Personal attacks, bizarro twitter spamming I experienced personally, trying to tar a Louisville fan as a racist, etc etc etc... Another former BS poster said it best: Dan is anti-Pro/Rel's Ted. And the ridiculous seven part series trying to tar the Deloitte Report, which was little more than a simple feasiblity study akin to Conventions, Sports, and Leisure.
Well, let's see what you have, here. Twitter? I would say that's more a function of two people who personally don't like each other getting into each other. Two people who seem to get under each other's skin is more about THAT than either person's "side." Tarring a guy as racist? Where's your evidence of that? Did I miss it? And as for the Deloitte report... pointing out logical holes one at a time isn't "tarring", it's critiquing. It's also not belitting, marginalizing or condescending. If Dan really is "anti-Pro/Rel's Ted," that says a hell of a lot about the difference between the two sides.
But he's not a "cult of personality." He's not my leader or anyone else's leader. FFS, you and the rest of the dozen or so anti-Pro/Rel zealots on BigSoccer have taken turns alternating between DEMONIZING and DEIFYING this guy as a "cult leader" as if all of us who'd like to see American soccer move towards an open system are somehow part of his "cult." That's total bullshit. It was only last month I had some back and forth with one of the owners of my club on twitter, which went something like this..... ME: "Asking Ted & Ben whether they've ever owned a soccer team is like asking Rush Limbaugh & Ann Coulter to if they've ever held a political office. ;-)" Apr 26 HIM: Haha. Great analogy. ME: Ted used to work for Barney Frank and Ben let the cat out of the bag that he's a naive libertarian Trumpster.... It is what it is. Apr 26Sent HIM: "......you have to be able to receive and except criticism in order to become stronger at things. That’s just the button I’m pushing a little bit. It’s killing time on my drive at least." Apr 26 ME: "Sometimes activists need to know their place. ;-/ " Apr 26 HIM: "Thanks for the vote of confidence Jeff. That actually means quite a lot. I honestly like Ted. I like what he stands for. It just gets incessant after a while. I don’t think that’s a good look for anybody" #ProRelForUSA
Loney and the Loney-bots had what can only be described as a bizarro exchange with Motorik FC that I can only characterize as trolls on meth. I witnessed a total Loney twitter meltdown complete with massive expletives when he went nuts over Kartik Krishnayder deciding to interview Ted on some broadcast or weblog or something or other. What I heard that day sounded pretty tame, especially for a guy who BS loves to characterize as the devil personified. I personally thought I'd dealt with Dan reasonably.one morning hoping he'd eventually just "agree to disagree" with me but instead, he had another meltdown, this time he either: A) Got religion and started tweeting-in-tongues or B) Randomly started typing jibberish so that nobody could see the public exchange we had, which I'd thought was reasonably civil in that I knew I'd never change his mind and made the mistake of assuming he came to a similar conclusion that he'd never change mine and simply leave it at that... but no... In a similar vein, he had another twitter meltdown with a sports journalist from San Antonio. I happened to be checking my twitter feed during lunch and once again... instead of just reaching a stalemate and agree to disagree, Dan blew a gasket and started spamming random jibberish to bury the twitter conversation.... I guess you did.. From my Twitter inbox: "Hey! Yeah, that was me. Was at the game with my wife and kids, and he made a point to come over and introduce himself. We’d sparred a lot on Twitter, so we knew each other that way." "And it was one of those 100% bullshit, rhetorical troll-trap kind of things where he took something completely out of context and twisted it. I was legit stunned that after meeting me, being chummy in person, meeting my wife and kids, he’d go for character assassination like that. Showed his true colors, a win-at-all-costs personality. Cut ties with him after that" How many other subjects has Dan done a seven part series on? With no rebuttal or other side of the story represented? Total overkill on his part... kinda like the anti-Pro/Rel version of Fonzi jumping the shark... seven times. All par for the BigSoccer course which at a minimum, partially explains, why there's been a steady exodus of American soccer fans away from this site.... and how this forum has a well earned bad reputation amongst American soccer fans who'd like to see an open system including Promotion/Relegation in the United States of America. I didn't know his reputation for the longest time, but hey.... once again from my inbox shortly after a bizarro twitter encounter with Dan. ME: What is accomplished when Loney spams like that? The discussion gets circumvented? Erased? I'd heard he'd done shit like that before, but hadn't ever seen how it works. May 2016 Sent HIM: Nothing but poisoning the well. He is the other Ted. 20 May 2016 ME: I had no idea he was a total sicko. That's way over the line, totally creepy. I reported it to twitter so they can keep track if he does that to others... sheesh. 20 May 2016 Sent HIM: Lol, go read his blog on BigSoccer. It's not just a couple of poignant articles, it's weekly crazy. 20 May 2016
Oh, OK. So you're trusting one person's account who's making an unsubstantiated allegation. I'll just condemn him then.
