What We Could Have Been

What We Could Have Been

by: Vidda Grubin

 Are there still soccer fans in North America who believe in McFranchise League Soccer?

Seriously?!? Who are the mouth breathers hanging out in stadiums and jersey/scarf adorned soccer dens watching the latest rich guy, marketing genius version of…

WE (a handful of greedy, ego-maniacs) TOOK OVER YOUR (generational & wide-eyed newbie soccer players, fans, parents, kids, coaches, referees) GROWING AND BEAUTIFUL SPORT AT THE PRECISE MOMENT WE REALIZED IT (soccer in North America) WAS ON THE VERGE OF ORGANICALLY, FROM THE ROOTS UP, BECOMING A BEHEMOTH POPULATED BY HUNDREDS/THOUSANDS OF UNIQUE CLUBS SUPPORTED BY MILLIONS OF PASSIONATE PARTICIPANTS AND SUPPORTERS.

WE (a handful of greedy ego-maniacs) HAVE OVERSEEN THE REVERSAL OF GRASS-ROOTS TRENDS, A REDUCTION IN YOUTH PARTICIPATION, THE CHOKING-OFF (soccer don’s version of erotic asphyxiation) OF WHAT SO OBVIOUSLY WOULD HAVE BECOME, IN TIME, A NORTH AMERICA-WIDE MULTI-TIERED OPEN PYRAMID OF AMATEUR AND PROFESSIONAL SOCCER CLUBS, THEIR PLAYERS AND FANS COMPETING YEAR ROUND FOR GLORY AND THE DREAM OF GREATNESS BASED ON SUCCESS ON THE FIELD, BETWEEN THE LINES.

As all of us (soccer fans here in North America) recently watched millions of UK and European football fans tell their greedy, egotistical owners to fuck-all-the-way-off to Toledo and then to fuck-off more to the left or right, depending on your travel direction, and jump the fuck into Lake Fucking Erie, some of us (soccer fans here in North America) continue to swallow the impotent ejaculate of well paid marketing pricks and red-haired, goatee wearing McFranchise lackeys.

I miss my sport. I miss the beautiful game and what it was quickly becoming in North America: millions of us as the creators of thousands of unique clubs in competition, but as one, united in the energy, beauty and unfolding mystery of shared glory and agony every Saturday afternoon.

I would gladly trade the last 25 years and McFranchise soccer for the promise of what we were quickly becoming not long ago. 

MLS is Using My Blueprint (I Want Compensation)

MLS is Following My Blueprint

(I want compensation)

By: Vidda Grubin

This will be short. Enjoy! (i lied it is not short)

I have written on a number of occasions about the need for both an August to June soccer season and promotion/relegation. I have also stated what would need to happen for both to be successful.

This post isn’t about promotion and relegation. (the sentence prior to this is a tiny lie)

Simply put. An August to June schedule is easily achievable in North America (and Major League Soccer is quickly moving that direction) if…

Half the franchises in the league are located in the Southern half of the United States and half the franchises are located in the Northern half of the United States and Canada.

Reasons August to June works under the half and half scenario:

1. The first few games can be played at the home fields of the franchises located in the Northern half of the United States and Canada. Hot games, but not as hot as August games in Texas and Florida.

2. The fall portion of the season would run until the weekend prior to Christmas. Allowing franchises to comfortably play at all venues after August.

3. Allows for a holiday break (Christmas thru Mid January).

4. A league wide winter league/winter training can be run in places like Southern California, Florida, Las Vegas, Arizona and South Texas (much like the NBA summer league in Las Vegas) for two weeks at the end of January.

5. The restart of the league season can begin February 1st, and first few games can be played at the home fields of the franchises located in the Southern half of the United States.

6. Season/Playoffs end June 1st.

7. This schedule consists of approximately 38 calendar weeks, in regards to the actual league season, and does not include the approximately three weeks of holiday break and two weeks of winter league/winter training.

8. Teams would be aligned in three divisions of 12. Western—Central—Eastern. Each division split evenly (six franchises in the north and six franchises in the south).

Current/Near Future MLS alignment: 

Northwest Conference: Vancouver, Seattle, Portland, Salt Lake, Colorado, Boise?

Southwest Conference: LA, LA, San Jose, San Diego, Las Vegas?, Arizona?

North Central: Minnesota, Kansas City, Chicago, Columbus, Nashville, Cincinnati

South Central: Dallas, Houston, San Antonio, Austin, New Orleans?, Birmingham?

