...but they are out there and should be pursued. I think the Salt Lake City area is one. The only Major League Sports teams to compete against for the public's sports dollars, would be the Utah Jazz in basketball and the MLS Real Salt Lake men's team. I also think the Sacramento area would be another one. The USL Sacramento Republic has been very effectively at marketing their team, as they attempt to secure the next MLS expansion team. Even if they were given a team now, I think they could easily sell out a few of their games in their current stadium that holds 11,422. Their plans, once they are approved for an MLS franchise, call for building a 18,000 seat stadium downtown. The league doesn't need all the MLS teams to get involved, but just enough, like in the case of Houston, over time, with the resources necessary to market in a larger metropolitan areas , can make it it profitable. While the older established MLS teams, may not be in a position to take on a NWSL team, many of the new teams will have the resources, to try and do what Orlando has done. In the case of Chicago and DC, if they can manage to hold on, could benefit from the growth that can be provided by the MLS teams. If MLS teams can help to speed up the growth in attendance with the resources they have available, it will help to benefit the league in better TV contracts, sponsorships, advertising, better salaries for the players, etc. All that will in turn give the league more exposure, in building more league recognition, and as a result help improve attendance in the struggling markets. Just what Orlando has done already, will do wonders for the league.
Sacremento would definitely be a possibility... I'm not sold that SLC would knock attendance out of the park like Portland and Orlando, though. They pack the RioT for MLS matches, but their fans aren't as fanatical (as a group) as those in Portland or Orlando, and it's showing in the attendances for their USL team. I think SLC would be more like Houston in attendance (i.e. aiming for 8-10k averages) than like Portland or Orlando. I'm definitely hopeful for DC, considering how many sellout games the Spirit had at the end of the season. Back in the Freedom days, they had extra bleachers installed on the far side stands, so I hope they decide those are worth it again and the Spirit start getting around 7k per game. I think Chicago is also looking up now that they're at TP - hopefully they'll get more cross-promotion with the Fire and also grow into 5-7k per game.
What you say makes sense. It still will leave the question whether it's possible to replicate Portland/Orlando conditions in some other cities. And, it might open up the question whether there really are some markets you can't ignore -- given that, at least for now, TV $$ don't seem to be a big benefit. But, perhaps the League could look at some markets like Chicago as an investment for the future when TV $$ hopefully will be more significant.
While the Toyota stadium is listed at 20,000 capacity, how many seats have they actually opened up for primary use for the Red Stars. In Houston they list 7000. Anyone know the figure is for the Red Stars?
From their website, it looks like they've opened a little under half of the total seating sections at TP, all on the near side:
Interesting. Since I'm not familiar with Toyota Park, I don't know if there's a good rationale for opening up one side. At Providence Park in PDX, they open up the lower rows first, all the way around the field. There, it would be a bummer to have only one side opened up.
Probably just has to do with how the sections themselves were constructed. In Houston and I assume in Portland, you have a lower bowl and an upper bowl, so it makes sense to fill the lower bowl first. In stadia like Toyota Park, the sections look like they go top-to-bottom, so you pick the X closest sections to the entrances. Since sections = staff, you prefer opening up whole sections as opposed to selling half of every section all around the stadium. I think Houston ran in to that issue in their inaugural game and the first post-WWC game, where the slowly hand-picked which specific sections in the upper bowl to open instead of letting fans simply pick anywhere in the upper bowl. Seattle's also switched from opening all sections on one side to opening all lower-level sections and a couple of upper-level sections on one side.
I don't know the facility at Toyota Park, but I think STT's assessment is probably right. I would add concession locations as an additional consideration. From another point of view, if you open the center 5 or 7 sections on both sides of the field, you have no "cheap seats." I have wrestled with that problem while trying to figure out a better way to fill out Sahlen's stadium by confining ticket sales to only the sidelines because the place feels pretty empty with 4,000 fans ( and very empty with fewer fans) who are so spread out in the 13,700 seat facility. A better solution is to sell more than 4,000 seats.
This is what's most telling so far. The organization hasn't gone too far out of their way yet to promote the team to the general public outside of some local tv interviews with Morgan and two ticket package deals with the full men's team. I'd expect to see the team schedule a bar crawl and maybe even another 5K that include tickets to the season opener as they do with the men. I'm also fully confident the lower bowl will be sold for the opener. I'd image an internal goal is around 30,000.
Interesting to note that should they manage to get 25,000 to 30,000 in attendance, it would not only set the NWSL record for attendance, but would also set the record for any single game in history for women's professional soccer in the US, which I believe was held by the CyberRays of the WUSA. I believe it was 24,000 plus, but maybe they know that.
The CyberRay's biggest attendance was only a hair over 17k; however, they were the visiting team in the inaugural WUSA game while visiting the Freedom, which drew over 34k at RFK Stadium. So I don't think Orlando will be breaking the overall record anytime soon, since I would be surprised if they hit even 30k.
In smaller attendance news, the Reign's most recent Medium post mentions a preseason "sellout" (tickets were free). If that's a sellout with regular-season seating that would be over 6,000. Perhaps the seating is more restricted though. Even if it's significantly less than 6,000 that's a positive note for a college match up.
I have been impressed with the attendance this preseason especially the 3000 in Washington. Maybe it's a sign that the off season is just too god darn long
Correct, though we don't know if both grand stands would be open for this match as they would be for the regular season. And yes if you go on their "site" to get ticket for this match it does say due to limited availability you have to call them.
This is fun if true: 715565030146752512 is not a valid tweet id Last we heard was that the cap was $265k or thereabouts; if we assume $20/GA ticket, that's a whopping 26,500 tickets supposedly sold. Now, surely some sections will be more expensive the GA, bringing the total number of tickets down, but if the ticket revenue is well above 2x cap then that's still likely above 25,000 tickets. Very nice, Orlando!
Orlando and Portland are certainly crushing it. But what if you to raise it to, say, $500? (Or eliminate it altogether?) Then you'd get Orlando and Portland (and maybe Houston) suddenly vacuuming up all the talent, with all the other teams either getting left behind or spending themselves into bankruptcy to keep up. Personally, I hope the cap does grow, but slowly, as the overall profitability of the league grows. I would've liked to see it hit $300k this year, honestly. Hopefully with a second MLS absolutely raking in profits to share, it goes to $300k next year.
Next in the queue: NWSL players union. The WNT has already gotten the attorneys warmed up and ready to go.
Repped as I agree completely; gonna siphon that discussion off to the General News thread for now though.
Have they announced the salary cap for this year? Is it unchanged from last? I would think they would raise it at least some this year due to good attendance estimates.
Again, probably should be siphoned off into the General discussion thread, but as far as we've heard, there haven't been any announcements of the cap going up this year. I get the sense that the salary cap is more reactionary than proactive - so when teams get twice as much shared profits at the end of this year with Orlando joining the likes of Portland, then the teams will have more money to spend on players next year (instead of forcing extra deficit spending this year on the hope attendances go up).