45+ of those (including 2 in my city area) perpetually stuck in a minor league. WTF does this even mean
Ok, not sure how this is a positive takeaway, but sure Yeah cool but let's see how that goes long term - obvs. St. Louis has hit "Garber's Millions" so you can take them out of that hat. Let's see how long SD Loyal is satisfied to be losing to reserve teams. Ok now do Rochester
And? Your club grew from NPSL in 2009 to a fully fledged professional team in a pro league. You guys moved from the semi-pro amateur leagues to being big time professionals. There's nothing minor league about non-MLS lower division soccer, its called professional soccer.
Closed leagues are "pointless" because teams never to up or down based on their performances on the field of play. Four Premier League teams have played at the fourth level in the last 30ish years. One was one goal from relegation out of the Football League, as was another a little longer ago than that. Heck, not so long ago Man City and Leicester City played at the third level. That fluidity based on performances on the field of play is exactly how it should work.
You do when he is specifically calling out Sheffield's performance as indicative of a counterpoint to the argument.
Please, Man City has spent one season of its entire existence outside the top 2 divisions, over 20 years ago. Likewise Leicester City has spent one season in the third division in its history, though more recent than Man City. The total number of seasons spent by current EPL teams in the 3rd division or lower since the founding of the EPL: Brighton: 16 Bournemouth: 14 Burnley: 7 Sheffield: 6 Southampton: 2 Watford: 2 Leicester: 1 Norwich City: 1 12 of the 20 teams haven't dropped below the Championship in almost 30 years and only 4 have spent any significant time below the Championship. Out of 540 seasons 49 of them were played below the Championship, less than 10%.
You made it sound as though the argument is somehow negated because he chose a poor example to include. It isn't.
So 40% have. Thanks for illustrating my point. Also noted you moved the goalposts from the 30ish years that would have included Wolves as well (88/89 was their last third level season). So in fact 45% - higher than I relaliized - of this season's Premier League have played at the third level or lower in the last 30iish years. Quite remarkable. And on the flip side, 10 of the inaugural Premier League season have played subsequently as the third level of lower.
27 seasons qualifies as "30ish" and it corresponds with the sea change that happened when the EPL broke away from the EFL. If you have a specific time frame in mind you can do your own research or give a more exact number than "30ish". Also I noticed you decided not to readdress your Man City/Leicester City point. Wise choice.
It did. When pro/rel was re-introduced, only "associate members" could be promoted into the league. The fee was not as high, but clubs had to pay the J-League membership fee just to become associate members eligible for promotion.
I don't see any definition of 30ish that could legitimately exclude Wolves. If I'd wanted to say since the start of the Premier League, I'd have said "since the start of the Premier League". There's nothing to readdress. Two Premier League champions have played at the third level in that time period.
Right, I was confusing VSI Tampa Bay and FC Tampa Bay (the Rowdies). Both had committed to NASL in 2010 and both moved to the current USL. USL is a perfectly legitimate, and growing league. I think the teams are doing a better job of launching as time goes on. Obviously one or two, like Austin, have missed the boat. Independent USL-C teams' 2019 attendances by expansion season:
No it's minor because it's not sanctioned as a division 1 league. Call it lower division if you prefer, but really all you're trying to do is split semantic hairs for some reason.
Thanks for your input. Sure, I'm spreading discourse and splitting hairs coming from someone who assumed that I'm anti-pro/rel.
MiLB is "professional baseball", too. Likewise, the Tulsa Roughnecks have as much of a chance to play in the big leagues as the Toledo Mudhens.
Theoretically, sure. Realistically? I'm a little more skeptical. I suppose their attempt to cannibalize NWSL might be their trial run. I can't think of anything more American-style late capitalism than the entirety of both the men's and women's professional pyramids being owned by a private equity firm.
"American-style late capitalism" LOL. That's gonna leave a mark. Wait until how every other country including your favorite European league has private equity organizations like DFL, Lega Serie A, and LFP administering their top popular divisional leagues in their respective countries. In addition to oligarchs owning popular European superclubs that American fans follow!
I'm sorry but Aston Villas objectives are to become European Champions and not simply relegation certainties like people have suggested in the past about promoted teams (FFS Jason I'm not necessarily directing this at you). So let's get this straight once and for all then 'move on'. It has been claimed that pro/rel is pointless because promoted teams go straight back down or they have no ambition - BOTH of these (frankly rudiculous) claims have been proved plain wrong time and time again (like I said they would), the league's will CONTINUE to be 'fluid' you don't need to be a rocket scientist to know that goid teams MAY take a little bit of time to get worse and bad teams MAY take a bit of time to get better, this will depend on the long term management but as history has proved and is continuing to prove anybody can go down and anybody can come up - I don't even know if pro/rel is good or bad for the US right now but I DO know the claims that top teams will ALWAYS be top and promoted teams will ALWAYS be relegation fodder is poppycock.