start of the playoffs? Also not sure why someone added Son to the list:- he wasn't injured, he was playing in the Asian Cup, something known to be a possibility before the season began.
This is largely why I have often proposed a format of regional leagues with continued expansion and a UCL-esque domestic tournament to decide the overall champion.
More importantly the US need to start attracting and developing young talent to the teams. I am satisfied however with the pace soccer is growing here.
The only issue with this is you limit the amount of times the top teams get a chance to play each other. In theory you could have the same thing in England. But as a neutral or even a supporter which would you prefer, Liverpool playing Arsenal, Chelsea, and Spurs or Tranmere, Wigan and Blackburn?
The only reason to lean towards the former would be because they're the bigger clubs with bigger name players. An effective parity-driven system should mitigate that. You could also look at it from another angle: would you rather see Barcelona vs Man City or Espanyol? In our Super League discussions here, we've seen claims that many people would prefer the latter. Now a US-centric wrinkle might be the lack of guaranteed matches between NYC & Los Angeles teams. With the championship tournament setup to facilitate inter-regional play however, those games might wind up as big events when they do happen.
Me and a few of my boys were debating this. Do you think UEFA will ever expand out of Europe so that MLS teams can compete in the Champions league?
FIFA and the other confederations would oppose it. FIFA actually wants the Club World Cup to grow to something like that. Of course UEFA are opposed to that.
No, UEFA itself not. The members would be dead against it. A remote chance is when certain clubs on the East Coast would join an UEFA league. For decades the UEFA was against cross boarder leagues as the Dutch and Belgian clubs in favour for a BeNed liga experienced. They even proposed an Atlantic League in which clubs from the Netherlands, Belgium, Scotland and Portugal would participate. Since a year however the stance has softened as the UEFA wants besides the big and dominating big six markets a league in which the now by their domestic market limited clubs get a market that can see eye to eye with the big ones. So now they're talking about permitting cross border leagues like the BeNed one. Van Raaij, the one who was the architect of the original BeNed plan some 25 years ago said he had investors ready for that BeNed league, but the Dutch clubs, in contrast to the Belgian ones, arenot so enthusiastic anymore. But in such a league there's no reason (apart frompractical travel issues) why an East Coast club cannot participate in it.
It's so unfair, just because a low flyer has a good day you lose sight of the title. Billionaires' pain is unbearable. Investing hundreds of millions and this is what you get. It's unfair low flyers arenot just relegating, but in the mean time put a stick between your wealthy legs. Newcastle 2-1 Man City RESULT: Champions stunned by Matt Richie ... Mirror.co.uk-33 minuten geleden Anguised Pep Guardiola saw Manchester City's title challenge suffer a huge blow. Matt Ritchie grabbed a late winner for Newcastle from the ..
2 years old but FiveThirtyEight had a pretty good analysis of this https://fivethirtyeight.com/features/dont-be-fooled-by-baseballs-small-budget-success-stories/ There's still a direct line between payroll and winning. The difference in MLB is that there are also playoffs, which can upset the apple cart a bit, but not by much. "No matter how you slice up the data, winning and payroll are linked. Teams like Oakland this year or Cleveland and Houston the past few seasons represent the exception. They don’t demonstrate that payroll is immaterial to winning. They demonstrate that sometimes payroll doesn’t matter, and that’s not the same thing." https://blogs.fangraphs.com/the-battle-between-payroll-and-parity/ Also posted from Reddit last year On average, the team with the 6th highest payroll has won the World Series each of the last 25 years. No team outside of the top 15 has won.
Newcastle United are a big club with a wealthy owner who probably admires Abu Dhabi's human rights record. They're about to spend $27 million on a MLS midfielder who is probably worth half that imho.
I know. My nephew's wife is from Newcastle and a huge fan of them. However for their potential they're chronically underperforming. She's so unlucky to be fan of Feyenoord too. Also chronically underperforming.
Alert the media, Reddit is wrong! The Marlins had the 20th highest payroll in 2003. http://a.espncdn.com/mlb/news/2003/0721/1583823.html It was the second time they won the World Series via the Wild Card Game.