promotion and relegation*

Please provide me with your 501c3 number so I can research your group.

Thanks.

 

Correct it's a free country. There are plenty of clubs at the PDL and NPSL level. They come and go as they feel fit.

If the clubs in the USL or NPSL wanted to start a pro/rel without the MLS- is anything stopping them? NOPE. There is nothing today saying the NPSL can't go to a 2 level set up as NPSL Premier and NPSL 2. But they have chose not to do it.

There are still penty of rooms in today's soccer world for any club to form, and either find their league, or create their own. What is stopping them?

 

sorry, as an advocacy group who lobbies Congress, your contribution is not tax deductible. We are not a charity.

 

I don't think we should be wasting the top of the officially sanctioned pyramid for a domestically focused system that enforces parity through enforced mediocrity, and you do. Agree to disagree, for goodness sakes.

 

The site needs a lot of improvements.

First it should not take side on particular league format (i.e. single table), it should just concentration of support for pro/rel.

It's not clear what it's doing, and where the donation goes.
It should focus on pressuring MLS and owners, make fans aware of it, but more importantly petitioning to USSF and FIFA.

 

It is also not clear what will ever happen with my money. He mentions on these threads, lobbyins congress, meet ups, grass roots efforts, multi media.

I did a google search and saw nothing other than his website. You can be as secretive as you want, but if it looks like a duck, walks like a duck, and talks like a duck.....you know the rest.

 

Okay we disagree. Now this means you have stated your point, I have stated mine, so there is no reason for either of us to continue on this thread? correct?

 

Thanks for your comments. It's a work in progress - nobody, to my knowledge, has ever put together an organized effort like this before.

It's not really about pressuring anyone, it's about proving that most American supporters understand promotion/relegation, educating the rest about how it would improve the game, and finally proving to all the naysayers that there is a large group of supporters that could be tapped once it is finally implemented.

The average American supporter isn't watching MLS. We're out to get them.

 

Then what does this have to do with lobbying congress?

 

You're right. It's about making my fortune off of unsuspecting American soccer fans.

 

gotta take your supporters where you can get 'em.

 

If I didn't love this conversation, I wouldn't be here. I enjoy parrying all the fear based arguments against the most successful sports league model on the planet.

 

so in other words, even though you said we should agree to disagree, you are not going to shut up.

Then I will continue to point flaws into your arguement everywhere.

 

You love it far too much to be considered healthy. Latest update in the past two hours: ten posts in this thread, eight posts in a similar thread over at the NASL section. A grand total of 18 nonsensical posts getting off for pro/rel in a two hour span.

You need psychiatric attention, bub.

 

you are stalking him?

 

You want American soccer to be more like the NFL, I want it to be more like the EPL.

Who's crazy?

 

...how can you do that when you don't really appear to understand it yourself?

I looked at your site, and beyond the idealistic dreaming exhibited there, it had nothing of substance.

Nothing at all to suggest why introducing pro/rel would create enough clubs to fill the 160 club structure you dream of.

Nothing at all to suggest how the relegated MLS clubs would survive relegation.

Nothing at all to suggest how promoted the currently unviable clubs would improve MLS.

In short, nothing at all to suggest you've thought it through at any higher than daydream level.


I think there are probably quite a fair number of people in the USA, even among those disagreeing with you in this thread, who quite like the "dream" of having a strong league structure with dozens and dozens of pro clubs moving up and down the divisions. They just realise there's a little more to getting to that possibility that just introducing pro/rel.

 

you.


1. G14 made a move to become a league in the model of the NFL before UEFA stopped them...even Euro clubs want to be the NFL

2. Championship/League 1 and 2 talked about salary caps like American leagues

3. NFL is the biggest league in the world as far as revenue and attendance and TV viewers. Has the biggest sponsors and media contracts in the world.

4. NFL has some of the highest paid athletes in the world easily eclipsing even the top paid players in all of the soccer world. A very small handfull of players globally can make more money overall than NFL players but this is due to sponsorships not from league pay. But as far as pure NFL vs EPL money spent on players salary it is not even close.


If we become 'like' the NFL someday, MLS will have the biggest league in the world with the largest amount of fans, biggest stadiums, highest values, and most of all highest paid players in the world. Yea you are right...who would want that?

