The rumors were true (another one), the North American Soccer League is back…kinda.
I know some of you are putting your faces in your hands and groaning, and if you follow basketball you have a good reason to. The second coming of the once celebrated American Basketball Association has been nothing short of a complete and utter disaster, just take a look at the list of defunct ABA teams. With that said, I trust Joey Saputo and Traffic Sports more than I trust Joe Newman.
The reaction from the American soccer public has been mixed, to say the least. Some appear to be willing to give the new league a chance while others, understandably, wonder why the new league would want to associate itself with what many people view to have been a failure.
I don’t really blame the TOA for going down this road though, lately it seems America is obsessed with sports nostalgia, nearly every team in the “big three” has throwback uniforms that they break out every once in awhile, and the NFL is openly celebrating the history of the AFL. So it makes some sense. Individual teams have recaptured pieces of the NASL with great success, notably the Seattle Sounders, Portland Timbers, and Vancouver Whitecaps, the latter of whom will play one season in the new NASL before moving on to join the other two in Major League Soccer for 2011.
I’ve always been of the opinion that the more teams we have, the better for soccer in this country, but that’s only true when the leagues involved aren’t continually throwing barbs at one another and constantly trying to one up the other, that’s when spending gets out of control and teams start folding like crazy.
I’ll give it a chance, as long as they agree to call the Silverbacks the Chiefs.
These guys better not cheapen the NASL name with this marketing gimmick. I don’t want to see the replacement Tampa Bay Rowdies who drew 30,000 plus in the NASL days playing at some high school football stadium with a couple hundred people.
By taking the name, you are raising expectations. I hope Kartik and his friends at Miami FC realize that the garbage they have put on the field the past few years is not of the quality that a league called NASL should beat at.
I think Tampa has plans for a soccer-specific stadium, only around 7,500, but a soccer stadium nonetheless and not some rented High School effort with fieldturf and football grid.
why are they calling it North American? there aren’t any mexican clubs in it.
North America has traditionally meant Canada and the US. Mexico is a Central American country that happens to be big and beside the US.
If you want to put it that way, the European Union is a fallacy because it lacks Swiss or Norwegian involvement.
I love the NASL name but not sure I love the idea of it being trashed by this minor league.
I am sure MLS will “LOVE” this announcement. I am positive that MLS will want this vagabond group to compete in the stage with them.
This is sounds like a very smelly mess before this is over.
wrong, wrong. NASL is intended to be a fixed second division league rather than compete. the USL inteded to compete with the MLS. so there..
NASL ought to compete with MLS. Why did it take MLS 14 years to arrive in the most logical soccer city in America? Why does MLS still insiston paying a sub market salary to most of it’s players? Why after 14 yes do we still have single entity? Why after 14 yes do we still have an all star game ? Why after 14 yes do we still have drafts, discovery players and partial allocations ? Sounds to me like MLS needs some real competition to loosen up and really move forward.
I’m not a big fan of the draft, particularly for players a team develops. Red Bull is in line to get screwed pretty hard by this deal, and have been in the past.
But you could make the argument that the league wouldn’t be around without single entity. Yes, some USL clubs have been around longer than MLS without it, but make no mistake, those clubs are the strongest of the strong. The USL is littered with the carcasses of clubs failed.
All-Star Game I could do without, but we aren’t the only country with one, Japan does it too and we have a lot in common with them sports-wise.
Horrible idea
The ABA analogy is right on the money.
And its a lose-lose proposition.
Half the people will hate it because its cheap/gimmicky/spoils the good memories some have of that era and the other half will say why would you name a league after one that has failed before?
Yes, as always, soccer people have their fingers on the pulse of the nation (as well as sticking them in other places).
And we cant even blame the Don for this.
>With that said, I trust Joey Saputo and Traffic Sports more than I trust Joe Newman.
How can you trust a rickety pseudo league where the two best teams are leaving in 12 and 24 months?
Saputo is going to lead a group that hes leaving?
Shouldnt it be an owner that is planning to stay for more than 2 years?
Ever hear of lemmings?
This is like planning your wedding knowing already the date of your divorce and who you will date next.
This is so idiotic that it boggles the mind.
Which means for north american soccer, its business as usual.
They aren’t leaving completely, Vancouver have promised some sort of continued presence in possibly either Victoria or Edmonton, and there are rumors that Saputo will put a team in Quebec City to make up for the gap left when Montreal ascends.
I do trust Saputo, actually. He basically built Stade Saputo out of pocket, so his commitment to the game in North America can’t be questioned. The Impact are also one of the most successful teams in Canada or the United States. So, I do trust him.
JRT,
It took the MLS 14 years to get to Seattle, because the ownership at the time didn’t want to go to a single entity model. MLS WANTED SEATTLE. He was obviously the richest, or at least among the richest, of the owners and probably had his reasons. All of which have been probably stated in these blogs, by those that don’t like it. As ownership transferred to Hanaeur that changed. He was able to recruit even bigger Microsoft money that did agree it was worth it.
You are free to disagree with MLS decisions, but that was not one of them that was incorrect, or late in coming.
MLS continuing to exist as a single entity is a FARCE, as is so much about that league. Why in the world do commentators continue to discuss the improbability of Real SLC’s playoff run? There is NO DISTINCTION between 1st and 8th place in the MLS. 1st place this year was 13-7-10, 12th was 11-13-6. Nobody was ‘good.’ This league was build for parity. All the teams are created equal and, therefor, all are equally mediocre. That is a direct result of single entity and prevents many of us who are Americans and are huge soccer fans from ever embracing the league. I care about my city, my town, my club. Cheering for Chicago Fire is really cheering for MLS-Chicago branch. LA Galaxy is nothing more than MLS-LA. A single entity will crush a member or inflate a member for the good of the whole. I can never be a fan of that organization. I want a club to cheer for, to belong to.
I am fully supportive of every effort to create a worthy soccer league in America. And I trust the people who build successful teams. Saputo is one of those. He gets results. Jeff Cooper is yet to show what he can do, but he seems to have all the right ideas. Everyone who has a successful or semi successful team is leaving the USL either for the TOA or MLS (the only possible exception is Rochester, but they’ve been in disarray for two years; and that is not to say everyone joining TOA has proved they can find success). Regardless, it is certain that USL was not capable of doing what it took to build a respectable league.
And to the rest – get serious, are you really saying that the new team might cheapen the memory of the old Tampa Bay Rowdies!? Who wore the jersey with western tassels!? Silly.