Trecker takes on soccer specific stadia in his latest blog entry... http://blogs.foxsports.com/JamieTre...os_Angeles_Times_on_Phil_Anschutz?reload=true I'll let you all comment on it, as I find this rather sadly typical and one-sided with the facts.
Trekker can go fcuk HIMSELF. Yeah and the first 6 years Anschutz lost millions upon millions in NFL stadium before they even entertained the idea of building SSS that was just a ploy to leverage his tax loss basis??!?! Give me a break Trekker.
Damn. I clicked on a Trecker link. One can be cynical about building SSS's, but it's hard to argue with trying to get out of the terrible leasing deals from NJSEA, SJSU, RFK, and being jerked around like the Rapids currently are and to some extent the Fire were.
well, if a couple more seasons go by w/o MLS opening up the bank book to bring in some elite players, then he may have a point. but we're still in the building mode now, i'm not ready to dive into the conspiracy pool yet. but i will say i'm a little disappointed we don't have any real big names in this league, other than Donovan. the level of play is improving in general (vaguely), but i think a lot of the uber positivity is coming from the DCU fans, who make up the largest subset of fans on this site. obviously they think the league is improving. their team is actually fun to watch. but the rest of us can't get as excited with talks of the league growing by "leaps and bounds" .
i have a question: qhy dont we start making "Trecker is a Duschebag" flags and banners for MLS games.
I think he raised some good points. As the attendances havent been what many have hoped for in the SSS, much of the SSS talk by MLS is going to be brought into question by outsiders. I never believed that people were staying away from MLS because of playing in NFL stadiums I think it is more to do with a mediocre product on the field. If they really want to grow the audience this issue is the biggest thing that needs to be improved. I think we all agree that one owner having so much power is not good for the league. MLS really needs to get AEG and Hunt down to one team a piece because that will only create a more competitive environment among owners.
I wouldn't dismiss what he is saying just because he brings up some points that are negative towards MLS. The league has let the level of play on the field stagnate. It's about to get worse with four more teams to be playing by 2010. Whenever someone brings up foreign talent, they immediately think it means players like Ronaldo or Rooney which would obviously break the bank. If the league was serious about improving the level of play, they would hire scouts to watch games around the world to help bring in players that can challenge our starters for their positions. Either that, or give teams control over the payrolls and let them hire scouts. Our "stars" are in no danger of losing their spots. Given the talent level of our "stars", that is detrimental to their development and the future of the league.
Trecker obviously sucks. So why in the world would you start a thread and link to his article? Just say no.
He seems to be emphasizing the youth development side of things more in this article anyway. I'd like to disagree with Trecker here, but the youth development thing I say on here all the time and as far as local governments giving taxpayer handouts to multi-millionaires, my opinions on that are publicly established as well. He goes off the deep end a bit when he says AEG's whole purpose is venues, that's not quite true. Still the belief that 'once teams start making money' MLS will start investing on soccer doesn't necessarily hold water either. If MLS and SUM can make money without doing so, whose to say they will? Since venues are a big part of doing just that, it's not a wholly unreasonable point. With the excpetion of not noting that 13,198 _is_ an increase in attendance for Dallas, he's mostly reasonable here. Shocking actually.
I see your points here and tend to agree with you on most of them, I just think Trecker has a rather nasty habit of only including evidence that supports his argument and not including any counter arguments (new investors, the franchises that are stable, how the league has not gone NASL under, etc). He has blinders on when it comes to MLS and usually attacks the league on all fronts without giving the owners and clubs credit in the areas where they are having success. The bottom line is that we do have to press the teams once they have developed stadiums to improve the product on the pitch. I do agree with him there.
13k is not really an increase in Dallas from the pre-2003 HSG sucklake days. That's what the team was averaging at the Cotton Bowl before HSG took over in 2003 and moved the team to Southlake.
I can't believe that you wrote that post and only wrote about your point of view. Where was Chowda's equal time in that post? I think the single entity system holds teams back from getting better. If you have to wait in line for an allocation when your team is plauged with injuries during the transfer window, something is wrong. I know all the arguements for single entity and I know it keeps the league "safe". However, when the league started focusing on stadiums instead of player aquisition/development (since they control player contracts, they have to handel it) the quality of play has diminished IMO.
The whole piece is predicated on the fact that AEG is extracting public money for the stadiums. How much public money was spent on HDC? Andy ps: Does anyone else feel the need to kick him the nuts every time he says "we" in his pieces?
Is it me or did Trecker totally miss the point of SSS? SSS was supposed to provide better revenue to the league/owners. 13K at the Cotton Bowl costs x dollars. 13K in Frisco costs half of x kind of thing. We can't expect the owners to throw more millions down the hole on better players until they start becoming whole. Yes it was also supposed to make the stadiums look better on TV and other things but the main reason was to keep losses down. Maybe after a couple of years of many SSS owners won't hesitate to drop more money on salaries. That and a real TV deal.
The whole thing is quite simple really. I/O owned SSS provide long term viability to MLS teams while rented NFL stadia don't.
That's true but if people still arent showing up with new stadiums how much longer before future investors start to take a second look at what the real potential of this league is even with SSS? It won't take long before journalists start to make a fuss over this. I think i've already read several different articles since Chicago has been a dud at Bridgeview. To make matters worse, the next 2 teams to move in to SSS are Colorado and NY and with the state of fanbases in Colorado and NY right now I see those places being just like Bridgeview when they open.
But we're totally fine w/ split infinitives and ending sentences w/ a preposition. BUT... we cannot tolerate confusion over there, they're and their. Ladies and gentlemen, I think we should thank Trecker for allowing us to stumble upon the Big Soccer Grammarians' Manifesto.
Don't know. How much? KSE's paying for the construction of the Rapids stadium, but is utilizing has obtained credit utilizing Commerce City's ability to float revenue bonds. Other bits about Trecker I found less than accurate.... The other item that the article is predicated on, which I find false, is that the municipalities are under the illusion that they've approved these stadiums to be for soccer. I don't know about the others but Commerce City is to be a mixed use facility, and the multiple uses were probably more influential in its passing than the possibility that 12,000 people will show up there 18 times a year. As for the US watching talent. The US will watch an event, which the World Cup is. They'll watch the Tour d'France, but what other bicycle race gets mentioned? If the US were so willing to watch top level soccer, we wouldn't need cable a special cable package to get foreign leagues..
Suggestion: you can save yourself a lot of time by cutting and pasting this comment after every Trecker article.
Not sure, but I can tell you how much investment interest MLS had when they were all paying exorbitant rent in NFL stadia. Plenty of people have tried to buy talent and make money off soccer in the U.S. So far, it hasn't worked. Maybe if a league remains intact for a while, that business model will be possible. As it stands now, AEG and MLS (and a handful of A-League/USL teams, who aren't exactly paying a lot for players) have figured out how to make a little bit of money -- or at least lose less.
Oh, we FCD fans can too Thank you. Repped. When we get to the point and all teams are in SSS (or even all but 1 or 2), and MLS isn't spending a little more money, then I'm concerned, but MLS still needs to build, and THAT is the priority - get itself a base, making it hard for the league to go away. When you have the infrastructure to finally put on a respectable show and market to fans from a concrete base that won't be changing anytime soon, you finally have something. As long as the level of play isn't decreasing or stagnating (it's still growing), then is the time to worry about the other factors....
Actually, Sarachan sat Mapp down for most of the last two games ... of course, Sarachan also moved him from his left flank where he dominated to the right where he had to pinch into traffic and was much less effective, which says more about Sarachan's utter stupidity than about Mapp per se.