MASL expansion team for 2023-24 in Guadalajara. https://www.maslsoccer.com/news/mas...3Du-SAel20jjTS4dA9LovFnvjKJGbaZzuJqLHFCOj4iCs
Attended my first MASL game on Sunday (unless you count MASL2 at the Crunch’s practice facility last year). Drove to Utica (after driving from Ohio to Philly for the Crew at Philadelphia Union match on Saturday). Overall, it was enjoyable. I think Utica City FC did a nice job with the game ops. Nothing too fancy, but good. There was a nice crowd on hand, and it got pretty loud at times. The quality of play was okay. Though Baltimore didn’t look very dangerous. That said, the Utica goalie had a very good game. I was glad I went. (My other option was an FPHL hockey game in Binghamton.)
Don't be shocked if Soles de Sonora is announced next. They have been talking about a return to the MASL for the past few years
I know. All I care about is the Ronaldinho team, not these teams that have folded twice and come back or teams that play in 3,000 seat basketball arenas. I think Cedar Rapids in 2015 was the last MASL expansion team where someone paid an expansion fee. All the other teams were teams that moved or bought the rights to a dormant team. Even the Ronaldinho team would be a free membership for Rob Striar. And Guadalajara is a free team for the owners who bailed out Orlando because the league didn't have the money to pay them back. I think Ft. Worth paid an expansion fee but they never played, so I don't know what happened to that money.
https://www.frontrowsoccer.com/2023...6vrYK2SLcWJDYIVt-o0qOV-KevOAYetlwWIw_h40sfdNE Lancers announce affiliation with Baltimore Mar 17, 2023
Article about leagues and streaming that features the MASL: https://www.sportico.com/leagues/ot...ues-streaming-social-media-twitch-1234716912/
entering the last set of games Heres what we know: All 5 East spots have been clinched. San Diego is the #1 overall seed. 3 points separate the west #3 from #6. the wave will clinch the East 1 seed by beating harrisburg or the blast lose to Utica. florida is pretty much locked into the 3 seed in the east. the west playin is still up for grabs, with Mesquite, Monterrey, Tacoma and possibly Empire in the mix if they lose their last game
https://www.wmar2news.com/sports/lo...qiocZrQPqY4gI9bnhYRIQhpAQ3XFdylewOaUMmfgULjqc Baltimore Blast set to launch new women's team
This is actually a good Idea, They can play at Towson on any one of the 3 soccer fields. Sign most of the Players who played for TSU women's soccer team and are no longer eligible to play. A Lot of this has to do with the Lancers deal.
The Major Arena Soccer League announced Wednesday that the Florida Tropics are suspending operations and will not participate in the 2023-24 season. https://www.frontrowsoccer.com/2023...WRSZKWcZLbTSZvvkVYjoy0AZSKXRZp5L8NrFHbe7Gu-Zw
Now this is funny "The MASL said that it will continue working with the Tropics ownership group to resume play in 2024-25 or sell the team to new operating owners." Fist off they will never comeback, what in the hell do u have to sell? a logo, name, franchise rights. that's about it. No investor is going to buy this team that only gets 1000 fans, they should have went to the NISL and played in a rec center.
The NISL (for what it's worth) doesn't play in rec centers. The Tropics can sell the franchise rights to another owner, which is a way of circumventing the expansion fee. The MASL keeps raising the expansion fee, but I don't know the last time someone paid an expansion fee of any amount. The Guadalajara team, for instance, is a free team that a few owners got for propping up the Orlando Seawolves after Chris Kokalis went AWOL. The Las Vegas Ronaldinho team (if it ever happens) was a free team that that Rob Striar got for selling sponsorships for the league. The Chihuaha team moved from Sonora...
I'd ask when the last time was someone out-and-out bought someone else's MASL franchise, but I think it actually was the Tropics. There haven't been that many traditional franchise purchases, but the worst of all time had to be Nathan Scherr buying the Blast in 1984 for a reported $2.9 million and selling it five years later for a reported $850,000.
Tim Krause bought the Wave for $5 million. I can't find how much he sold the team to Jim Lindenberg for. https://www.oursportscentral.com/services/releases/wave-sold-for-5-million/n-2708425
lindenberg didnt pay 5m, for it. i think lindenberg paid over 1 million for it, but thats just a guess.
suspending operations is code for ' folding'. i mean how many MASL teams are even 10 years old? 3? 4? wave have been around for 40 years, Sockers date to 78, at least the name, and the Blast date to the 80s. and thats.. pretty much it.
And even if you just count the current business entity, I'm pretty sure the Blast go back to the '92-'93 Baltimore Spirit.
Correct. If I start a nightclub in Parsippany, New Jersey and call it Studio 54, I can't claim Pele and Mick Jagger used to party at my establishment back in the 1970s. I didn't know of that $5M sale...that seems like a lot. But when Tim moved to London for business in 2004, Charles Krause became a "major investor" and when his fortunes took a downturn in the Great Recession, he unloaded it on Lindenberg (else it would have been gone...and actually was for a few days). We don't know how much Krause pere paid Krause fils, but it's likely Lindenberg didn't pay a lot. And even less likely that Sue Black paid anything a few years later, given her financial situation. Even if the Wave sale in 2001 wasn't $5M and that was just for show to try to stoke the values of MISL franchises, it probably was a loss for the Krauses.
This made me wonder who the last MISL organization in existence was. Turns out it was the Crunch (who had since been renamed the Force), who went under following the 2004-05 season. The Sidekicks folded one season earlier. The Wings after 2000-01 and the Sockers following the 1996 CISL season. (The other three teams from 91-92 folded with the league.)
It was quite a run by the Wings. Not always easy and touch-and-go there often, but that was a success story, to keep running from 1979-2001 in that market. Outside of the Wave and Blast, the longest-running current MASL franchise is the current Comets, isn't it? One year before Syracuse/Utica?
As a top-level club, yes. The modern-day Sockers started a year earlier, but in the PASL-Pro. The Tacoma Stars date back to 2003, but in the amateur PASL. Went pro in briefly in 10-11 and then for good in 14-15. Also, I think the Force could've sustained a Wings-like run if Wolstein didn't spite-fold the team in '88. Look at the drop in attendance between the Force and Crunch. I did the math and they went from selling 300-350K tickets per season to 125-150K - and that's with a higher % of weekend games (100% by league rule in their early NPSL years), playing downtown instead of in Richfield, and a late 90's peak with the Browns not eating up a metric ton of the region's sports dollars. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cleveland_Force_(1978–1988) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cleveland_Crunch
Two charts to illustrate that. The first, average attendance by season over time, with the Force having the first part before the break and the Crunch/Force after: