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My only significant quibble with that article is that the author makes it seem like threatening cities with demands for money for new stadiums is rather unique to MLS, when it's a cancer affecting every major sports league. And considering it's Neil De Mause, he should know better. Hell, the Diamondbacks in Major League Baseball just tried to sue the local county for tens of millions of dollars, claiming that one burst water pipe meant that total stadium renovations would have to be done, or else the team would have to cancel the lease and move.
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Aug 4, 2017 23:26
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Crazy Ted posted:My only significant quibble with that article is that the author makes it seem like threatening cities with demands for money for new stadiums is rather unique to MLS, when it's a cancer affecting every major sports league. And considering it's Neil De Mause, he should know better. MLS is a poo poo-tier league, though, and whereas other leagues' teams can believably pretend that these cities will make back the millions they spend on stadiums (they won't), money spent on MLS stadiums is basically a waste. The point here is the same point he makes many times in the article: MLS can't simply do the same things other American leagues do, because they exist in a fundamentally different dynamic. B.B. Rodriguez posted:Lol. It's Deadspin. I was super curious to see the first MLS apologist "EVERYTHING IS FINE" response, thanks for being quick.
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Aug 5, 2017 00:58
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It's good to see you've moved on from pro/rel to another bullshit topic.
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Aug 5, 2017 01:19
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DC are hyping a new signing...: https://twitter.com/dcunited/status/893566157533392896 ...of a 19 year old Bolivian striker on loan-with-buy-option from the Chilean league, where he has made three appearance and scored zero goals. And I thought MY team was frustrating about filling positions of need. Also, any article that talks about MLS' revenues or business model and doesn't mention SUM (or the recent advances in sponsorship revenue from Adidas et. al) is fatally deficient. Most people believe the claims of losses are just the usual pleas of poverty you get from owners who are thinking ahead to CBA negotiations, but who really knows at this point?
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Aug 5, 2017 01:21
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Feels Villeneuve posted:Speaking of MLS losing things, drat dont wanna brag but I called it 2 years ago. Looks like I was right as always. https://forums.somethingawful.com/showthread.php?threadid=3754874&pagenumber=7&perpage=40#post454338017
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Aug 5, 2017 01:21
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B.B. Rodriguez posted:It's good to see you've moved on from pro/rel to another bullshit topic. It's good to see you still fellating an obviously broken league.
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Aug 5, 2017 01:33
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MLS must be dying because this thread gets like 10 posts per month now
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Aug 5, 2017 01:37
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I like soccer and I want America's soccer league to succeed, ergo I want it to stop doing all the dumb poo poo that's making it fail. I will never understand why this is a controversial opinion.
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Aug 5, 2017 01:43
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Should I go to the DCU v Toronto game tomorrow or should I stay home and not use 4 hours of my life on it? wicka don't answer, piss off to another thread tia
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Aug 5, 2017 02:04
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camoseven posted:Should I go to the DCU v Toronto game tomorrow or should I stay home and not use 4 hours of my life on it? Depends if you have any really creative booing you want to try out?
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Aug 5, 2017 02:09
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camoseven posted:Should I go to the DCU v Toronto game tomorrow or should I stay home and not use 4 hours of my life on it? Skip the game and instead start slapfights on the internet for no reason.
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Aug 5, 2017 02:09
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The fact that MLS has survived for 22 seasons shows that what they're doing is working - it just isn't working fast enough. That's by design, though. Pretty much every esoteric rule Don Garber has put into place was to prevent another NASL situation where owners were spending money they didn't have on players. Do I think MLS can be improved? Of course, I'm not delusional to think it's the best league in the world. However, you've got to consider where MLS is not only in the global perspective, but the American perspective as well. They've got two fronts to look at in terms of support: other soccer leagues around the world and the big four sports in North America. Does Bayern Munich have to worry about multiple Munich teams in other sports with more history and more people watching on TV? If they did, you'd better believe that the Bundesliga would have rules to get more out of less. And no, camo, don't go to DC vs. Toronto unless you're a Reds fan.
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Aug 5, 2017 02:12
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wicka posted:I like soccer and I want America's soccer league to succeed, ergo I want it to stop doing all the dumb poo poo that's making it fail. I will never understand why this is a controversial opinion. Me too all-Rush mixtape posted:The fact that MLS has survived for 22 seasons shows that what they're doing is working No it doesn't
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Aug 5, 2017 02:13
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wicka posted:Skip the game and instead start slapfights on the internet for no reason. Ok! If you think it's such a poo poo league just ignore it and move on. There's a lower division USA league thread you can post in if you wanna support that.