North East: Toronto, Montreal, New England, New York, New York, D.C.

South East: Atlanta, Orlando, Miami, Tampa?, Jacksonville?, Charlotte?

8a. Play all teams in your division home and away for 22 games. Play six to eight teams from each of the other divisions for a total of 12-16 more games (depends on how many league games the MLS decides it wants). Total games in season: 34-38.

9. Playoffs would be down and dirty and follow a bracket format. Top four in each division auto-qualify. Next four best records qualify. 16 team bracket format ensues with won/loss records being the criteria for placing each franchise on the bracket. 1 v 16, 2 v 15, 3 v 14, etc. Games always played at home of team with best record. Single game first round on a Saturday. Single game quarter-final on Wednesday. Single game semi-finals on Sunday. Championship final on following Sunday. Two weeks total for playoffs.

Finally, why I believe MLS is quickly moving this direction.

1. They want more locally viable rivalries.

2. The franchises they are moving/adding achieves what I’m writing about.

3. (I know I said this wasn’t about pro/rel, but I can’t help myself. Just this one bullet point) MLS structured as above allows for two lower league clubs to earn their way into each six club northern and southern conference, making for eight club top league conferences. These two clubs would only move up after top league finishes filling out the twelve team divisions and a viable 16 club lower league is established in each conference’s geographical region.

3a. (cheating here and splitting up the bullet point) After expanding to 8 clubs per conference, top league regular season play would remain the same; divisional home and away (30 games), remaining games split between other division clubs (pick your poison, my choice would be year to year rotation with conferences playing all eight teams from another conference).

3b. (still cheating here) USSF/Players Association/Consortium of Professional Club Owners could then institute pro/rel on regional conference basis. Relegation from the top league would be based solely on games between clubs in the same conference (14 games). Bottom club auto relegated, next to bottom club plays home and away with second place club from regional league below.

Some advantageous things about this model: 

1. There is room for growth, up to 36 teams and even 48 teams in the top league (this is an expansive country).

1a. Comes much closer to mirroring the small-nation, short travel, club culture seen around the world.

1b. Many more geographic rivals.

2. August to June season is easily achievable/doable.

3. (cheating) Promotion/Relegation would see all lower leagues sharing the same geographic boundaries as the top league’s conference boundaries (so a total of six regional leagues in each tier). 16 clubs per regional league would have a typical year see half the teams in each lower regional league fighting a promotion or relegation battle. Plus, with only 30 games to play, the lower regional leagues can start the spring half of the season later (Mid-March), thereby not having to worry about the worst of the winter weather.

The Cable Snapped, or Innocence Lost

By: Vidda “JibJab” Grubin

September 7, 2014 (Amended January 16, 2017)

{The below is an update of a piece I wrote over two years ago. Given the trajectory of Major League Soccer, I thought a redo was in order.}

The cable snapped…twang…quietly. The auditory nature of the “twang” made sense, the cable was made out of Twizzlers. The kids picked up the scatted pieces of red deliciousness quicker than a soccer mom, or dad, can peel an orange.

The game was over and Tommy and Timmy had somehow found a way to tie Twizzlers around their two dirt and grass-stained soccer balls. After circling the individual balls in sugary goodness, the two friends got the idea to tie the balls together with the remaining stretchy lengths of candy.

Gabbi, the goalkeeper for the under seven Squarepants Middleburg Youth Soccer Association team, had shouted “See how far you can stretch the balls apart.” Her declaration of childhood ingenuity was met by a raucous cheer from the rest of the Squarepants team.

Tommy and Timmy began pulling, slowly, the two balls apart. Time seemed to stand still as the small group of six and seven-year-olds (scraped knees, runny noses and bed hair) leaned closer. One or two attentive parents joined the time altering fun.

Six inches apart, seven, eight and then…twang…quietly. The picking-up and eating of the Twizzlers was accompanied by shouts of “Don’t eat that!” and “Gross!” Not a single child present remembered the game which had ended only five minutes earlier.

One particular dad remembered. He was busy waving his hands wildly at the 13-year-old referee. Words were coming out of the crimson faced father’s mouth. Something about offside and something about the Squarepants’ opponents, The Fiddlesticks, deserving to win. The 13-year-old ref stared, slack jawed, at the wild-eyed father. And then, the 13-year-old walked away, while mumbling “Wow” under his breath.

