Not sure how many people have followed the Nashville FC story, but essentially (note, essentially) the club was lauded as supporter-owned and never was, they got an offer from an investment group to form a USL club with their intellectual property in exchange for 1% ownership in the new club but were never given a valuation, after months of discussion the investor group said "thanks for the offer, but no we're not going to use your IP but you can maybe keep the supporter trust". Here's a good (albeit extremely long) recap of what happened prior to the investor group changing their idea about the IP. All the NFC board members will retain their positions with the USL club and it's beginning to look like those board members were always just looking for a step up. While some fans may just be happy for USL in their town, it just doesn't seem fair that so many fans that believed they owned the club are just getting screwed. So my question is, why do US soccer execs/admins tend to be so shady about this? Or is it pretty common in the sport across the globe? I just am not sure if they think the average fan doesn't realize the shitty trade-offs that have to happen to move up the ladder, or what Sorry if this question seems uninformed, I just have read a lot about this story and as someone who almost bought a "membership stake" two years ago I'm so happy I did not. Those fans got played.