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Aug 5, 2017 02:17
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all-Rush mixtape posted:The fact that MLS has survived for 22 seasons shows that what they're doing is working - it just isn't working fast enough. That's by design, though. Pretty much every esoteric rule Don Garber has put into place was to prevent another NASL situation where owners were spending money they didn't have on players. Do I think MLS can be improved? Of course, I'm not delusional to think it's the best league in the world. However, you've got to consider where MLS is not only in the global perspective, but the American perspective as well. They've got two fronts to look at in terms of support: other soccer leagues around the world and the big four sports in North America. Does Bayern Munich have to worry about multiple Munich teams in other sports with more history and more people watching on TV? If they did, you'd better believe that the Bundesliga would have rules to get more out of less. The problem is that his rules today aren't actually keeping the league financially sound. They're doing the opposite. They're requiring huge investments in expansion fees and stadium construction in exchange for the privilege of joining a league that doesn't make very much money. The Deadspin article makes a great point - for any of this to work, MLS needs to receive a windfall in the form of a giant TV rights package. That doesn't seem likely. camoseven posted:Ok! If you think it's such a poo poo league just ignore it and move on. There's a lower division USA league thread you can post in if you wanna support that. No thanks, I am going to stay here and discuss MLS in the MLS thread.
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Aug 5, 2017 02:17
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wicka posted:The problem is that his rules today aren't actually keeping the league financially sound. They're doing the opposite. They're requiring huge investments in expansion fees and stadium construction in exchange for the privilege of joining a league that doesn't make very much money. The Deadspin article makes a great point - for any of this to work, MLS needs to receive a windfall in the form of a giant TV rights package. That doesn't seem likely. MLS gets really horrible TV ratings. It is doomed.
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Aug 5, 2017 02:22
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African AIDS cum posted:MLS gets really horrible TV ratings. It is doomed. Cool go watch and post about another league if you're so sure this poo poo is gonna fail
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Aug 5, 2017 02:24
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camoseven posted:Cool go watch and post about another league if you're so sure this poo poo is gonna fail Nah I'm good why don't you relax bud
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Aug 5, 2017 02:26
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camoseven posted:Cool go watch and post about another league if you're so sure this poo poo is gonna fail What part of "I would like for this thing to better" is confusing to you? I don't want MLS to fail, I want for people to understand why it's failing and fix it (i.e. get rid of Garber). African AIDS cum posted:MLS gets really horrible TV ratings. It is doomed. It's really funny to me when ratings for Stoke at 7:30am crush primetime MLS games.
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Aug 5, 2017 02:27
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Basically what I'm saying is that I need one of you to step up and make sure "Is MLS A Ponzi Scheme?" gets engraved on my tombstone when I die.
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Aug 5, 2017 02:31
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camoseven posted:Cool go watch and post about another league if you're so sure this poo poo is gonna fail Just because your team is insanely bad doesn't mean you should make insanely bad posts about things.
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Aug 5, 2017 02:33
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wicka posted:The Deadspin article makes a great point - for any of this to work, MLS needs to receive a windfall in the form of a giant TV rights package. That doesn't seem likely. Ratings on ESPN were the highest they've been in years, and the Fox (not FS1) broadcasts were big successes. Considering the league just made a deal with Adidas for $117 million/year (more than the current yearly TV rights), I can't see the national TV rights not increasing a large amount in some fashion unless there is a fundamental change in the way we watch TV. NBC's deal with the Premier League is $1 billion dollars over a six year period, so I would have to guess that MLS's next eight-year deal from 2023-2030 would be worth ~$300 million (pooled from multiple networks).
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Aug 5, 2017 03:03
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"Highest they've been in years" and "great success" for MLS are still, like, 300k viewers. That's another problem I have with MLS, they constantly point at growth without revealing how miniscule that growth is. They're basically just getting a contact high off the Premier League at this point. I'm also just pessimistic regarding TV rights money as a whole. Sports have been largely insulated from cord cutting but there's no way that continues. ESPN has already seen revenues slashed due to the shrinking number of cable subscribers, and obviously that filters down into the amount of money they can spend on the likes of MLS. Other networks have been picking up the slack but eventually they're going to have to cut back as well. MLS may get the big deal you mention but it's gonna be tight.
