Play on!
By Ben Knight
Okay, Sportsnet just ended one of its updates by saying the Montreal Impact and Vancouver Whitecaps will be taking next year off.
Guys, if you can’t get hold of Ryan, Craig or Gerry, you can still run soccer stuff by me. I may not work there anymore, but I can still help you avoid making mistakes that big.
Yes, the United Soccer League is in huge turmoil, with most of its teams apparently walking away. But that doesn’t mean there won’t be a league.
Here’s the dime-store, quick-hit bones of the thing:
Nike sold USL a couple of months back, and the breakaway teams refuse to acknowledge the new owners. The dispute is deep enough – and heavy enough – that the league is kicking out teams as quickly as they can walk away.
The breakaway teams – apparently including Montreal and Vancouver, but all the details are in play right now – are applying to the United States Soccer Federation to form a new league.
Vancouver, of course, will be joining Major League Soccer in 2011. Most of us on the local soccer beat fully expect Montreal to join them in 2012.
The Portland Timbers, who will walk down the MLS aisle with the Whitecaps, are still in USL-1, as are the perennially strong Puerto Rico Islanders. I expect this divide must, eventually, close.
There are too many teams – and too much at stake – for some form of league not to form and function. Who ends up owning it is for the lawyers. If you’re a ‘Caps or Impact fan, the only real issue is the name of the league, and who benefits from the franchise-fee cheques.
Don’t panic. Hang in there. It’s bad, but far from fatal.
More details as they emerge.
Onward!
October 28th, 2009 at 8:47 pm
Maybe,they should form sort of an MLS B Division and start relegating and advancig teams etc.
October 28th, 2009 at 9:22 pm
why do people always mention promotion/relegation for MLS? I mean who honestly would want to subject their hometown team to the possibility of relegation??? …. and playing a season against Minnesota Thunder? Count yourself lucky that we don’t have it.
October 28th, 2009 at 10:46 pm
People always mention relegation in passing but never expect it to happen in the US/Canada. Why not? Because “heckler” and the like are afraid their team will go down? Will there be a massive loss of TV $ from the huge contracts MLS has with NBC, ABC, CBS, ESPN etc in specific cities? Should the English, Italian, etc. systems change b/c of fear of going down? OR, does the whole relegation prospect, or more importantly, the prospect of promotion, ADD excitement, and could do the same in the MLS.
Heckler, you argument re Minnesota Thunder doesn’t even make sense. They were near the bottom of the USL1 table. If they WERE a good team with good attendance, I can think of a few smaller MLS markets. To properly use your analogy, the number one team in USl1 was Portland. Portland in the MLS?? heaven forbid! I can’t imagine. OR, we could use playoffs for the “best” team to be promoted. Montreal Impact in the MLS. Unimaginable. Sure the Red Bulls would have gone down. But how long would it have lasted with their potential assets? And it’s not like the MLS was making huge money from massive NYC viewership on TV. Whose kidding who. And San Jose down? Maybe they should go down, and stay down.
I think this is the best time ever to consider promotion-relegation (as I posted earlier today), and fear of the unknown (in the US/Can) is the only reason why not.
October 29th, 2009 at 6:19 am
It’s simple, folks.
You can’t charge a $40-million expansion fee one year, and relegate the new team the next.
Leagues that have relegation do NOT charge expansion fees.
October 29th, 2009 at 9:27 am
Yeah, definately Portland and Vancouver would have something to say about that (and any other team that paid a significant sum to join) and something would have to be worked out. I’m not sure that’s an unsurmountable obstable that could not possibly be overcome, if the will was there. MLSE or other clubs spending millions on stadiums may also not be keen on having their club potentially go to a secondary league. But, if the secondary league is good and the upside of the system is recognized, it would be worth a hard look.
October 29th, 2009 at 10:03 am
Relegation works everywhere else in the world
October 29th, 2009 at 10:50 am
It isn’t going to happen here, folks. Never. Right, wrong or otherwise, that’s the way it is.
