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MLS wants to be in top 5 in the world by 2022. How will this happen with salary cap and no relegation system? Also, CCL is nothing like UEFA CL. How can you attract good players in such circumstances?
I agree that the existence of MLS Playoffs doesn't hold the league back quality wise(like single entity and the salary cap does). But I think it does prevent the league from getting decent regular season TV ratings. There's just no compelling reason to follow the league when they just dump over half of the teams into playoffs at the end of the season to decide a league champion. The whole narrative during the season is who is going to qualify for playoffs. That's all they talk about during broadcasts and pre and post game shows.
I'm not convinced playoffs are the answer for MLS, but while the EPL doesn't have playoffs, they have entry into the Champions League & Europa, which is a huge deal. It keeps teams fighting as the season goes on. multiple spots are up for grabs. MLS has CCL, but no one cares about it (did anyone know there is a round tomorrow?), probably due to lack of real money won through entry. I would think it would be a bigger deal, as if the US could consistently beat the Mexican teams, it would show growth for the MLS.
Anyway, playoffs is a way for more teams to keep playing for something as the season goes on. So, it seems to make sense at this time, but I wouldn't care if it went away in place of a real international competition. My opinion.
I'm not convinced playoffs are the answer for MLS, but while the EPL doesn't have playoffs, they have entry into the Champions League & Europa, which is a huge deal. It keeps teams fighting as the season goes on. multiple spots are up for grabs. MLS has CCL, but no one cares about it (did anyone know there is a round tomorrow?), probably due to lack of real money won through entry. I would think it would be a bigger deal, as if the US could consistently beat the Mexican teams, it would show growth for the MLS.
Anyway, playoffs is a way for more teams to keep playing for something as the season goes on. So, it seems to make sense at this time, but I wouldn't care if it went away in place of a real international competition. My opinion.
You make a good point but MLS is partly to blame for CCL's lack of prestige.
A few years ago I decided I would give MLS a go. I live in LA so I decided to support the LA Galaxy. They were playing a CCL game and I was pretty excited to tune in and watch. I forget the opponent but it was an important game in the CCL (they needed the points). So I was pretty disappointed when I saw that Landon Donovan wasn't playing and neither were a handful of starters. They put the B- team out there and they got beat. They were out of the tournament.
The problem with playoffs in soccer is that we already have Cup tournaments for that. It would be one thing if MLS was getting these huge TV ratings with playoffs. They aren't. You could actually still have an MLS Cup and not have playoffs.
You treat the season as a separate competition. A single table with the team with the most points winning that competition.
Then you have an MLS Cup that every MLS team plays in. You play the all of the games up until the quarter finals throughout the season. Then after the league ends you play the MLS Cup quarter-finals through MLS Cup Final.
The casual fan (if he exists) wouldn't even know the difference. And you'd get traditional soccer fans to finally take the league seriously.
I always thought something like a post season cup would be better than what we have now too. You have Supporters Shield who has most points which they say is the equivalent of winning the league. Its absolutely not though. When you are playing one team three times and another once there is no way to say who the best was that season.
We have 19 teams in the league with 3 more coming making 22. That's a 42 game season right there. Thats a really long league season but doable. The problem is MLS wants to add God knows how many more teams to MLS and there would be absolutely no way to have a league format going over 22 teams without having a promotion relegation. I am all for that but thats another bag of beans to open and I doubt many more teams would pay 100 million to join MLS to be put in the 2nd tier. The only way MLS can have a league is to do it now or they can never do it.
As for the CCL. There is just no money in it at all. Below is the money they are supposed to get for CCL participation.
CONCACAF Champions League
Group stage qualification: $35,000
Group stage victory: $3,500
Quarterfinal advancement: $30,000
Semifinal advancement: $35,000
Finals advancement: $40,000
Champions League champion: $42,500
So using Donavon for an example, he earns 2.4 million a year and if you do your best in CCL and win you get a total of $186,000. So if Donavon gets injured hes screwed. I wouldn't risk my best players for CCL against some team from Guatemala earning pennies who don't know how to tackle and risk Donavon breaking his leg. As little a MLS pays out in prize money its still even more than CCL. My point being that is CCL wants all the top players to play and all the teams to put in best effort they need to get prize money from somewhere to make it attractive.
