http://www.foxsportsworld.com/content/view?contentId=1796164 The URL for Wheelocks article about how great Parity is for MLS and saves it how bad the big European and South American leagues are with the same old (aka RICH) clubs dominate the leagues and EUFA competitions year after year after year after year .... While I agree with his sentiments that Parity is much better than letting rich clubs always stay that way, I think MLS has gone about it all wrong. Its one thing to give Draft preferences to weaker clubs and maybe steer the next foreign star to them. But iits an ultimately self-destructive policy to actively and deliberately tear down your best teams. DC United was the best team in MLS for the first four years. (And, yes, Wheelocks right in saying DCs continued dominance would not have been good for MLS). But MLS went about it all wrong (and continues to do so for every other big team since then): "You're winning a lot?" "Your players must be really good!" "We'll give 'em all big raises - Top Dollar!!" "Oh - You got salary cap problems" "You're gonna have to dump most of your best players" "Gee - What happened to your coaching - You don't have a great team anymore" Just when MLS could have show-cased DC United on the Internation scene, they decided instead to tear the team down - And this is something they've done consistently to other teams as well. This is not a Positive policy to achieve parity - Its a Negative and ultimately self-destructive one. And just as DC was getting torn down about 4 years ago, most teams in the MLS started to get better - Suddenly - A lot - Teams that used to have 2 or 3 really weak players no longer had no glaring weaknesses - Every team could play smart solid defense - Each team had dangerours strikers - And DC was no longer the only team to be able to switch fields effortlessly - So DC went down while the rest of the league went up - (Then DC's remaining players started to get persistent season-long injuries and the slide became precipitous) So we're finally back - Should walked in through the door - (I think Ben Olsen's injury really hurt us and we woulda won most of the remaining matches instead of ties and OT losses - And we'd be in a respectable 2nd place and almost 1st) - But given the state of the team and how we did the past few weeks, its better we're playing Chicago now instead of NE or NY who seem to have our number right now - If DC gets past Chicago, then they'll be on a roll and know they can take on any other team Early Prediction: Sat Nov 1: DCU - 3, Chi - 1 Sun Nov 9th - toss-up John L (Jersey #111 - my IQ in Binary)
John L, Do you think we would have acheived parity by giving the worst team only a bit of a bump up? I'm not so sure. Is an early draft choice or a price break on a foreign star alone going to help a 1997 Colorado Rapids make up ground on a 1997 DC United? Besides, the salary cap doesn't just serve one purpose. It's not only about parity; the league has to keep costs within a certain realistic range or face financial disaster. There has to be a limit as to how much teams can spend on their rosters. And once you have some sort of cap in place that is, as you rightly observe, going to create a lot of parity all by itself. I don't think MLS was so much actively tearing down teams as forcing them all--champions and cellar-dwellers--to stay within certain limits that existed both for the sake of parity and the sake of simple survival for the league. If they had truly intended to *crush* teams, they would have said, "OK, you won last year--that means you need *less* money than other teams. Here, we'll give what we cut from you to the worst squad, to help them out." Now *that* would have been a blatant attempt to demolish any foundation of a winning dynasty. As it was, Arena managed to keep a core intact form year to year and build on it. What did DC United in in the end was not the cap (though that hurt every year, but only because our players kept excelling); what hurt us was losing the man who could drop two or three aces every game and still come up with a winning hand. Speaking of salaries and parity, what continues to astonish me is the way players apparently still expect (and get) sizable rises in pay even when the team tanks. Why did we have cap trouble in 2001 and 2002? The teams fromt eh year before had *stunk* but according to reports, players were still anticipating big plus-ups in thei pay packets. Not COLAs, but significant increases. That just beggars the imagination as far as I am concerned.
John, this sounds like sour grapes. What about Tony Sanneh? The league treated him as you're suggesting it should have treated the other guys who got their big raises-- offering him more money, but not big piles of cash-- and he played out his contract and ran off to way bigger money in Berlin. The league also hiked the salary cap twice: after the DC championship year in 1996, and after the DC championship year in 1997. That doesn't make your allegations of a plan to screw DC look good, does it? Look, DC got burned by the salary cap, but this debate was resolved YEARS ago. DC was the first to get bit by the cap, but not the last-- and other teams, either exhibiting more foresight or learning from DC's mistakes (you choose), avoided DC's fate of a quick plummet.
I just about completely disagree here w/Wheelock. Say I wake up in the morning, and have Shootout. I want to watch a great MLS match. Which one do I watch? And don't tell me I have to watch ALL of them, I don't have the time. If the EPL was made up of Man City, Portsmouth, and Tottenhams, people wouldn't care as much for the EPL. The Champions Tour was a HUGE success. The idea that DC United would become like Celtic-well-SO WHAT if it happens under the rules, due to better management. However, with the salary cap, it's just about impossible for DC United over time to stay as good as Celtic and Rangers are and completely dominate the league. People can say "do you want your team destroyed to make another team better?" My answer is no, I don't want ANY team destroyed period if it's a great team. To me, MLS has gotten much more boring under parity. I don't watch MLS nearly as much as I did in the past because there's no team I really want to watch this year.
