Originally posted by jwinters Again, the problem is your biased used of stories as a replacement for serious analysis. And you use one stat (Tampa's attendance) to justify dismissing the attendance figures of an entire league (NASL)... As a counter to the fact that Tampa was a knock-out NASL market and a dismal MLS one, you conjure the excuse that the NASL team was great, the MLS team was awful, and that's why the attendances were so different. There are two ways to destroy this excuse. use the force Luke... Luke, I am your father... huff, puff... First, it's simply not true. In 1996, Tampa demolished the competition, winning the Supporter's Shield by nine points and scoring a league-high 66 goals. Supporters' Shield... no, there was NO Supporters' Shield that year... any arguments you have from now on CANNOT BE TRUSTED!!! Thanks for playing... Tampa played attractive, attacking soccer. It also pulled in an average attendance of 11,679, second from the bottom in the league. MLS put the best team in one of the premier NASL cities, and they couldn't draw flies. Indeed, the only year (1999) that the team averaged over 13,000, they had a decidedly mediocre season on the field... Thinks that's called "marketing"... but that's a "story" best told by a Tampa fan for better perspective... I'd forgotten how good the 1st year Mutiny was--- faded at the end of the year and didn't go anywhere in the playoffs... I just couldn't get past the name of the coach... THOMAS RONGEN... Second, there has been little to no connection between on-field success and attendance in the MLS. Pull my OTHER FINGER... IT'S GOT BELLS ON IT... No, Tampa's gate was dismal from the get-go and no amount of winning or losing could change that. It was a mistake to place a team there. It was a mistake to place a team in a huge stadium with no owner... kinda like Dallas... a team with bad attendance in the NASL for years and years... and still no owner... Fighting cold hard facts with fuzzy stories is understandable, given what you have to work with. Your facts are neither cold nor hard nor have any perspective attached to them whatsoever... when I confront you with the facts of Tulsa attendance with the facts that both Garber and Hunt are interested, I'm told that Tulsa officials are somehow being duped by MLS... But being openly contemptable of facts and numbers like population and demographics (Des Moines? in MLS? That's dumber than anything you've said yet!) Why? Univ of Iowa can fill stadiums for college football. A threshold of 15,000 fans per game in MLS soccer shouldn't be that hard to cross... I feel Des Moines may be a better market for MLS than Kansas City... and creating stories--pathetic excuses--that are so easily checked and debunked leads me to the inevitable conclusion that you are someone who debates without honor. Creating stories? Did I JUST MAKE UP THE TULSA ROUGHNECKS???... No, statboy, I didn't... you've decided that dry statistics from Tampa can debunk anything I say proposing Tulsa as a viable candidate for expansion... as for "honor"... newsflash from BBC... "pot calls the kettle 'black'"... I can excuse a partisan, So now I'm a partison rather than "some idiot"... gee, how mighty white of ya... and understand that people make honest mistakes from time to time. But someone who has such a low regard for the truth is not worth dealing with. I withdraw from this thread and will no longer expose your errors of fact and logic, let alone outright lies. I wish you lots of bad luck on bringing MLS to Tulsa. So, listen "Johnny One-Stat"--Don't let the door hit ya on the way out... ... we've gone from your view that Tulsa would be a "disaster" as a franchise based on your work with those superior MSA stats to wishing "lots of bad luck on bringing MLS to Tulsa"... slow, steady progress is being made on the Brooklyn front...
