It appears the lower divisions of American soccer are about to undergo a massive upheaval.
Less than a week after Nike sold United Soccer Leagues to the Atlanta-based NuRock Soccer Holdings, a group of USL team owners — whose own bid to purchase the league was rejected — threatened to bolt from USL and start a breakaway league.
And wouldn’t you know it? My local club, the Carolina Railhawks, are right in the middle of it all.
The breakaway threat comes from a group called the Team Owners Association, which consists of five current USL-1 clubs (Carolina, Miami FC, Minnesota Thunder, Montreal Impact and Vancouver Whitecaps), one club in stasis (Atlanta Silverbacks), one expansion club (Tampa Bay Rowdies), and one expansion group looking for a club (St. Louis Soccer United). In its rather bitter missive, the TOA claims that it is “committed to a restructuring of USL-1 into a truly professional soccer league which complies with the international rules established by FIFA, the governing body of international soccer. These rules include the requirement that the league be owned and controlled by its teams.” Clearly, the TOA thinks the boys at NuRock would rather keep USL going as a single-entity league like MLS.
According to David Fellerath at Triangle Offense, most of the TOA member clubs have not committed to playing in USL-1 in 2010, which will accelerate talk of a breakaway league. Plenty of questions remain, though — the biggest one being whether there are enough clubs to pull this off in the long term.
At this point, I figure that any breakaway league will probably need a minimum of 8 clubs to get started. That’s good for a 28-game season, where everyone plays home-and-away twice.
The TOA has eight members, but not all of them are on the most solid footing. Miami, Minnesota and Atlanta are all struggling with their finances, the Rowdies are brand new, and St. Louis’ club doesn’t exist yet. Plus, the Whitecaps are bound for MLS in 2011, and MLS commissioner Don Garber is still flirting with the Saputo brothers in Montreal. So even if a breakaway league forms in 2010, it’s guaranteed to lose at least one member before 2011 begins.
The question then becomes who would join the TOA in this breakaway league. Portland? The Timbers are also joining MLS in 2011, so they pose the same problem as Vancouver. What about the Charleston Battery, a club that would lose a few of its nearby rivals if it stayed in USL? How about the Austin Aztex, a club co-owned by a Stoke City board member who could be swayed by the TOA’s argument? What about USL-2 clubs in larger markets, like Crystal Palace Baltimore, who have been looking to move up to USL-1?
Then there’s the potential linchpin in all this — FC New York. Having the NYC market will be crucial to the future of any fledgling league, especially in terms of TV money. If FCNY bails on USL in favor of the TOA, this breakaway league would suddenly have a lot more clout when it approaches the networks.
Of course, all that is just speculation at this stage. NuRock could still convince the TOA owners to stay with USL for another season. It would take a lot of convincing, though, and at this point, I fully expect the lower divisions of American soccer to look very different in 2010 and 2011. All I can hope is that I’ll still have a club to support then.
UPDATE: Inside Minnesota Soccer has an even better write-up of this story. Make with the clicky.
4 responses so far ↓
1 jack // Sep 2, 2009 at 11:05 pm
There are rumors that the new league created by the TOA will be called the NASL (North American Soccer League) with teams from the USA and Canada and Mexico. Traffic is very interested in getting some Mexican teams in the new league. In tradition of the old NASL they will bring back the shoot-out and the 35-yard offside line to make things more exciting. The main difference between this new NASL and the old NASL is that the new NASL will have revenue sharing amongst the teams so that the smaller teams can survive with the larger teams. If the old NASL had revenue sharing then it might have survived.
2 a different Dave // Sep 3, 2009 at 10:19 pm
***”There are rumors that the new league created by the TOA will be called the NASL (North American Soccer League) with teams from the USA and Canada and Mexico. Traffic is very interested in getting some Mexican teams in the new league.”***
That can’t happen without the approval of the FMF, which isn’t going to happen. This is not a credible rumor, IMO.
If, however, there is some truth to it and it represents Traffic’s thinking on the matter, this is another bad sign. I really am skeptical of any league that has Traffic as a major partner in it. They can’t run Miami FC properly, and now they want to have a major say in running an entire league?
***”In tradition of the old NASL they will bring back the shoot-out and the 35-yard offside line to make things more exciting.”***
Dear God, no. We had some of this cr@p in the early days of MLS and it was pathetic. Shoot-outs do not make things “more exciting” they just pointlessly extend the duration of a regular season match which does not need to be extended beyond 90 minutes. Idiotic idea.
As for 35-yard offside line, it did little to affect the nature of the game except to allow some aging, tired European ex-stars to camp out at the 35 yard line instead of at the 50 yard line. It didn’t make things “more exciting”.
***”The main difference between this new NASL and the old NASL is that the new NASL will have revenue sharing amongst the teams so that the smaller teams can survive with the larger teams. If the old NASL had revenue sharing then it might have survived.”***
Certainly true, but the linchpin NASL club, the Cosmos, would never have agreed to that so they allowed the league to collapse rather than compromise until the economy killed everything (ie got Warner Communications out of the pro soccer business). By 1983/84 if the NASL owners couldn’t agree on revenue sharing (or even better, single entity of some kind) then they were never going to. The NASL was born in chaos and died in chaos.
3 a different Dave // Sep 3, 2009 at 10:27 pm
Also, this statement makes the idea of reviving shoot-outs and yellow 35-yard lines very unlikely:
***”the TOA claims that it is “committed to a restructuring of USL-1 into a truly professional soccer league which complies with the international rules established by FIFA, the governing body of international soccer. These rules include the requirement that the league be owned and controlled by its teams.”***
If the above is serious, this “rumor” of reviving oddball NASL rules is not coming from the TOA.
IIRC Cooper has also made noises about switching to an August through May schedule, which is IMO not a workable idea at this point in time, even with a generous winter break. There’s also less reason for a lower division North American league to take a summer break since there are a lot fewer USL-level players who play for national teams. USL teams don’t have to worry as much as MLS teams do about losing all their best players for weeks or months during the summer.
4 Dave // Sep 3, 2009 at 10:59 pm
That’s the good thing about having Mr. Deane read this blog — I don’t have to waste my time debunking the clueless. (Although if the TOA could convince Paul Kemsley to bring his new New York Cosmos aboard to join the Rowdies and Whitecaps, they might as well try to resurrect the NASL name, too…)
Right now, I’m really curious to see which direction Puerto Rico goes. I’ve heard the Islanders are sympathetic to the TOA, and I suspect they want to play in the league with the best competition, just to stay fresh for the Caribbean Championships and CONCACAF. Plus, having both Montreal and Puerto Rico in the breakaway league might make it just slightly more marketable to TV networks.
As for Portland, Timbers owner Merritt Paulson has gone on the record to say he’s not getting involved in any sort of breakaway. Sounds like he’s keeping his focus on getting the MLS franchise up and running in 2011.