NOTE: This is NOT intended to be a thread in which the merits or indeed viability of pro/rel are debated. There's a gargantuan thread for that very thing here: http://forums.bigsoccer.com/threads/the-case-for-pro-rel.2009269/ This thread is a place to discuss how you might institute and/or run promotion and relegation in the US, as well as discussing what that might look like, what formats might be used, etc. These may be pipedreams, it may all be pie in the sky. But hey, you might like pie. Or even pipe. To each their own.
Have divisions all under the umbrella of MLS, meaning expansion continues as is but the new clubs go into a 2nd division.
I'm of the opinion that there's little need to implement pro/rel until we hit 30-32 teams. There's also little point if the teams below aren't capable of doing more than spending their time in MLS as canon fodder or replacing something moderately close to the outgoing teams in terms of infrastructure and financial commitment. Any system well have to benefit the owners as well as the league. A single season of bad form is not enough. We need to be able to point to teams that are habitual under achievers. For this reason, for fun really, I am proposing a "test phase" as a postseason contest for the worst teams. Assuming 32 teams divided between 4 8-team conferences, the bottom two from each compete in the test phase. This is a single round robin with home games determined by overall regular season standings. For teams to go down, they will need to be "relegation eligible". This status occurs if a team is in the bottom two of their conference for 3 consecutive seasons, or 3 of the previous 5 seasons. So these 8 teams play each other. The top three at the end of the test phase are not relegated. A team in the bottom five, will be relegated if they are relegation eligible and one of the following is true: -The team finishes last. -The team has the worst average points from it's last three test phases compared to other rel eligible sides in the bottom five. -The team has the second worst avg and the last placed team isn't rel eligible. Teams in the second tier must apply to be promotion eligible. This will be based on stadium guidelines, cash flow and the ability to pay a yearly participation fee once promoted. If a team's ownership previously paid an expansion fee, the participation fee is waived. Pro eligibility lasts for five seasons if granted. If the criteria is not meet, a team may also become promotion eligible for a two season period, based on a vote between owners. Two thirds of the owners must be in favor. Each season, the champions and best record teams can be promoted if eligible. The second best record can be promoted if the best record is also the champion. To prevent frivolous bids, applications must be made two seasons apart. This provides a mechanism whereby a relegated team can have no complaints, demands ownership groups to push for success and offers strong second tier teams an opportunity to participate, as long as they have the required infrastructure and resources.
That's too complicated. If there's going to be a relegation group it should only including relegation eligible clubs. Depending on how many regular season games there would be, I think a relegation group requiring 7 games per club could take too long. If there are 4 divisions or conferences of 8 clubs each, relegating 5 out of 32 clubs would be about the same percentage as the EPL and La Liga which both relegate 3 out of 20 clubs. What I would do is relegate the 4 last place clubs and put the 4 seventh place clubs into a relegation group with the bottom club being relegated. This group could be played during the playoffs, and if the relegation group had each club play every other club once for a total of three matchdays, the last relegated club would be determined at least a week before MLS Cup.
Good points. The trouble with just relegating the bottom placed teams though, is that it gets us into that whole "punished for one bad season" scenario that the owners would likely push back against. The main reason I went with such a complex approach was to provide a mechanism which says "You may or may not have paid a big expansion fee, but your team has been consistently terrible for years now. You're not pulling your weight, so we're dropping you". This should be more palatable to the general ownership group and in fact, it might even be supported by some. Phil Anshcutz may secretly loathe that Robert Kraft goes years without meaningful investment and effort while he builds and maintains a flagship franchise. A franchise which incidentally, generates revenues that Kraft gets a cut of. I'm also a little wary of having five teams go down when there may not be five decent teams coming up, hence the "promotion eligible" piece. How about any team that finishes bottom two for three years straight or three times in five years being relegated, provided there is a "pro eligible" team to come up? If you have more teams to be relegated in a given year than can come up, then the relegation group (or playoff if its two clubs) can take place. If there happen to be more than four to potentially go down, only the worst four go into the relegation group.