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Aug 5, 2017 03:12
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Hell, if Twitter pays MLS the big bucks, it's all the same greenbacks.
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Aug 5, 2017 03:18
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wicka posted:I'm also just pessimistic regarding TV rights money as a whole. Sports have been largely insulated from cord cutting but there's no way that continues. ESPN has already seen revenues slashed due to the shrinking number of cable subscribers, and obviously that filters down into the amount of money they can spend on the likes of MLS. Other networks have been picking up the slack but eventually they're going to have to cut back as well. MLS may get the big deal you mention but it's gonna be tight. I kind of agree with this much at least, except that that pessimism extends to the Euro leagues (and basically all other televised sports) as well. Sky is already squeezing blood from stones to pay for the PL's TV deal, and frankly that isn't sustainable either. Even less so, really. I'm not arguing that this leaves MLS in a better position for not having had that TV money in the first place - more that the whole landscape of money and sports is due for a shakeup when that bubble bursts and we'll honestly just have to see what happens. As for the article, I think the author was way too credulous regarding the league's claims that it is losing money. On one hand, he ignored revenue streams the league is known to have (though SUM is tricky to talk about because nobody knows how much it makes, only extrapolations of how much it is worth), and claimed there was going to be no growth in sponsorship revenue when the uniform sponsorship deal alone quintupled this very week. On the other hand, he underestimated salary expenses by at least half because, I think, he calculated from the salary cap rather than using the MLSPU disclosures or any other source that tabulates what has actually been spent. MLS' finances are incredibly opaque in places, often by design, and a better version of this article written by someone with less of an axe to grind could really have dug into that and taken a thorough, educated guess at what they actually are and whether the league is sustainable. Unfortunately, the article we got made so many elementary, self-undermining mistakes that it's worthless as anything but clickbait.
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Aug 5, 2017 04:42
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Dallan Invictus posted:I kind of agree with this much at least, except that that pessimism extends to the Euro leagues (and basically all other televised sports) as well. Sky is already squeezing blood from stones to pay for the PL's TV deal, and frankly that isn't sustainable either. Even less so, really. I'm not arguing that this leaves MLS in a better position for not having had that TV money in the first place - more that the whole landscape of money and sports is due for a shakeup when that bubble bursts and we'll honestly just have to see what happens. Are we really going to compare Sky's four year £5.2 billion TV deal for the Premier League with MLS's eight year $700 million TV deal? When that deal was signed we're talking about more than ten times the money for half of the duration.
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Aug 5, 2017 04:57
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Shrapnig posted:Are we really going to compare Sky's four year £5.2 billion TV deal for the Premier League with MLS's eight year $700 million TV deal? In the sense that it's quite likely that neither of them will be that big next time around, as people stop paying for cable/satellite packages anymore? Yes. Otherwise, no. What exactly did you think I was trying to say in that paragraph you quoted? Because I'm not sure what part of it you are responding to here. Dallan Invictus fucked around with this message at 05:06 on Aug 5, 2017 |
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Aug 5, 2017 05:03
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Say we cut both deals in half for the next contract. MLS folds at worst or greatly struggles at best and the Premier League will be just fine because there are 200 other countries that will pay for TV rights to the Premier League while there are two who would pay for MLS TV rights. No one stays up until 4am to watch Real Salt Lake play but there are plenty of people who will watch a 4am Premier League game in the US.
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Aug 5, 2017 05:33
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Shrapnig posted:Say we cut both deals in half for the next contract. MLS folds at worst or greatly struggles at best and the Premier League will be just fine because there are 200 other countries that will pay for TV rights to the Premier League while there are two who would pay for MLS TV rights. Those 200 other countries add up to 60% of the money the domestic deal gets, and if the domestic deal weakens, a lot of them will also be cut for the same reasons. The PL earned around 60% of its reported revenue last season from those TV deals, MLS made around 15% of its reported revenue from its TV deals. Neither is going to go under from a cut in that number but they will both look different. What follows is: does the PL look even remotely the same, talent-wise, without the TV money fountain? What happens to the demand for it in other countries at that point, compared to the demand for their domestic leagues? I don't know. Neither do you. That's all I was trying to say.
