1) That MLS will make this the year of the product

The political climate has shifted: publicly funded stadiums are, at long last hitting a wall. Why? Well, people are sick of seeing millionaires ask the public for a hand out for the express purpose of building arenas chock full of luxury suites the average fan will never see the inside of. Canny fans know that these deals smell funny too: Many of these new stadiums seem to be more about a profitable piece of real estate than about supporting a soccer team… which was the rationale for building them in the first place!
The spin that this is just “stadium fatigue” doesn’t wash here: it’s more like stadium rejection. So, if MLS really wants to convince us that these stadiums are helping their product, they have to do something about the product on the field. They can start by increasing player salaries (which are pitiful), loosening restrictions of foreign players and start bringing in some of the very talented — and also underpaid — younger players that populate the South American leagues.
And, if MLS feels it has to have a stadium for each team, OK: Then build ’em. But let the owners do it. It can be done: Since the owners don’t spend more than $5m total for these teams in overhead a year, they can follow Lamar Hunt’s model and fund them themselves. If putting out $70-100m in one shot is too rich, then how about spending $1-3m a more year on the on-field product instead?

2) That U.S. Soccer will realize that they need a radical overhaul if they are to capitalize on the gains they have made.

There’s no question that American soccer has come a long way since 1990. But there are legitimate questions about where soccer is right now. Optimists claim the growth potential is bright, realists point to static attendances and pessimists say it’ll be gone tomorrow, just like in the 1980s.
All of these viewpoints have a lot to back them up. That’s why the U.S. Soccer Federation needs to focus on the things they do well and allow MLS to handle the rest.
The Fed — like the English FA — has to stop mucking around in the selling of the game, and focus instead on putting a quality product on the field. All those sponsorships won’t mean jack (and won’t last, either) if the men don’t start winning outside this region. Yes, the men’s team does drive American interest in the sport. But that interest is driven by games won, not ad campaigns, web sites or press releases. After all: which drives interest in foreign soccer: the FA, or the leagues?
Just go play the games. Spend the money on the youth teams, and getting quality opponents. Get some new blood into the coaching ranks (hiring Nowak is a good start) and stop playing politics. The sandbox is too small, and if enough sand is flung, soon enough it’ll be empty.
Sadly, the Fed is riven with conflicts that date back aeons. Some of these political struggles are so arcane you need a map to figure your way through them, and they are only of interest to the folks fighting them. A piece of unsolicited advice to the fighters: grow up, guys, and start thinking about the game, not your reputations. The truth is, no one in the outside world knows who you guys are anyway, so stop worrying about it.

3) That soccer will form an alliance with other leagues to ultimately control their own television channel and packaging.

Three MLS owners, Stan Kroenke, MLSE and Dave Checketts, have a problem. There’s this network, called Versus, that bought the TV rights for NHL games; the production is top-notch but the ratings are in the tank. That’s led to some in hockey circles talking quietly about forming their own network, a la the NFL net, which made big waves by getting cable operators to fork over a remarkable 70 cents a subscriber — or 50 cents a person more than the must-have CNN!
Thing is, the NHL isn’t year-round, and the sport’s biggest fans are on the coasts and in Canada. Versus also doesn’t carry every game — the regional Fox networks remain the backbone of the sport on TV. The NHL probably doesn’t have the oomph needed to carry its own network, so, they’d need a partner, ideally one that doesn’t interfere too much with their schedule and one that might hold some viewers while attracting others. See where we’re going with this?
Received wisdom has it that hockey fans don’t cross over into soccer, but take a good look at the map and you’ll see that the big hockey towns are also the towns in which pro, club and college soccer has a long tradition. So, if MLS and the NHL teamed up, they’d have a pretty solid core to launch their own network down the road. Add in that the NHL has one thing MLS clearly doesn’t (solid, professional broadcast crews with experience following a fast game) and the fact that MLS has something the NHL desperately wants (a young, ethnically diverse fan base) and you’ve got a winning combo.
If this match-up were smart and snagged the EPL rights to boot — or folded the very network that sponsors this column in as a third party — they would be nigh unbeatable. Hey, EPL games in the morning, NHL or MLS at night. Tell me that wouldn’t sell.

