No. Not really, with the sporting and business culture in the United States. That's what everyone keep trying to explain.
It'd be a 32-team league, just you'd have 12 franchises with the money. Or in other words, it would be more like college football.
Actually it would be closer to baseball, a sport that has been drowning in it's own self-important bile for years. And this is coming from a Sox fan. Big market dominance is a fact of life in the US, but the small market teams don't have to just bend over and take it. You want 32 teams, you better start sharing some of that revenue...
YES. Read below. There would be almost no national interest in the sport unless it is packaged as a "major league"--and even with how it is now, national interest in MLS is still pretty small. There is not enough interest by the majority of the US public to patiently develop the game in a grassroots way. The only way in America to get to the level that MLS has reached (and beyond) is by sinking millions (possibly billions) of dollars into it. Small clubs and local amateur sides do not have the capital to do something like that. Salaries, paying for/or renting adequate stadiums, and travel all cost tons of money. Fans like me want to see a competitive US team and watch its players develop. If we didn't have this league, most of the domestic players in our league would probably not even opt to play professional soccer at all.
My point being that Div. 1 cannot be financed by tax money w/o support of rich, rich guys specially in our market therefore, yes, US Div 1 has to be set up a tad different than Europe due to different sports markets. Tell me. How big is American Football (NFL), Basketball (NBA), Hoceky (NHL), Car Racing, and Baseball (MLB) in Croatia? JThis is the sports market that MLS has to compete with. And...yes...clubs Europe also like to use a combination of tax money and rich,rich guys money to get stadiums and what not. See Liverpool's continued work to pursue their stadium and funding. So. Where did Mr. Abromovich's £160Million go? The fact is that you have franchise in reverse. Establish football club needs money and gets taken over by very well off rich guy. That's why they don't move them. It doesn't necessarily it doesn't happen, but it does happen. Which means we are doing well if we are moving up ennit? Anyway. We don't have to wait. We didn't wait. I already answered your OP. Make your own conclusions as to why leagues within USL and USASA have made or have not made progress. If you want to see how grassroots soccer looks like, check out PDL (http://pdl.uslsoccer.com/) and USASA (http://usasa.com/2006logo/default.aspx). Take it from there. . . . . . . . . . and yes...your country is still smaller my state, so big difference on how things get done as far as soccer goes.
No. MLS lost $200 million in its first 10 years. Year 11 could actually be the first year the league breaks even or produces a small profit. Can you name any European clubs other than Chelsea that could absorb $20 million in losses a year? Clubs like Fiorentina, Bradford City, Notts County have been close to ceasing to exist for a lot less than that. Not even Leeds lost that kind of money. Pro soccer could not develop in a decade to the level of MLS without MLS's money and corporate structure.
Agreed. And that's the key. What kind of level we want and how much it will take. Take out MLS out of equation. And see USL by itself. That gives you pretty much a good idea of what soccer looks like in the US without a group of corporations investing BIG money into professional soccer.
But you assume that those other teams have to be the Arizona Cardinals or the New Orleans Saints. Couldn't they just as easily be the Nevada Bulldogs and the Oklahoma Roughnecks without costing the other teams a dime? The New York Yankees don't need the Kansas City Royals in the slightest. They need opponents, sure, but there's no reason the Royals have to be one of them. Why should the low earners and poor revenue generators be the ones who wield all the power in the league? That seems to me to be bass ackward...
guys, just watch the MLS ok, it's good ! believe me. Forget about league that starts from the community, it will take too long....If you like what you see and you will come back for more and next thing you know you are one of biggest fans of that club.
and since you brought up the example of the USL, another problem with that league as a smaller operation is the franchise instability. In any given year, you can have 3-4 teams fold and a couple new ones created. Back in 97 or 98 there 28 or so franchises, now the league has about 13. To give you an example of an attempt to go grassroots, the San Diego Flash (formerly of the A-League) had plans to go "public" as a shareholder team (complete with stadium plans) and the interest was not sufficient. The owner lost his shirt and within 2 years the team folded. That's one thing MLS has been pretty good at avoiding (minus SJ, TB, and Miami blackeyes). Big bucks and capital has enabled 11 of its 14 franchises to weather the storm and stay in place--hopefully long enough to build proud histories...
Sporting club gjoa a Norweign club in Brooklyn has been around since 1911 and is still around. If there was no MLS that club would still be around same is true with brooklyn IOtalians and Hota and Gotchie. If no mls the mens teams on these club will be a lot better then they are today that the diffewrence.