We could have a 4 team race run by billionaires who are loosing massive amounts of money. Where clubs are not making pay roll. If there is a bubble in the sports business world it is not in MLS like you suggest it is certainly in EPL. The market is sustained by Man City and Chelsea happily loosing hundreds of millions of dollars. The highest value team Man United has more debt than it is worth, had to sell a record transfer just to cut into their losses. This is what you want! They are doing it in england, where the game is king where the game was founded, where soccer is #1. Here soccer is #4 at best and probably lower to be realistic. You think we are going to find russian and middle eastern oil billionaires throwing hundreds of millions of dollars at teams all while loosing money in the US?

The fact that you have a website asking for people to give you money so you can somehow magically turn the US off a path paved by the most successful sports league in history onto a path where teams are swimming in massive debt, with record losses, and unable to even meet payroll. If it were a viral joke campaign by some blogger...then I would love it and laugh right along with you. But I fear you actually believe this.


this is coming from someone who hates the NFL and watches about 100X more EPL than NFL. I love EPL, but I also run a business and am not an idiot. I can understand smart business with irresponsible business, and EPL has become irresponsible. Go on any english site or listen to any english journalist and they say the same thing. There is no one on the planet that I think agrees with you other than a few very young and very uninformed americans on big soccer.

 

Because I don't judge American soccer by the inability of MLS to reach the vast potential of an American first division.

Americans lead the way in World Cup ticket sales
It's been the most popular youth sport for thirty years
European friendlies sell out huge stadiums
MLS average attendance records were set in 1996.
For every MLS cable tv viewer, there are 25 WWE viewers

Thanks for your criticisms, but if you are able to ignore this disparity, you are not our target audience...

 

the euro clubs want to make money, but quite a few have rules in place that make them unlike the NFL clubs, where generating guaranteed profits is the objective.

Not really true. The proposal was to limit clubs to a % of their turnover, so they didn't overspend (as some clubs overspending puts the onus on other clubs to also overspend, or risk being at a disadvantage)

hmm, I'd wonder about tv viewers these days. Nationally, I'm sure it has, but worldwide?

Per person, the premiership actually generates more money through tv now I think, although that's due to how that money is generated (subscription rather than just ads)

with wishing to risk pc4th jumping in, part of that is down to the culture of pay scales in soccer. You don't see the stars in each team earning 5 - 10 times the salary of the average memebers of the team.

there's certainly truth in that, but some of it is due to the open market. If the were international rivals to the NFL, that weren't salary capped, the NFL would be ruined.

You can blame that entirely on Glazer. He moved his personal debt onto the books of the club, and it's a massive disaster on the brink of blowing up in his face. The club was actually in the black before he took over.

As the saying goes (and has for as long as I can remember) the only way to make a small fortune out of football is to start off with a large one.

The sport isn't geared towards profits. It's about re-investing any profit made in the squad to make the squad better. And pro/rel, as well as a lack of parity, is a big reason for that. It's not necessarily a bad thing. Those clubs that get themselves in a mess usually only have themselves to blame.

 

I said before, your plan is...

1) introduce pro/rel
2) ???
3) large league of pro clubs

You've given no thought whatsoever to how you get from 1 to 3.

That's just bluster. For pro/rel to work, you need a large number of viable clubs. Without it, you'll just see relegated MLS clubs fold one by one, with nothing to replace them.

You've given no thought to where those missing clubs are going to come from.

Your problem is you aren't listening. You aren't responding to the flaws being pointed out to you. Until you do that then why should anyone here, let alone in a position to do anything, take your campaign seriously?

 

I get it now, he's an underpants gnome.

Exactly.

 

He kinda reminds me of this guy

 

Ahhh- there we go again, spewing your numbers with no context


Attendance in 2000, after all the "newness" was gone ,and teams had established fan based =13,700.

Now, it's up over 16,000. 1996 was a "honeymoon year". what haven't EPL attendances reached numbers from the 1950's for most clubs?

Apples vs. Oranges

Pro wrestling is an ENTERTAINMENT program. Disney's High School Musical 3 outdoes pro soccer too, but who cares? again

Apples vs. Oranges.

Want to get more people interested in MLS??? Simple- bring 3 of the worlds top players to each MLS Team. Bring all the top US National Team, and bring in all the top Mexican Team Players.

See how quickly with that star power each team sells out their games. See how high TV ratings go. Ask the players if they care about relegation.