4) That soccer bigwigs will improve the quality of the sport’s broadcasts

One of the things that drives American soccer fans crazy is the quality of the telecasts for MLS games. I’ve received literally thousands of emails about various broadcasts and broadcasters (to be fair, this included FSC) and without naming names, I don’t think it is a stretch to say that most fans think most telecasts of American games are lacking.
Broadcasters have a tough time: finances have been tight and sometimes, well-intentioned moves have backfired. Most notoriously, fans didn’t appreciate ESPN’s attempt to bring a professional sound to their games by taking on Dave O’Brien as the lead play-by-play man. Personally, I wish fans had cut O’Brien a little more slack, and I still think ESPN had the right idea in moving to make MLS and U.S. national team game telecasts sound more like every other broadcast. In fact, I wish more moves like that one were made, but perhaps with former players and other quality announcers (which O’Brien is — he just got hired by the Boston Red Sox, which is a plum assignment in sports) to give this game the professional veneer and credibility it so desperately needs.
On the picture side of the equation, the work of producers, directors and cameramen has indeed improved but it’s still got a long way to go. Fresh blood would really help here as well: let’s hope the new league deals with FSC and ESPN drive those changes.
One last point: Honesty sells. People don’t need to be told that the game is “exciting,” especially when it isn’t. Fans also don’t need useless “sideline reporting;” this isn’t American football, after all.
People do need to be told who has the ball, what they’re doing with it, and why a team has lined up in a certain formation. Too often, that basic information is lacking. And announcers would be well-reminded that their main job is to tell viewers what they cannot see on a large field. Every broadcaster could profit by studying Premiership Live radio, which features the superb BBC commentators who are talking to people who aren’t seeing a live picture and have to understand the potential in every attack.

5) That MLS and its teams will stop faking attendance numbers.

Speaking of honesty, lying about your turnstile counts kills your credibility. So does adding in international doubleheaders into your counts and then pretending that 50,000 people really came out to the MLS match when the draw was really Mexico-Uruguay.
Some have asked if it is fair that so many people in the media are “obsessed” with MLS attendance? Yes, yes it is. Attendance and TV ratings are reliable gauges of popularity, and every sport is judged by the same standards. That’s why editors who were told that a team was drawing 16,000 a game, only to find out that only 10,000 of those seats were paid for, go ballistic and keep the sport out of the papers.
And yes it does matter that the NHL sells out many of its buildings and still has lousy TV ratings. The sellouts are real, especially in Canada, not contrived. That tells editors something, too.

6) That MLS will stay out of the hornet’s nest that is women’s professional soccer.

Fact: WUSA crashed and burned.
Fact: The most recognizable face in the women’s game is retired.
Fact: 99.9% of all Americans cannot name a single member on the current U.S. national team roster.
Fact: All women’s professional sports struggle mightily at the box office.
Fact: For all the good of Title IX, most women’s college soccer programs cannot compete at the top level.
Conclusion: Say no.

7) That MLS will cross-promote with other sports.

MLS needs to work on getting more people to the games. It’s encouraging to see MLS finally cross-promoted with other sports on ESPN; it would be nice to see that continue at the local level with tie-ins and cross-promotions to other local teams.
One example: Other minor sports give discounts to fans who try out their product if they bring a ticket stub from one of the bigger boys down the street: How about promoting MLS games at baseball games and giving half-off to fans who take them up on it? Not only would that reach general sports fans, it would reach Latino consumers to boot.

8) That college soccer will come into the 21st Century.

Change your rules, and play the international game. The product would not only be more attractive, but you’d actually be appropriately training some of those kids for a pro career instead of just using them for your own egos and devices. Enough said.