Threads are threaded Nacional: No threads are sacred on this board; feel free to respond when there is a change of venue! The stadium pic you have on Houston? Is that a renovation of Rice Stadium aka: Bluebonnet Bowl? I have always thought that the 78,000-seat Rice Stadium was more beautiful than the Cotton Bowl. I would definitely like to see a second MLS franchise in the state of Texas. Houston, Austin or San Antonio would be great sites. Does anyone know if the old 22,000-seat Alamo Stadium is still standing in San Antonio? It would make a great MLS venue with some renovations. I don't know how well soccer would be received in San Antonio. I heard rumors that many of its inhabitants left Mexico for San Antonio because they didn't like soccer. I remember the old Professional Football League of America (PFLA) which really wasn't a league; they had some great rivalries going on among Oklahoma City-San Antonio and Albuquerque, there were no crowds below 10,000 when these teams met. The Oklahoma City Wranglers and the San Antonio Toros had the hottest rivalry going. We pulled into SA one night and that stadium had 25,000 packed into it waiting on the Wranglers. We brought eight bus loads from OKC and it was indeed an exciting game. Hope to see expansion franchises in Houston and Oklahoma City! This will make for some interesting rivalries--Dallas-Houston-Oklahoma City!
Re: Threads are threaded That's Robertson Stadium at UH. Rice Stadium is a massive bowl with a very narrow field-level area and astroturf. It's also not as easily accessible as either Robertson or Reliant. As a facility, Rice Stadium would be a terrible option for MLS (and I say that as a Rice alum who's spent far too many sunny Sat afternoons watching dismal football there).
Re: some decent points Originally posted by caputobd Sorry I have been away for awhile since my last post on Friday. I only surf this thing while I'm on my lunch break or before work. Some of you made some good points about Oklahoma despite my "personal vendetta." My problem with Oklahoma deals with a certain politician's son that I cna't stand. ...understandable, as I am NO FAN of Tulsa's Southern Hills' ruling clique, including Mayor LaFortune... I'm not even from St. Louis so don't attack me for moving, in fact, I never lived there. I just visit alot and have tried to develop some ties into the youth soccer program because my girlfriend's family lives there... ... I always thought StL would be a better city than KC for MLS. St. Louis has had a well established soccer community for a long time; a "hotbed" for players... I just haven't seen ANYTHING to indicate St. Louisans could support MLS as a spectator sport. The only soccer that was consistently supported there was the Steamers'-- and I don't equate success at the gate in the sport of "Human Pinball" with success in the outdoor game. If St. Louis can field a team that can break even at the gate and provide an exciting atmosphere at the stadium, hey... I'm an MLS fan, not a local-yocal... I'd put them in over Tulsa/OKC in a heartbeat... No, population has nothing to do with it. Rochester draws more fans than most MLS cities for pete's sake. NASL also means nothing, look at Tampa Bay and their miserable attendance records. While you're looking at Tampa, please look at Dallas... a city that over years/decades rarely showed any support for its NASL team... nothing's changed. For Tulsa, as well as Seattle and Minn/St.Paul (and to a lesser extent, Detroit and Portland), NASL attendance shows that there was fundamental fan support/infrastructure that gives these cities an advantage over others without that experience-- i.e... the "Blue Ribbon Panel" including former Roughnecks coach Charlie Mitchell that proposed a Tulsa franchise in '94 or someone who had a connection to the Roughnecks' franchise like Brad Lund who now is working with Express Sports in OKC to secure a franchise for that city... I never considered Miami/FtL a particularly well-supported NASL team, yet NASL attendance/Lockhart Stadium was a factor in securing an expansion team. MLS shouldn't be handing over franchises to cities with no ownership/bad ownership simply due to some pre-existing NASL pedigree. Let's just call it the: previous experience helpful but not necessary factor. Chicago doesn't draw that much despite a large soccer population and 8 million people....NY, same deal. Actually, I think both DO draw pretty well... Chicago's fans are pretty darned rabid and NYC's... well, have to deal with the Metro's failings... Columbus proves that with a smaller market and a SSS that any city could produce a team that will profit from MLS. Columbus was also the ONLY city to promise over 10,000 season ticket holders... if any market (large or small) can make a similar promise, then they should get a team... Tulsa's proposal will include a season ticket drive of at least 7500 tickets... why can't this kind of threshold be just as important as stadium/investor? However, St. Louis, Houston, and Philadelphia seem the most logical to me. They have large potential sponsors and great locations to put soccer specific stadia. That same logic made sense 20 years ago and makes sense today. But it doesn't always work out that way. The lessons that should be learned from a league like the NASL is that NO CITY CAN SUCCEED without good owners who KNOW and can MARKET TO their respective communities and who are interested in doing what's right for the long-term prospects of MLS and soccer in general in this country. That factor takes precedence over all others. You can't just plop a team down together with a wad of cash in some big market and expect the fans to come out. A local organization has to work for it and promote it. From a business standpoint, MLS needs to fix it's cash flow problems first, By moving unsuccessful teams without O/Is to better situations, perhaps? then create a better product with SSS, then attract some new sponsors and THEN and ONLY THEN, we can talk about expansion. SSS already built in Columbus and LA... because of new stadia in Boston and Denver, I don't see that happening anytime soon... or is this simply a matter in which you'd be FOR expansion if Philly or StL or Houston were involved, but since we're talking about OKC/TULSA, we should wait EVEN LONGER to expand to keep out the "riff-raff" ...this advice even after Garber has discussed expansion EVERY YEAR he's been commish... And honestly, I would bet my life that Oklahoma will not be in the first expansion group. Not that you don't "deserve" it, maybe I'm just a pessimist, but I don't think it will happen. Entirely possible... Hmmm... but if you lose that bet, CAN I HELP?!?
