From the KC study http://www.kansascity.com/multimedia/kansascity/archive/sports/KC_Soccer_Final_Report.pdf we know that each team send MLS 30% of its gate receipt. MLS use that, in addition to national tv and national sponsorship to pay for player salaries and league operation. Seattle ----------- 30,897 Los Angeles ------- 20,416 Toronto --------- 20,344 Houston --------- 17,047 Salt Lake-------- 16,375 DC United--------- 16,088 Chivas USA ------- 15,092 Chicago--------- 14,689 Columbus-------- 14,447 San Jose-------- 14,114 New England ------ 13,732 New York -------- 12,491 Dallas------ ----- 12,441 Colorado --------- 12,331 Kansas City ------ 10,053 MLS TOTAL ----- 16,037 Amount sent to MLS in 2009 to pay for player salaries and league operation: Paid attendance x $25 average ticket price x 15 games x 30%. ******Assume that paid attendance is 15% less than announced attendance in 2009 except for Seattle, Toronto and Los Angeles. Also assume that the average ticket price for 2009 is $25 and the SAME for all teams******* Seattle ----------- $3,475,912 Los Angeles ------- 2,296,800 Toronto --------- 2,288,700 Houston --------- 1,630,119 Salt Lake-------- 1,565,859 DC United--------- 1,538,415 Chivas USA ------- 1,443,172 Chicago--------- 1,404,635 Columbus-------- 1,381,494 San Jose-------- 1,349,651 New England ------ 1,313,122 New York -------- 1,194,451 Dallas------ ----- 1,189,670 Colorado --------- 1,179,151 Kansas City ------ $961,318 Total: $24,212,475 Average per team: = $1,614,165 Teams subsidizing other teams (2009): Seattle -------- $1,861,700 Los Angeles ------- 682,600 Toronto ----------- 674,500 Houston ---------- $16,000 Teams receiving a subsidy (2009): Salt Lake---------- $48,300 DC United--------- 75,700 Chivas USA ------- 171,000 Chicago----------- 209,500 Columbus---------- 232,700 San Jose---------- 264,500 New England ------ 301,000 New York --------- 419,700 Dallas------------- 424,500 Colorado --------- 435,000 Kansas City ------- $652,800 Obviously, ticket prices are not the SAME for all teams, which further skewed the actual subsidy since the high ticket prices are in LA, Toronto and Seattle (I used a flat $25 for all teams because I am too lazy haha): from triplet1: For example, 2010 figure could look something like this: Seattle: 36,000 paid tickets x 15 games x $30 ticket price x 30% = $4.86 mil Dallas: 7,000 paid tickets x 15 games x $22 ticket price x 30% = $0.693 mil The above is the amount that Seattle and Dallas will send to MLS to pay for player salaries and league operation. MLS is all about parity on the field. What about parity in contribution for player salaries and league operation? If every team contribute equally, it would look like this instead: Seattle ----------- $3,475,912-----now send $1.61 mil instead Los Angeles ------- 2,296,800 Toronto --------- 2,288,700 Houston --------- 1,630,119 Salt Lake-------- 1,565,859-----now send $1.61 mil instead DC United--------- 1,538,415 Chivas USA ------- 1,443,172 Chicago--------- 1,404,635-----now send $1.61 mil instead Columbus-------- 1,381,494 San Jose-------- 1,349,651 New England ------ 1,313,122 New York -------- 1,194,451-----now send $1.61 mil instead Dallas------ ----- 1,189,670 Colorado --------- 1,179,151 Kansas City ------ $961,318 -----now send $1.61 mil instead Since this equality is not going to happen, how about a very modest reward for teams that subsidized other teams in the form of allocation money? For example, Seattle: 36,000 paid tickets x 15 games x $30 ticket price x 30% = $4.86 mil Dallas: 7,000 paid tickets x 15 games x $22 ticket price x 30% = $0.693 mil In the example above, Seattle gets a very modest reward of say $48,600 in allocation money (or 1% of what it sent MLS) to buy down the cap of its DP(s). Just a thought. If it's 2% of the $4.86 mil that Seattle send to MLS, Seattle could get $97,200 in allocation money to buy down the cap of its DP(s).
tl;dr:another thread by pc4th about how financially lucrative Seattle is. also, anyone that enjoys the MLS that doesn't support Seattle should feel guilty, you owe it to them.
