Sacramento MLS Expansion Superthread

The point is that a city like Fresno -- I mean Rochester -- has no business being in a 30-some team major league.

Sacramento does.

 

I think the only reason MLS wanted Rochester (back then anyway) was because they were playing in a new soccer stadium.I also remember they were drawing decent attendance numbers...

 

I would still take their pitch over Seattle's!

 

Having watched a couple games from Rochester in the last year or two, I have to tell you that you've made the wrong choice. As bad as Seattle's surface has been, Rochester's is currently much, much worse.

 

I was mostly going by that picture. My cousin tried out for the Sounders a few years ago and told me their fake plastic field was just horrid to play on.

 

It is FieldTurf. 10 year old FieldTurf.

 

Yeah I know I re-edited.....that pic still looks better than the Sounders CenturyLink Field though...

 

...not to mention that Rochester never had anywhere close to Sacramento's paid attendance. They were handing out comp tickets like Halloween candy. Even the staunchest defenders of Rochester's attendance figures mainly argue that people still had to be interested enough in the game to show up even if they were getting free tickets. In the years they claimed 5-figure attendance, the Rhinos were giving out 4,000 free tickets and another 4,000-5,000 discounted tickets per game. They actually sold more full-price tickets in 2009 (after the attendance decline) than in 2006 (the last year that their average attendance was in 5 figures), and I wouldn't be surprised if their paid attendance is higher today than it was in their peak attendance years.

 

I know the Chargers thing isn't done, but any idea that SRFC could get bumped makes me just cringe...Evan seems like he's pretty well connected for someone relatively new as well.

Just saw that the Chargers are moving to LA. From everything I'm hearing, this is bad for Sacramento's MLS bid (1/2)

— Evan Ream (@EvanReam) January 13, 2016

The rumor is that San Diego State football and MLS are going to combine to build a stadium that would host an MLS team (2/2)

— Evan Ream (@EvanReam) January 13, 2016

Not sure how true these rumors are. Not sure if MLS wants 5 teams in California. Am sure that MLS wants to be in San Diego

— Evan Ream (@EvanReam) January 13, 2016

 

Sacramento and San Diego will both eventually be in MLS.

Why? Because they're both top 30 TV markets that want MLS teams, and have (or probably will have in SD's case) the resources to build a stadium.

Evan isn't thinking rationally here.

 

It depends on what Garber and MLS marketing view Sacramento as. Do they view it as an independent TV market. or do they falsely view it as a supplemental TV market.

We all know that San Jose was trying to pull Sacramento into their territory. Even promoted rail transit to Earthquake games.

You just don't know.

 

MLS is not that stupid.

I do believe the Quakes have been that stupid in the past, but they've very clearly gotten beyond that mindset.

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And I'm going to post this map again.



Five teams in California -- two in Northern California, three in Southern California -- is not a big deal.

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Really, folks, stop feeding panic to the Redditors.

 

Oh, FFS, Evan - do you have any knowledge of the dynamics of the San Diego market, or are you just pulling stuff out of your arse just to get your Twitter Q rating up? Do you know what the current most popular soccer team in San Diego is currently? (Hint: that team ain't in MLS)

At what point in any conversation has there been a serious mention of San Diego by the MLS hierarchy other than something along the lines of "we'd like to be down there, it's a nice town"?

At what point in any conversation has there been a serious mention of a MLS San Diego expansion venture?

JTFC, I sure get tired of all of the nattering nabobs of negativism trying to throw water on Sacramento's MLS possibilities. Seems like every time we get close, another "major" market steps up to hog the spotlight, never mind if they don't have a fanbase (Minnesota), don't have a fanbase OR a realistic path to a SSS (Miami), or have a fanbase but have to go sharesies with the local NFL team (Atlanta). And now Evan Ream asks us to consider the spectre of San Diego, which had every opportunity to snatch Chivas USA from their freshly dug grave beginning five years ago but failed to do so.

The rumblings I get out of San Diego via my MWC contacts indicate a serious bout of nervousness for SDSU football, because if the Chargers move to LA, SDSU can't afford to properly maintain and/or rebuild the Murph, and SDSU doesn't have the land or financial assets to build anew on the campus because they built their basketball arena on the site of the old Aztec Bowl - so they'll be stuck in a bit of limbo unless a sugar daddy comes and helps them out...or they go on bended knee to the Padres ownership for permission to play at Petco.