Like that Fiddlesticks father, North American soccer has finally made it to the edge of reason. North American soccer’s version is the billion-dollar, sports as big time business precipice. Major League Soccer has pushed the beautiful game up the rocky slope. There have been casualties along the way. The Tampa Bay Mutiny come to mind. There have been near disasters. Paul Caligiuri almost having to play more than a single season in Columbus, Ohio may have destroyed what little credibility MLS clung to in its infancy.

Don Garber, Major League Soccer’s billionaire owners and wanna-be owners want to push our sport over the edge and into the rainbow, unicorn and pot of gold filled valley below. The LeBron James, Mark Cuban, Jerry Jones, Tom Brady and Derek Jeter filled valley.

For many soccer fans, myself included, the trip up the mountain has been fun, a kind of affirmation of the bullied child’s life and dreams. For many soccer fans, like myself (somewhere between 45 and 60 years old), the thought of riding the unicorns and digging in the pots of gold is both quiver-inducing and nauseating.

We want to see the world’s greatest players on our Columbus Crew, Chicago Fire, New York Red Bull, Seattle Sounders and L.A. Galaxy. We want to watch youngsters born and raised in the United States command Messi-like respect. But we grew up with a chip on our shoulder. We carry that chip proudly. That chip helps define our soccer minds. That chip is as big as a boulder taken from the mountainside as we climbed higher and higher. That chip is made of taunts like “Soccer is for sissies. Why don’t you move to France if you want to play that commie sport? Soccer will never be big in the United States.”

Despite the rocky past, we cherish Saturdays at the park with our children. We look forward to a Thursday evening beverage remembering the ferociousness of a shot, the creativeness of a pass shared with the handful of lucky travelers who played the game alongside us in the 70’s, 80’s and 90’s. Our sport was our special secret, only the chosen few knew what made it shine.

Now, North American soccer is about to leap into a world of cocky, self-assured prominence. There is no room for hard-won boulders. What are we supposed to do with all those boulders? So many un-answered questions.

Will there still be room for size four soccer balls wrapped in Twizzlers? Or, perhaps more importantly, for the adult equivalent of size four soccer balls wrapped in Twizzlers, hidden coolers of beer dragged triumphantly from beneath team benches, flung open, contents emptied in a glorious celebration of the local team, it’s fans and caretakers winning the right to play at the next level?

You know, those boulders might just come in handy. Strap them on. Wear them proudly; because, there is one universal truth about our sport. The more human beings who feel a direct connection to the ball, the field of play, the teams, the players, coaches and fans, the greater the magical players become, the more vivid the magical moments shine.

We and all those who came before us, and our children after, those who slogged through mud puddles, spent hours juggling into the night, used trashcans for goals and cracked shins created the opportunity for the handful of businessmen who started Major League Soccer. It is our boulder to carry, and that boulder is shared with hundreds of millions around this beautiful planet.

Those who think they “own” the sport of soccer in this hemisphere must earn their place among us. There is nothing stopping them, the United States Soccer Federation and Major League Soccer, from regionalizing soccer (the blueprint is already in place at the youth level) in this country from the very bottom to the very top. There is nothing stopping the USSF and Major League Soccer from implementing a standardized set of criteria/rules for promotion and relegation within each region. There is nothing stopping the USSF and Major League Soccer from beginning promotion and relegation in the lower divisions and promotion only into the top tier, MLS, when teams in the second tier win their way in and meet the set criteria for top level play.

Would Major League Soccer want twenty years before a single team is relegated from the top tier? So be it. Give them twenty years. Do they want 7 or 8 teams per region, per level and five or six regions? So be it. This is a large country and close proximity of regular competition brings us all greater joy. Would Major League Soccer still want a championship among the winners of each region? So be it.

In a weird way, it is our burden, those wearisome boulders, which may reconnect the frayed and snapped cables of North American soccer. It is all of us who bear their weight who must bring, kicking and screaming if need be, USSF and MLS back into the beautiful game’s wide open soul.

Don Garber, The Wrong Voice

"If you're investing billions and billions of dollars, which we are now at about $3.5 billion invested [in MLS] in twenty years, to build something in Kansas City and they have a shitty season, to think they might be playing in Chattanooga in a stadium of 4,000 people on a crappy field with no fans, makes no sense." - Don Garber talking at "BlazerCon," Saturday, November 14th, 2015

Don Garber, MLS Commissioner, has a deep-rooted misunderstanding of the sport of soccer. At the very essence of it, soccer is a sport open to everyone no matter their means. This is what separates it from other sports out there and why it has become the most popular sport in the world.

