we used to have capacity or close to it crowds in a 22k stadium. the question used to be if we had underbuilt. this is not the fans' fault and this is a big city and not some small market. in fact, that is part of their trouble is we have other teams well attended who spend so our fans will not put up with perennial losers. we also have other things to do.
problem 1 is spending ie owners problem 2 is personnel work (I didn't say GM for a reason, as that assumes how to respond) problem 3 is coaching problem 4 is the academy problem 5 is the HC/GM split has made (dedicated) personnel work worse rather than better problem 6 is the HC/GM split has resulted in many players signed by the GM then sat by the HC, we are not even efficient in our poverty, the GM is giving the coach unwanted players, the HC wants something he isn't getting problem 7 is i think at this point on an org chart the HC reports to and subserviates to the GM, which is bad if the GM sucks and unattractive to experienced quality HCs problem 8 is whether we have some sort of lingering perceived organizational radioactivity dating back to Canetti, like, "don't go there," which affects player and coaching pools problem 9 is spending on coaching problem 10 is we seem to shop for a coach to implement entertaining tactics (an executive mandated "house style" identity from the top) rather than spend to hire a good coach who is delegated the soccer decisions and figures out what actually works on the ground level problem 11 is whether a cheap team should be as offensively oriented and tactically aggressive as we are problem 12 is whether tactics fit the climate, eg, kinnear's methodical grinding 442 would work in summer problem 13 is their plans for the 18-23 bridge after RGV problem 14 is the lack of homegrown promotion problem 15 is if we do sign young players when do they ever play, integration, and what effect does that have on the academy as well as other houston youth players deciding whether to bother problem 16 is a lack of beneficial external relationships, no bayern munich pipeline out, if we have something working incoming like olimpia we drop it, RGV fell apart as a relationship problem 17 is i think we have become more loyal to (worse) players than in the kinnear era of 6 month loans, we lost the ruthless streak, and worse, re-up people like lundkvist and valentin to basically ruin table position for most of a decade i left off the fan experience/SG stuff because i want steak and not more sideshow pandering. quit "fixing" everything but the soccer.
he confronted the coach after a lengthy winless, now losing streak, and then we went out and lost another. what did "confront" as opposed to "fire" do? he should be fired today. or will it be next weekend. or maybe it's too early in a long season. or maybe just run his contract out. how long we gonna fart around. similarly, he said some interesting stuff when he came in about "resources." we then signed a zimbabwe defender from turkey that no one has ever heard of as a minimal DP, and brought in baird and a USL guy. does that feel like anything actually changed? worse, we're letting jordan lock in new dumb ideas into the future, despite continued sub-red-line tenancy and perhaps lame duck status. and at the risk of tautology or begging the question, what the fans want is action that results in a competitive team. like i said the other day, yelling is for talented people out partying or not trying as hard as they can.....those can be motivated. if you hire a bunch of schlubs on the sideline and on the field trying as hard as they can but not enough, you should really yell at yourself first. yelling at hard workers is generally overrated. if you want better product get better people.
i forgot problem 18 road form caused by (??) coaching/tactics/personnel/defense/goals allowed/travel spending or approach
Believe it or not, I'm not mad. I was mad back in 2015. Now I just don't care and that's arguably worse for a club trying to get supporters back on board.
I've always admired you for your dedication to the sport and knowledge of the local history of football in Houston as well as the football culture. That said, I don't think the market for the Dynamo is as strong as you believe. Yes...this is a strong football market but most of that strength lies in the support of other clubs that have traditionally supported by Houstonians (think Liga MX and more recently European clubs.) In my mind, the Houston Dynamo have completely squandered any goodwill built up through the first five years of the club. I imagine even former players are looking at this and wondering "what the heck happened???"
Nil? You underestimate our club leadership and MLS more so. Columbus was this close to moving. Clubs have gone under in the past after poor management. Having two other Texas teams is a moot point. Don't forget where our club originally came from. So no, the chances of them moving are nowhere close to nil. Sure they could put a USL team here if they left, of that I don't disagree. But I'm not the optimist you seem to be on this club lasting very long here.
