MLS to Miami - Oshan got it right
by Dave Clark on Jan 8, 2011 2:57 PM PST
in Sounders: MLS Regular Season
Email
PrintJeremiah took a tongue-in-cheek look at what Don Garber would say to the Miami Ultras and he met prior to today's Combine action. Except that the MLS Commissioner pretty much said what Jeremiah said he would.
Garber emphasized three points that would help most: getting the market excited for soccer, supporting the second division club that already exists, and supporting the Gold Cup matches to be played at FIU Stadium this summer.
If Miami is currently ripe for MLS it would have been a great idea to have more fans show up to meet the Commissioner than players who played in today's Combine games.
While Miami makes a ton of sense from a geographical and television sense. Right now there are several cities who have larger supporter groups despite the lack of a team at the highest pro-level. This includes the over 300 strong Crocketeers of San Antonio, the hundreds strong Borough Boys of NYC, and already awarded Montreal.
Think back five years. What would have happened 5 years ago if the Commissioner had announced that he would be meeting with Seattle fans to talk expansion. Or Philly? Or Portland?
If this is going to be a fan driven effort that captures the imagination of an out-of-market investor the people of Miami have to do better.
21 comments
|
0 recs |
Do you like this story?
Comments
Not having high hopes for a Miami franchise
just take a look at the current sports teams in Miami/Florida. According to the ESPN attendance trends, the Marlins are 28th in the league with an average of 18,825 and the Rays are not much better with an average of 23,024. The Heat are only so popular because of the holy trinity that was set up by the players. Sports just do not seem to be a priority there which is fine but the league should not handcuff themselves.
It's not sports...
It’s anything other than college football that they don’t seem to like.
Editor/writer at Sounder at Heart, North American soccer editor SB Nation and of course follow me on Twitter
by Jeremiah Oshan on Jan 8, 2011 4:16 PM PST up reply actions
Disagree with you
Miami Fusion had solid fan support. They were contracted b/c of a failure of their ownership, not their fans.
Win or lose, we will always be here for you.
by johnjahafanclub on Jan 9, 2011 10:36 AM PST up reply actions
60 people showed up to this thing, 60!
I’m just so tired of Miami supporters saying they got screwed. I get that it’s a complicated situation, but what’s not complicated is that people in Miami have never shown a willingness to attend club soccer matches on a regular basis.
Editor/writer at Sounder at Heart, North American soccer editor SB Nation and of course follow me on Twitter
But they did
get screwed when fusion were contracted. It’s too bad more of them didn’t show up to this thing but it doesn’t change the fact they did a decent job of supporting the fusion.
Win or lose, we will always be here for you.
by johnjahafanclub on Jan 9, 2011 10:38 AM PST up reply actions
If Miami doesn't support what they already have.......
Why would anyone think they deserve an MLS franchise? Hell, the only reason Miami FC Blues is still around (last I checked) is because the company that owns them can absorb that kind of financial loss without breaking a sweat. Better to move FC Frisco to San Antonio and add the Cosmos than fail AGAIN in Florida.
Fusion failed
b/c of their owner, not their fans. Their fan support was solid.
Why should NY get a second club? MLS has sunk/spent/lost hundreds of millions of dollars in that market, built the shiniest SSS in the country, and bought multiple international superstars, and they still can’t come close to selling out RB Arena. If MLS spent that kind of money in Miami I bet they would get the same attendance as RBNY.
In Miami the losses were negligible in comparison with NY and they still got solid fan support.
Win or lose, we will always be here for you.
by johnjahafanclub on Jan 9, 2011 10:58 AM PST up reply actions
There is no evidence that the fan support was there for Miami
Also, the Red Bull comparison isn’t valid, because REDBULL eats those losses, not MLS.
The bigger issue is that there is less interest in Miami RIGHT NOW. History doesn’t matter.
Right now it is an AWFUL soccer market.
I am not a Supporter | I am not a Fan | I am a Sounder
Sounder At Heart
If you act major league the support will show
USL Sounders averaged what 2k per game? USL ECS had what 200 members? Toronto’s minor league team had even less support.
If a team starts in Miami that has proper ownership support and proper marketing, and acts major league, like Sounders FC and TFC, the fans will come out.