Heh. That touches on an important symptom of the single-entity model. It dilutes the tribal passion of loving your club and hating the enemy. Along with the revenue-sharing aspect, that may be a good thing (as extreme emotions could lead to nasty consequences), but it does make our fan experience very different than what is felt by fans of clubs who play in open leagues.
Which MLS teams are being subsidized? Which MLS teams are providing the subsidy? Teams subsidizing other teams (2009): Seattle -------- $1,861,700 Los Angeles ------- 682,600 Toronto ----------- 674,500 Houston ---------- $16,000 Teams receiving a subsidy (2009): Salt Lake---------- $48,300 DC United--------- 75,700 Chivas USA ------- 171,000 Chicago----------- 209,500 Columbus---------- 232,700 San Jose---------- 264,500 New England ------ 301,000 New York --------- 419,700 Dallas------------- 424,500 Colorado --------- 435,000 Kansas City ------- $652,800 That's what this thread is about. And Seattle is just 1 of the 16 teams listed. The data also show that Seattle is financially lucrative (which every MLS owners are very thankful for since they get a cut) but that is not the point of this thread. The point is that some teams are subsidizing other teams to pay for player salaries and league operation. I also made a comment how MLS is all about equality on the field yet it is all about inequality in contribution to pay for that equality on the field.
Why do I feel like I'm being trolled? 18 different teams have paid franchise fees. Many teams have been giving the league their gate money for 15 seasons, everyone but Philly has paid more money to the league than Seattle(that might not be true, depending on their franchise fee). To borrow a phrase, the point is, it is a single entity league. The other point is, after one year, Seattle hasn't subsidized anybody. Someone kindly point me to the ignore functionality.
Interesting point, but my question would be, where does all the money go? For New England, taking into account club seats, average ticket price is $34. The reported attendences are very accurate, and they no longer give away seats like they used to. New England --13,732 x 15 games x 25$ x 95% = $6,653,154 They don't pay any rent, then you have to add in concessions. If the average person pays around $10 dollars in concessions. That's an additional $2 million in revenue. Then if you add in sponsors, advertising. You get somewhere near $9-10 million in total revenue. So 3 million goes to the league. That pays for player salaries and operating costs. But where does the rest go? How can the revs be losing money? $7 million in operating costs? That's impossible. I know other teams have to pay rent, or other stadium costs, but still. Does anyone else feel like the owners might be slightly untruthful about how much money they loose?
Actually, he doesn't even phrase things differently. He just copies/pastes the same crap over and over. And actually yeah, Seattle has helped subsidize some of the salaries in the league for this year. They did in fact play last year, sent in 30% of their gate, and then had it split amongst the league. As top contributors, yes they subsidized others.
Assume this, assume that, have you thought that these franchises with lower crowds have owners who have subsidised the league for well over a decade, sinking in hundreds of milions so the likes of Seattle can jump on the bandwagon and rake in the cash? If anything, these older franchises which built MLs are subsidising Seattle's profits. It's not like they were getting 30k+ crowds in USL.
No, they didn't. They may have thrown more money into the pot that is a single entity league;after one year of throwing money into the pot, they didn't subsidize anything. This.
Here's the WHOLE of what I said. I spoke very specifically. Your convenient lack of quoting the whole statement makes it look like I said something that I didn't.