There are many out there that can trace the invention of the game back hundreds of years, but the modern game (as we know it, mostly) started forming in the mid 19th century. The Victorian age. Back then two entire towns would gather around one rugby / American type looking ball and kick, fight, throw, knaw, punt and everything in-between to get the ball to the other side of town (okay, oversimplification... still though - for quick, informative read check out The Victorian Football Miscellany).

While the Victorian version of the game is where rugby and American football originated, soccer split and ended up going down a slightly different path. In the 1800's teams could hardly agree on rules let alone the formation of nationwide leagues. Rules were different everywhere.

What wasn't different was the inclusionary way it all started. Every town, city, and village could participate. Because of this, the game exploded in England and beyond to where it is today.

Except here. In the United States. Weird, right? Why is that?

Don Garber's thoughts;

"Promotion and relegation was created in the 1800s," he said. "It was a system that existed because there was no other way that existed to create good competition. They were amateur teams. If you were to create professional football in England or Italy or Spain today, I don't believe you'd have promotion and relegation. We need to create a league that works for the fan base in this market. Nobody looks at the NFL and says it's not working because there's no promotion and relegation."

The game would be nowhere near where it is in the world today were it not for the open systems. England alone has 92 fully professional teams with another seven thousand plus playing in organized leagues.

Every time Don Garber gets a national platform to talk about MLS he turns it into a league history lesson. He does this without fail. In that history he loves to stroke his ego by talking about the bold decisions in the early 2000s to contract a couple teams. He likens it to saving the sport in the US when in reality, the only thing he saved was MLS and their exclusionary system that only benefits the few and not the many.

If you stand it up to other sports in the USA, Garber plays the part of "commissioner" very well. Proud, arrogant, boisterous, untouchable, ignorant and so on. It's what we have in this country (including where they all got it from - pro wrestling). Where this doesn't play is in a global marketplace. Which is the obvious future of sports.

From the NFL attempts to get a foothold in the rest of the world, to the NBA playing games in China to MLB having regular season games in Austrailia - they all want their game to spread all over the globe. It never will though. Not with closed systems.

MLS, and the sport of soccer, has the opposite problem. The rest of the world is ready and waiting already. It's just Garber is going the wrong direction on a clearly lit path.

Soccer has been played in the US for over 100 years and the most played sport in this country for decades. MLS, just like the rest of the professional game here in the US, should be light years beyond where it is now. Don Garber is doing nothing but selling a narrative - and it's insulting.

Major League Soccer: Irrelevant, Filler, Fleeting Tease???

Photo: Al Pacino as Michael Corleone. From the movie trilogy The Godfather.

Finish This Sentence: Keep your friends close…

You know the rest. Often associated with ruthless business endeavors, movies about organized crime and shady government fat-cats smiling over thousand dollar plates of pasta and truffles (while under the table calmly slitting the throat of the quixotic commoner), “and your enemies closer” carries much wisdom within its simple yet dark lesson.    

How might those few wicked words relate to the sport of soccer, and more specifically, Major League Soccer?

Perhaps “and your enemies closer” teases the thrill of sporting competition. Or, maybe, the intimate touch of our sporting enemies, when brushing dangerously close to our physical and spiritual vulnerabilities, arouses pure ecstasy, heartbreaking misery and engages all our senses in an unavoidable cauldron of escapist dreamscape.

Does Major League Soccer dare venture into the cauldron? Are the people guiding North America’s top league and professional soccer in the larger sense capable of grasping the meaning in the dreamscape of ecstasy and misery at the heart of our sport?

Evidence suggests the guiding minds have, to date, only stumbled unknowingly and occasionally into the deep racing river of soccer’s blood-red arteries.

The collection of rivals, sporting enemies, in the Northwest: Portland, Seattle and Vancouver, give a glimpse into what “and your enemies closer” might stir within the core of our sport. The intimate proximity of these clubs engages all our senses.

More often, our soccer senses, our souls, are only fleetingly teased by those running Major League Soccer. In a part of the world where millions of children and adults play, the signing of a handful of formerly brilliant players brings with it a hollow and temporary dip into the coppery smelling river of blood. These “business” moves wreak of condescension. Their long-term effect is a net negative. The soccer soul knows the difference between the charlatan’s loud bark and the true call of the ball as it rolls under foot.

Often, new cities and owners are chosen based on demographics, wealth and metrics which have little to do with what our sport is about. Worse, the devil’s plastic is given tacit approval despite the numbing effect it injects into the beautiful game. Those evil plastic fibers are one enemy to be shunned at all costs.

