A fascinating story on Denver's Phil Anschutz ran this week in the Los Angeles Times. While soccer fans (too often) blindly accept Anschutz and AEG as some sort of "soccer angel," the Times piece makes it clear that Anschutz is, in fact, a crafty businessman who is deeply concerned about his public image. It also points out Anschutz's hard-hitting tactics follow a pattern of using one asset to leverage another interest.

There's nothing wrong with that, of course. But we point it out as we believe, and have for some time, that AEG's real aim is to build VENUES, not soccer teams, using MLS as the asset to lever. The truth is, MLS offers a low-cost way for AEG to get municipalities to approve and/or build venues for AEG to then control. (We have wondered if this is how Dave Checketts was sold on Real Salt Lake, to be honest; the "business plan" this team has seems to be predicated wholly on having a Utah city or county give them a pile of cash.)

In of itself, this isn't a bad thing, is it?

We're not sure - if you're a soccer fan you might be wondering, as we do, why MLS spends so much time and energy talking about getting venues built and so little time and energy on development and acquiring talent. Or have people forgot that Don Garber told the media: "Our priority is the product on the field" back in 2000?

Now, we agree MLS needs to control its own houses and destiny, just like any other league. However, we remain skeptical that the league will blossom once they have them if they don't pay attention to the game on the field. [After all, have attendances really improved since these stadiums have opened their doors? Chicago's Firehouse is averaging just 13,152 over eight games and FC Dallas' new stadium is only bringing in 13,198 on the average. In fact, one team - despite playing in an owner controlled stadium and having a pretty good team - has plummeted off the face of the earth. That would be the New England Revolution, drawing just above 10K at home.] In fact, we wonder if once these venues are built if soccer will take a back seat to the real money-maker - concerts and "venue management."

One thing the 2006 World Cup showed is that Americans WILL watch good soccer. Unfortunately, MLS is not consistently good soccer yet by any definition. American sports fans know this, and show it with their feet - many have come to MLS games but only a few have gone back. So we're not convinced the venue actually matters in that basic equation. If the sport was worth watching, we think people would show up regardless of where it was held.

As such, we wish some of MLS' effort would go to reforming a badly damaged youth development system. We also wish some of the money spent on the efforts to get cities to build these houses would instead be spent on the talent. Then again, we care about the sport itself, not billionaire businessmen. As the Times points out (and the Washington Post has in the past) nothing comes for free.

Will soccer fans be stuck with a bigger price tag than they ever expected?