Is it just me, or does it seem like the Montreal Impact would be better off not buying into Major League Soccer?
I’ve been keeping an eye on this CONCACAF Champions League, where MLS clubs are winless and USL clubs are undefeated. New England and Chivas crashed out in the qualifying round, while D.C. United is 0-2 and is ready to crash out of the group stage. Only the Houston Dynamo are accounting for themselves half-decently here with two road draws, including a 4-4 thriller last night against Mexican clausura champs Pumas de la UNAM. (You can see the highlights of that match here. Waaaaaibeeeeel!!!)
Meanwhile, the Puerto Rico Islanders are 2-0, including a 3-1 win against Santos Laguna, and sit atop Group D, while the Montreal Impact are atop Group C with a win and an impressive home draw against Atlanta. If both those clubs get results tonight — Montreal faces Olimpia in Honduras, while Puerto Rico takes on CSD Municipal in Guatemala — they will be favorites to get through to the knockout stage. Both are also in the USL First Division semifinals, which take place this weekend.
Montreal remains on the short list for MLS expansion cities, along with Vancouver, Portland, St. Louis, Atlanta and a few others that don’t have a prayer. I’m starting to wonder, though, if the Impact really need to move up from USL to MLS so desperately.
Think about it. Here’s a club that already has a 13,000-seat stadium that fills up regularly. It can get into the CONCACAF Champions League every year just by holding off Toronto FC and the Vancouver Whitecaps twice a year, and on current form, it’s good enough to get through the knockout stage.
If Montreal moved from USL to MLS, it would suddenly have to deal with a salary cap and a limited roster size — the two things that most pundits believe are preventing MLS clubs from being successful in the CCL. Is that worth it? Would the Impact really make that much more money by trading its current Champions League success for a better TV deal and a visit from David Beckham once a year? Wouldn’t international success be more appealing to higher-quality players — especially if it means getting paid more by a USL club than an MLS club?
I understand why Vancouver and Portland might want to launch MLS expansion bids. They’re too separated from the rest of USL, and they would like to keep their rivalries with Seattle going. Plus, they have the fan bases and/or the financial backing. Montreal, however, is close to the rest of USL and seems to be building a winner all on its own.
Perhaps it all comes down to the question of whether a club would be willing to trade success on the continent — and, in a sense, the open market — for the boundaries of a closed league filled with parity. That works fine for the NFL. Just ask our pal MJD:
Sitting down and watching a Sunday full of football is like a 10-hour long acid trip. You can’t tell what’s real and what isn’t. And I love that. By contrast, I’m a huge NBA fan, too, but nine years out of 10 in the Association, you know by the All-Star break that there are no more than three teams that have a realistic shot at the ring.
Today in the NFL, you could narrow it down to, what … 24 teams?
It’s just all one big glorious mess, and we’re assured — we’re 100% guaranteed — that it will get sorted out to our complete satisfaction, no later than the morning of February 2nd, 2009.
Makes me feel like breakdancin’.
MLS has basically the same model as the NFL. Everyone has the same salary and roster limits, and that’s okay — when you’re only playing for one trophy. Soccer’s not like that. There are lots of separate competitions out there, and MLS Cup might be valuable, but it’s not the only way into the Champions League. Making a run at all these different competitions requires a lot more than 18 players and 10 developmental guys making Wal-Mart wages. Why let a domestic league’s salary constraints prevent you from building a team that could win the continent?
I’ve often wondered what would happen if a Roman Abramovich type suddenly decided to invest in a USL club. Imagine this guy using the $30 million expansion fee MLS asks for and instead building a club and a new stadium from the ground up, then pouring lots of cash into player salaries, just because he had the cash to burn. The goal? Win the U.S. Open Cup and the CONCACAF Champions League. What would happen if his club actually pulled it off? What would MLS do then?
I doubt Montreal will give us the answer to that question next April. Still, the Impact’s… er, impact… is enough to make you wonder how many people will start to ask if the second division really is just as good as the first. Now that’s parity.
9 responses so far ↓
1 a different Dave // Oct 1, 2008 at 4:56 pm
Montreal Impact are a non-profit club financed by one of the richest families in Quebec. They don’t NEED to be in MLS. However, MLS is a lot more stable than USL is. Long term, that’s important.
MLS has evolved, and will continue to evolve. The Single Entity scheme will be tweaked beyond all recognition. International competition will force MLS to follow the FIFA calender, and eventually adopt a split schedule (with winter and summer breaks); once everyone has their own SSS they’ll play even in cold weather. Soccer fans will have to learn to toughen up just like they do in Europe. The CBA will increase salaries and the squads will get bigger and deeper as the salary cap is increased and the minimum pay for development players is increased. MLS central office will be forced to mind its own business and not be allowed to prevent transfers; MLS will sign the paychecks but the MLS clubs will make all the actual decisions about player transfers. This will happen because this is no longer AEG and HSG’s private league anymore. Newer, richer owners will demand these changes.
As for a rich owner buying into USL and pouring in money to win US Open Cup and CONCACAF Champions League, sure, this could happen, but IMO it would be part of a bid to get into MLS, not to stay in a financially shaky and unstable USL. Keep your eye on the owners of the new USL Tampa Bay Rowdies; there has been plenty of speculation about how much money they really have and how much money they plan to spend. It could be an indication of what the next wave of USL owners will be like.