Which enemies should North American soccer embrace? Which enemies enhance and grow our sport? Which enemies stir the senses?

Start by embracing the regionalization of the top tiers of our sport. Expand the number of intimate rivalries. Professional soccer in North America would be better served by abandoning the East and West model. Create smaller regions, much like the Portland’s, Seattle’s and Vancouver’s existing in the Northwest.

Arouse the beating heart by creating six distinct zones for professional soccer in North America.

Example: The Mid-North: State a goal of eight teams in the top division. Cities like Columbus, Chicago, Minneapolis, Cincinnati, Indianapolis, St. Louis, Pittsburgh, etc. Play each team in your region home and away. Play each team in the Mid-South region (Texas, etc.) home and away. This accounts for thirty games. Play each team in one other region once for eight more games. The eight game region would rotate each year to add an element of competitive balance and fan curiosity over time.

State a goal of having Promotion and Relegation within each region. Relegation will only begin after ten to fifteen years, in deference to the owners who started and built Major League Soccer into a sustainable top tier. Only those games played within a club’s region determine which teams go up and down. Cap the league structure at two divisions per region. Once relegation begins, three teams per region go down each year. The resulting turnover will guarantee incredible competition throughout the season.

Continue to have playoffs and championship for best in the first division. Top two of each region, plus four best third place teams, make the playoffs. Playoffs are single elimination, quick and dirty, Sunday, Wednesday, Sunday, Sunday.

Lastly, embrace the North American born player, regardless of heritage, and encourage in-depth, critical reporting on everything professional soccer in North America. Stop with the insular fear.

“And your enemies closer.” There is much wisdom within this simple yet dark lesson. In soccer it arouses pure ecstasy, heartbreaking misery and engages all our senses in an unavoidable cauldron of escapist dreamscape.

And, you never know, those businessmen, the ones who started the professional soccer ball rolling again in 1996, might just find monetary return beyond their wildest dreams if they let the heart of the game guide them. 

Promotion/Relegation Debate is Worth Another Post

A good exchange of comments and ideas with Beau Dure after my last post, The Psychology Buried Within the Promotion/Relegation Debate, has inspired me to attempt to outline a plan for Promotion and Relegation in the United States.

I will make an effort to keep this post short and simple, and more importantly, take into account the biggest concern from Major League Soccer's owner/operator's perspective (this is the concern to which almost all arguments against pro/rel boil down. All other concerns simply address the different, and clearly debatable, ways in which a thriving pro/rel system can be structured):

*Protecting the investment the current MLS owner's have put into their league*

If you are a soccer fan in the United States, and you want to see promotion/relegation instituted from top to bottom of our professional leagues, you cannot ignore the owner's concern about their investment. If you do ignore this fact, you immediately give up any semblance of legitimacy when making the case FOR pro/rel.

Also, and this is slightly more of an opinion on my part, but certainly follows logically from the above concern, if the current and future owners of Major League Soccer continue to be the sole arbiters in the decision to choose or reject pro/rel, they will assuredly reject promotion and relegation. Furthermore, it is my opinion that, as the number of teams in MLS increases and the TV, advertising, merchandising and sponsorship dollars grow, there is a decreasing chance of Major League Soccer ever taking part in a system of promotion and relegation.

To bring this point home: Suppose twenty years from now the 35th and 36th teams have been added to Major League Soccer, clearly not out of the question in the fastest growing soccer country in the world. Suppose that television rights sell for 1 billion dollars a year, again, not out of the question. Suppose soccer has, in popularity, surpassed all other sports except football, could happen, might take a little longer.

Why, with all that money and power, would the owner/operators suddenly choose to implement promotion/relegation? Heck, a handful of the teams in the league will have just been accepted. They will have spent hundreds of millions of dollars in their bid to gain acceptance. Given these future facts, the idea that promotion and relegation would even be considered by a league's owners is fantasy, at best.

Keeping the above in mind, what is the most palatable way for Major League Soccer's owners to jump on board the Pro/Rel train?

The most straight forward idea is for MLS owner's, in conjunction with the USSF and leagues such as the USL and the NASL, to come up with a set number of teams for a top division in North America's promotion and relegation system. My feeling is that number is between 35-40 (these are the kind of things which should be debated). This number is high, higher than most soccer geeks discuss, because the United States and Canada are so large geographically, diverse in their populations and there are so many densely populated urban areas throughout.

Once that number is determined, Major League Soccer can go about its business, while slowly and judiciously moving away from single entity as a stand alone league. At the same time, a governing body, which includes players, owners, referees and even fans can be developed to oversee the entire multitiered, promotion and relegation, professional soccer arm of North American Soccer.

