Overcoming soccer's problems in the U.S.

Discussion in 'MLS: General' started by RedMenace, Oct 28, 2004.

  1. RedMenace

    RedMenace New Member

    Jun 20, 2004
    Palo Alto, CA
    I see great promise in soccer in the U.S., but there are also huge problems. The biggest seem to come from the fact that professional soccer leagues are administered by two separate entities (perhaps more, but I'll leave indoor and other leagues off the table for now), and those two entities don't seem to work together very well. In addition, the American business approach to sports teams as simply being commercial investments, rather than investments in civic pride, I think gets in the way of greater acceptance and stability for professional soccer.

    I think one of the best things to promote long-term development of soccer is to do everything possible to ensure teams can stay in existence in their communities, even if they can no longer compete (economically or otherwise) in their present league. I don't really care if teams move up or down, or if leagues sometimes get reorganized or renamed - teams are already disappearing from soccer leagues at all levels with distressing regularity (while usually being replaced by other teams).

    Fan loyalty is strongest, by far, to their local team because it IS their local team, especially when the team sticks around long enough for most people in the area to begin to recognize it, its players, and its history. Thus having teams that don't last longer than a decade means there is little or no fan loyalty.

    Unfortunately, the way soccer has worked in the U.S. it's all too easy for teams to disappear in a few short years. In MLS, the two Florida teams that were contracted didn't drop down to the A-League or PSL or PDL (that I know of), they just disappeared off the face of the earth. If San Jose "moves", it, too, will disappear. I don't know what the plans are for the several A-League teams that are dropping out this offseason, but I have not heard that they are necessarily dropping to the PSL or PDL.

    (I also think that the idea of "moving" a team should be scrapped before it even happens in MLS: it's a non-starter, in my opinion. If the leage and team owner want to shut down a team in one location and open a new one in another, fine, but let's get past the pretense that the team is "moving". If the team moves, they should and probably would come up with a new name, and they should also keep only a small core of existing players, instead treating it as an expansion team.)

    I agree that the past MLS/A-League agreement was unworkable, but that's because it was the wrong kind of agreement (giving MLS teams the ability to poach players at will from the A-League? What kind of sense does that make, even with some compensation? It would only make sense if the MLS teams owned the A-League teams and used them as farm teams, which isn't the case that I know of.) Sensible transfer arrangements to both teams' advantage (which those teams, and the players involved, get to negotiate before agreeing to) are fine. But that agreement didn't make much sense to me.

    But what SHOULD be happening is facilitating the movement of teams between divisions, and what's more, making it a priority to keep teams in business, regardless of what league they're playing in. A San Jose team that keeps playing under its recognized identity but in the A-League (or even PSL/PDL) has a far greater chance to break back into MLS later than one that goes out of business entirely (or "moves" to Texas). AND it can keep people in the area interested in soccer in the meantime, and adds to the legitimacy of the A-League as well. Even if people in the San Jose area (or wherever else) do keep an interest in soccer and try to form a new team, I think a string of unstable, unconnected startups is not the most productive way to build soccer in the U.S. The biggest problem for most teams seems to be having a large, loyal, stable fanbase - something that takes many years to develop. Killing teams off at will wouldn't seem to be the best way to promote that.

    I think that any team contracted from MLS (including any team moved more than 50-100 miles) more or less automatically be transferred to the A-League, minus some number of player contracts that would continue in MLS (but not necessarily all with the "new" team if the team's MLS franchise is moved to another location). If even the A-League is too expensive, it would drop to PSL, then PDL. It may be tough to find new owners to operate the team at even any of these levels, and this doesn't really address what to do about accumulated debt, but everything possible should be done do encourage this sort of arrangement rather than letting the team die. And by "everything possible" I don't mean "lip service". I mean pre-arranged procedures to transfer certain property (the team identity, at the very least) automatically, etc.

    In addition, a new agreement could give MLS and USL better opportunities to cross promote and market. MLS should be promoting A-League and vice versa, since they generally do not compete in the same markets, but increased awareness of each can only help both leagues and build excitement about soccer generally across the country.
     

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