For obvious reasons really. Timbers have one of the strongest supports. Strong support= huge revenue. The league is young. It shares Revenue. It needs every bit of support. It cant afford to loose any revenue. If i doesnt do something like it almost always does with the Galaxy to ensure Timbers are one of the premier teams or atleast competitive, it will loose a major source of revenue.
I, the first person to respond, will be "loose" with my words. The Timbers don't deserve to win. The Timbers must earn the wins.
sorry grammar cop but the MLS can't afford to lose the support timber has. If Timbers continue sucking, fans will stop attending and that is one of, if not, the mls biggest support (does the galaxy continuously sellout like the timbers?)
Support and attendance will be successful even in the face of losses. Four decades of Trailblazer support suggests the Timbers will achieve the same following year in and year out. On field product be damned.
Oh no. A team might experience an ebb and flow of support. Oh dear. Someone please give this poster a red card and delete this thread.
I guess I'm too concern for the MLS. I just want to see it improve and loosing one of its strongest support, well I don't see how that would help it improve.
27 consecutive sell-outs and you're concerned about waning support? Man, you must have a couple screws "lose"
my concern is if the team continues sucking? do you think that sell out streak is going to continue? obv not, which is something must happen...which is my point. you must be daft if you cant comprehend that.
I'm curious as to what exactly you want the league to do..? and if you think Portland/Timber fans are so readily fickle, you don't know much about their history
Blame management for fielding a bad team. Be happy people support this team if anything Chivas needs help *cough* relocate *cough*
Soooooooooo............ what about Toronto? or Columbus (who had one of the highest avg attendances for years after Crew Stadium was built, and recently has been struggling at the gate despite fielding a playoff team)? What about DCU? Should the league help them out too? What about NY? Despite a brand new stadium, star players, and a very good team the past 2 + seasons still struggles to sell out RBA. Should MLS get involved there too? $h!t while MLS is at it they better help out Philly too, b/c you know support is starting to wane here as well................
This thread is out of the twilight zone or something. Isn't MLS a competitive soccer league? Or is it pro-wrestling where you script results to maximize market appeal?
Not to fix matches, not at all. By help I mean allocating Talents to Timbers, like they always seem to do with Galaxy.
I agree, the league should treat Portland like LA. Especially since the Galaxy doesn't actually get any of the special favors folks tend to believe LA gets.
Your drawing a distinction between fixing matches and ensuring that a particular team has superior talent so that the team wins disproportionately?
Former SPL player? Decent but not quite. Not on Par with Henry's, Beckham,Kanes, Donovans, etc. You catch my drift? The league needs to stop stockpiling all the talents in LA and NY, spread them around, and especially send some down to Portland. Its their only constant sellout...I keep saying they cant risk letting it slip. They will seriously regret.
I wasnt advocating league fixing matches in favor of Timbers if thats what you were saying. Isnt that the cases with Red Bulls and especially Galaxy?
Really? So teams like Seattle, TFC, RSL, Philly etc don't sell out every game? Are Portland, LA, and NY the only US soccer cities that exist in your world?
No pity in the Rose city brother. If the league actually did anything to help a specific team win so as to maintain its attendance, I would probably drop MLS and never look back.
Please Portland... Do the following: Appoint the refs to take points away from competitors put your team on national tv each week put your teams name on the cup employ stooges as tv "announcers" steal players from teams & then destroy the team have players exiled out of MLS If Portland can do these things that the Galaxy currently do then I'll be happy. Because I cannot stand much more Galaxy "sportsmanship"