Why isn't the internal transfer market stronger? I know about single entity and so on but why isn't there a concerted effort to increase this market and make it viable? Shouldn't the teams, at least in this regard, have WAY MORE autonomy? Maybe this could be a way to help keep American players in MLS for longer. Thoughts?
Yes, whenever you hear about a player traded for "allocation money" that's what everyone else in the world would call a transfer.
Maybe for baseball, basketball, or hockey, but trades in soccer are rare. The proper terms are transfers or loans. Anything else is extremely unusual.
Please, don't do the whole "proper term" bull crap. When a trade is done for allocation money, it's the same as a transfer...except the contract still belongs to MLS.
Yes it's the same but, and I know you know the difference, that a transfer involves the purchasing of a player. Whereas a trade is more of a this for that type of transaction where no money is involved. Technically everything is a trade/transfee. Where's my cd? lol
yea i wish there was a bit more trading between teams. it's pretty rare that a team has too much talent in a certain area, but it does happen. chicago is loaded with forwards, columbus has ekpo and noonan on the bench.
A more aggressive internal market would (imo): 1. Help with that almight parity 2. Help with keeping domestic players at home and raising certain ones to a type of "star" status. This in turn would help to market the league. 3. Definitely make the offseason bearable. lol 4. Create a competition for AMERICAN/MLS players on the international transfer market. This alone would help to increase revenue for the league. (if only the MLS would see that there is NO SHAME in being a feeder league. 5. Create a bigger buzz, maybe some of the media will catch along and help to promot the league. This is a stretch but it could work.
In Europe transfer season is like Christmas... Ther are plenty of exciting rumours going on and supporters have big hopes and are excited about which players they may get... It doesnt really matter if you support a big or a small team, it's always great fun... .
When the contracts are owned by the same entity even after the player changes teams it is hard to "purchase" the player. Let me give you a scenario. Let's say you are married and you and your spouse both put all of your money into one single account as household financial partners for paying for everything (meals, bills, discretionary spending etc). Each of you has a budget of what you can spend on discretionary items each month of let's say $1000, but everything is still owned by the household. You have an iPod that you purchased with the combined account money a while back so it is owned by the household but possessed by you. You decide you no longer want it so you "sell" it to your spouse for $50 of her discreationary budget so you now have $1050 this month and she has only $950, which she takes from the single account to give to you. While possession of the actual device may go to her the overall ownership (in this case your combined household) hasn't really changed because the device is still owned within the single household, although you did get a little bump on your discreationary spending for the next month. Replace that sceanrio with the owners being the financial partners, the product being transferred as the players, the overall operating budget for the league replacing the bank account, and the salary cap as the discretionary spending and you have MLS.
Just be patient. The first round of player movement went to Seattle for expansion. Now teams are setting up budgets and planning. They have until March for pete's sake. Things will heat up.