Having a stadium to play in isn't necessarily indicative of whether or not a club could move to a new location. How long did NYCFC play in Yankee Stadium? Many clubs have played elsewhere (temporarily) while waiting on new digs. You ask a good question. If anything, it's possibly they move before WC 2026 to generate excitement. But I'll still stick to my guns that the enough damage has been done and that's it's irreversible.
Thank you for your kind words Bill. Not only our past players looking at their former home in disbelief, there is the bad optics our situation beams out to any and all potential players that are even remotely interested in moving here to play. Same for potential head coaches. Who wants the job???
LOL at thinking the Houston market is comparable to Columbus. The Dynamo can leave and we’d land a new team almost immediately. Maybe it’s USL, maybe it’s MLS. Doesn’t matter because one way or the other it will be back to being MLS soon. I mean, I get that you don’t care about the Dynamo anymore, but the market is the market is the market. There’s zero chance that they’ll cede the 4th, soon to be 3rd largest metro to a competing league.
Who said our market was comparable to Columbus? No one. What was said is that MLS is not above moving a club. They've done it before and they'll do it again. And you're right about the market is the market. That's partially my point. I used to be a part of that market. Not anymore. They've lost a lot of people like me. You also may be right that we could land a new team almost immediately in terms of already having the stadium in place. That would certainly put us in contention if the Dynamo left. Chivas USA was in what could be argued one of the best soccer markets in the country. They didn't make it. One could argue with the ownership did that to themselves and that would be what I'm arguing here. That our ownership has done this to themselves. Don't get me wrong. I'd love to see the Houston Dynamo rise from the ashes to become one of the top clubs in MLS again (thuggery and all LoL !!!) but I just think, in my one man opinion, that too many bridges have been burned for that to happen. Time will tell.
MLS isn’t going to let the Dynamo move for the same reason they won’t let NYCFC move, they don’t want to fail in a massive market. I know you mentioned CUSA failing in a big market but it had so much against it. It did not represent LA at all which vindicates the LA market, the target audience was a subset of a subset of people, and that subset viewed it as minor league even among MLS’ reputation of that. Their situation is not even comparable to Houston. Also I remember a lot of these same sounding arguments in 2012-14 when the Astros were losing 110+ games and moving to the AL that “Baseball is dead in this city” and “why would anyone watch the Lastros?” It’s easy to get in these bubbles of fanaticism and forget that there are people interested in the team that don’t show it as much as we do or just choose to support from a distance right now. The Astros fans that filled MMP in 2005 were back in 2017 like the Dynamo fans that filled BBVA in 2012 will be back in 202X.
I tend to agree that MLS would have to see a terrible situation to allow this market to be abandoned. And then you’d see Liga MX lobby to put a team here - that’s the move on this market, not USL. Obviously it would be blocked to start but maybe MLS allows it for a payment.
You used CBUS as an argument for the Dynamo leaving? What’s the implication there? That they’re willing to leave a small market. I’d agree. But that’s more a worry to a team like Salt Lake. Chivas USA was in a market with an existent team and had baggage that not even the Dynamo have. Proves my point though because you lost Chivas USA and then LAFC came in to replace it. Again, you’re letting your own personal issues with the team (and I get it, I have plenty as well), cloud your judgement.
Houston would have to economically collapse to leave us without a major league team. Just hard to see that happening.
It would be absolutely astonishingly stupid for MLS to abandon Houston. I actually think that there have been talks behind multiple thick doors about all the problems with Brenner. Maybe even from Garber to Brenner himself. Either way, we are the Southern Hub. L.a to the West, NYC to the East, Chicago to the North and us. Is it any wonder why those are the 4th largest cities in the country? It would be a stunning example of stupidity for Segal to want to move and MLS allow it. We have a very nice stadium in a great location. How many MLS teams can say that? Houston is growing, and is predicted to grow even more. It is the most diverse city in the country and the world loves football. In terms of infrastructure, potential and location, the Dynamo might be in one of the best positions in MLS. Last home game, a family sitting in front of me was from Lake Charles, die hard fans but obviously can't make every game. We pull fans from all over Texas, Louisiana, N.M and Oklahoma. No, there will be no move.
