The West Coast is getting USL PRO representation next year with the announcement of the new LA Blues franchise, set to begin play in 2011.  The club, which had been rumored for about a month to be the newest franchise for U.S. soccer’s new third division, will play in Cal State Fullerton’s Titan Stadium and be coached by Charlie Naimo, the former head coach of the Pali Blues (a professional women’s soccer club) and team general manager.

The club becomes the third division’s fourteenth team and moves USL PRO two teams away from its stated goal of having sixteen for the 2011 season.  Being able to field a stable and competitive league for the upcoming year would be a major accomplishment for U.S. soccer, considering that last season there was so much turmoil in the second and third levels.  For 2011, the USSF Division 2 Professional League (composed of the USL and NASL) will be replaced with the NASL, while the third division USL-2 will be replaced with USL PRO.

LA will join Barracuda FC (Antigua), Charleston Battery, Charlotte Eagles, Dayton Dutch Lions, FC New York, Harrisburg City Islanders, Orlando City FC, Pittsburgh Riverhounds, Richmond Kickers, River Plate Puerto Rico, Rochester Rhinos, Sevilla FC Puerto Rico, and Wilmington Hammerheads in USL PRO.

Notice one thing about the Blues, however, compared to the rest of this list.  Los Angeles is the only team on the West Coast.  In fact, it is the only U.S. club not on the East Coast, which could cause some major headaches and travel costs for the small start-up.  But USL PRO CEO Alec Papadakis promised further West Coast expansion as soon as 2012 and stated LA would be the building block of that effort.  Hopefully the team can remain financially competitive until then.

Additionally, the team is located in a city with two other major soccer franchises.  Despite the promised Fox Soccer Channel coverage of the league, it will be hard to garner attention in a market already saturated with a product that does not receive enough attention.  The club is playing it smart by playing in a small stadium but I wonder where the club’s fan base will come from.

However, I think this is major progress for U.S. soccer.  If the Blues can survive and thrive as a west coast division is built, it will help USL PRO reach into new markets and further stabilize the USSF structure.  As soccer fans know, a stable soccer pyramid will help this country begin to solidify its hierarchy and regularly produce national team and international club talent in this country.  Until that happens, MLS and the rest of American soccer will be a step behind, so welcome to the league LA Blues!

And this meant something.

Bruce Arena fielded a somewhat — though not very — weakened team against the USL conference’s basement dwellers and most likely expected to end up taking a comfortable lead down to Bayamon for the return leg. He won’t be.

The Islanders went on to smash the Galaxy 4 goals to 1, and LA didn’t even have the pleasure of putting the ball in the net, Islanders defender Martinez may have been feeling sorry for them when he scored a terrible own goal.

It was an almost mind boggling match in which the Galaxy dominated possession and every other measurable offensive statistic other than the only one that actually means anything. But this isn’t out of character for Puerto Rico, they often play Champions League matches like this, relying on an organized defense and the incredible goalkeeping of Bill Guadette while waiting to spring a counter attack. Colin Clarke’s tactics worked to perfection tonight as his Islanders took their chances well.

The result is especially frustrating when you consider the victories scored by Major League Soccer teams against European opposition in friendlies this weekend, while they are only friendlies you’d like to think that the results show a degree of improvement among MLS teams but it’s hard to say that when the league’s best team gets throttled by a second division team from its own federation.

Why does it seem like every year we have to talk about MLS teams failing in official competitions?

Since I don’t want to end this on doom and gloom I will mention Toronto’s result tonight. 1-0 against Motagua is nothing to sneeze at, the Honduran league is stronger than many people may like to believe and I firmly believe that TFC has what it takes to at least manage a draw in Tegucigalpa, but it won’t be an easy task.

Congrats to Puerto Rico on a well deserved win, while they haven’t finished off the Galaxy yet, they’ve given their opponents a very tough road to travel.

Sold out crowd at Lockhart Stadium for Miami Fusion v DC United

I had the sudden realization Sunday that if aliens descended on my town and were asked to find any life of Major League Soccer in South Florida, the only thing they would find is MLS trading cards in the bargain bin of the local dollar store. Seriously.

Sadly, Major League Soccer is extinct in South Florida. The nearest MLS team is 1,000 miles away. The last time I saw anyone wearing a MLS jersey was more than two years ago. And the last time there was a trace of a MLS team in all of Florida was nine years ago.

I sound like a broken record, but the reality is that if it wasn’t for television, I would be — as the Brits say — a miserable old git. It’s practically my only outlet to watch the professional game. And even then, the amount of MLS coverage is few and far between especially when compared to the smorgasbord of European soccer on US TV.

Yes, I go watch my kids play AYSO games. Yes, I attend Miami FC matches in the USL, now NASL or whatever temporary league name the USSF gives it, but the reality is that it’s not MLS. It’s nowhere close to a MLS experience. It’s nothing like when I was a Miami Fusion season ticket holder when most of my life revolved around when the home team played at Lockhart Stadium.