Wheelock said: I can truly emphasize with D.C. United and their supporters, in regards to how this once-mighty club fell into disarray, and in such a short span of time. Under a more conventional system, D.C. United likely could have continued their incredible run of success over the long term. But at what cost to MLS as a whole? It would have been a pretty high one in my estimation. First, exactly WHAT cost would it have been to MLS as a whole? Specifics please. I'd like to know how the league is so much better off now than it was 3 years ago. And....under a more conventional SYSTEM, eh?? Like a conventional system where a team becomes good is a bad thing?? Where a terrible team staying terrible is a bad thing? Want a better SYSTEM where the good team is torn down, and the bad team is made as much equal if not BETTER than the good team? THAT'S what you want Wheelock? In politics there a FORCED SYSTEM trying to make everything equal, and it's called socialism/communism. I'm a soccer fan. Period. I want to see the best soccer, not some guy from up top forcing me to watch mediocre soccer instead.
While I know what Mr. Wheelock is getting at and to a degree I agree with him, however, I could not disagree more with the above quote. For the last three seasons DC United has been terrible at best - more like horrendously awful. Even this season DC United is mediocre at best...still terrible according to some... The fundamental issue I have with the parity language used by the league is that the league HQ still holds all the contracts. I am all for a strict salary cap but I believe this can work with each team negotiating their own contracts. The issue with this is that each team would need a set of contract lawyers (thus raising overhead) but I feel that this move towards greater independence for each team will remove the APPEARANCE of impropriety that plagues MLS. The lack of transparency in league transactions and the fact that MLS HQ makes player decisions makes it SEEM like there is a lot of backroom deals going on, when there probably are not.
My observation: Fans who rail against parity coincidentally never volunteer their own team to be the designated cannon-fodder.
Fine then. I volunteer DC United to become cannon-fodder. And you know what? For the last 3 years, that's what DC United WAS. And what have we gained from that? NOTHING. I STILL don't see a truly great MLS to watch. And to those that think parity's great, I DEFY you to sit through game after game, 2 hours on Shootout, where the only real significant difference between the teams is their home field advantage, and their shirts. Sounds easy, if you don't actually WATCH the games and love to talk about parity. But I'm a hardcore soccer fan, a former lover of Shootout-watched Hudson's Miami team a few years back. Here's the average MLS attendance over the years: 2003 14,898 2002 15,822 2001 14,961 2000 13,756 1999 14,282 1998 14,312 1997 14,719 1996 17,406 The increase in 2002 was due to going to Saturdays only, and folding the Miami and Tampa teams, which not only added to the attendance average, but was supposed to increase the level of soccer. Garber was desperate to stop attendance from going down, stated it as one of his main objectives. I see no basic increase in attendance, even with the gain of a few soccer only stadiums. To those complaining about the NASL, I read this: Pele's signing led many other international stars to join NASL teams. Among them were Franz Beckenbauer of Germany, Johan Cruyff of the Netherland, and Giorgio Chinaglia of Italy. Average attendance throughout the league doubled in two years, and the Cosmos' average went from about 5,000 a game before Pele to nearly 30,000 in 1977. But Pele retired after that season and the NASL, with exceptionally poor timing, expanded to 24 teams in 1979. Attendance dropped almost as fast as it had risen and the NASL roster declined to 21 teams in 1981, 14 in 1982, 10 in 1983, and only 6 in 1984. The league officially went out of business in March of 1985. From http://www.hickoksports.com/history/soccnasl.shtml#hist1 I see MLS losing money big-time, just like the NASL did. We've just got deep pockets w/the 2 or 3 guys letting this league survive. I find it hard to believe MLS is SO MUCH better than the NASL was. MLS wants $ so much, it's almost bending over for the new Chivas guy to come in and help save the league.
