Shouldn't someone tell Bill Archer that nobody on the boards here actually owns the team? 'Cause I don't think he knows.
People should also be careful what they wish for in case it comes true. Remember when the Jays were selling out the Skydome every game and could compete with anyone in terms of money? Now they have to do the best they can to keep up with Boston and New York. TFC is selling out every game and is a rich team at the moment. There is no guarantee with will always be the case. Rules should be fair to everyone in all circumstances, not be arranged to benefit those who already have.
Personally, I favour a luxury-tax type salary cap. I.e. set an upper limit that teams can spend past, but tax wages above the cap level and use that money for teams that spend above a certain (base) amount on salaries (if you spend too low you get nothing). Similar to baseball. It would allow clubs with bigger ambition to spend more, and would give smaller clubs extra incentive to spend to at least the minimum to get a cut of the luxury tax. Also, I would stipulate that the distributed luxury tax would have to 100% be spent on salaries. But.... That's just my opinion Cheers!
I'm tired of this argument because, quite frankly, it's ignorant. Communist league? Are you kidding me? Your suggestion is akin to telling the different branches of the same company to compete against each other, price cut each other, etc. MLS is not like a normal free market system. Think about it this way, if TFC successfully pushed other teams out of the market (which is desirable in a normal capitalistic system) what would happen? Oh, that's right, TFC would have no one to play against and it would fail. The league itself is the company, not the individual teams. Right now for the company to succeed, parity is key, a point which I agree with 100%. If a team is more popular, what do you get by letting them spend more? Well, the teams that can't spend as much lose more, they lose fans, they collapse, an the league suffers for it. I agree that the cap is too low right now, but the solution is an across the board increase, not an unbalanced one. The only unbalanced solutions I agree with are: 1) The academy. Teams can spend whatever they want on an academy. The owners should get full rights to everyone (not just top 2), be able to sign them, or sell them to another team/league if they want. This will help the team, and help drive profits. 2) Coaching/Infrastructure. Teams can spend whatever they want on staff and equipment to give them a competative edge. This allows rich teams to try to get a slight edge to reward their fans, but doesn't make the league another EPL (I hate the disparity in the EPL).
As much as I truly love the MLSE IS THE EVIL EMPIRE hysteria, stop swearing at people (like you did in a previous post), acknowledge that this reality is what we entered into when we joined MLS, and stop whining. And incidentally, I would also like to see where you get your figures - as salary information in the Premiership is generally kept confidential.
From the BBC, but I realize the figures are from 2002 http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/business/2308683.stm but I don't believe it would've fallen drastically in that period. Note how MLSE seems to have a higher profit than most EPL teams!
Hold on, I'm trying to keep up with you here. Let me get this straight, profits = bad? I'd like to subscribe to your newsletter sir.
Hmmm, your source is a six-year old article. What could possibly happen in six years... You do realize that the Prem signed an absolutely titanic TV deal a couple of years ago that kicked in this season and made the previous revenue numbers absolutely irrelevant, right? And by titanic, I mean that their revenues have increased ridiculously - during 2002 the league was getting £167 million per season for its TV deal. In 2007/08 the league gets more than £300 million per season (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Premier_League#Finances) - the BBC now pays more for the rights to broadcast the highlights of games than was initially paid to highlight the games themselves - and that is just for domestic TV, the increase in foreign TV rights has to be at least the same, if not higher, given where the league is now worldwide. So unless you can establish that player salaries have also doubled, then you will have to go back and find some other reason to hate MLSE.
I have no problem with the way the league is currently structered. Over the last 12 years hundreds of millions of dollars have been invested in the league. The league is turning the corner and starting to gain a foothold in many cities. I think the time is right for the league to reinvest in all its teams. The cap should have been raised 1.2 million, as an example with 200K invested in academies totalling 3.2 million. That would give each team wiggle room to add quality and depth to their rosters. Now is the time to reinvest in the product on the field IMO.