Many critics may argue that South Florida had its chance and failed at Major League Soccer. But that’s a far too simplistic explanation. The reality is that it was a combination of drastic mistakes everywhere from the back office staff to poor marketing and a failed attempt to target the Miami-Dade community, most of whom didn’t want to drive the short distance to Fort Lauderdale. But the main culprits were, in my opinion, the ownership of Ken Horowitz who decided to pull the plug too early just as the team was becoming successful both on and off the field, and the failure of Major League Soccer to find an investor willing to take over from Horowitz.

The reality is that there are hundreds of thousands of soccer fans around the United States, or perhaps more, who are in a similar boat to me and have no local MLS team to follow. Arsenal is just as “local” to them as is Chicago Fire. There’s little bond between MLS and these isolated soccer fans, so the next best thing is either the USL or NASL or, more likely, television. And as I’ve discussed previously, when it comes to the TV war, MLS almost always loses.

So in communities such as South Florida and tens of other large metropolitan areas around the United States, we have to be patient. But the longer we wait, the more the new soccer fans will gravitate to what is most accessible — which is European soccer on television. And the longer the wait, the harder it will be for new MLS teams to make the local team its passion instead of Bayern Munich, Barcelona, Tottenham Hotspur or whatever team he or she supports.

If you’re fortunate to live near a MLS team, count yourself lucky. Go watch games at the stadium and support the beautiful game. There are huge amounts of soccer fans nationwide who would jump at the chance to go see a MLS team.

Before ESPN or Fox Soccer Channel begins the live broadcast of a Major League Soccer game on a Saturday evening, many soccer fans are burned out. They’re burned out from watching a smorgasbord of European soccer that has been on television all day.

Take a typical Saturday on US cable and satellite television, for example. Soccer fans in the United States can watch 7 live English Premier League games (more than anytime in US history), 1 live Serie A game, 3 La Liga matches and 2 Bundesliga games. That totals 13 live games (i.e. 26 hours of live coverage) before a Saturday evening MLS game begins on television. And those 26 hours don’t include the handful of European games shown on delay or the EPL-centric shown on Saturday mornings such as the Barclays Premier League Preview Show and Fox Soccer Match Day.

On top of all of that, Fox Sports International launched a new channel on March 1st, Fox Soccer Plus, that is 100 percent European programming featuring games from the Premier League, FA Cup, England national team, Coca-Cola Championship, Champions League, Carling Cup, Serie A and four, yes four, rugby cups and tournaments.

My question again is where does Major League Soccer feature in all of this? Or, for an even broader question, where does U.S. soccer feature in all of this and how can it compete on television? The answer is that it simply can’t. The battle has to be won in the streets.

That battle is a difficult one especially when you’re competing against soccer TV networks who are showing games in HD, launching new channels, improving their broadband offerings and putting most of its dollars into advertising its European soccer coverage. At the same time, it’s hard to convince a family to spend their hard-earned money by going to see a live game for their local team when it’s much cheaper to stay at home and watch it on television.

So how does Major League Soccer (or the USL, NASL or WPS for that matter) convince soccer fans that it should either (a) attend one of their matches on a Saturday night or (b) encourage them to watch one of their games on television especially given the fact that there were 26 hours of live European soccer coverage shown earlier in the day?

It’s a massive question because if Major League Soccer is unable to figure out how it can do that, it could lead to the death of the league. Seriously.

I’ve discussed before that there needs to be more local Major League Soccer teams across the country. I also believe it’s important for Major League Soccer, USL and NASL to work more closely together to promote its teams across the United States so there’s no excuse that soccer fans don’t realize there’s a local team near them. For example, why isn’t there a website or tool that soccer fans in the US can use to find their nearest teams? And, unless I’m blind, why is there no 2010 schedule of NASL and USL matches on either the official NASL website or USL website even though one does exist?

And yes, the product on the field needs to be improved to bring people to live soccer matches and to encourage them to watch it on television. But is there anything else that local clubs can do in addition to that?

I don’t pretend to have all of the answers, but I would like to hear from you – the passionate supporters of soccer in North America – what you think the MLS, USL, NASL and other leagues can do to ensure that large numbers of soccer fans go to local games each week and watch US soccer on television. Please share your thoughts in the comments section below. I look forward to reading your insight.

AC St. Louis Fills A Big Gap

Professional Soccer has often been a spottingly available product across North America, and MLS, as a Premier Division, cannot fill the gaps by itself.  This is where USL has often filled in, in the past, although USL has often been perceived as small market, for good reason in many cases. The reformed NASL aims to change that.