If MLS starts promotion and relegation I would rather it be sample and not care about if a club had one bad season. Newcastle United is popular and normally in the EPL, but got relegated by 1 point after 2008-2009. They won League Championship in 2009-2010 to go back up. One difference between MLS and the top leagues in UEFA is that a bad season in MLS is normally not as bad as the worst seasons in the top leagues in UEFA. In 2015 so far, the Red Bulls lead MLS in points per game and are on pace for 57 points. The club in the top hypothetical relegation position (18th out of 20 in points per game regardless of conference) is Chicago, who is on pace for 35 points, meaning 22 fewer than the top club. In the 2014-2015 Bundesliga, which had 18 clubs and plays 34 games like MLS, the fifth place club was 30 points behind champions Bayern Munich. One problem with starting promotion and relegation is that relegated clubs could be unable to pay their designated players, and designated players could be mad at having to play on a club that wasn't at the top level. If the bottom clubs without regards to conference were relegated, Los Angeles would have been relegated after 2008 when they had Beckham.
I agree. With parity, pro/rel can't be based off a single season, because a single season is just not enough of a sample size. And for DPs, I have no idea what you'd do with that. But I'd imagine it'd be unlikely that Beckham would have signed a contract with MLS if he knew he might be playing in MiLS
What about Pseudo-Pro/Rel? Divide all the professional Soccer clubs into 2 Conferences (East/West), each with 2 Divisions (North/South). Each Division of MLS would consist of 7 teams each. These are the core teams that will never be relgated, as they have paid mucho dollars for the privilege. Each MLS division will have an eighth spot available for the previous season's top team in the corresponding Div-II division. That team would spend one year in MLS operating as an MLS team, with MLS paying for the team salary under the cap and all travel (allowing the saved salary and travel costs for the year to be spent by the Div-II team on infrastructure upgrades or to build a battle chest). However, the Div-II teams would not receive any of the TV revenue an MLS team would normally get for the season. A 38-game season is then played (Intradivisional home-and-away, Interdivisional home or away). At the end of the season, the Div-II teams return to their respective Div-II divisions and the winners of Div-II for that year are promoted for the new season to repeat the cycle. At the Div-II level, the structure would mirror that of MLS, but with a maximum of 12 teams per division. If there are fewer than 12 teams in a division, then a Div-III team could chose to pay a one-time expansion fee to join Div-II. Div-II teams would only play a 34 game season with the same format at Div-I, but no inter-conference matches to keep travel costs down. Once the divisions reach 12 teams, relegation to Div-III is instituted and run the same format as for Div-I, except the newly promoted Div-II teams must pay for their own travel and salaries, but get a portion of any TV contracts Div-II manages to negotiate. For Div-III, the structure is again as above, but with a maximum of 16 teams per division. If there are fewer than 16 teams in a division, then a Div-IV team could chose to pay a one-time expansion fee to join Div-III and become fully professional. Div-III teams would only play a 30 game season playing only intra-divisional home-and-away matches to keep costs down. Once the divisions reach 16 teams, there will be no more spots available unless a Div-III team voluntarily chooses to relegate itself, at which point a local Div-IV could pay to take its place. MLS reserve teams cannot play higher or lower in the pyramid than Div-III. I don't expect the pyramid to fill itself out like this for decades, as it would require 144 professional teams and over 4000 professional players. If somehow the US manages to field more teams than this, then they can start the process all over again for a new Div-IV professional league and the semi-pro teams would be pushed down to Div-V. For the three Division names, I would keep Div-I as MLS, Div-II as NASL, and DivIII as USL just for Global name recognition, regardless of whoever ends up running those leagues. Such a pyramid setup would require a total of
Interesting ideas for the lowest lower leagues. However I think the MLS portion is a little restrictive. You've got four teams coming up and competing for one season with relegation guaranteed. I guess that kind of makes MLS like a domestic "champions league" for lower divisions. I can see this making it hard for the div ii teams to compete in their MLS seasons though. Perhaps you reward these teams of they finish above a certain position in the division by not relegation them. If they finish below, maybe have them playoff against the promoted team for the slot?
I like Pie! MLS absorb the other leagues. 20-24 clubs at the top flight national level that has a national (and Canada) footprint. Two/Three teams at the bottom will be in the "relegation zone" but that does not guarantee they will be relegated. Below MLS are two DII leagues between 20-24 teams divided geographically east and west. The winners of each league after each term are given the option of a one time MLS buy in, once you have paid this fee your club is eligible hence forth for MLS/DI. If the fee can not be met then the team highest up the table is protected from relegation. If there were a third spot the 2nd (maybe 3rds also) place finishers have a playoff for that spot with a higher buy in fee. These clubs must also meet minimal criteria for promotion, not outlandish criteria but reasonable things such as a suitable stadium. The pyramid could continue to divide down from there regionally as warranted under the same principles. Reserve (or "2/II") teams will be allowed in the division below their parent club (as earned after starting in the lower tiers if existing) but if a player competes in a competition for that club they are locked in until the next transfer window. If a reserve of "2" side finishes in promotion zone it protects a relegation spot. Between the buy in fees and television contracts the relegated clubs can be provided parachute packages.
