Everybody's looked at it on the list and demanded a professional team be placed there; Riverside-San Bernardino-Ontario MSA, the Inland Empire. However, without even a PDL team, to me it beggars the question; what's the problem which exists in the Inland Empire that they can't even support an amateur side? Is this one of those times where an MSA is in fact a red herring? Made up of Riverside and San Bernadino counties, the Empire is essentially a collection of valleys, divided from their coastal neighbours by the San Jose Hills in the north and the Santa Ana Mountains in the south. The somewhat fractured nature of the market means that areas like Coachella Valley, Victor Valley and Temecula Valley are almost markets in their own right. However, one would think that the roughly continguous Pomona and San Bernadino valleys have enough of a population to support something. There are colleges but no major colleges with a soccer pedigree. San Bernadino has a downtown baseball stadium. In what kenntomasch calls the primordial soup era, they had two different teams, the Fontana Falcons and the Inland Empire Panteras, with the former lasting a lot longer than the latter. However, with nobody trying since, is there just a lack of investors in the area? A lack of soccer? A lack of stadia? Alternatively, are they just missing out on a great PDL market?
It does seem that the demos are there for a PDL to work there. Didn't they have a few teams out there in the past?
The Riverside County Elite played in the D3 Pro League in 2000. An affiliate team of the San Diego Flash, they played at West Valley High in Hemet and went 7-10-1 but drew <1,000 people (announced) per game and folded at the end of the year. There have been various PDL teams in Southern California over the years, so convincing someone to give it a try hasn't been an issue, really. But there haven't been many teams that have been overly successful (Orange County Blue Star comes to mind just for longevity). As with most things, it's probably a combination of a lack of money and vision and appropriate venues. Plus, no matter what you do, it's not easy to just start up a team in this country.
NASL mentioned "Greater Los Angeles" as a possible site, and specifically mentioned Riverside (and Anaheim). Riverside is at least being considered for D2. http://www.insidemnsoccer.com/2012/...ague-expansion-is-delayed-but-still-on-track/
why? there already two MLS teams there, a usl pro team, many usl pdl teams and college soccer.Go to places like Omaha or sacramento.
The USL Pro team is not at all a well cat, the PDL teams don't draw flies and the college teams play in the fall. Omaha is a small market. Sacramento I could see (though it has a lot of teams in different sports, too). This fascination with simply picking markets based on a perceived lack of soccer competition, even though the market itself really doesn't have anything going for it, baffles me. Southern California's big enough and spread out enough that an NASL team would at least have a million or more potential customers around it. I don't know if they'd be able to tap them, but I'd feel pretty confident that neither the LA Blues, nor the PDL teams nor UCLA or USC or Cal-Irvine would be a serious hindrance. And they could be a lower-cost alternative to the Galaxy and Chivas. Not saying it would definitely work. Just saying....Omaha? Really?
If you're thinking of Omaha, it's probably better to look at Des Moines. At least they have some proven soccer interest.
Omaha has almost 300,000 more people in its metro, but, yes, uncertain market for soccer. But Des Moines is smaller than Charleston. And Akron. And Dayton. Kyle Krause does a great job in Des Moines, but that would be a big jump.
They have tried in the past to move up. I am not sure the motivation is there for them, amateur is so much cheaper. They would need a new investor/partner to make the jump.
When they were trying to build a new stadium with a local bank as an investor. They were trying build the new stadium and join the USL1/A-League but it all fell apart. Probably around 2004ish?
Oh, I remember the new stadium, completely. I just didn't remember it being tied to a move up, but, yeah, they were hoping to build a new stadium. I don't remember why it all fell apart, though.
http://inlandpolitics.com/blog/2012...bless-rates-fall-as-people-leave-labor-force/ The Inland Empire has a Las Vegas/Detroitesque unemployment rate.
LA has a slightly higher rate. Isn't Inland Empire already being served by the LA Blues in Fullerton?
I'm going to guess since the LA Blues aren't even in the Inland Empire and their attendance is quite low that the answer to your second question is no. Frankly for the LA Blues to survive I think you have to put a team in the Inland Empire and one in San Diego and you need to do it stat. And possibly a fourth in either the Southern end of the Central Valley or up on the north side of the LA area in Ventura. Or maybe both and let the Blues fold.