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Aug 5, 2017 06:32
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No one is going to be insulated from the changes in the TV landscape, of course. But it's going to be a lot easier to navigate those changes for the established, successful leagues, versus a league like MLS that is clearly planning around the potential for future megabucks. Your point regarding MLS revenue being less reliant on TV money is a good one, but why are they not flexing that strength? One would think that a league whose crowning achievement is in-person attendance growth would want as many successful local teams as possible; instead, they alienate the lower tiers and pump the most successful small clubs for $150m expansion fees.Dallan Invictus posted:MLS' finances are incredibly opaque in places, often by design, and a better version of this article written by someone with less of an axe to grind could really have dug into that and taken a thorough, educated guess at what they actually are and whether the league is sustainable. Unfortunately, the article we got made so many elementary, self-undermining mistakes that it's worthless as anything but clickbait. Very few people without an axe to grind are willing to substantively criticize MLS, as this very thread has taught us many times.
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Aug 5, 2017 14:27
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This conversation generated a few reports, just a reminder to keep it civil in here. It's not illegal to think MLS is run poorly (he posted from a cavernous NFL stadium while drinking a 12 dollar domestic beer with 300 or so other idiots on a Wednesday) and its also not illegal to think that MLS is growing, because it is regardless of whether you think that growth is sustainable. This is a good and interesting conversation to have. Comments like this though camoseven posted:wicka don't answer, piss off to another thread tia Shrapnig posted:Just because your team is insanely bad doesn't mean you should make insanely bad posts about things. African AIDS cum posted:MLS must be dying because this thread gets like 10 posts per month now Are dumb. Basically stop getting mad at bullshit and making intentionally obtuse posts.
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Aug 5, 2017 15:01
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I like MLS. It's fun to have a team that I can consider my own because of my hometown. However, it is important to understand that this is still a very young league. Maybe soccer fandom is no longer in its infancy in the US, but it is still definitely on childhood. Looking at the early history of the big 4 leagues, it's easy to see that big and often undesirable changes are on the horizon. We may end up seeing a league that has to contract as teams fold. We may end up seeing the league fold altogether, or merge with another league. After my last trip to Seattle, though, seeing the Sounders gear outnumbering everything but Seahawks stuff, I'm pretty confident that pro soccer is here to stay in the US. How quickly it grows and whether that continues to be something called MLS is certainly up in the air. It may indeed all depend on the next TV deal. \/\/\/hell, 
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Aug 5, 2017 16:35
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There are eight (8) MLS matches in today none of which are on normal television. There are three (3) euro friendlies on television, today. I don't care about pro/rel or stupid MLS rules just put it in television so I can drink beer and laugh at it.
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Aug 5, 2017 16:58
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paddyboat posted:There are eight (8) MLS matches in today none of which are on normal television. Aren't you in Chicago? All the games today are on local channels/RSNs, and the Fire are playing so there's at least that one. Assuming you don't have Live. National TV games on one specific day is definitely an improvement from "national games on whenever the gently caress", though.
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Aug 5, 2017 17:30
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paddyboat posted:There are eight (8) MLS matches in today none of which are on normal television. How about there being eight (8) MLS matches on and the first one doesn't start until 7PM. Spread them out over the day and I'll spend 10 hours watching our lovely league. Squish them all into the evening and I'll be lucky to watch one.
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Aug 5, 2017 17:34
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Let's start with MLS Live not blacking out like 1/3rd of the season, please.
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Aug 5, 2017 17:36
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wicka posted:Let's start with MLS Live not blacking out like 1/3rd of the season, please. That would be nice. At least it's easy to get around with a vpn, but that shouldn't be required.
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Aug 5, 2017 17:53
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Dallan Invictus posted:Aren't you in Chicago? All the games today are on local channels/RSNs, and the Fire are playing so there's at least that one. Assuming you don't have Live. Part of my point was that if MLS wants lots of people to watch, they should put it on national tv. Maybe they don't and just want MLS Live money, but it seems like a bad way to grow.
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Aug 5, 2017 17:57
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binge crotching posted:That would be nice. At least it's easy to get around with a vpn, but that shouldn't be required. Can a VPN get around the blacked out "nationally televised" games that are on TSN and Univision?
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Aug 5, 2017 18:04
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wicka posted:Can a VPN get around the blacked out "nationally televised" games that are on TSN and Univision? Yep. Just use a vpn to Mexico and you can watch everything.
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Aug 5, 2017 18:14
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