At least you aren’t advancing the GenOrange circle of suck ticket guy theory of “they’ll take our team elsewhere because you fans SUCK!”
two things against that theory. One, if they really wanted to do this they would have put a team in San Antonio the second MLS announced Austin FC. The other thing is when they tried to play a La Liga game in Miami it opened up all kinds of lawsuits and was eventually dropped. That was for one game so imagine what a permanent team would cause. I think Liga MX sees their growth potential in the US best if they cooperate with MLS rather than face them head on. edit: I missed your last sentence so my bad for repeating what you said.
revisionist history. he used to give westie and i crap for being so critical then went out way past us and quit on the team. based on his photo the dynamo were always his moonlighting team. pick a lane.
When ownership decided to go all NBA with the FO that's when they developed the attitude that all of those loyal suffering season ticket holders who had dropped their tickets were not worth bothering about. The new impetus was to try and go for the younger hip crowd who would fill one end of the stadium with joyous celebration and to hell with the old season ticket folks. This current FO has written former season tickets off as lost causes not worth the effort because the know damn well that it would require a much bigger investment in the actual reason the majority go to games - to watch good football. Their strategy was the experience and the social mingling, stadium amenities etc. They even did away with scarves cause head rags are cheaper. I'd volunteer to allow the organization to fund myself and a couple of others to go on an English Championship tour of clubs over there to see if we could recruit some FO people who actually understand the sport and know what they're doing.
Honestly I thought bandanas were dumb as hell when they first announced it but it’s grown on me a lot. I’ve found myself wearing one to every game and I think I have three now. All really nice designs.
there are some inconsistencies in how FIFA enforces the cross-border rules eg the canadian MLS teams, queen of the south, cardiff, swansea, wrexham, wellington phoenix, derry city, andorra, vaduz, monaco, teams from the caribbean in USL i think they tend to let it go if you have a weak or nonexistent home league, or are like some principality inside the other country. if you have strong leagues i think they try to stamp it out as an incipient SuperLeague. i think the real concern is not so much Mex in US or NZ in Oz as a transnational league that could escape FIFA. but to have some sort of a rule they nominally say no cross border stuff then sanction some exceptions anyway. they would say "grandfathering" but as i understand it gretna and derry completely blew up and rebooted as new teams and were not denied back into scotland and LoI.
I don't think cost was the main driver. I mean it's Houston, the hell I need a scarf for. I think the bandanas are pretty cool and fits with this boiling hot city. I rarely if ever bring my scarf to the game because it's too damn hot.
the point varus is trying to make, that i back, is that with our city size, historical team excellence, and attendance it would be a very short absence. we would be top of the next move or expand list. LAFC for chivas. they were awarded a new team the same year and had the team playing within 4 years. this is headed the direction of chivas where they become radioactive and p*ss off the home fans more and more. but the league is not stupid where they miss what attendance was when the team was run right, and the other features. i actually think the friendlies, gold cup, etc. are a mixed bag. they speak to latent soccer fans. i think it would be more decided on 21k plus attendance when we were done right as a MLS team. how we attend other teams is ambivalent because it hasn't translated back in years. it might suggest a better owned team could convert them. but it could also suggest dallas style soccer snobs who have a strong youth soccer culture but wouldn't attend FCD on a bet. for that matter given how atlanta has gone i think it's debatable whether we should be an outdoor team that takes on that stadium debt. i think our concept was naive self sufficient SSS theory from the 2000s. seattle, toronto, atlanta, a lot of this era's elite are sports conglomerates that share NFL stadia. what's changed is they are co-owned instead of just a tenant. you then get big league resources. if you look at the bottom of MLS' 2019 (pre-pandemic) attendance it was almost all the SSS teams. the teams with massive attendance and massive resources also tend to own NFL, CFL, NHL, etc. which is kind of a sports throwback to when a team might be owned by turner or warner brothers and this division can offset that division and every team doesn't have to be self sufficient every year. that or as i have said 20x, you get an owner who gives a crap, portland. this is my hobby, not my retirement. i want to win at my hobby.