Relegation is a far more serious circumstance than winning a trophy in terms of the viability of a club. Getting cast out of the league could ruin a club. Falling to win the league usually won't. With parity, you could be relegating a team that could be a title contender next season. Doing it over a number of seasons means that you're punishing consistent failure instead of a bad year.
If I were going to implement pro/rel, I'd do it completely differently. Instead of limiting pro/rel, I'd still keep it closed below the top two divisions (and entirely within the MLS umbrella), but make the top two divisions so fluid that relegation means very little loss of value and no one can count on staying in the top tier. It may be a radical idea, but I think there's some merit to making the top tier so unstable that everyone in it has to plan for second-tier revenue. What I'm envisioning is really more of a league within a league: an elite group of clubs within MLS that mainly play one another but also play a substantial number of games against the rest of MLS, have a shared TV deal with the entire league, and get only a slightly increased share of TV revenue (maybe a 10% bump) and a slightly increased salary cap (say, 5% higher plus some player retention allocation money). Teams in the elite group would be guaranteed some form of postseason play, either championship playoffs or pro/rel playoffs; teams outside the elite group would still have some spots in the championship playoffs. As an illustrative example, here's how it might potentially work with a 32-team league: "MLS Super 12": 12 teams in single table; eastern and western halves for scheduling purposes only "MLS Classic": 20 teams, divided into Eastern and Western Conferences MLS Super 12 schedule: 32 games 2 games against each Super 12 opponent (22 games) 1 game against each MLS Classic team in corresponding conference (10 games) MLS Classic schedule: 34 games 2 games against conference opponents (18 games) 1 game against each team in opposite conference (10 games) 1 game against each team in corresponding half of MLS Super 12 (6 games) Championship playoffs: Places 1-6 in Super 12: seeded into quarterfinals Places 7-8 in Super 12: play-in round Conference winners in MLS Classic: play-in round Promotion/relegation: Places 1-2 in MLS Classic automatically promoted Places 9-12 in Super 12: pro/rel playoffs 2nd place in each MLS Classic conference + 2 wild card teams: pro/rel playoffs Pro-rel playoffs: 8 teams seeded into two brackets of 4, compete for 2 spots in MLS Super 12 A similar setup, with scheduling adjusted for number of teams, and perhaps conferences added to the upper tier, might work for 40 or more teams. The idea here is that, because up to a third of the upper tier can be relegated each year, and as many as half of the teams in the lower tier may have a realistic shot at promotion going into the last couple weeks of the season, it becomes very clear that promotion and relegation are both temporary. And the very small difference in salary budgets means turnover between the two tiers should be very fast. If even that isn't fluid enough, some adjustments to the playoff format could even put half of the upper tier in the relegation playoffs.
How would you determine the expansion fee? Same as the current one for Div 1 adjusted for inflation? Or half because they are going into Div 2?
That's actually kinda fascinating. I haven't considered the nuances but it sounds like wall-to-wall drama that can accommodate expansion for a very long time.
Since I am free to post any pro/rel idea no matter how goofy here it goes. The first step for true pro/rel is a complete dismantling of the single entity or franchise system and open the pyramid to clubs. This of course will open up investment and communities will rally around their town clubs. Now Europe has about 50 countries and there 50 states. Sorry Canada you are not included. Simply make 50 different professional pyramids. States stay within their states for leagues. Each state has their own tv contract with their local sports channel but the big leagues would be on Fox and ESPN. But the top teams play in the champions league. Think about California, Florida, Texas, New York, and Illinois as the BPL, Bundesliga, Ligue 1, BBVA, and the Serie A. Oklahoma would be like the Jupiler League. Every 4 years we could have a tournament like the Euro Cup with qualifying and everything. Once the pyramid is open the investment both financially and emotionally will grow larger than anything ever seen. A 50 state pyramid will be the only thing able to contain it.
Depends how quickly you wanted to expand. Also would be determined by the Market but my thinking is it would be less than the current fees and by 1/2 sounds about right. So 40 million dollar range.