I treat CCL the same as I treat the US Open. I hope we dont play our best players and nobody gets injured and if we lose we lose. Both are Mickey Mouse tournaments.
On the retirement thing, we are seeing a better quality player coming from Europe. Yes theyre old and yes they're past their prime but its not youre getting a 36 year old washed up Stoichkov as much as you used to. Keane and Henry could easily still play in BPL if they wanted. I dont mind older guys coming here so long as they have some quality to offer, when the league first started we where lucky some of the players could tie their own shoe laces. Thats not so much the case anymore I dont think.
the players coming over are better for sure, still overall quality is really lacking. Best thing I can say is sometimes I'll watch a game and be really entertained and sometimes I'll watch and say "what the heck is this?" and it seems to be random regarding teams and players.
remember Henry's loan a few years ago at Arsenal? couldn't dialed the clock back 10 years!
Quote:
Originally Posted by TAM88
There are two cases that I can think of where you're not going to see a natural grass pitch; Seattle and New England. Both the Sounders and Revolution play in NFL stadiums and both of those stadiums will definitely give preference to the Seahawks and Patriots. The Sounders and Revolution are the clear secondary tenants of those stadiums.
I am not sure how much it would cost to change out the surface every year, but unless they do that, artifical turf will be staying put.
Portland, the stadium was built some actual feet underground (field surface) and it will never drain properly, I've actually seen pictures of the pitch under water from the 70's or 80's. And they just refurbished so Portland won't be moving stadia anytime soon.
but there's really no such thing as a SSS, soccer specific stadium in the US. Even the ones that are supposed to be 'sss' will sometimes have gridiron marks on them because HS games / state championships, Even Houston's new stadium has a college football team play there from time to time.
Quote:
Originally Posted by NJ Brazen_3133
Is there a relegation system for MLS? If not, then the worst teams will have no real incentive to play hard as the season winds down because they wont win it anyways, and if they play really good teams, they wont put up a fight. With a playoffs, at least the best teams will face each other and have something to fight over.
in America no one is going to buy into a league (100million expansion fee) where you're "brand" could get relegated into a second tier and lose value and exposure.
Relegation is just so foreign to americans it'll never happen.
Look at some of the teams in baseball that get revenue sharing payments, there's no law that states that payment must be spent on the team/payroll and some teams just pocket it w/o trying to seriously win a championship.
the players coming over are better for sure, still overall quality is really lacking. Best thing I can say is sometimes I'll watch a game and be really entertained and sometimes I'll watch and say "what the heck is this?" and it seems to be random regarding teams and players.
remember Henry's loan a few years ago at Arsenal? couldn't dialed the clock back 10 years!
Oh yeah it is better and is definitely still lacking. It always will compared to the top leagues in Europe but thats OK with me. I got that WTF am I watching feeling when I watched Colorado play last year several times, im glad OP is managing Dallas now thats for sure lol.
This may be one of my favorite threads on City-data, it makes me think strategically. Here are some thoughts after 104 posts in thsi thread:
-The CCL doesn't drive interest, but is a good concept. Push more support and money into this competition, or change it and eliminate the junk at the bottom.
-The US Open Cup doesn't drive interest, and is a bad concept. I think it should be killed.
-The unbalanced schedule in MLS is limiting and creates a situation where we don't know who the best regular season team is
-Not having one single table turns away some soccer purists. Institute a single table with home/away. The number of regular season games would increase, but eliminating the US Open Cup would provide some of the time for more games.
-A major issue is getting teams to continue playing as the season progresses
--The top of the league incentive would be achieved through advancement to a pretigious event. Is that the North American Champions Cup (top 4-5 teams)? The CCL sucks south of Mexico anyway.
