Re: Expansion based on city population Well Dallas will soon become the sixth largest metro area in the country, and Houston is close behind.
Toronto and Rochester in '07 = 14 teams Philly and Cleveland in '09 = 16 teams STL and SJ in '10 = 18 teams
A year ago in January, Garber said he would announce a 14th team from the Midwest in the next 60-90 days.... MLS didn't plan on 13 teams this year... they were jones-in' for a 14th...
I think if MLS goes to 16+ teams it should go to a one division format. With the top two playing for the MLS Cup. I know alot of people will disagree with me on this but it will make the level of play better, by adding meaningfull games, more competition, and some serious rivalries. The MLS will become a better league if they do this. Just my .02 tho
I would be inclined to agree but only if there is relegation involved. The two division set up is more competitive (for the time being).
I think San Diego is an underrated choice. Soccer there is very popular, especially at the youth levels (Nomads and Surf Tournaments). Also, there are only the Chargers and the Padres, who draw well, but there is a place for a third franchise. The population numbers mentioned do not include San Diego County and the draw that could come from Mexico...although that might be limited, I don't know about the ease of crossing the border for a game. And a stadium/investor pose a large problem.
I thought that you were being rude to the poster previous to the post I cited. I retract my post and send an apology.
Why's it a big deal? You superstitious? OK, I call BS. Garber's bound not to have been dumb enough to use that "60-90 days" reference.
I like that idea, 2 divisions of 18 teams each for a total of 36 teams. The question is, do we have 36 metro areas in the US with populations of more than 1.5million?
Tampa-St. Petersburg-Clearwater metropolitan area has a population of 4 million people on April 1, 2007.... So if expansion was based on population we would have a team no questions asked
Atlanta has 5 million, if you want to talk metro areas Tampa is pretty far down the line. Philly- 6,268,176 Atlanta- 4,973,243 San Diego- 4,922,723 Miami- 4,825,569 Pheonix- 4,026,207 There are more on the list before Tampa as well, but I don't want to list all of their populations. You may want to check your sources, the one I looked at had the Tampa metropolitan area's population at 2,653,869 which was ranked 19th in the US. Besides, it is obvious that the MLS does not make that their primary factor considering the fact that towns like KC, Salt Lake, and Columbus have a team. Columbus doesn't even have the highest population in it's own state, Cleveland and Cincinnati each have 400,000 more people than Columbus.
Re: Expansion based on city population Ok, I love this post. So much data to look at!! One not so small nit pick, why is the city with the current MLS champions listed as a city with no team? I believe that population is ONE factor amoung many to take into consideration. Amoung demographic factors, total population and population growth are key to me (i.e. would you rather be in the 8th largest city with 5% growth or the 11th largest with 39% growth). Yeah, self-serving I know. Anywould would love to see this data updated. Especially for the average attendance number for 06/07 seasons.
Re: Expansion based on city population miami is missing from the list by population with no team. they may have once, but they don't now.
Re: Expansion based on city population Not to mention the fact that that data is almost 10 years old and Atlanta has maintained that growth rate every year.