Really hate this kid...with a passion. Anyone heard the last name Worthen? As far as your comment about KC V. STL, I agree. the only reason I think KC got the nod over STL in the first place was a gentleman by the name of Lamar Hunt. Nuf said. Also very true about not having shown support for soccer before, but as with OK, HOU, PHI, MIL and others that have a large "soccer population" the problem lies in that MLS does not relate to the fan base or market to it properly. As far as the old Steamers are concerned, I would like to see that as the name of a team there, either that or the Stampede (with the logo being a Clydesdale horse or some sort. As for the Tampa Bay/Dallas thing, I definitely DO look at Dallas. Tampa Bay is just the most obvious glaring example of failure in the MLS so it usually is the first to come out. Most teams in the league have really really poor attendance figures. For awhile, DC, NY, LA, Columbus and Chicago really carried the league. Although their attendance has in large part carried the league over the years, I disagree that Chicago and NY actually DO WELL at the gate. For NY averaging 20,000 a game ain't too shabby, but consider the population they have to draw from and the potential sponsors in that city....same with Chicago. I haven't seen the actual numbers, but if we were talking "per capita," I would suggest to you that Columbus is BY FAR the league leader in attendance, even before Crew Stadium was built. You're right about my crazy gorilla logic, sponsors and stadia do not equal success at the gate. Having owners who are honestly interested in their product and are willing to shell out the dough, surround themselves with the right front office staff and do MUCH MUCH MUCH better marketing is the only way for MLS to succeed. The hope is that this will all come together WITH the sponsors and the stadia. NO MLS TEAM has all of these compenents yet. Even the Crew needs to attract larger sponsors and needs to market better. I fear that if all the teams don't do this soon, that it could be the downfall of the league. You're right, the first step to "fixing" MLS is to correct the current mistakes in cities with either no or a bad O/I. Again, get some freakin whale that actually cares about soccer more than his wallet, and we're in business. I think if the bigsoccer.com fans had the money that NFL, MLB, NHL, and NBA owners have, MLS would be right there with the big boys in the US and Europe. Unfortunately, this is not the case. Crew and LA have stadia now....kudos. You could be very correct when you say Denver and New England are out because of new NFL stadiums. KC also going nowhere because Lamar Hunt owns the chiefs. Chicago will likely be stuck in new Soldier Field once it is complete. DC should be next, period. First get Dallas an O/I, thena stadium...please God. Either that or move them to Houston. NY should get a new stadium after Dallas. They DO have the biggest average attendance correct? SJ I'm afraid is FUBAR. Despite one of the most exciting teams in MLS with our brightest young star, their attendance is atrocious (SP?) Better marketing, better city (Bay Area?) or whatever...just fix it and do it quickly. 8,000 for a playoff game should never happen, ever. I don't care if it's on Wednesday, that's absurd. The Fire draw more in the snow and wind of Chi-town!!