I agree. If there's a strict cap, and teams have their independence to become great OR to suck, that's all I ask. Instead, it seems like the league is ENFORCING parity, and hiding what they're doing at corporate HQ. Transparency, and let things grow w/out meddling.
i agree 100%. I love parity. parity doesn't mean that all teams suck. It just means that most teams are in a position where they are just playing out the string each year. basketball has a salary cap, but yet the Lakers had a huge run. the Celts had a nice run (both about 10 years). the Bulls had a 10 year run where they were great. and currently, the Lakers are back again. you can still establish dominance, but it has to be done through smart trading and draft picking rather than the biggest fish throws money at the problem and gets to the World Series every year. that to me is boring personified. yeah, it's all good if you are the Real Madrid or Yankees of the block, but what about everyone else? you get to compete your one or two years, and then you go back to the end of the line again. not fun at all. would I rather be a fan of West Ham or DC united under the current systems. give me DC United please. we actually have a SHOT of winning it every once in a while. As for the fact that MLS hasn't exploded ......... you think that is because of parity?? please! so if DC United were now the 6 time champion, people in other cities would run to the gate to watch their team?? i don't think so. I think we are being unrealistic about this league. I defy anyone to tell me of any league in this country that took over the sports culture within 7 years of existence. MLB didn't do it, the NBA didn't do it, and even the 800 pound gorilla NFL didn't do it. not even close. each one of them ......... decades.
Understandable, since you are watching from Falls Church, VA. When I lived there the NASL Washington Diplomats were mediocre at best; the Cosmos had the money and the players, but that didn't stop me from going to the matches. Metro has resembled the Dips more than the Cosmos, but I prefer MLS way over what the NASL had to offer. Sure, I wish we were at the level of the EPL -- where teams with smaller budgets seem to be making an impact at this early stage of their season, and what does that have to say about managed parity? But the fact is we have a league that is about right for the amount of fan support in this country. Triple the salary cap, and I seriously doubt we'd see even a 10% increase in average attendance. Add a Beckham to each team, the Eurofans would still stay away. I'm sure once your team is out of the tank, you'll find MLS more to your liking.
This whole "who's gonna volunteer their team to be cannon fodder" is a bit of a straw man. There are two basic ways to achieve parity. First, you can dismantle the better teams. Second, you can help out the worse teams. MLS does both, the former a byproduct of the cap and the latter a function of the draft and allocation regulations. Those who seek to relax the parity rules generally concentrate on eliminating the full burden of the cap from the top teams. They basically want good teams to be better able to hold onto their players. I'd also bet that most of those who are in favor of the above (or given the reality of the money situation, wishfully dream of the above) are also very much in favor of helping out the worst teams through the current mechanisms. So the issue for the anti-parity folks isn't "let's concentrate all the talent in a few teams" but "let's let the good team remain good and make the bad teams better". In short, they'd like to see MLS work to abandon the first parity strategy and concentrate fully on the second.
Well........let's just say I used to watch Shootout a lot, whether DC United was playing or not. I've been to Metros games at the Meadowlands when I had a contract in the NYC area, where DC United didn't play. I almost made my 2nd team to watch on Shootout the Galaxy this year, until I realized their midfield is crap and so they're probably going nowhere. You can call me a frontrunner, but then I loved watching Metros 99 implode. I love watching what works, and what doesn't. In this league, you can't tell who's the best or worst coach, team, player is. If you can't tell that, you can't tell what's working, and what isn't. Things just seem to go downhill, as you can't emulate what's good, and stay away from what's bad. You've seen one game, you've seen 'em all. In recruiting for the US National Team, say Arena quits. Who gets hired? Who's the best? Who can actually say for sure. What new players should be picked up? Who knows. What style of Americanized MLS play should the US National Team pick up? You can't really tell if teams play almost the same way. You can see SOME difference, but in a fuzzy league, you can't really be SURE if you missed out. All I'm saying is make a strict cap, make things transparent, give the teams control. That's it. Not too much to ask. I hope Chivas comes in w/their Latino, Spanish speaking team. Would add a lot of spark to the league I think. They WOULD be different-I'd look forward to discerning if their way works better or worse, and we'll all learn from it.
I suspect that your view of this is greatly colored by your being a DC United fan. Ask other fans whether the league is better now than it was in 1999, and most people will give an unreserved "yes," as will most media members who cover the league and its teams. Obviously, I can't blame you for thinking that the league was better when your team was cutting through it like a hot knife through butter, but your perception is obviously much different than other people's. I do that every weekend. I TiVo all the games that I can and watch them over the course of the following week. What I see is a league where there's precious little difference in skill level between the teams. The Quakes do not have a markedly higher talent level than the Burn or the Galaxy, the two worst teams in the league. They do have a bit more talent up front, however, and they are well-coached, very disciplined, and very difficult to beat. Defenses are a lot better than they were in 1996-99. You see fewer shockingly unmarked players these days than you did back then (Well, unless you're watching the Burn). And that's probably for the best, because attacking players waste a lot fewer chances than they did back then. Sometimes, two evenly matched teams will mean a real end-to-end barnburner. Sometimes, it'll mean a match between two really good defenses, where quality chances are few and far between. But the former is not necessarily a mark of better soccer, nor is the latter a mark of worse soccer. Since when does better soccer translate necessarily into better attendances? If that were the case, the Earthquakes and Revolution would be averaging 20,000 a game. (And I noticed that you conveniently neglected to mention the Burn and Fire's less-than-ideal home venues in 2002 and 2003.) And I'll answer your big NASL reverie by pointing out one thing: For all that starpower, for all the millions that were spent on players, the best the NASL ever did was average 14,440 in 1980.