Win or lose, we will always be here for you.
by johnjahafanclub on Jan 9, 2011 11:46 AM PST up reply actions
There's no evidence of that
Hundreds turned out to see Drew Carey at a bar talk about how the next day there would likely be an announcement that MLS was coming to Seattle. Tens of thousands watched the USL Sounders v MLS teams in Open Cup action.
Miami doesn’t have that. Not even close to that.
I am not a Supporter | I am not a Fan | I am a Sounder
Sounder At Heart
How do extrapolate
the 33k attendance that SSFC gets from 200 supporters meeting Drew Carey, vs. guessing that Miami would get little attendance b/c only 60 supporters met Don Garber at a bar? Personally, if I was a casual soccer fan, I would be more motivated to meet the hilarious and witty TV Star Drew Carey at a bar than some commissioner that I’ve never heard of, of some minor league that never gets talked about on ESPN.
Sure Seattle had 10k at open cup matches, but that just shows how people are willing to turn out to see a MAJOR LEAGUE product. Look at Toronto, the USL Lynx only got around 1k attendance pre-TFC, yet TFC sells out all 24k seats at their stadium all 4 years despite never making the playoffs. You can’t look at Miami FC’s poor numbers and extrapolate from that that MLS would do poorly in Miami.
Win or lose, we will always be here for you.
by johnjahafanclub on Jan 10, 2011 10:07 AM PST up reply actions
This is the thing
What shred of evidence is there that people want MLS in Miami?
1998: 10,284 (second worst)
1999: 8,689 (second worst)
2000: 7,460 (worst all-time)
2001: 11,117 (fourth worst)
They never even came close to meeting the league average in attendance. More importantly, unlike the teams that weren’t contracted, no one stepped forward to own the team. Say what you will about KC, SJ, Dallas or any other team that was drawing poorly at the time, but ownership groups were willing to operate those teams. No one was in Miami. The reason? Owners don’t see any reason to believe people will attend MLS games there.
Attendance in second division has always been among the worst in the league. Until they show a passion for attending games, there’s no reason MLS should force feed a team on that market. If an owner emerges that is willing to take the chance, bully for them and I hope they are successful. As much as we may all agree our preference is not for NY to get a second team, but there’s an ownership group(s) that wants to buy a team. Money talks. Such is the way of the world.
Editor/writer at Sounder at Heart, North American soccer editor SB Nation and of course follow me on Twitter
by Jeremiah Oshan on Jan 9, 2011 1:56 PM PST up reply actions
11k in 2001 was pretty dang good
That was better than 2001 MLS cup champs San Jose who only had 9k that year. And that was with them playing in a crap location, in a crap high school stadium, and having a crappy owner who wasn’t putting any money into the team and was doing jack to market it or connect with fans.
Moreover, why would MLS contract a team that was clearly in the midst of a massive turnaround? They added 4k attendance in one year (and not by using double headers with euro clubs to fudge the numbers). If that graph looked like this: 1998: 11k, 1999: 10k, 2000: 8k, 2001: 7k, then sure, I could see more justification for contraction. But why would you contract a club that was on the up? If they added 4k in 2001, who knows how much more it would have been in 2002? I bet 14k-15k was a real possibility if they were not contracted.
I agree with your point about ownership. If an owner doesn’t back a team in Miami then this talk is all for nothing. If NYC#2 is the only proposed expansion club that has a dedicated owner with significant financial backing, then yes, I think MLS has to move there. However, I would hope that an owner like this could step up in another market like Atlanta, Miami, San Diego (move chivas?), or St. Louis, before NYC gets a second club.
Win or lose, we will always be here for you.
by johnjahafanclub on Jan 10, 2011 9:58 AM PST up reply actions
Former Fusion Supporter
I am not here to argue the point about whether MLS should expand in NYC, Miami or elsewhere, but people may be underestimating the degree to which the stadium situation really did handcuff the Fusion down there.
The Lockhart was not bad in itself but it would be something like the Sounders playing in a high school stadium in Everett and wondering why the attendance wasn’t always there. Secondly, the financials were bad with a sketchy stadium as well so it folded. Finally, Miami is a poor town. The Miami fanbase is urban and can’t always make it out. Put them near downtown and I bet the attendance triples.