This is actually close to how the game grew organically in the England. Teams in local competition, numerous local leagues, evolving into broader regional leagues and eventually a national league. Due to the gradual process, we ended up with numerous clubs that had an argument for competing with those originally added to the national league. Then we had a league challenging the national one for supremacy, leading to a merger. Then we had more clubs at the time than a league was deemed able to handle. They split it into divisions and used pro/rel to sort based on capability. As more teams vied for inclusion, so the league and divisions grew, leading to additional divisions later on and a pyramid growing beyond the Football League itself (though it would be some time before those clubs could be automatically promoted to the league without election).
Sounds a lot like the Brazilian league system, actually. The one serious obstacle I see is that it's much harder to grow the game organically when 1) the sport is still not all that popular, and 2) foreign leagues are widely available on TV. Most fans and potential fans don't have the patience to wait for the league system to develop organically -- it's too easy to be simply left behind for foreign leagues. I tend to think the only realistic chance to develop a viable pro/rel system in the US without destroying the pro game is to do it within an existing system, because in an underdeveloped soccer nation in the TV era the sport simply needs to be jumpstarted from the top down.
The specific 32-team setup was a back-of-napkin computation. Ideally, I'd actually want more of the upper tier (up to half of the teams) potentially relegated each season, both so that it becomes even harder to count on being up there for longer than a season or two at a time, and increasing the chance for promotion -- the whole point is to make the values of teams in the lower tier as close as possible to those in the upper tier while still offering enough of an incentive for owners to chase promotion.
My concept: First, MLS grows to a 26 club MLS First Division. Afterwards, MLS opens up opportunities to enter the MLS Second Division (MLS-2). Any club can apply, but in order to enter MLS-2, clubs must meet certain “Initial Entrance” (IE) criteria. Stadium size (18k-22k) Attendance (70% minimum) Expansion Fee Payment of $20M Expansion opens every 4 years, after the World Cup. The first expansion will bring in 8 clubs meeting IE criteria. Second expansion and each expansion thereafter will bring in a maximum of 6 clubs. MLS-2 caps at 26 clubs. With the MLS crest, name, and brand behind them, MLS-2 clubs should experience increases in revenue and profitability. New MLS-2 clubs remain in the second division for a two-year probationary period. During this time, these clubs, regardless of success on the pitch, are ineligible for promotion. After probation is complete, MLS-2 clubs will become eligible for promotion into the First Division provided that MLS First Division Fitness (FDF) standards are met. FDF standards include: MLS Profitability Standard Robust Commercial and Marketing Development Sponsorship, including Stadium Sponsorship Local TV Contract Creation of a Reserve Team Complete Academy system (u-13, u-16, u-18, u-20) MLS Standard Front Office, Technical, and Medical staffs Promotion/Relegation: MLS relegates its bottom 2 clubs each year to MLS-2 and promotes two MLS-2 clubs provided the MLS-2 clubs are eligible for promotion. Relegated clubs are immediately eligible for promotion. The two clubs promoted will be the club with the best record and the playoff winner. The top four clubs in MLS-2 will compete in an annual playoff. If the Playoff Winner also has the best record, then the Runner Up in the playoff promotes. If the Playoff Winner/Best Record/Runner Up is not eligible for promotion, no club from MLS or MLS-2 promotes/relegates. If the Runner Up is the only eligible club for promotion, it does not promote. The Runner Up only promotes if the Playoff Winner is also eligible. The "Back-to-Back" Rule: If a club wins two consecutive MLS-2 championships, this club is hereby eligible for promotion in the following MLS season regardless of their current FDF standards position. East/West: Due to pro/rel, the Eastern Conferences shall be re-named the American Conference and the Western Conference renamed the National Conference. To keep with existing rivalries, no MLS clubs will change conferences, and MLS-2 clubs will be promoted within the conference that suits them geographically TV: MLS works out a TV deal for the MLS-2. This is included within the framework of the new TV deal that should begin in 2022. MLS-2 receives 33 nationally televised matches a year, including the MLS-2 Championship and playoffs games. Also, each MLS-2 club works out a local TV contract. Revenue sharing: Revenue sharing is handled on a 70-30 formula. MLS First division receives 70% of all MLS revenues and MLS-2 clubs receive 30%. USL relegation If an ineligible club is unable to attain FDF standards for a period of 8 consecutive years, it re-enters a probationary period whereby the club must achieve and maintain FDF standards for two years. If after four years, the standards have not been maintained for two years, the club shall be relegated to the USL Third Division. The club shall be eligible immediately the next season for promotion into MLS-2. Footnote: USL Clubs are not eligible for promotion into MLS-2 unless they have met the IE criteria for MLS-2 or if they are an MLS-Reserve club.