9) That soccer fans stop bickering.

Guys and gals, does anyone but you really care if you think MLS is better than the English league? Does it really matter if you prefer Spain’s league to Brazil’s? No, it doesn’t. Arguing about games is fine. Having a preference for what games you watch and how you spend your money is your right. And supporting your side through thick and thin is the life-blood of all sports passion.
But ripping your fellow fans for having somehow “lower tastes” than you is stupid. It’s just silly elitism that makes the sport’s fan base look fractured and contentious, and it keeps new people from embracing and enjoying the sport. That may keep the sport “cool” to you, but it also cools the long-term survival prospects of soccer in the States. Not cool.
This is supposed to be fun — we’re not in Rio or London, folks — so how about making this year the year in which fans respect each other and their differences?

10) That the fans will keep growing in depth and volume.

While we’re on the subject of fans, take a bow, folks. For 2006 was the first year since MLS kicked off that the voices of the fans actually got heard.
Doubt me? How about the furor over the Houston 1836? Or the blistering the U.S. team took after the World Cup? How about the cheers over the MLS All-Stars’ performance, and the disappointment with U.S. Soccer blowing their long courtship with Juergen Klinsmann?
Your voices matter. If I had one wish here, it would be that these same fans sat down and watched some broadcasts of other American sports, and read the papers and saw how other sports teams are covered. If they did, they’d quickly find out that soccer’s getting the shaft all around, and they’d yell even louder.
Demand better, fans, of everything on and off the field.
It’s your money, and you deserve it.

Forget about Joe Cannon's move. Forget about the new season schedule. The must-read today in MLS is the scathing series of stories about Real Salt Lake's new stadium plan (in this weekend's Salt Lake Tribune) which is under serious, serious fire.  Here's some choice stuff:

-- Doug Willmore, the Sandy County chief administrative officer, fired off an email to RSL CEO Dean Howes saying:  "Someone has been going around town making false (cowardly, wild, irresponsible, unethical) accusations about me and attributing them to you. Unless I've seriously overestimated you, I don't think you'd ever stoop to ad hominem tactics, especially behind someone's back."
    According to the Salt Lake Tribune, the "defamatory things," include charges that Willmore "breaks his word; lies; is out to kill soccer in Utah; and other accusations."
    (Howes denies making these statements.)

-- Howes, when asked why the team hadn't turned over financials to the county as they had promised to, claimed the team feared that  "competitors" would see RSL's finances. When the Salt Lake Tribune asked just who those competitors might be, Howes replied: "Everybody."  "Everybody" is competing against RSL?

 --Take a look at the last hotlink for a SLT editorial, headlined: "RSL must come clean or go away."

If there is any organisation out there that has failed as badly as RSL has to articulate their message to the public at large, I'd like to know about them. From where I stand, this seems like a disaster.

Little noticed in the midst of today's election gloating or teeth-gnashing was the news that a proposed soccer field project tied to a new stadium for the K.C. Wizards had been shot down, and hard. What this means for the Wizards is anyone's guess, but after spending a lot of money to back the intiative, the new owners of the Wizards are going to have to come up with some other way to build a stadium in Kansas City. Or, they could just do the sensible thing, and move the team, as MLS execs had been quietly urging Lamar Hunt to do since Year Two.

Hey, San Jose has a stadium, doesn't it?

 

This isn't a new story — both the Sport Business Journal (in a story I wrote) and the New York Times have detailed how MLS teams "paper the house." But Mark Ziegler of the San Diego Union-Tribune today confirms with official MLS docs what many of us have known: MLS systematically lies about its attendance. The bottom line: Most MLS teams average just 10,000 fans a game.

Back in May, Mark Abbot, MLS' CEO, lied to the San Diego Union-Tribune, saying: "“(MLS teams) aren't faking the numbers. We know this from the reports we get from the tickets distributed. It's not happening.

You wonder why we harp on MLS attendance? Because it's all just another sign that the league has no clothes, and a lot of fans, players and taxpayers are being taken for a ride.

