Scholarship table
The MLS has made CONCACAF better and more competitive.In order for the MLS to continue becoming a better league they need to do the following:1. Change their schedule to conform with the rest of the world. Single biggest reason holding this league back. Same playing window, same transfer window, same national game window.2. Continue to find and buy good young talent. If the schedule is changed, now you open the ability to get good young talent loaned to our league. Raises the talent level overall. Develop players and sell them for a profit until the competitive level reaches a point where you no longer need to sell them. 3. Figure out the best way to bring in Liga MX4. Pour money into Academies to raise the talent and development level of young players in this country5. Eliminate the pay for play concept or at least minimize its influence by sanctioning clubs and providing better coaching at the lower levelsUntil changes are made and the talent level rises in the MLS, all of the U.S.'s most talented younger players should and do go oversees.
For most owners, this is a waste of money. Too many teams owned by people out to make a financial investment. Not out for a successful franchise.
For me, MLS is an International Club Soccer League first foremost as opposed to a training ground for the U.S. National Team. It certainly can be and has been both. And that's good too. But it's not a means to end with the National Team, it's an entity to be enjoyed in an of itself.
I've never been invested in any MLS team. I've long felt the league should be used exactly as Germany used the Bundesliga to rebuild their own national team. Make each MLS team an academy, develop homegrown players and reward or require teams to field Americans.Ultimately, the sport's popularity domestically has always been driven by the national team. 1994, 2002, 2010, those moments drove interest. The better the national team, the more interest MLS will garner. It's in their own best interest to drive the USMNT.
I'll stick with my opinion on Gold. He'll be in foul trouble within the first eight minutes.
First time in either a long time or ever that 4 different people managed a North London Derby in the same season. Arteta, Jose, Emery, and Poch. Pretty incredible.
Perfect example of why relegation battles can be more interesting than title chases. Villa and Bournemouth getting huge results today, and four out of the bottom 5 picked up all three points this weekend. At this point in the season I'd much rather tune in for West Ham v Watford than Liverpool v Arsenal.
The MLS has made CONCACAF better and more competitive.In order for the MLS to continue becoming a better league they need to do the following:1. Change their schedule to conform with the rest of the world. Single biggest reason holding this league back. Same playing window, same transfer window, same national game window.Until changes are made and the talent level rises in the MLS, all of the U.S.'s most talented younger players should and do go oversees.
Of course UEFA caved.
my wife is a huge Leicester fan but I was glad to see Bournemouth win yesterday since it keeps the relegation battle interesting. I read an article a few months ago on how if they go down they're screwed financially and may never get back. They weren't supposed to last more than one year in the EPL and they're on year five.
That's just not feasible in the US, both due to the market (competition with NFL, NBA, NHL, college sports, all things international leagues don't have to deal with) and weather. Chicago, Minnesota, New England, NY, DC, all would be brutally cold for games in January and February.
my wife is a huge Leicester fan but I was glad to see Bournemouth win yesterday since it keeps the relegation battle interesting. I read an article a few months ago on how if they go down they're screwed financially and may never get back. They weren't supposed to last more than one year in the EPL and they're on year five.That's just not feasible in the US, both due to the market (competition with NFL, NBA, NHL, college sports, all things international leagues don't have to deal with) and weather. Chicago, Minnesota, New England, NY, DC, all would be brutally cold for games in January and February.
If you want to grow the league and become a player in the soccer landscape, you have to conform with the international soccer schedule. If you just want to have a league to have a league, keep the schedule the way it is.
I think a summer league is better for the MLS. Less competition for butts and TV dollars. The NFL and college football would kill their fall ratings. European leagues are the big dogs in town so they don’t have to deal with that.
You do know that MLS currently ends its regular season and has playoffs during the heart of the college football and NFL season in the fall? Keeping the schedule as is,is short sighted. The MLS is a non-player in the transfer windows so getting good young players on loans is a no go. It hurts the quality of the league but if all we care about is just having a league then everything should remain status quo. Quality of the league and top players is going to bring butts in the seats and TV dollars. Getting the quality of the league up so you can attract a younger Beckham, Ibra or Ronaldo is what the MLS should be setting their sights on. Those players will get lots of butts in the seat.
The success of MLS depends way more on attracting and converting the casual fan than it does on attracting some expensive young player only the hardcore fan cares about. Those casual fans aren't going to sit through a regular season soccer game in November or February in Chicago, Toronto, Boston, Montreal, New York, Minnesota, etc. And that's not to mention you're going to lose most of the group sales to youth clubs and the like. Teams don't make nearly enough from TV to sacrifice the loss of ticket revenue you'd see, and your idea of just putting a third of the league's teams on the road for three months is a non-starter. You think the PA would go along with that? The owners of those teams?The only thing that matters when it comes to the quality of players is money. Top players would flock to MLS if the pay were comparable to the top leagues. Many of them has said as much. But it's not, so they don't. And the only way it ever will (though it almost certainly won't) is if the MLS can grow its fan base. But that's not going to happen by a) making attending games less pleasant and b) making games harder to watch on television because you're going against college and pro football for more than half of your season.
This is false. If MLS paid like the EPL or La Liga, but the level of soccer is what it currently is, they wouldn’t attract stars. If you’re a top player, you can get paid anywhere. That’s why before MLS you saw top players go to the Middle East or Asia when they lost a step. China is a bit different, cause they weren’t matching salaries for guys like Oscar, Hulk, and others, they were beating it. But otherwise, most top international talent wants to make the money, but also play against the best. They won’t come to MLS, even for the fat paychecks, until that’s the case...or until they are older like they do now.Best case scenario is MLS combining with LigaMX. Second best is moving to the Russian Premier League style schedule with a break in the winter and trying to improve the league by aligning it with the rest of the elite soccer world. Otherwise, it remains a side show that will improve incrementally, but largely just remain a money marking venture for a few and continue to be a drag on the USMNT. Such is life.FWIW, saying soccer isn’t culturally significant and won’t be for the next 20-30 years is pretty asinine. The TV deals and global reach changed everything. It wasn’t enough when a bunch of kids just played in youth leagues, but now the best soccer in the world is in everyone’s standard TV package. If you’re 6-7, you can easily fall in love with any German or English team as easily as your local NFL team if you’re not physically going to games. The calculus changed monumentally in the last 5 years.
We’ll see what happens long term with various things. Short term there aren’t going to be significant changes in the U.S. sports landscape.High School football participation is down 27% in Ohio and 10% in Texas over the past decade. And participation has dropped significantly with White players Nationally, compared to Black and Hispanic players.