NE did it. The goals were necessary but I think keeping Quintero quiet was the first best step. The attendance is always of note but with Kraft being touted as the best owner of some other franchise that team isn't going anywhere soon. Sorry Boston.
NE did it. The goals were necessary but I think keeping Quintero quiet was the first best step. The attendance is always of note but with Kraft being touted as the best owner of some other franchise that team isn't going anywhere soon. Sorry Boston.
FORMER FULL TIME KOOL-AID DRINKER
yes it's early, but from the standings, TFC are the only team with all points from all games early in the season as SEA vs VAN finished 0-0
That was a sad display the week after Canada played. Seeing the Canadian talent in the back on Montreal just capitulating like that.
But the disappointment on KC for giving up the shutout was an eyebrow raiser. They are seriously serious.
FORMER FULL TIME KOOL-AID DRINKER
Love to see him contribute before it was a rout.
The offensive side to this league keeps getting improvement without enough focus on the back. There are definitely some teams getting left behind in the off season, not making enough additions and that's enough to lose parity in this ever expanding league. It's a concern.
FORMER FULL TIME KOOL-AID DRINKER
Dallas had a great game vs Salt Lake.
Another example of the offense lopsiding this league.
Salt Lake were stupidly down to 10 men but the Dallas goals were stupendous.
Another example of Rimando's curse. Don't say it's your last season dude. Just retire when you want to. You'll get your props.
Houston kept their focus while Colorado lost their shit. And another poor attendance. No reason I could see, sports competition-wise.
Last edited by Fort York Redcoat; 03-31-2019 at 10:12 AM.
FORMER FULL TIME KOOL-AID DRINKER
Just wow. Shambolic defense.
MLS is a tough, physical league, that emphasizes speed, and features plastic fields, grueling travel, extreme weather, and incompetent refs. - NK Toronto
There are some real problem franchises right now in terms of attendance where you watch games and the stands look almost completely empty it’s embarrasing really. I’ve watched games from Chicago, Colorado, New England, Columbus and Houston for a few games now and all I see are empty stands with a few scattered people here and there you can actually count how many people are actually in the stands . I’m serious most of these cities there can’t be more than a few hundred people in the stands it’s crazy. At what point are we going to hear rumblings of teams folding ?
^ Next recession.
NASL started contracting in the early 1980s when interest rates spiked to 20%.
“What the world needs is more geniuses with humility; there are so few of us left.”
Well hopefully I’m over reacting here and there is money being made in other ways because if some of these teams are relying on their gate to bring in money they can’t be making much money. I lived through that whole original NASL going belly up in 1984 so that’s why when I see these teams with crap attendances I’m always a but fearful that this whole MLS thing can come crashing down.
MLS attendance is historically bad in many markets in the spring and picks up in the summer, but yeah – it currently seems worse than it was before, maybe because it's now so obvious how behind many of those markets are. The biggest disappointment though is Houston; they actually have a great stadium in a great location with a good team. There should be no excuses there, hot weather or not.
Watching Orlando is like watchng a basketball game - just tune in for the last 30 minutes.
There's some real differences with the original NASL though.
* salary cap (which NASL only brought in when it was far too late)
* significant TV rights through SUM
* much better ownership (you could get an NASL franchise for about $300k in today's dollars, and they opened it up to just about anyone)
* rules promoting parity
* it already survived a recession in 2008
* two whole generations of people who have actually played the game as a major part of the fanbase
* single entity structure. They can easily ramp down spending in an emergency by eliminating TAM, lowering GAM, or even eliminating DP slots. The league will only fail if most teams fail.
That's not to say that a significant enough downturn wouldn't cause some teams to fold, for an other sports example the NHL lost two of eight teams during the Great Depression leaving the "original six."
I don't fear for the league anymore though. In 2006 I wasn't so sure.
Zlatan now goes and does the panenka.
Pfffh. We've seen that already
^^NASL risk. I agree with this, except for the SUM part. That is just a different business, they could hive that off anytime. SUM is in some sense a threat to MLS, regardless of who owns it, it competes with the product.
I would add that NASL never had a supporter culture, so there was no “base” to retreat to, and the stadium situations were universally bad.
The thing NASL had, that we will probably never have, was a better “product” (better as in bigger name, more exciting players). We had like 50% of the World Best XI of 1974 in the league in 1978. Plus Pele. Plus an absolute ton of very good other players that played or could play for top clubs in England, Germany and Italy.
Salaries in Europe were a joke in those days, and there was no Saudi or China. We were it.
Last edited by ensco; 04-01-2019 at 12:36 AM.
“What the world needs is more geniuses with humility; there are so few of us left.”
“What the world needs is more geniuses with humility; there are so few of us left.”
Something to remember
Check out this tweet at https://twitter.com/tutulismyname/status/1112654177539420160
Its early days yet.
^What??!!
I look at that list of teams ....and I see 4 of the top 6 teams in MLS 2018 in the top 5.
Bring fifth in a 23 team league is somehow a sign that you aren’t a top team?
I draw the exact opposite conclusion of that of the tweeter. Early form mostly really matters.
Last edited by ensco; 04-01-2019 at 11:35 AM.
“What the world needs is more geniuses with humility; there are so few of us left.”