One more note: Two years ago, I was told that MetroStars employees routinely faked their Giants stadium numbers — to laughable ends. The writer was able to demonstrate to me that the "announced" attendance for certain dates... was actually just team officials' birthdates.

Here's a look at numbers, reprinted from the Union-Tribune. Note that not only do teams routinely paper the house... but then they add on another few thousand bodies on top of that to top it off!

A look at attendance figures for the 12 Major League Soccer teams from the 2005 season. The numbers come from the "Game Attendance Summary," a confidential MLS document obtained by the Union-Tribune that is updated regularly. It provides a snapshot of average paid tickets and complimentary (free) tickets, and how that compares to the official attendance figure announced to fans:
Team Paid att. Comps Total distributed Announced

Chicago Fire 12,104 2,523 14,628 17,238
Chivas USA 12,121 4,821 16,942 17,080
Colorado Rapids 8,058 3,485 11,543 13,638
Columbus Crew 8,608 3,735 12,342 12,916
FC Dallas 6,634 3,864 10,498 11,189
Kansas City 7,004 1,917 8,921 9,691
Los Angeles 19,940 3,214 23,155 24,329
New England 9,725 1,472 11,197 12,525
MetroStars* 9,956 3,776 13,732 15,077
Real Salt Lake12,689 3,009 15,697 18,037
San Jose ** 10,134 2,077 12,211 13,037
D.C. United 11,982 3,186 15,169 16,664

TOTALS: 10,746 3,090 13,836 15,118
* = The MetroStars have since been renamed Red Bull New York.
** = The San Jose Earthquakes are now the Houston Dynamo.

Read today's Salt Lake Tribune leader. Here's the first sentence:

"A gaggle of local politicos insists that the latest scheme for a Real Salt Lake stadium in Sandy is a good deal for Salt Lake County taxpayers. We don't buy it."

Ouch. Stay tuned — this "deal" is, again, not over yet. Does this mean no more RSL if it falls through?

 
Also: comment from board poster "neophyte:"

"Jamie, I am an unapollogetic RSL fan. I even have season tickets. Right now I am feeling pretty good with the string of wins and Jeff Cunningham showing on both the scorers sheet and assist sheets.

However, your comment on Checkett's ham-fisted way of dealing with the politicians is correct. I never understood why he laid down the ultimatum for a deal. Why he isn't pursuing the angle of community benefit is something I don't understand.

Utah has more soccer players per capita than anywhere else in the US. How having a team and a "community" facility to hold tournies, state championships, expos and use for club and local league play is beyond me. Every local league in the three local counties is bursting at the seams with players and teams needing fields to play on.

This seems to me like a good starting point for negotiations---you supply the plumbing and the blacktop and we will supply the complex. This approach may sound too simplistic and maybe I'm just too simple minded but it sounds like the locals get "open space" and parks all in one.

Checketts' threats are just that--would you leave a place where the attendance is one of the highest in the league for another unproven market? Dave, you get more bees with honey--stop the ultimatums, keep winning and take a community approach instead of a all or nothing stance."

Salt Lake's proposed new stadium is still taking hits and heat in Utah, as this leader in the Deseret News shows. Despite a "groundbreaking," it's important to remember that this deal is NOT over and done with and that RSL's continuing and arguably clumsy public tactics are costing the team support.

We have been surprised for sometime at the ham-fisted way Dave Checketts' group have gone about this process — when we chatted with Salt Lake's Dean Howes about the stadium some time ago, we were floored that the word "soccer" didn't come up; instead, Mr. Howes hammered away on RSL's "business plan."

RSL is gaining traction in Utah, and a stadium will undoubtedly help the team. But we're not surprised taxpayers and politicians remain wary given the history of touchy interactions between the team and the county's elected representatives. We are surprised, given this, that RSL hasn't spent more time talking about what this team means to the community — as opposed to what the community can do for the team.