The Kansas City/Chattanooga Pro/Rel Meet-n-Greet Superthread

This is a double edged sword, though. I agree that it's advantageous for being able to quickly spin up a national league with outlets in a variety of regions that are ready-made to absorb the losses inherent in a new league.

Over the long-term, though, it becomes much more difficult to shake the perception of being a farm system league. The MLS reserve sides have pretty much proven that the American soccer fan isn't particularly interested in that experience.

 

Maybe. Soccer fandom in the U.S. seems fairly atypical compared to how people follow other sports here. I'm pretty out of the loop for minor league hockey (there was a team in Knoxville I would go see when I was in college, but A) that was 25 years ago B) I was just there for the beer and the fights - NASCAR on ice, you could say), but I don't know if it's a farm system like baseball (i.e. the teams are affiliated with a single parent club) or what the "fandom" actually consists of (e.g. nobody cares about how a MiLB team does, you just hope to catch a future star or rehabilitating famous player).

But, sure, it might be like MiLB: take the family out for a cheap night of entertainment. Hotdog races, t-shirt cannons, "Bring your dog and/or smoke bombs", etc. The only problem is that soccer doesn't lend itself nearly as well to that since there's only really one scheduled break in the action.

 

Maybe MLS teams should play their reserves in other cities and rename them to appeal to the local community, as with Bethlehem Steel and the hybrid.

RB2 recently moved to a new stadium in Montclair NJ but kept the RB2 name.

They may have to keep the Red Bull name for sponsorship reasons but a make like Essex County Red Bulls may get a few more through the gate.

 

Agreed.

I have the ability to go and watch LA Galaxy II games but I only have so much time and of the chunk that is dedicated to soccer, much of it is of course spent on their main team.

The MLS2 teams that are playing in the same market, if not the same location, are effectively having their attendances stunted by their parent clubs.

I plan to catch more lower league US soccer in the near future though.

Point being though: the Bethlehem Steel approach is very solid. They did their diligence, identified a somewhat local market that seemed like it would embrace a "minor league" team and it seems to be working out well for them.

Of course, we'd be remiss if we didn't acknowledge that ultimately, good MLS2 attendances are just a "nice-to-have". The point of those teams is playing experience and development.

 

All 31 NHL clubs have an affiliate in the AHL, and 27 have an affiliate in the ECHL. Wikipedia says those are the only minor leagues recognized by the NHL's CBA. There are junior hockey leagues that are not affiliated with NHL teams.

 

Is the model similar to MiLB? Teams are independently owned, but all players are paid by the (single) affiliated team?

 

I don't know.

 

I'm not going into a deep dive here, but it kind of looks like the AHL is the only farm league, all of the others are independent leagues.

 

Scratch that, the ECHL are part of the farm system, too.

 

I'm kind of whatever about the Red Wolves' name: it's mildly less minor league sounding than the other options, but still pretty meh. It has inspired me to go see the real red wolves over at the Nature Center, though.

As far as the expected USL names: chuck them in the sea. Take the historical English names, remove their context, and apply them in the same half-assed way to the US pyramid for no apparent reason? No, thank you.

 

As I've posted many times before, it seems that US soccer teams can't win on names.

So instead of going over the whole Eurocentric vs US Nicknames spiel, I'm going to ask an open question: if you could name a Chattanooga (or indeed any US) soccer team, what would you call it and why?

 

As I said, Red Wolves are fine. It's not exactly something Chattanooga is known for, though (they were released in the Smokies - northeast of here - but they're generally more associated with North Carolina with regards to reintroduction). I'd still say it's the best of the lot and better than at least 90% of minor league names. Bonus that it's not "Redd Wolvez" or some other moronic spelling, as well.

I was kind of into a variant of one of the proposed names that I saw someone make on Twitter: The Chattanooga Ironhorse (singular). Definitely plays into the locomotive heritage and the singular makes it sort of badass.

Honorable mention of what I saw others come up with when presented with the truly shitty list the USL Jr. team trotted out:

• [some order of Chattanooga and the word Dynamo] - the city was known as the Dynamo of Dixie because it was one of the major manufacturing centers of the south
• Scenic City Soccer Club, although I think I'd grow tired of this pretty quickly

On the whole, I kind of like team names bubbling up organically and unofficially: the University of Alabama doesn't have one of the greatest name in sports through focus grouping or naming contests. I think the "Five Stripes" nickname for Atlanta United or the Loons for MNUTD are pretty good, too.

I personally don't care that much about team names as long as they aren't cringe-worthy ("Mad Antz", "Kickers", "Real [Your City Name]"): the Eurofied names don't generally bother me very much.

 

Plural names that replace the letter S with Z should be banned.

 

Also, "dawgs".

 

The Chattahooligans are proud to announce our long-awaited #rebland

We are utilizing this momentous opportunity to maximize synergies across our performance portfolio and are now heretofore and forthwith

Chattahooligans Professional Xtreme

— 𝖈𝖍𝖆𝖙𝖙𝖆𝖍𝖔𝖔𝖑𝖎𝖌𝖆𝖓𝖘 💙 (@chattahooligan) September 25, 2018

 

Making fun of "XTreme" while seriously incorporating "hooligans" into your name? That's one way to do it.

 

Cum on Feel the Noize!

 

Reportedly, the rivalry in Britain between Slade and T-Rex was so intense that their fans would literally have brawls over it.

1) To look at Dave Hill and Marc Bolan at their most "Glam", it's odd to think of them as inspirations for testosterone-fueled aggression.

2) I sincerely hope that fans of Slade charged into such altercations with the battle-cry "IT'S CHRIIIIIIIIIISTMAAAAAAAAAAAS!!!!"

 

Marc Bolan had talent, Slade most certainly did not.Too bad that Bolan died so young.