I voted for Rochester and Seattle, but the two that are picked will be the towns with an owner lined up who has plenty o' $$$$ and at least the promise of an at least soccer friendly, if not soccer specific stadium. If some dude from Scranton, PA ponied up the money, and Lackawanna County gave the go-ahead for a stadium (or the same guy had the money to build his own), then the Scranton Spleen (or, since Scranton has a rich railroad history, how 'bout Lokomotiv Scranton (for the love of Pete, I'm joking)) would kick off in April '06.
Philly and Portland MLS should do well in the northwest and Portland rather than Seattle because there is less competition - only one other major sports team. Philly for selfish geographic reasons and also because of the good turnout for the European clubs that have come the last couple of years. Also, Philly fans and maybe more importantly the media will fanatically support any team from the area, especially if they have a chance at winning a championship(which pratically every MLS team has).
rochester and philly, mls needs to add to eastern teams to level off with rsl and chivas. rochester already has a stadium under works and there are no pro sports to compete with. i chose philly, because i think it is the only other east team that i think would do well right now and according to SSV report PA is ranked 5th in soccer particiption with 1.07 million. they are ranked behind cali, ny, tx, and ohio which already have teams.
I chose Roch and Port. I would hate to see them leave USL D1, but Roch is the best attended in USL and a SSS on the way, and Portland because they have a core group of supporters allready and little other pro sport competition. But there are many on that list that would be good choices.
Exactly. They are definitely smaller markets, but with the jump to the big leagues (and the increased budget that came with it), I could see them doing quite well.
Definitely a hard choice. I took Philly and Portland. Philly because it's the biggest population center on the east coast that doesn't have a team. A team there would be helped by the number of fans travelling from NJ and DC. Other than that, I don't know a whole lot about Philly. Portland because, as has been stated earlier in the thread, the only other top pro team is their basketball team, which doesn't overlap much with the MLS season. Plus I have family out there. But they really need an owner to come forward. The Timbers are not having an easy go of it financially, and I think that PAC Park (or whatever it's called) is still owned by the city. Understand, the city didn't want to buy it, but the previous owners went under and the city got it by default. While that stadium has a great history of soccer events, I would prefer that they build a new SSS and leave it to the AAA baseball team. It is a baseball stadium, first and foremost. Plus, no MLS team wants to share with a baseball team for a million reasons. Finally, being an environmental advocate, given Portland's pro-environment reputation, they might actually build an environmentally friendly stadium. I think an excellent argument can be made for San Antonio. They've been trying really hard for a team, and I think they could pull it off. They're in a similar boat to Portland, i.e. in terms of market and NBA being the only other top tier franchise, but without the Division One (formerly A-League) team to promote to MLS. Seattle, Houston, and Detroit I think are also all viable candidates. If Seattle and Portland came in, there could be a great west coast rivalry that would continue. I do worry about the impact on the Vancouver Whitecaps, however, as the three teams duke it out for best in the Northwest. One thing that should come out of these NW teams entering is a yearly match pitting one of them against a J-League opponent, or maybe even a tourney featuring a J-League, a Korean League, and an MLS Pacific Coast team. As much as the Hispanic market is talked about, the heavy Asian market in that region should also be tapped. If Houston and San Antonio came into the league, we might be able to have a Texas Cup. In the name of fostering cross border rivalries we could have them duke it out with MFL teams just south of the border. Finally, it would be nice for Detroit to enter the league for those of us here in the Midwest. Right now Columbus is the only easy road trip, and it's about 7 hours I think (I shamefacedly admit that I have never made the trip--partly because I don't own a car). Detroit is about 6 hours I think. With Milwaukee, St. Louis, and the Twin Cities all having baseball and many other sports, with the result being less disposable income (and here I'm thinking of the Best Expansion Cities article), Detroit seems to be our best bet in the Midwest.
I'd bet all the money I have that Rochester is in next expansion if PAETAC is finished. Once PAETAC is built, the Rhinos will be a shoe-in for MLS. I know it's not a 'sexy' market, but with an SSS in place Rochester will already be drawing almost enough fans to turn a profit, and surely attendance will see an increase with promotion to MLS. I'm sure Rhinos' management is aware of this. The other nice thing about Rochester is there is already an established FANBASE. There have been a lot of threads on BS lately about selling tickets to kiddies versus making real fans, and Rochester already has a lot of the fan-making knocked out. It makes too much sense to pass up. As for the other, I would love to see St. Louis, but realistically I see Houston or Seattle.
Detroit has the same number of pro-teams as the Twin Cities and also has a MLB team just like Milwaukee, St. Louis and the Twin Cities. So why is it that Detroit would be the best bet in the Midwest? As for who I picked in the poll, I went with Portland and other. The other being Minnesota of course.
Probably because Detroit is a bigger market. As for the poll, Florida and North Carolina aren't cities.