It corroborates what I've experienced from Dan first hand. And I remember the incident(s) from when it originally took place. So yes, it checks out. But believe what you want to believe. Believe that the moderating on BS is consistent from moderator to moderator and subforum to subforum and that you're just being fair and even handed and it's just the general public posting and you have no inherent bias involved with your choice to ban me from the only couple of threads I've posted on in your MLS subforum over the last few years... and that after you find my posts too critical of MLS to allow on your subforum, you honestly believe scolding me with: "the ignore button, use it" is not the least bit hypocritical or a double standard, even after negativist anti-Pro/Rel zealots on this thread regularly try to suck every bit of positive oxygen out of any Pro/Rel conversation that takes place here. You see, I used to believe all American soccer fans were the same deep down... and we could fight like cats and dogs but at the end of the day, we all just want whatever's best for the future of the sport in this country. I still believe, for the most part, that's still true. The only exceptions seem to be this small slice of self righteous "expert" regulars on BigSoccer which has inspired me to gradually stop posting on most of this forum in protest. #OpenSoccer P.S. I don't begrudge fans in Columbus being fans of the Crew, or fans in Denver being fans of the Rapids. A friend of mine I grew up with who lives in LA gave glowing reviews of the rollout for the new LA team... but even he would really like to see a more open system that includes Pro/Rel in this country... Hell, I have all sorts of respect for fans of MLS teams in the Pacific Northwest earlier this decade, markets that saved MLS's butt and did so without building Mr. Garber a single shiny new soccer specific stadium as a prerequisite for admission. But I do have a problem with MLS apologists and status quo loyalists, many of whom told us for the longest time how the old NASL died from overexpansion but now seem to think the real reason can be blamed solely on the NY Cosmos and that MLS can expand infinitely and charge multiple times more for an expansion fee than most major league football clubs in Europe are worth.
This list flies in the face of the reality of what's happening ... Toyota Field in SA to The Dominion in Austin is 81 miles. LAFC and LAG play 12 miles away from each other. NYFC and NYRB play 21 miles away from each other Talen Energy to Red Bull Arena is is 106 miles Mapfre to Nippert is 109 miles and both house MLS teams btw It is CLEAR that this "territorial" rights bit is a clinging to an old standard that is very obviously not being adhered to any longer. There are better run clubs in lower leagues all over the world ... vast majority of them don't ever get to the top league. I wonder why? And what does it cost to buy a club in the EPL? the Championship? League 1? League 2? How much would it cost to buy a Bundesliga club VS a 2 Bundesliga club? This stratification exists EVERYWHERE and in pro/rel systems. Yes it has, and how has that worked out ... ... Or threatened violence against forum members or publicly accused them of stalking across social media *cough* As opposed to say the totally sane attempts to use it as a proof point and proper capture of the entirety of US Soccer fans ...
Pro/rel twitter a decade ago wasn’t even a thing. A large part of the pro/rel is a good idea crowd on social media are actually involved in local soccer and/or supporters of MLS or USL sides. They don’t have the history with Ted that this and similar communities do.
Tampa is not part of Orlando's MLS territory. San Antonio is not part of Austin's MLS territory. Cincinnati is not part of Columbus's MLS territory (and vice-versa) Louisville is not part of Cincinnati's MLS territory. Memphis is not part of Nashville's MLS territory.
The top 3 have live MLS bids, and territory has not been an issue, and Memphis is over 3 hours away from Nashville.
I'm not aware of any city have territorial rights to an area ... only thing I've ever known of is an ownership group having league rights to "insert place here" Jeffy either conflated the point or is just twisting something into something else to try and further his narrative (likely the case). Yeah, you're one to try and speak to hypocrisy .... that's rich.
Who is blaming the Cosmos? Reasons NASL died are well documented from multiple sources. Reasons relating to expansion include the pace of expansion, the lack of vetting of owners, and continued expansion at a time the league should have been looking to contract to a number of viable teams.
How long has this discussion been going on? Here's an AT 40 throwback from ten years ago today:(There's laughter all right...just not how he expected.)
http://www.theunsubs.com/wp/2016/03...-edwards-calls-mls-speculation-premature/1633 https://www.sbnation.com/soccer/201...san-antonio-to-send-threatening-letter-to-mls https://www.sacbee.com/sports/mls/article10161326.html I could go on, but am pressed for time today.
"According to the Vice President of Communications for the MLS club, Leonardo Santiago, Orlando holds “full territorial and TV rights for the Tampa Bay market.” TV rights can easily be renegotiated to tweaked. Columbus used to have all the TV rights to Ohio. Now they and FCC are on two different networks. But sure, don't let reality get in the way of a shitty narrative.
I sort of feel Cincinnati is an exceptional case, though. Pretty sure Garber was fairly confident they were going to be the only Ohio team when he started the expansion process. But I agree this is almost certainly a negotiable process.
This isn't Customer Service. Post your complaints there. We've all put up with way more of your whining than I should have allowed.
I think most people feel San Antonio's bid pretty much had its legs cut out from under it once Precourt committed to Austin. You could chalk that up as much to the unlikelihood of MLS having 4 Texas teams as it being in Austin's "media market", though. And with Tampa, well, it's not a given until their bid is accepted.