Team Names

Over at the Soccer Insider Steve Goff wrote (quoting Don Garber):

As for the push in Seattle to name the club the Sounders — something that MLS adamantly opposes — Garber said: “The good thing about team branding is that it involves a lot of people and there are passionate views on different sides of the issue. I believe our league and the sport has come so much further than the days of the NASL. While we have the name ‘Earthquakes’, I am very focused in trying to have our teams look forward as opposed to look back. That’s not taking away from the value of the ‘Sounders’ ... I think there is tremendous history there and a very passionate fan base but I am thinking about what this team is going to be 20 years from now or 50 years from now because that’s how long team brand names should exist.”

The club will allow fans to vote for the club name: Seattle Republic, Seattle Alliance or Seattle FC.

Say what?!? The Sounders name goes back to 1974 … so that’s 34 years of history. How in the world can someone claim (with a straight face) that ‘the Seattle Republic’ or ‘the Seattle Alliance’ positions a team better for the future than ‘the Seattle Sounders’? Throwing away the history and goodwill of the Sounders name is just silly. To choose names like Alliance or Republic instead seems even worse. I guess the good news is that if they choose Seattle FC, the fans can always use the Sounders as a nickname.

Sounders to the MLS

Well, it looks like the Sounders are coming to the MLS in 2009, but that might mean they’re leaving the USL in 2008. Wow! I’m super excited to see Seattle getting into the MLS, but I’ve got to add some caveats to that:

I really hope there’s a continued USL1 presence in the Puget Sound area. Maybe in Tacoma? (The down side to that would be the loss of a great PDL rival to the BYU Cougars.) If, in fact, the Sounders aren’t coming back to the USL1 next year to try to help market the MLS Sounders for 2008 the USL should ensure that there’s a way to keep the Cascadia Cup a three-team affair.

I’d like to see the MLS version of the Sounders looking a lot like the current Sounders. Brian Schmetzer is a solid coach and would do well in the MLS. Sebastien Le Toux is a good looking striker, and there are a number of other good players on the team. This doesn’t mean that all the current players are MLS caliber, but there is something to be said for cohesion—and you know what, it might be interesting to see what promotion might look like in the MLS instead of yet another team built from the expansion draft.

The MLS needs to get Portland and Vancouver into the mix as well. This three-way rivalry is too good not to keep alive, and would translate well into the MLS. Throw in the natural Portland-San Jose rivalry and the potential for a Canadian Cup between Toronto and Vancouver and you get a lot of bang for some Northwestern expansion bucks.

These aren’t new ideas, I’ve been talking about them for a while, and I’ve seen them elsewhere as well. I just hope that ‘the powers that be’ are considering them.

PDL Expansion

I’ve posted a couple of things about MLS expansion lately (as have a lot of other folks). One related topic that I can’t seem to shy away from is promotion and relegation. For this to ever work though, it’s not just the MLS that needs to expand. The USL1, USL2, and PDL all need to get bigger and improve their geographic coverage—the USL 2 is a particularly bad case.

I’ve been thinking a lot about the PDL (and especially the Northwest Division) recently. As part of that I’ve noticed something, the Northwest Division is geographically unbalanced:

It’s also three teams smaller than the Southwest Division. In the interest of shooting the breeze with other folks interested in the PDL, I decided to ask around and see where people would like to see three additional teams added. Here are the tally’s, along with some commentary:

City	Num Votes
Boise, ID	4
Salt Lake City, UT	2
Missoula, MT	2
Eugene, OR	2
Pocatello, ID	1
Logan, UT	1
Victoria, BC	1
Vancouver, WA	1
Olympia, WA	1
Corvalis, OR	1

I think Boise would be a good place. That is solely based on geography, I don’t know if they would have the input from NCAA colleges or have the local player pool to draw from. Right now, Ogden has a difficult time getting players in town from their colleges in time to get quality training with the team. ... Many of the teams in the northwest have local colleges that feed the PDL teams with players, and since they are local, they are able to train with the team. -Daren Moon

If I were the one choosing the First place that jumps at me is Boise, ID. Pocatello as well, ISU is there and you would probably get some sort of response out of that. After that, either Logan, UT or Missoula, MT. I think college towns make a lot of sense in that just looking around at RSL games, the majority of fans would fit into that age demographic and also that is the potential talent pool a PDL team would look at. -Donk

Good question. I think Victoria, BC would have good support. Eugene, OR seems like a natural fit, although a team in Corvallis might work better since Oregon State has men’s soccer and U of O does not. As a third option I would go with a team in Vancouver, WA, preferably one that is associated with an USL or MSL Portland Timbers club. -Bob Kellet

To name names, I’d plop a team in the Tri-Cities (Pasco, Kennewick, Richland), Boise, Idaho (why not give Idaho a team? I played my first tournament in Sandpoint), and…to be honest, it gets a little tricky after that, but I’d go with either the Eugene/Springfield area, or perhaps and Olympia/Tacoma thing. -Jeff Bull

So, what does all this prove? If you ask a dozen soccer fans where they’d like to see another team, and you’re likely to get twenty answers. There is some overlap though:

• Boise seems like it’s got the geography right, and has both the potential player and fan population to make it work
• Salt Lake City is also up on a couple of lists, maybe something like the Chicago Fire Premier or the Rapids U23 sides
• Missoula, MT is an intriguing idea that a couple of people mentioned—would the beautiful game work in cowboy country?
• Eugene, OR is another interesting choice, though it doesn’t really break up the geographic imbalance that already pervades the division

It also seems that there’s some common ground in terms of what would make a good PDL host city:

• a local college/university with a men’s soccer program
• a decent level of soccer support/interest in the community
• in Idaho, ‘cuz, well, they deserve it.

