I'm highly skeptical that NASL will have 12 teams for 2018--I doubt they will still have 8. I don't think they have a whole lot to offer when courting expansion groups. USL offers stability and regional travel which keeps costs low. Finding new owners for Jacksonville ans Ft Lauderdale is going to be tough. If Beckham ever gets Miami MLS going operating Ft Lauderdale and Miami FC is going to be rough. The league's new star franchise, North Carolina FC wants MLS so they could be out the door eventually.
SD is kinda like the West Coast version of Houston - sneaky-big in population, very spread out, and damn near everybody who lives there is "from" someplace else, and all those people brought their sports allegiances with them. About the only thing that San Diegans (and Houstonians) all collectively have in common as a group is a near-pathological hatred for their more glamorous neighbor to the north.
Well on the plus side for soccer, be it USL, NASL, MLS, there isn't much in the way of any real hardcore soccer allegiance that I see around town. Particularly to any US teams. I mean you see a few Tijuana Xolos car stickers around and of course there's a number of people who follow other Euro or Latin American clubs. But nothing like the transplant population of fans who bring their Big 4 allegiances with them. I don't think a soccer team would have nearly the issue the Padres do (and Chargers really did) in contending with fans of other teams who only show up for their team being in town.
No you missed my point also, that was their heyday. Where they play today in NYC proper on Long Island, in New Jersey or on Neptune (they are the Cosmos after all), they will never see that type of success again. For any of the fan boys out there to think that will happen is delusional. (You might also include owners) BTW, I know you are not a fan boy do not assume I implied that with my prior comment.
Oh, I misunderstood. Apologies. My point was that if New Jersey in 1977 was the big factor, then, sure, but it wasn't. Bethlehem Steel was a big deal in the 20s. Maybe they only drew a couple thousand a game this year because they weren't owned by a steel mill.
I haven't followed anything throughout the holidays but whats going on with Maldini and Nesta's Miami team? I can't really find much online but are they still involved?
Miami seems to be pretty quiet through all of this. Indy, Edmonton, and NCFC seem to be the movers and shakers in the nouveau regime. It will be interesting to see if they can get all 7 ownership groups working in the same direction.
Considering previous "power brokers" in this league have included Cooper/AC St Louis, Traffic/Ft Lauderdale, Hartman/San Antonio, and the "return" of a dominant NY Cosmos team, if I were an Indy fan, I'd be breathing a sigh of relief at this point.
Uh oh... Somebody's in trouble... Wonder if Wilt was right and they will have to rush one or more of the SD, OC, ATL teams to market in 2017 to fill another hole.
It dies. This will be a happy day. Unless of course some white knight comes in to save the Cosmos again and we do this all over again.
Re cfu, we r very aware of draw. Working w fpf to figure out this mess. We did what we had to do. Now up 2 fpf, cfu, concacaf to sort & fast— Tom Payne (@TomPayneSoccer) January 16, 2017 Something weird is happening. May not be a money thing, may just be a bureaucratic blunder.