There is a chat (via Facebook) with Commissioner Don Garber apparently taking place right now. I'm guessing someone could post a complete transcript later, if anything of interest is said.
Pretty much standard fare so far. Garber answering mostly softball questions and avoiding the more pointed ones. Although, in some cases he's not answering the questions that are actually asked. Here's his answer to someone asking about if pro/rel will be implemented. So close.
Garber’s Social Chat Series Quotes: Brian Antonio Calderon adidas micoach is a terrific technology and will allow our players, coaches and technical directors to have valuable real-time performance data - power, speed, heart rate, etc. Marc Oberholtzer NYC remains our top priority for our 20th team. We are still having discussions in Miami, Atlanta, Minneapolis and some other markets. The Cosmos have decided to play in the second division, NASL. That's a good decision for them now, in that our NY opportunity won't happen for a few years. David Vitek The League has a very active Club Services group that works closely with all of our clubs to share best practices and support their sales and marketing efforts. We are making progress in almost all markets, including in Dallas where we expect a sell-out for this weekend's game vs. LA Tony Rossi I have stated in the past that we are very interested in seeing if we can include goal line technology in our stadiums. The project is just recently approved by FIFA, so we still have lots of work to do on logistics, budgets/pricing and other issues before we can take it forward. Josh Biringer We are making some real commitments in this area- - we've just hired a new chief marketing officer to focus on a wide variety of initiatives to first better understand our fan base and then create programs to target specific demographic groups to hopefully get them more engaged in MLS and our Clubs. You might have seen this article on ESPN.com that outlines some of our thinking... http://espn.go.com/sports/soccer/story/_/id/8194367/mls-hopes-build-national-profile-roger-bennett Greg Hall - First let me first say that we are really excited about Jason Levien and Erik Thohir joining Will Chang as new owners for DC United. Kevin Payne, Jason and Will recently had a very productive meeting with the Mayor Gray and we hope we can count on him to be supportive of our need for a new stadium... Michal Wos The Kraft family have been working for some time on trying to secure public support for a soccer specific stadium located closer to the urban core in Boston. These projects are extremely difficult - - particularly in big cities. We have great faith in the Krafts and their commitment to MLS and the Revs, so I continue to hold out hope that something can get done. Tim Smith We are really proud of both the quality and growing audience on MLSsoccer.com. The League has a separate digital office in Manhattan that has almost 50 staffers. They are all really soccer folks and are incredibly experienced in this "space." We have also created the SUM Digital Properties group, that aggregates the traffic of a number of key soccer sites (Yahoo Soccer, US Soccer, Goal.com) and allows us to both generate revenue and expand our audience. We clearly have fewer views than the other major leagues, but traffic is really growing. Edgar Nunez I am really glad someone asked this question... Let me start by saying that I grew up in Queens. This isn't about my own personal views. It's about what's appropriate for our in-stadium and television audience. As far as YSA goes, I personally think the cheer is sophomoric and not at all creative. We need to end it. I'd like to think that our supporters can figure out a way to do it on their own so the League doesn't have to step in... Trey Madara - Trey - I sat in a US Soccer meeting yesterday and had Sunil Gulati say that he believes our officiating is far better than the public gives us credit for. Soccer fans around the world complain about officiating. And it's fair to say that there has been bad calls at the highest level of the game. We created the Professional Referees Organization in conjunction with US Soccer to better train, assess and assign referees. The GM is Peter Waldron, a guy who officiated his last season last year in the EPL. I am convinced that we will continue to make improvements in this area. Jordan Garahana - Our goal is to be one of the top soccer leagues in the world by 2022. We will measure our success by the quality of the play in the league, the passion of our fans, the cultural relevance of our clubs and the value of our enterprise. We just finished an MLS Board of Governors meeting and started the meeting (like we do every meeting at the League) with a statement of this vision. Filippo Ferrara I can't tell you enough how much time we think about our season schedule. There are so many factors that affect this issue - - weather, available broadcast windows, stadium availability, FIFA dates, the Concacaf Champions League and the Lamar Hunt US Open Cup, just to name a few. Sven Offerson - Come on Sven! 9 different teams have lifted the championship trophy since the league began in '96. Including Kansas City, Salt Lake, Columbus and Colorado!!! Joey Barnes Joey- I really believe at some point MLS will have a closer relationship with the lower divisions. We are investing significant funds in our reserve league and academy programs and are looking for ways to ensure that we are effective in developing players as best we can. Hector Lewis - Yes, it is part of our collective bargaining agreement. But remember, there's lots more invested in players than what is allocated to the salary budget. From academy programs, the reserve league, Generation Adidas, designated players, etc. Nick - While we are probably not yet ready to roll out an MLS vertical channel, we have been producing a lot of video programming that available on MLSsoccer.com and KICK TV. You really should check out www.youtube.com/kicktvto see what we are doing in this area. Mike Juell We think we have the most competitive all star game format in pro sports. I do expect us to continue with the concept. Be sure to tune in to ESPN2 at 830 pm est to catch the game. And stick around for Halftime... I will be interviewed by Max, Alexi and Kasey Mark Parker - Artificial turf continues to improve. While everyone would prefer that every game be played on grass, it's a practical reality that playing on turf will continue to be part of the game. Remember, World Cup qualifiers are played on artificial turf in many countries around the world. @Isaac Knopf - Our SUM staff regularly assists our clubs with jersey sponsor sales. We are very proud of our newest sponsor in Dallas, Advocare! @Ryan Whitehead - The MLS DC viewed the incident with Brek as more egregious. They did not view the act as the same in that one involved a referee and the other did not. I can assure you that the committee is required to make decisions based on their interpretation (and video review) of the facts of an incident, without regard for who the player is... vince Man That certainly seems to be an easy solution. But in actuality, we still have a shorter schedule than most leagues around the world. It also would have a significant impact on our economics.(in regards to decreasing the schedule to a 30 game season) Fern Gully - We are not at all considering relocating any MLS teams.... I am very impressed by the fan support for the Scorpions. It's a great story for soccer in America. Gabriel Sabin - Joey Saputo and his team have done a terrific job so far this year. They currently are second in the League in attendance and have had two of the largest stand-alone games in our history. I attended both their first match at the Olympic Stadium and at Stade Saputo and believe they are off to a great start! Gotta go folks. Off to PPL Park to begin the AT&T MLS All Star festivities. Thanks again for your support and I will try to engage in another social media chat soon. I also want to congratulate the US Women's National Team for a great victory against France. Tune in to tonight's match on ESPN2, Telefutura, or TSN and RDS in Canada. And let's hope our guys have a good match against Chelsea!