Will the PDL Northwest expand? I sure hope so. Where? I don’t know, but I think we’ve got a few ideas. Will a bigger PDL Northwest suddenly make promotion and relegation in US soccer happen? No, but it’s a start.

MLS Expansion Dreams Revisited

A lot of other people are writing about MLS expansion (one of my favorites is The Significance of the Frontier in MLS History which looks at expansion in a before 2010 and after 2010 context). Since I wrote up my MLS Expansion Dreams post, a couple of things have happened. How do they affect what I’d like to see? Let’s find out.

2008

I wanted to see Vancouver get an MLS team first (and really, for the Whitecaps to move up from the USL1. It’s looking more and more like San Jose is going to be the team instead. I think this is a bit of a shame, as California already has two MLS teams (along with a bunch of USL 1,2, and PDL teams). Not that I don’t want San Jose to get a team, I’d just like to see it happeh later.

2010

I’d listed Seattle and Montreal as my choices here. Seattle would renew it’s rivalry with Vancouver (if that happened), and Montreal would join an interesting rivalry with Toronto and Vancouver.

Seattle does seem to be on the short list, but there’s not a lot of clarity about how it might happen. There is at least some talk of the Sounders becoming part of the MLS franchise. If that happens, I really hope that Washington gets a new USL1 team, either in Spokane or Tacoma (though both cities have PDL teams).

Montreal, I don’t see anyone else talking about this (except for a brief mention in the ‘Frontier’ article linked above), and I think that’s too bad. The Impact have been at the top of the USL1 for the last several years, they play good looking soccer, and have a good-looking SSS being built. I do wonder if the MLS rule requiring national players would have to be adjusted to allow three MLS Canadian teams though (even two might be a stretch).

2012

I was hoping for Philadelphia and Portland as the two expansion teams here. I really think bringing the Timbers up to join the Sounders (and maybe the Whitecaps) would be the best option in the west. A brand new team in Philadelphia would round things out in the east.

2014

My last set of expansion was to bring back two familiar faces, San Jose and the New York Cosmos. While reality might beat me to the punch with San Jose, I still hope the Cosmos make it eventually. If San Jose does land a team early, maybe Vancouver could fill this slot or perhaps a team from the Midwest or Southeast would be a better fit.

Just some notes

I tried to keep the two divisions balanced, but I’d really like to see the divisions dropped and a single table created. I’d also like to see both the USL1 and USL2 fleshed out. I think 20 teams in the MLS, 24 in the USL1, and 30 in the USL2 would be great.

I realize that I’ve dropped a bunch of cities that are in the running—St. Louis, Phoenix, and Las vegas leap immediately to mind. Of these, the only city I’d look at putting an MLS team into would be St. Louis. Even then, I’d rather move an existing team (cough Kansas City cough) than expand.

MLS Expansion Dreams

Okay, admission time. This isn’t some well thought out list of where the MLS ought to place teams based on years of analysis. It’s just my dream of how things ought to work out. (Thanks to Jason Kreis Superstar for the idea.)

The MLS wants to grow by three teams by 2010, I’d like to see expansion beyond that. If I could make it happen, here’s what I’d do in 2008, 2010, 2012, and and 2014.

2008
Western Div	Eastern Div
Vancouver
2010
Seattle	Montreal
2012
Portland	Philidelphia
2014
San Jose	New York Cosmos

I could even see moving the two 2010 teams to 2012 to preserve the Seattle/Portland rivalry.

The best way for the MLS to make this happen (I think), would be to buy the existing USL1 Whitecaps, Sounders, Impact, and Timbers (either now or later) and replace them with new USL1 teams when they transition them into the MLS. I think some potential USL1 locations might be:

• Spokane (or Tacoma), Washington
• Phoenix, Arizona
• Ft Collins, Colorado
• Detroit, Michigan

Of course, the best course of action is to build better geographical coverage of the US and Canada at the USL2, USL1, and MLS levels then figure out how to make relegation and promotion work. (Hey, I did say this was my dream, and who’s dreams ever really tie that well to reality?)

So, what are your expansion dreams?

More about Vancouver

The City of Vancouver is currently considering a proposal for Whitecaps Waterfront Stadium, a new stadium to be built over the railway tracks east of Waterfront Station on Burrard Inlet. This 15,000 seat stadium would replace Swangard Stadium as the home field for the USL's Vancouver Whitecaps, with a proposed opening date in 2010. There is a fair degree of controversy with regards to this location — Wikipedia

When I wrote about Vancouver as a possible MLS expansion site, I wasn't aware of the proposal above. With an expanded capacity of up to 30,000, this could be an ideal MLS stadium. It might require promotion of the whitecaps though, something I'm not sure the MLS is willing to consider.

MLS Expansion in the Northwest

The MLS expansion rumour mill seems focused on either Seattle or Portland getting an MLS expansion team (maybe promoting the existing USL1 team already in the city). What about the other Pacific Northwestern option though?

What, you don't know where I mean? Why, Vancouver. Home of the Whitecaps FC.

They're a pretty solid looking USL1 club (the reigning league champs even), they seem to be well coached, and they play in a Soccer Friendly stadium (which is supposed to be expanded to seat ~10,000 for the U20 World Cup -- and might be able to be expanded to fit even more).

I'm not in a position to go making the decision, but I do think it's an interesting idea. What do you think?