October 29th, 2009 at 10:56 am
Promotion relegation would not work yet because, by your example Juve, if the Red bulls went down they would most certianly lose Angel and Kanji and a host of other players that would move on or sign with the promoted clubs.
Ben is right about the expansion fee argument, but if MLS starts an MLS-2 in conjunction with the team owners assoc. (TOA) they can let the second div grow on its own and introduce relegation promotion in, lets say, a decade.
October 29th, 2009 at 10:59 am
Shit the USL is already considered the 2 div in North America all you would have to do to give it more reputation would be to rename it MLS-2.
October 29th, 2009 at 12:56 pm
Juve and Cyd: Not only would relegation not work from a financial standpoint (as Ben explained) the teams that were relegated would also lose half if not more of their fanbase. Think Seattle will have 35k a match for a USL season? How many TFC sth’s would drop out if the Reds were sent down and not in the top flight for 2 or 3 years?
October 29th, 2009 at 12:57 pm
Promotion/Relegation in MLS will be in the end of the league. Faster than you can say NASL
October 29th, 2009 at 1:51 pm
Listen Promotion Relegation is not so far fetched as some might think…. it will just take time and more legitimate pro franchises to build themselves up.
Think Baseball, at the 2/3 mark of the season half if not 3/4 of MLB franchises are eliminated from contention, now I know they don’t get sent down to AAA but they do finish out the seasons and the fans still come, why? Because a Tigers fan was born a Tigers fan and his/her dad was a Tigers fan, Granpa was a tigers fan, thats why.
Its just gonna take time, the MLS is just going to be 15 years old next season and has garnered world wide attention, think of what this league will be at their 35th anniversary.
Saying it will never happen is a little short sighted, its better just to say it just might happen one day.
October 29th, 2009 at 1:57 pm
You are already seeing Second generation LA Galaxy, DC United and Metro Star/Red Bull fans.In 10 years you will have second gen TFC fans, this will grow and it will become, IMO, a one table league.
and maybe not long after that Promo/Releg might be introduced if the MLS has established a legit and strong MLS-2 Div
October 29th, 2009 at 6:49 pm
The only real argument against MLS1 and MLS2 is the expansion fee and that’s not impossible to overcome.
For example, if the Vancouver-Portland $ has not already been distributed/spent, you could have MLS2 with Portland, Puerto Rico, Austin, Cleveland, a second NY team, Atlanta, Carolina, Miami, Minnesota, St. Louis, Tampa Bay, Vancouver, Montreal and Ottawa. To join MLS2, an expansion fee of 4 million for 56 million. This could be paid out mostly to the clubs who joined MLS at a high fee in the last 5 years and any remainder to the rest of the league. Of course there are numerous potential flaws with this that are obvious.
I don’t think it will happen, or come close to happening, but the only point is it’s worth a thought, rather than outright dismissal, as if the system doesn’t work well elsewhere, and arguably, far superior, elsewhere. With a reasonable salary cap and more than a nominal expansion fee, the NASL risk would be minimized.
October 29th, 2009 at 6:54 pm
oh and re chris and gazza, your points would apply equally to European leagues, re: losing players and fans.
October 30th, 2009 at 4:34 pm
Ben, you’re absolutely right. Relegation is a stupid idea for North America. Now, promotion in a sense we already have. Prove you’re a decent soccer market in USL and you get a shot at MLS. So it’s more off the field promotion than on the field. Promotion/relegation is an archaic system in countries where they have far too many teams anyway
October 30th, 2009 at 6:10 pm
Relegaion and promotion is necessary to assure that teams from minor leagues have incentive to improve and that worst teams from the top leagues have consequences to that.
October 31st, 2009 at 10:54 am
I think North American pro sports has it’s form of relegation: it’s not making the playoffs. I do think MLS would benefit from having a farm league of some type so as to develop younger players and build depth, since they ditched the form of reserve league circuit they had prior to last year.