Whoops wrong button didn't mean to delete last post. (will repost below). We'll see what MLS decides to expand to rather it be Vancouver/Portland or Portland/st Louis or Vancouver/st Louis in a few weeks. One would think if St Louis won a bid to get a team that MLS would have announced it by now.
The MLS waited this long to give Portland a chance to run this through their City Council. They were given a March 15 deadline as the intent was to announce the winners before the season opener March 19
I can imagine the following: Saputo wanted to shortchange the bid until George Gillett could unload his Liverpool shares. Without that, MLS thought Saputo couldn't even deliver on promises to upgrade Stade Saputo... ...meanwhile... ...St. Louis shortchanges their bid, but they DO earmark funds to a mostly FUNDED project. It's a bias toward public components to financing that conceivably boots Montreal and not St. Louis. That vaults St. Louis over Montreal. Does that vault them over Portland and Vancouver? Two weeks away, anyone?
Would someone just please admit that they don't really know, that they haven't seen the bids, that they're going on face value of readily-available, incomplete information, and allowing their own biases to color their views? I'll hang up and listen to your answer.
Who knows what MLS will decide which next two cities the league will expand to. It seems that they are waiting on Portland to see if they pass the soccer plan or not before making the announcement. If St Louis had more investor backing their bid that probably could give them a better shot at getting a team.
I'm not generally too keen on text/net shorthand, but not being afraid of tangents, it's interesting to note that my 16-year-old stepson (really ex-stepson due to divorce, but there's still a decent relationship) HATES it. Sounds unnatural, no? It's certainly unnatural and disconcerting to me. The kid is supposed to dive right into crap like that, no? Even worse that google didn't reveal squat. Just saying.
Well, Bigsoccer reduced what was an all-caps, unpronounceable pseudo-acronym into the Farsi/Polish-looking concoction you see above. It meant Your Ideas Are Intriguing To Me And I Want To Subscribe To Your Newsletter.
To be honest, I really have no idea what the MLS Board of Governors is going to decide. Based on past history, the scraps of publicly available information, and my own personal biases I think that the coming announcement will consist of at most two teams from the four publicly recognized bidders. YMMV
Yeah, but I was just bored with doing it that way. Call me crazy, but it seems easier to type out the whole phrase.
It seems as though the Ottawa stadium situation is going to cost Melnyk an MLS Franchise. It appears that Saputo and Gillette's reluctance to shell out $40M has cost Montreal a franchise this time around too. Maybe someone could introduce Melnyk to Saputo? Stadium is already built, a team already in place, and Montreal is going to be a better fanbase for an MLS team. Melnyk would get his team, Saputo and the MLS the money they need, and they'd likely all have a better chance of making money. Even Ottawa fans could make the 2 hour drive if they're interested. Team could likely even start in 2010 with an increased capacity at the stadium. It would be a bit weird having the owners of the Habs and Senators join forces though wouldn't it?
But Saputo and Gillette don't need Melnyk's money. They have their own...they have just valued the MLS model (versus the USL model) and, in their estimation, it is not worth $40 million US plus stadium reno's expansion. Similarly, Melnyk's interest is not simply to "get an MLS team" it is to "get an MLS team for Ottawa"....so teaming up with Montreal does not solve his issue either.