San Diego's a great spot... There's two NPSL teams that a lot of us would love to see make the jump up... I didn't realize the Blues were in Fullerton. I think maybe Blues, an LA team, an Inland Empire team, and one of the San Diego teams (with the other having the option depending on demand) would be worth considering.
There's no real proven demand for one of the two San Diego teams at the moment, much less two, wouldn't you say?
I'm not sure... How much demand do you need for a USL-Pro team? I think if it looked like a serious possibility, demand wouldn't be a problem. I can't find the actual figure, but the Flash/Boca game was pretty well attended.
More than for an NPSL team. Dude, I like San Diego, but there aren't many magical places in this country where you can just plunk down a team (or float the possibility of a team) and have demand not be a problem. Tickets simply don't sell themselves in this sport, in 99% of the places in this country. Selling tickets is almost always a problem.
True, but then NPSL isn't exactly a great gauge of what support would be at a higher level at least fan wise. Especially when you consider both teams are largely unknowns in the region unless you keep up on lower level soccer. Question really is, would moving up to NASL increase their exposure and fan desirability enough to make it worth while (and mind you that's something to consider for not just the two SD teams but any PDL or NPSL team considering the jump). If it could be done right like several D2 and 3 teams have done over the years (namely the ones that eventually were able to make the MLS jump like Sounders, Timbers, Impact) then it's very much worthwhile as all 3 teams were successful in the lower levels before they made the MLS jump. It could also be a disaster if not done properly and they could end up like the last three California D2/3 league teams the California (LA Blues, California Victory, and the SD Flash 1.0).
the city (Urbandale) that was lined up as a partner changed its mind. there wasn't the interest from a funding perspective from any other city. now, no one has any money and the mayor who was there at the time (and a supporter) is in the state senate.
Have you ever bought a car you really couldn't afford? And said to yourself, "I'll work harder, I'll get some overtime, I'll probably get a promotion at work, because that guy will leave, somehow it will work out and I'll get the money and it won't be a problem?" That's called optimism bias. And unfortunately, some people look at what Seattle has done (didn't draw particularly well in D2, gets Cosmos-like crowds in MLS) and think there's no reason they can't do it, too. They think, "We'll move up, it'll be a higher level of soccer, more people will be interested, somehow it will work out and we'll sell the tickets and it won't be a problem." Unfortunately, too many people think this way. But if you're not selling tickets now, if you don't have a plan to sell tickets that's more involved than just "we'll move up and the demand will be there, look at all the kids who play soccer here or watched Euro 2012," you're almost certain to fail. I have no doubt that if there was a capable owner and a stadium solution in San Diego, you could put an MLS team there and very likely draw - MLS is past the "is it going to make it?" stage, and only Chivas USA among recent expansion teams has had a problem selling tickets, because the owners MLS has picked have understood that you have to invest more and work harder to sell tickets. Rare is the market where tickets just sell themselves. Anyone who thinks that a team in San Diego or Dayton or wherever would just naturally be a bigger draw if they moved up doesn't understand the work involved. Or they really love soccer and optimism bias kicks in in a major way.
Day Dream moment: If I hit the lotto or did very well in my career endeavors I could see owning a team in the Inland Empire. Wouldn't start in the USL though, it would be a major waste of money (maybe look to make a move up later down the road) I think the Blues have shown us that the USL doesn't garner any more automatic attention then PDL or NPSL but costs much more. The Blues have an $800,000 budget, if you cut that budget in half and after the operate costs (estimate $70k) invest the rest in a detailed aggressive marketing strategy you could start to see a real fan base begin to grow along with Corporate sponsorship opportunities. I've looked at stadium options in the IE and think the best current option would be Riverside City College (even though I hate turf fields with football lines and fields inside of tracks). The Stadium is right on the edge of Downtown 5-10minute walk from Downtown Pubs. Day Dream over Back to work.
From what I've read they spent about $880k and they lost pretty much all of that bringing in very little revenue. Don't think too much of that Budget was put towards a marketing campaign. Its hard work promoting a lower division club and I don't get the feeling that they have a real marketing strategy. Even if they did it would be difficult to get the ticket sales up. http://espn.go.com/blog/los-angeles/soccer/tag/_/name/ali-mansouri “We had a budget, what this thing is going to cost us. And we were very close to it. We were about 10 percent [above] what we estimated the cost is going to be. Very happy about that. But we also had an estimate of how much money we're going to bring in. We [made] 20 percent of that. That wasn't good.”- Ali Mounsori, Blues Owner