--The bottom of the league, since we have single entity, could be acheived through financial incentives...i.e. bottom three teams do not get a financial bonus that goes straight to the players...although the league probably doesn't have money for this yet.
As the league grows in size, you could switch to two separate leagues where they strive to be champions of the East or West, like the old structure of baseball. The top teams make the MLS Champions League.
-I am in favor of ways for teams to increase their salary cap...like by making the CCL. That way players get bonuses and teams are incented to play their better players.
in America no one is going to buy into a league (100million expansion fee) where you're "brand" could get relegated into a second tier and lose value and exposure.
Relegation is just so foreign to americans it'll never happen.
Look at some of the teams in baseball that get revenue sharing payments, there's no law that states that payment must be spent on the team/payroll and some teams just pocket it w/o trying to seriously win a championship.
Nonsense. I've never met an American soccer fan that didn't understand or appreciate the relegation system. It's the way soccer is structured all over the world. I would guess that 95% of soccer leagues on the planet have pro/rel.
You have a point about expansion fees. But this problem was created by MLS and USSF. They are building a league top-down instead of bottom-up. So, you're getting investors to buy into a league that they will never get relegated from.
If we had a proper league system we would probably have a fully functional pro/rel pyramid by 2020 with a solid D2. Teams wouldn't need to spend those millions to join the top tier. They'd start off in lower leagues and put the money into their clubs.
Instead by 2020 we're going to have a soccer league that is still not going to be accepted by the vast majority of soccer fans in this country who are being cultured into the sport through Europe and South America.
This may be one of my favorite threads on City-data, it makes me think strategically. Here are some thoughts after 104 posts in thsi thread:
-The CCL doesn't drive interest, but is a good concept. Push more support and money into this competition, or change it and eliminate the junk at the bottom.
-The US Open Cup doesn't drive interest, and is a bad concept. I think it should be killed.
-The unbalanced schedule in MLS is limiting and creates a situation where we don't know who the best regular season team is
-Not having one single table turns away some soccer purists. Institute a single table with home/away. The number of regular season games would increase, but eliminating the US Open Cup would provide some of the time for more games.
-A major issue is getting teams to continue playing as the season progresses
--The top of the league incentive would be achieved through advancement to a pretigious event. Is that the North American Champions Cup (top 4-5 teams)? The CCL sucks south of Mexico anyway.
--The bottom of the league, since we have single entity, could be acheived through financial incentives...i.e. bottom three teams do not get a financial bonus that goes straight to the players...although the league probably doesn't have money for this yet.
As the league grows in size, you could switch to two separate leagues where they strive to be champions of the East or West, like the old structure of baseball. The top teams make the MLS Champions League.
-I am in favor of ways for teams to increase their salary cap...like by making the CCL. That way players get bonuses and teams are incented to play their better players.
I agree with most of what you've said except for the US Open Cup. The US Open Cup has been around for 100 years. There's no soccer competition in the country that has more history than the US Open Cup. Not only that, it's the only competition where NASL and USL clubs compete with MLS clubs for a trophy. It's a tournament that is vital to the survival of our lower divisions who depend on the revenue from it.
The fact that it is under-appreciated and poorly marketed doesn't mean it should go away.
I agree with most of what you've said except for the US Open Cup. The US Open Cup has been around for 100 years. There's no soccer competition in the country that has more history than the US Open Cup. Not only that, it's the only competition where NASL and USL clubs compete with MLS clubs for a trophy. It's a tournament that is vital to the survival of our lower divisions who depend on the revenue from it.
The fact that it is under-appreciated and poorly marketed doesn't mean it should go away.
It needs to be a true cup though. I like the idea of USL, NASL and MLS being in a tournament together but the fact is it is a badly run cup. The idea of being able to buy home fixtures is beyond stupid. For that reason alone MLS teams need to not enter into it. I like to see my team not play first team players and get knocked out of this cup. It has no relevance. Either have a true knockout tournament or dont have a tournament.
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