Exactly, record profits are bad.... whats so hard to understand about that? Your probably one of those idiots who brags about how profitable the leafs are...
Nope, I'm one of those "idiots" who makes a living by helping companies make "record profits". Sorry, a good profit margin in the MLS will only serve to convince other well run sporting companies to join the MLS. Companies are in it to make money, full stop. The sooner you can come to terms with that fact, the happier you will be in life.
This is what I can't stand right here...languish at the bottom??? Its been 1 season. 1! By this way of thinking if we won the MLS Cup this year we might as well start calling it a friggin dynasty! Cmon, get real. I do think the cap is low and should be raised but things are still getting started. This kind of talk is way too early and would doom the league to fail like the NASL before it. Really Kingston said it right...TFC is selling out every game and is a rich team at the moment. There is no guarantee with will always be the case. Rules should be fair to everyone in all circumstances, not be arranged to benefit those who already have.
I think it's the other way around. I agree. Just think of the MLS as being governed similar to Canada, a free market economy with socialized health care.
The MLSE has enough money, power and clout to run a soccer team in just about any league in the world...they could have bought Liverpool for Christ's sake! They could have started a Candian League! No...they bought a MLS franchise, and knew exactly all rules and parameters involved. They're *equal partners* with all other teams in the league, they are not above the league. The league has avenues for successful teams to spent more money, so saying we are being punished is a gross mis-statement. We can spent whatever we want thru using 2 DP spots. My final point...I'd rather see TFC in the MLS with the current salary restrictions than in the USL. Get over it.
In other words, MLSE is pretty happy with the relative cost certainty in MLS, especially if the turnstiles keep spinning at BMO Field, and contrary to what the original poster implied, it's not MLS keeping MLSE from spending more money on TFC, it's MLSE that's keeping MLSE from spending more money on TFC, which should be especially obvious since they haven't even shelled out for a big-money DP.
I'm not a big fan of caps and revenue sharing. Funny how these big business owners are the biggest free-market capitalists, then suddenly need socialist mechanisms to prevent them from spending their investor's money. There is no substitute for a good business plan. I can't believe owners go into a risky industry like sports without one. Using baseball as the classic American model, Oakland and Cleveland are small market teams that compete year after year with a plan. The Yankees dominated when they had both resources and a plan, now they have no plan and just spend, their underachieving is laughable. The MLS is different because the "league" is the owner. I was not founded by separate teams. You buy a franchise in the league and run it in a way more similar to McDonald's than Arsenal. THe MLS also has to fight uphill against well-established sports. I understanding it and hopefully in another 10 years they can loosen up. but I would do it too quickly. As a D.C. United fan I was horribly upset watching the dynasty of the 1990s get pulled-apart each year, but I'm sure there are other fans who groaned for four years when they were in yet another final. http://weblogs.baltimoresun.com/sports/soccer/blog/
"Toronto’s ties with Major League Soccer go back to its formation. The losing bid in the original process for Division 1 status presented to FIFA in 1993 came from then A-league owners Karston Von Werbse of Toronto, the billionaire Saputo Family of Montreal, Milan Illitch of Vancouver, as well as American counterparts Corneila Corbet of Tampa, Ivan De La Pena of Los Angeles, and Doug Healy of Denver. The winning bid - MLS - was led by than USSF President, and World Cup 1994 CEO Alan Rothenberg. MLS Executive Mark Abbott was sent to assess Toronto in January of 1995 during the weeklong Skydome Cup tournament featuring the National teams of Canada, Portugal, and Denmark. At that time then Skydome chief Richard Peddie – now a major player with the Maple Leafs and Raptors, was interested in bringing MLS north of the border as a new tenant for the cavernous Skydome. " http://www.soccer.loop48.com/modules.php?name=News&file=print&sid=487 http://www.turfmonster.com/content/?CatId=4&ContentId=173 Richard Peddie did not like the business model that MLS was proposing so they opted out.. I had more links way back when ppl were discussing the merits of a Toronto expansion team (those were some wars lol)