The model for the Fusion which relied on a suburban commuter fan base was destined to fail. Something similar seems to be happening with Dallas trying to get people to commute to Frisco.
If they want a team they are going to have to show up in numbers, but if the stadium situation is not taken care of there is no point.
I'm sure there's truth in that
Here are my problems: It’s one thing to acknowledge the Fusion and FC Miami attendance is bad, but I rarely see Miami supporters acknowledge just how bad it was. In 2000, the Fusion drew like 7,000 a game, which is easily the worst attendance in league history. In 2001, when they won the Supporters’ Shield, they drew like 11,000 a game. I know that was only the fourth worst total that year, which leads to many of the “Miami got screwed” statements, but the reality is the league couldn’t find an owner that wanted to take a chance.
All things being equal, I think the MLS really wants to be in Miami, though. It seems to have lots of potential. Problem is, soccer fans have literally done nothing to make returning to Miami seem possible. You can blame Traffic all you want, but if there was a thirst for soccer, more than 1,000 people would be attending games. Until Miami can show they’ll support a soccer team, I just don’t understand why this conversation is even happening.
Editor/writer at Sounder at Heart, North American soccer editor SB Nation and of course follow me on Twitter
by Jeremiah Oshan on Jan 9, 2011 8:53 AM PST up reply actions
I think the key is that Garber doesn't really care about the failure
He is looking at Miami as a completely new market with new potential. Basically recognizing that there were lots of reasons that MLS 1.0 didn’t work in Miami.
But the current state of soccer in Miami is not showing that they deserve a team any more than San Antonio, New York and probably St Louis. Charleston, Rochester and Des Moines have stronger support, but tiny markets.
Miami soccer fans aren’t watching MLS games on TV. Aren’t a high traffic area for internet sites that cover the league. They don’t support their 2nd division team and hardly anyone showed up for an event with the Commissioner to talk about expansion.
All of that is much more important than what happened in a dead era of MLS that was played with different rules and horrid finances.
I am not a Supporter | I am not a Fan | I am a Sounder
Sounder At Heart
Miami is a risk.
Seattle was thought of as a bad baseball market. The Seattle Pilots were here for one season and left for not so greener pastures in Milwaukee. The only reason that Seattle got another team was the state settled a lawsuit against MLB.
With bad Mariner ownership through the years, Seattle was thought of as a bad market. On more than one occasion, owners wanted to move the team. It all changed when Seattle got good ownership. Now, Seattle is thought of as a good baseball city.
When the Seahawks had the Nordstroms and Paul Allen, the Seahawks a great football town. Under Ken Behring, Seattle was not a good football city and he actually moved to team to LA.
It is all about ownership. In both football and baseball, Seattle was once thought of as a risk. Not anymore.
I do not know if Miami is a good soccer city. But, sometimes you have to look beyond the surface to know the real answer.
But there were indicators that Seattle was a good market in both sports
TV Ratings, Attendance for minors/college
Miami doesn’t have those. It doesn’t have a fan base.
I am not a Supporter | I am not a Fan | I am a Sounder
Sounder At Heart
Soccer by Ives published a demographic snapshot of their 2010 readership
As the nation’s most read soccer blog it is a fairly decent look at what cities are showing interest in the sport.
Here are the non-MLS cities that read Ives more than Miami at 23rd overall readeship
8.Atlanta
16.Austin
17.Minneapolis
19.San Diego
20.Raleigh/Durham
Every single one of those cities has a smaller market size
Only Baltimore had worse attendance in D2 last year. No WPS team had lower attendance than Miami’s D2 men’s team. Charleston, Richmond and Harrisburg in D3 had higher attendance. Vancouver Whitecaps W-League had higher attendance. Des Moines Iowa, West Texas, Fresno, Carolina and Victoria of the PDL had higher attendance. Dayton and London Ontario were barely passed.
And this was a good year for Miami with a +18% over last year.
I am not a Supporter | I am not a Fan | I am a Sounder
Sounder At Heart
Comments For This Post Are Closed
Secondary Sidebar
User Tools
FanPosts
Community blog posts and discussion.