 

This is one of those times that I really wish KJ could have kept it in his pocket all those years ago. Ever since the most recent revelations, he's been pretty much a non-entity - and the story he was telling about Sacramento was and is a compelling one. Golden 1 Center does not happen without Kevin Johnson leading the fight, and the current tack to seemingly place all his contributions into the memory hole are most regrettable.

I like what Mr. Smith and Mr. Nagle are doing, but they are not the dynamic communicators that KJ was and still is; with him neutralized, it is easier for other cities to step into that limelight. We need that dynamic lead person now more than ever.

And I know we're supposed to avoid politics here, but Darrell Steinberg (the most probable next mayor) is a tool in person, he's a tool on the radio, and he's an uber-tool on camera. Maybe Angie Ashby can pull off a miracle.

 

While I'm all for MLS in Sacramento, those arguments are off-base. Yes, Atlanta have lots of season ticket deposits but you're saying Minnesota has no fanbase as though they didn't draw second highest attendance average in the NASL in 2015.

Also, Minnesota has actually played matches for the fanbase.

Who was the interested party? Were they ever given an offer by MLS, or expressed real interest in MLS?

 

I do think there's been a little of this lately with him. Mostly pertaining to the NASL. I get it ... but I don't really welcome it.

At a different level, it's sort of like Ives. There's a guy who built a pretty good soccer journalist following. Then he went full tabloid. Now I go out of my way to ignore his ramblings.

 

@Knave That map is only good for showing what it describes; relative distances between cities in California compared to the eastern seaboard. It has no relevance to a discussion of TV markets perceived by sports ownership groups.

Bos-Wash megapolis is 50+ million people with 6 cities holding sports franchises in the big four.
NorCal megapolis is 14+ million people with 3 cities holding sports franchises in the big four.

It gets more crowded if you include the multiple franchises in the same sport along the eastern seaboard, as well if you add in MLS teams. Sac will most likely get an MLS team and could be considered a different TV market, I just don't think each of the Big four would consider it that way. You won't see MLB, NFL or NHL looking to get into Sac anytime soon. They likely consider Sac to be within their TV markets already.

NB: I'm not trying to be offensive at all.

 

You're not telling me anything I don't know. I post that map to give perspective on distance.

But let me note something about Sacramento's position in the Northern California sports market. Yes, it was eclipsed by the Bay Area teams for MLB and the NFL. But that Bay Area dominance happened many decades ago when Sacramento was a much smaller city.

In some ways, that's sort of the point here. Sacramento will never get either of those sports (though they did try), but it is actually a big enough market to support an NFL or MLB team. What Sacramento does have is an NBA team. What they could and almost certainly will have is an MLS team.

The view that the NFL and MLB might not consider Sacramento a separate market from the Bay Area owes nothing to what Sacramento is now, but is simply an historical artifact of a time when Sacramento really was a small agricultural town that had almost by accident become the state's capital.

In other words, if the NFL or MLB were starting over today without all that history, I'd expect one or both league's would be looking pretty seriously at Sacramento. It would certainly be a pretty attractive option over placing a secondary Bay Area team in Oakland.

 

Let's note, once again, that Sacramento is currently the largest media market in the nation that doesn't have at least two major sports franchises -- and ranks ahead of San Diego as a media market if not in metro area population, because the northernmost part of the San Diego MSA is considered to be within the Los Angeles media market.

 

I know a little off topic, but here in San Antonio they are talks of the Raiders to come here. Is there any talk of trying to get the Raiders to move a little east to Sacramento? To me it was a far better city than Oakland even when I was in the area in the mid 90's. IF there is room to build a stadium?

 

I'm not as impressed by this map that I've seen a couple of times because population matters: California = 39 million
New Hampshire, Vermont, Massachusetts, Rhode Island, Connecticut, New York, New Jersey, Pennsylvania, Maryland, DC, Delaware, Virginia & West Virginia = 66 million...

Lest you think it is incorrect to include states that do not actually include teams even though team is right next door (but remember, you have that corner of California that abuts the Nevada/Oregon state line as if those folks might come to a game in SF or Sacramento, or at the border with AZ might come to a game in SD or LA.) then: Massachusetts, New York, New Jersey, Pennsylvania and DC = 48 million for 5 teams.

By this analysis, it is not clear that 5 teams actually makes sense for California.

Now, in truth, I think both San Diego and Sacramento should get teams.

But, we are fast approaching a future in which MLS has an Eastern and Western divisions that basically don't play each other if we add St. Louis, possibly Indianapolis, Charlotte, Las Vegas, Pittsburgh, Detroit, San Antonio, Phoenix, Nashville, etc. to the league.

Is that going to actually work for MLS?