A few things that the analysis misses. Average ticket prices is from 2007 - I know that for RSL moving into a new stadium in 2009 meant a dramatic change to ticket prices (they went up significantly). Also, the average doesn't account for relative sell out rates at each price point (which also can effect the total revenue dramatically). For example, suites at RSL stadium are sold out and their per seat price contribution is significant (30 suites at $30K or more per year)... plus, add to that 1,000 club seats that sell at $2,000 each. You can generate $3,000,000 in revenue off less than 10% of the seats. In 2009, the club seats were 95% sold out for season tickets... at Rio tinto. I'm sure there are similar impacts at stadiums that may have been built since 2007 (the time of the aricle) and the mix of seats DOES matter. I would average general seat prices and then calculate up PREMIUM (suites/club/vip seats) separately - particularly for those stadiums that have their own stadiums. Another example, go to the HDC and see how many of the club seating / suites are sold out for the Galaxy and then conversely look at how many are sold out for Chivas USA... it's a big difference. Club/suite seating is a large contributor to total revenue sold of tickets - much more so than their percentage of the total number and they tend to have much higher sell out rates than general tickets. Hence... regardless of sport professional teams focus a lot of attention on creating/selling those premium seats.
Ok - Just to make it more obvious (using Rio Tinto as an example): Suites - 32 (ranging from 14 to 35 seats per)... sold out - at least $1,000,000 total (if average price is $30k per unit) for about a total of 500 seats. Lions Club - 96 seats at $7,500 each per season. $720,000 total. Club Seats - 1,000 seats at list $2,000 each per season. $2,000,000 total. ------------ In 2009, suites, Lion's club, and club seating were +95% sold by category. The revenue potential for those 3 sections is at least $3,750,000 for seats. Meaning... that RSL could sell out PREMIUM seating (about 1,600 seats of the 20,000) and nearly make the "AVERAGE" dollar amount you designated as the team contribution requirement if 30% of those receipts go to MLS.
I think the MLS has just experimented with less parity with the DP rule being changed a little. I think they are cracking the door so to speak to see what change it effects with regard to league interest. Having some subsidy will always be a good idea but absolute parity where teams are all very close to equal regardless of success in the stands would be boring. At some point I think the fans would become conscious of paying for the other teams that face them. Making it sound like this is about Seattle is a mistake as there are more teams out there paying into the league. Most fans in Seattle want the league to be successful and understand the nuances involved in doing that ..as I'm sure they are in LA as well. LA has subsidised the hole league(aside from the 30% cut) in the signing of David, which from what I read boosted tickets at away games. So rewarding Owners to some extent; and their teams fans for spending the money is good thing and boosts the entire league. A balance that needs to be made by MLS regarding how open a League this will become.
pc4th when are you going on vacation to give all of us a break from your stupid threads? I swear half these threads on here are from you and they all say the same thing. We all could use two weeks of you not wasting our time with your threads!! Everytime I see a pc4th thread it feels like a prostate exam. [ame="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xHKTE75dgE4&feature=related"]YouTube- Family Guy - Prostate Exam[/ame]
Well if you look at it than all the teams in MLS Subsidized Seattle last year because Seattle took players from every other teams roster in the expansion draft and took the money from 2008's gates for their team saleries in 2009. Everybody subsidizes everybody in this league. This is a stupid thread by pc4th is all I'm saying.
I bet Revs are #1 demanding subsidies! Revs has no future in MLS. I feel bad for Dallas, last year was the only teams in MLS worth watching ( win or lose ). Reason why they should let high earning MLS teams should spend more on players, just them pay luxory tax ( not that high ), in the long run its helps weak markets like: Dallas, Colorado, New England and Kansas with TV money and people coming to watch other teams. It works in MLB with Yankees selling out in other cities. Yankees always sellout in Orange County and in Marlins games.
Really? When RSL plays Colorado, I'm not standing in the stadium thinking "Well, win or lose, at least we're all part of the same company! We can all get along!" I'm thinking "******** these guys! Curb stomp Mastroeni!" If your main thought process during a match involves revenue-sharing between teams in a single entity model, I think you're doing it wrong.
"tribal passion of loving your club and hating the enemy" How the hell were able to type that and take it seriously?
Some people think that sport lives and dies on "passion". I take seriously that this is a common belief, not that I necessarily subscribe to it. I think that passion can be misdirected and go too far, such as fan-on-fan violence, and it seems to me that MLS differs a lot from leagues in other countries in this respect. The passion seems to be more focused on the sport and league as a whole than exclusively on the clubs.
Yeah but if you want to be technical about it, they covered that with the expansion fee they paid. we do agree completely on your last sentence however.