I think the league is in good shape. Expenses going down. Revenue going up. Let's look at numbers. Expenses for 2002 season were guesstimated at about $29 million - revenue at about $9 million = 20 million down. Divide that by 8 teams. Call it 2.5 per team in case the numbers are off. The cable industry is a cash rich business. When a cable company comes into town and installs new cable lines, they do it at an industry estimate of a million dollars a mile. When @Home was going under last year, Comcast and Cox Communication spent $150 million each to keep the company running for three months. 2.5 Million is a tax write-off. Pichon and Clemmons getting their picture taken with the Mayor Street while participating in the Mayor's school program was worth most of that in PR. Sponsors may not be jumping for joy over the TV numbers, but they love the product. The league is so clean it squeeks. Most importantly, the level of play has improved greatly in the last two years. Everybody has sat next to a person coming out to there first game. A person skeptical about the talent on the field during warm-ups, and amazed by the final whistle. Will the league ever get NFL numbers - No. Is the league hoping for NFL numbers - No. Profit by 2007 is a realistic goal, and the cable companies who own the league have that kind of patience. Dwight
I can't speak for other markets, but I'd say WUSA is performing a ltitle bit better than I had expected. As Dwight wrote, when soccer knowledgeable people see the product first hand, they are overwhelmingly satisfied by the product. In NC a Brazilian guys shows up with different people all the time, and these soccer fans have been more than complementary. And work colleagues who are soccer fans have commented glowingly about the play. The whole thing is about building awareness, and the Charge marketing approach has been very successful. And I'd say there's about 5,000 loyal fans, with about another 5 or 6 thousand who are interested. This is a good base, and I think very loyal