However, note the recent talk of FC Barcelona wanting an MLS franchise in Miami. The really deep pockets are still going to MLS first, not USL. Financial stability and continuity of franchises counts for a lot when evaluating which is the stronger league long term – not momentary successes in the CONCACAF Champions League.
2 joejoejoe // Oct 2, 2008 at 2:36 am
I’m on the USL mailing list and they just had a blurb about a big shot from Nike being added to their board of directors. Nike owns Umbro which owns the USL. I get the feeling that Nike is getting it’s ducks in a row and is poised to start really pumping up the USL and beating MLS straight up as a league.
3 a different Dave // Oct 2, 2008 at 3:08 am
Yes I’ve been hearing about the Nike connection to USL. If they can get some big investors into USL, things could get interesting, but that hasn’t happened yet. If MLS persists in its stupider policies and/or stops expanding, I could see big money new investors diverted into USL. Hasn’t happened yet, though.
Keep in mind my prediction above doesn’t have a “due by date”; it’s what has to happen and should happen, but MLS is stubborn and may take a long time to face facts, exhibit A:
http://www.bigsoccer.com/forum/blog.php?b=2124
Still if the SSS keep getting built and new owners keep coming into MLS who want to spend more money, I could see my predictions coming true within the next five to ten years. Maybe a bit more.
When you’ve been around as long as I have, watching the American soccer scene, you learn to be patient.
4 a different Dave // Oct 2, 2008 at 3:10 am
(Apparently if I post any hyperlink the post goes immediately into moderation, so let me repost this without the hyperlink:)
Yes I’ve been hearing about the Nike connection to USL. If they can get some big investors into USL, things could get interesting, but that hasn’t happened yet. If MLS persists in its stupider policies and/or stops expanding, I could see big money new investors diverted into USL. Hasn’t happened yet, though.
Keep in mind my prediction above doesn’t have a “due by date”; it’s what has to happen and should happen, but MLS is stubborn and may take a long time to face facts, exhibit A:
http://www.bigsoccer.com/forum/blog.php?b=2124
Still if the SSS keep getting built and new owners keep coming into MLS who want to spend more money, I could see my predictions coming true within the next five to ten years. Maybe a bit more.
When you’ve been around as long as I have, watching the American soccer scene, you learn to be patient.
5 Dave // Oct 2, 2008 at 8:49 am
A note about the comments: Hyperlinking is automatic. If the comments section detects more than one URL, however, the comment gets dropped into moderation. This has been highly effective in keeping spam out of the comments here.
And now for the follow-up…
In the comments at the BigSoccer post, Bill Archer wrote something interesting:
The “business model” is that league games, the ones that, you know, people buy season tickets and signboards and sponsor “free annoying clappers day” for, matter. Everything else – not so much.
Basically, MLS is specifically designed in a way that prevents clubs from caring about the U.S. Open Cup, the CONCACAF Champions League, and FIFA international breaks. Only winning MLS Cup matters; everything else is irrelevant. That’s a very American attitude toward a sporting league. Perhaps this model does keep MLS in business, but it’s always going to make the rest of the world scoff at them.
BTW, Montreal and Puerto Rico both won this week and now top their tables in the Champions League. I’d say USL is definitely making its case for more investment from Nike.
6 Rob // Oct 2, 2008 at 12:10 pm
MLS’ policies almost insure they won’t be competative with the rest of the world. Many of the top players in USL are here because they did not want to be “owned” by MSL which severly restricts player movement to other leagues and countries. Also the fact that MLS instituted it’s cap on players making over one million dollars may insure league survival, but limits the worldwide marketing capability and competativeness which comes with international superstars such as Beckham. It’s no fluke that high priced investors in the US are now buying EPL teams such as Aston Villa and stocking them with American talent. I think Nike may want to use USL as a proving ground for less restrictive league policies and may eventually surpass MLS as the premier soccer league in the US. Along those lines, wouldn’t a system of promotion and relegation be nice in the United States?
7 Rey // Oct 4, 2008 at 9:55 pm
I don’t see how USL stands a chance with the smaller markets they play in. My hometown of Rochester, NY has squandered money on a new stadium in the worst area of the city only to see it turn into a high school football venue. Nobody attends Rhinos games anymore.
I’m an admitted novice when it comes to soccer, especially the business side of it. But the conjecture that MLS gives a darn about anything other than the MLS championship just doesn’t float with me. It’s Americanized.
8 a different Dave // Oct 6, 2008 at 10:21 am
“But the conjecture that MLS gives a darn about anything other than the MLS championship just doesn’t float with me. It’s Americanized.”
If that were really true MLS wouldn’t bother to compete in the US Open Cup and the CONCACAF Champions League, and Superliga would not exist at all.
Obviously a majority of MLS owners DO care about things besides the MLS championship. What Don Garber says isn’t the final word on much of anything at all. Garber runs the day to day operations of MLS; he doesn’t set long term policy.
Once you’ve spent three decades following American soccer like I have, you’ll learn to take the long view and not get bent out of shape over minor tiffs like this. MLS has changed drastically over the years and has proven they can learn from their mistakes. I look on these recent MLS setbacks in international competition as part of the learning process.
9 Don’t Tread on Us, FIFA | socalspaces // Oct 22, 2008 at 11:31 am
[...] in the conversation that followed this post, however, is the real answer. The default policy of MLS is isolationism. Isolationism is a foreign [...]