Comrade, please. There isn't anybody here forcing you to watch anything. If there is such a person in your living room now, let me know and I'll ask the local commissar to remove him immediately. I would suggest you install a dish or save your money for the next Champion's World tour.
I agree. And what I haven't heard from critics of parity is where the extra money is going to come from to make the worst teams better *and* pay the annual salary increases for the players in the top teams.
Well, that was under 24 teams. Only have 10 teams in MLS. I'd love to see MLS try to get 24 teams w/attendance at 14,440. No way in hell that would happen.
Actually, it can be argued the quest for parity increases the cap. A major allocation going to each team once they lose a player or don't make the playoffs often results in another high salaried player coming in. I'm for a strict, transparent cap. Meaning if a team sucks, a team deserves to suck. Meaning, the coach should get fired, new players should be brought in, whatever, instead of the league coming in and putting lipstick on a pig, as they say.
Not really. Leagues are zero-sum by nature. If one team is kicking ass, then that means that one team is really sucking or that several teams are merely bad. And let's go even further. There's only one position that anyone's interested in: #1. Whoever's on the losing end on November 23 will pretty much get the same thing out of their 2003 season that Dallas got. And given that, you can pretty much call the the entire league, except for the winning team on November 23, "cannon fodder." And if you've got the same team winning every year, everybody else gets the title of "cannon fodder" every year. You might think that's a bit extreme, but the first-ever Burn team that didn't make the playoffs has given me a bit of clarity. I don't feel any worse now than I did five days after the fateful playoff less in each of the previous seven seasons. What killed me about 2003 was going out to Dragon Stadium or turning on the TV and seeing the Burn lose, week after week. I don't think I feel any worse now than I would've if the Burn had made their customary first-round exit. So yeah, if one team gets to win damn near every year, then everyone else gets to be cannon fodder damn near every year. And frankly, that sucks. Name a good team that was "dismantled" by MLS. (Hint: I know which one you're going to say, in which case, you should be prepared to tell how the trade of Chris Albright for Roy Lassiter "dismantled" DC United. Whoops, I forgot Diego Sonora. Yeah, you're still waiting for compensation. Good luck. The schmuck went AWOL on the Burn in July 1997 and we never got jack for him either.) They tried that in the NBA. It basically made the salary cap such a joke that the owners had to lock the players out a few years ago to get a new system put in. Now, the NBA has a system that's even more arcane and more regimented than MLS'. Yes, NBA teams can still sign their own players for more money than other teams can, but there are limits to how much more, and teams that exceed the salary cap have to pay big dinero to the league office. Just ask Mark Cuban. In the end, however, there's still incredibly player turnover each offseason. So the good teams stay good and the bad teams get better. Sounds wonderful. Hmm. In your dream league, does anybody actually lose any games? If so, who? Please educate me, because I can't figure it out. After all, it can't be the good teams because they they're staying good. And it can't be the formerly bad teams, because they're getting better. Also, are you calling this league the "Lake Wobegon Soccer League," where all the teams are above-average? If on the other hand, you tell me the losses will come from the good teams' losing a few more games and the bad teams' losing some games, but not as many as they used to, then all I can say is, "That's what you've got."
Don't go painting all of us with that brush, please. I don't agree with anything BW is saying. I think it's absurd to blame the league for the sucking of DC United. Honestly, MLS doesn't have folks smart enough to figure out how to take a team from champions to bottom-feeders in one short year. Do I think the league was relieved when DC stopped dominating? Oh, absolutely I do. But do I think we suck because of some sort of conspiracy? No. Not even close. And as for parity, I don't have a problem with it, necessarily. The salary cap is necessary for financial reasons - it's not a plot by the man to keep us down.
Right. Coaches never get fired and players never move around and the league never, ever brings in new players. I'm not really getting what your point is.
Well, first you say you don't agree w/anything I'm saying (not surprising). Then you go on to say you don't get what my point is. If you don't understand my point, how about thinking a little harder on it, or asking me for clarification first? Would be appreciated. I wouldn't paint you with the same brush as me anyways-for one you're female. Yes, coaches get fired, players move around. That's a plain obvious point, sarcasm-EVERYBODY knows that. My point is-you have less certainty about what you're doing. Should Andrulis get fired for being just a single point away from the playoffs? Should Hudson? Which players are the great ones? Should Etcheverry continue to play? All these answer's cloudy. Andrulis could get fired and Hudson stays over a piece of luck-KC realizing they don't need a win to get home field advantage.