In order to move up through the ranks clubs will have to win on the field and meet requirements like minimum stadium seating, owner cash net-worth, etc. at each new level. On top of those requirements, any team winning their way to the top tier must pay a significant one time fee, much like the fee paid currently by teams joining MLS. This fee would go to the new governing body.

As an example of some of the above requirements: For division 3 status a team must have an owner worth a minimum of 100 million dollars, cash, not leveraged assets. A division 3 team would have minimum stadium requirement of 8,000 seats. For division 2 status a team must have an owner worth a minimum of 250 million dollars, cash. A division 2 team would have a minimum stadium requirement of 12,000 seats. For division 1 status a team must have an owner worth a minimum of 500 million dollars, cash. A division 1 team would have a minimum stadium requirement of 18,000 seats.

Suppose that in two years, 2017, there are 22-24 teams in MLS and the two or three lower divisions have been organized with Promotion and Relegation in place. For as many years as it takes to fill out the top tier, teams will only move up from division 2 to division 1. Until the top division reaches it goal of, say 36 teams, no teams move down from 1 to 2. Movement up and down between the lower divisions will commence immediately, as long as teams meet the minimum requirements for moving up within those lower divisions.

Beginning pro/rel in this way guarantees the existing clubs stay in the first division for the foreseeable future. Beginning pro/rel in this way guarantees that only teams which meet minimum requirements can earn their way into the top tier. There could conceivably be many years that the top two or three teams in the second division don't meet minimum off-field requirements and therefore are not allowed promotion. Of course, once the top tier fills-out, years from now, relegation will begin from 1 to 2, more than likely slowly at first due to the minimum off-field requirements being an issue.

For soccer fans who are fans of promotion and relegation, discussing the above minimum requirements, number of teams in each division, and fee to be paid once earning promotion to the first division are the types of things that should be discussed. And all of us must acknowledge and factor into any discussion about Promotion and Relegation the money, time and sacrifice made by the current owners of MLS.

Finally, a major advantage of starting promotion and relegation in North America in this way is its gradual nature. Clubs, cities and fans will have time to grow with the new, and unique to North American sports, structure.

Major League Soccer's Offseason Sucks! Promotion/Relegation!

Promotion/Relegation is indispensable to the sport of soccer. Why?

I'm going to leave that hanging, right there, for a moment.
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Hint: It's not the usual reasons discussed. And, yes, the owners of MLS will, probably, never institute Pro/Rel.

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This is the reason...

Here it comes...

Ready???

Were you ever an NBA fan? This is important. Think, think, think.

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What about American football keeps older, seasoned veterans from developing a routine of coasting through portions of games and seasons? Answer: The level of violence inherent in the game. You go all-out or risk getting killed.

Why are Major League Baseball players always trying to compete at their peak? Their salary is greatly influenced by their individual performance and giving 100% effort rarely sees them risk major injury.

Now, back to the NBA. Why is the NBA regular season virtually unwatchable for all but the most diehard of fans?

I was an NBA fan growing-up. I was a kid and then college student who loved the game, the greats and the competition. But...I matured, hard to believe, and realized like most sport's fans that NBA players coast for portions of both games and season's. It's a grueling game and a long season. As long as each player proves that he is at least worthy of top twelve status on their team, they will have a spot and a very comfortable living.

It's a closed league. I'm not saying that NBA players step-up to the tip-off consciously thinking "I'm going in the tank for the next twenty minutes of my career." I'm saying, the closed nature of the league, with guaranteed contracts, the elevated risk of injury during the lengthy season, and the fact that it is a contact sport leads to exactly what you see so often in the NBA.

That's why soccer NEEDS Promotion and Relegation. Human beings choose, subconsciously, to coast occasionally when the circumstances allow. It's human nature. Leagues around the world are better and more enjoyable to watch because Promotion and Relegation adds another layer of pressure/motivation to the competition, for everyone involved.

I love what Major League Soccer has done for the professional game in our country. But, I am not naive. It is far too easy for the owners and players of MLS to slowly, year-by-year, institutionalize the very same structural aspects that make the NBA unwatchable so often. They have already begun the journey down that path.

I was and still am a basketball fan. I'm just not an NBA fan anymore.

I don't want Major League Soccer to become the soccer version of the NBA. I think it's inevitable given the business model; but, I'm still hopeful the rich guys can grow a collective pair and give North America the real beautiful game.