The North American Soccer League 2.0 (Special Edition, Director’s Cut, etc) has stepped up where USL had failed previously.  While many of the teams in the NASL remain small market teams, there has been some significant progress made, specifically with regards to the new clubs entering the league (St. Louis, Atlanta, Tampa and a jumped up Baltimore).

Major League Soccer and USL had previously failed to succeed, or even enter, in certain major markets in the United States and Canada. In all of the cases of folded teams, we have numerous examples in the wasteland which is the southeastern United States, and of course, “Western Canada” (read as Alberta).  In the case of non-starters, we have St. Louis, among others.  But regardless of case, the reason for failure has largely been due to poor business plans.

It seems that NASL seeks to learn from the mistakes made by both the MLS and the USL.

Evidence can be found with the new club in Edmonton, known at this point as FC Edmonton (a name which I hope they keep, it has a nice, crisp feel to it).

Where the Drillers have failed before, FC Edmonton seeks to succeed. It seems the ownership and management understand the need for a successful team in what could be considered a barren wasteland for the beautiful game. They certainly have shown an understanding for the Prairie psyche, and are establishing a youth academy in order to reach out to talented youngsters across the three provinces. What is most promising is what seems to be the commitment to winning, and the acquisition of pedigreed coaching in Dutch-Canadian Manager Dwight Lodeweges.

Other smart moves taken by NASL can be found with AC St. Louis.

It has already been documented on this website that AC St. Louis has acquired Steve Ralston from the Revolution, in both a player and coaching role, but one cannot emphasize the importance of such an acquisition. The talented player will undoubtedly be important in what could be a rocky start for the expansion side. Even more important though, is his role as a coach as well as a player. It is little secret that once players get over the hump of 30 years of age, their abilities start to decline quite quickly.  Ralston is well over that hump and will be making the transition from player to coach, and potentially manager one day.

Essentially, NASL (AC St. Louis in particular) is making an investment for the future in this acquisition, and sending a clear message that they’re serious about sticking around.

We can also talk about the Florida market and the attempt by NASL to lock it up with teams in Tampa and Miami. One should note that MLS has left this place a soccer wasteland.

Essentially, NASL has filled the gap of pro soccer in mid-major markets in North America. This will allow for more professional opportunities for youth across the continent and allow for longer term development. Why is it able to succeed where USL has failed? Simple branding. The North American Soccer League is a brand which remains one of the strongest in North American football and it will play an important part in filling a major gap in the availability of association football in North America.

In my next piece, I will discuss the importance of capping MLS at 20 teams and which markets should fill the final positions.

MLS Superdraft

A good starting point for Superdraft information.

Generation Adidas explained, reported by L.E. Eisenmenger.

Before the expansion draft I was pegging Philadelphia to take defenseman Ike Opara with the first pick in the upcoming SuperDraft. But with their strong back line picks, Jordan Harvey and Shavar Thomas, along with the signing of Danny Califf, I am now leaning towards them taking forward Danny Mwanga. Update: It’s being reported that a deal is in place between the Union and Mwanga.

MLS Collective Bargaining Agreement(CBA)

In Defense of MLS Players by the Ginge.

Jason Davis’ overview of the demands.

Back in September, I gave my take on the rosters and financial portion of the.CBA and didn’t address free agency and guaranteed contracts which have been generally reported as the two top issues for the players. Many good writers have extensive posts on these issues, so I’ll just give my ‘from the hip’ viewpoint.
If a player without a guaranteed contract is dropped before July 1, he should be able to sign with any team that wants him without compensation to his former team. If a player is out of contract, he should likewise have the right to sign with any team, his former team retaining no rights whatsoever. Retuning MLS’ers from foreign leagues should also be able to sign with any team. With salary restrictions still in place, this does not change the structure of the league.

USL/NASL Stuff

The official USL/TOA/NASL solution, for one year at least.

Inside Minnesota Soccer’s articles on the USL/TOA/NASL situation.

Bill Archer’s summary of the USL/NASL solution.

A view of the USL/NASL dispute from the perspective of Portland Timbers community bloggers. The Timbers are scheduled to move up to MLS in 2011.

Financial stability. I think that was the keynote of Sunil Gulati’s address on the ‘formation’ of USSF D-2. The continuous turnover of USL-1 teams lends credence to this opinion. The current solution may be the best thing to have happened, with a possiblity of direct affiliations with MLS clubs a real possibility in the near future.

Good Things that Effect MLS

Development Academy teams are poised to become true feeders to the parent clubs. Now the league needs to loosen up the rules about signing developmental players in the upcoming CBA.

Does MLS Have it Right?

Manchester United is debt ridden by John Leicester of AP.

And now they are looking to raise money to restructure its debt.

Manchester City is reporting huge loss.

Portsmouth is having trouble paying its players.

Kenn.com with a great explanation of who owns MLS teams.

Some folks across the pond are wondering the same.

Dumb Things I Expect to Read This Year