You would think, but Utica City FC is still the dumbest indoor soccer team name in history. Even though Certified Lion reminds me of when Mitt Romney called himself Severely Conservative.
Now that you mention it, I think the original name was Waza Flo Pro. I can't remember if I insisted on adding Detroit to it. It ultimately became Detroit Waza, which I think is an interesting and decent name. 1790 Cincinnati FC was probably worse than Utica City FC. And then it became 1790 Cincinnati Express and then Cincinnati Kings. So, yes, Utica has some competition. Because of my indoor sensibilities, though, any name with FC is going to be relegated to "worst ever" status.
MASL coming to Allentown, PA: https://www.maslsoccer.com/news/maj...ocB7vTgIAa8zlW-SOE_aem__My2ilMsnxSYNZJoN1c6-A
Wow - good news (I hope)! And the news came out without a lot of (any??) rumors in advance. It is interesting that this was announced by the MASL before anything about Oklahoma City, especially considering that they are already in MASL2 and have a relationship.
There's a reason they're in MASL2. If OKC had not built that mid-sized arena, we're not having this conversation at all. In any case, there's nothing that says you have to announce the closer one first. OKC has applied. Apparenty they are not ready to do that one yet. Allentown was ready. There you go. The Allentown folks own the Phantoms hockey team and have a long track record of investment in various sports teams (though none in soccer before now). The one owner saying that Pele helped devise the rules for indoor soccer was a head-scratcher. You'd think it would have to get better from there, but you'd also think the league's communications staff would know that wasn't true before they hit send on the release.
"The one owner saying that Pele helped devise the rules for indoor soccer was a head-scratcher. You'd think it would have to get better from there, but you'd also think the league's communications staff would know that wasn't true before they hit send on the release."
OKC has markers to meet. It's a big jump from M2 to the MASL. I don't know a lot of the details, but it sounds like OKC just ghosted Sonora and forced them to cancel a home game, which is a bad look.
It's big. Look, seriously: Harrisburg was 15-81 (.156!) since COVID in the MASL. (Or Premier Level now, apparently.) Absolutely non-competitive. They're on their way to being 12-0 in MASL2. But record aside, when you actually have to pay people and have a front office and travel farther than 1,100 miles to Mexico City (once), it's not fun and games anymore. Saw the forfeit, didn't know the circumstances.
Red Flag for me last night. The attendance in Milwaukee on a Friday night for a playoff game is 1,782. A franchise that is a staple of this game brings in less than 2k? And we are expanding?? Anyone out there?
This is pretty standard. The Wave didn't clinch the quarterfinal until Monday (in a game that drew 1800), leaving three and a half days to sell tickets to Friday night's game. No time to sell groups. The idea of "the big playoff game" making tickets fly off shelves does not apply in this sport at all. Hockey having the building Saturday and Sunday pushed the second game to Monday, which likely won't be pretty, either.
The Soles put out an announcement canceling the game and lamenting that they were awarded a forfeit win, which doesn't do them any damned good. That was the gist of it.
What's the point of this many playoff games if they aren't money makers? Just play a championship game and call it a season.
The eternal question at some levels of sport. While major leagues want more playoff game inventory, leagues like the MASL are kind of stuck. They want as many teams as possible to have hope that they can make the playoffs without having everyone make the playoffs. They want to crown a champion in a way that's perceived as "the right way" to do it. They want to look at least somewhat major. The playoffs in this league are usually fun to watch. But they've been stuck with weekday dates a lot of the time because of arena availability. That doesn't help at all. (Last year's playoffs were all on weekends, but even that didn't work out because everyone hated the quarterfinals/semifinals in San Diego thing.) Some people are still hung up on appearances. How can you be a league worthy of attention if you don't have multiple playoff games? (That's the thought process of some, anyway.)
I think you need a playoff for the season to even mean anything. And fans need to have home games to feel involved in the playoffs. The downside is crappy crowds and bad dates (or no dates). The lack of dates is as big an issue as the league's visa problems.
Playoffs in minor league sports generally average smaller crowds compared to the regular season. Season ticket holders are engaged but those numbers are small throughout the league.