You Probably Don't Know What You're Missing

The Houston Dynamo and the LA Galaxy will be squaring off next week in the finale of the 17^th season of Major League Soccer - but you probably didn’t know that.  Major League soccer, this year, had the 3^rd highest attendance average of the major US sports, only behind the NFL and MLB – but you probably didn’t know that either.  An MLS match is a great atmosphere in the Stadium and a very good product on the field – but unless you live in an MLS city you probably didn’t know that either.  MLS had a rocky beginning, and that was to be expected, but you probably haven’t noticed that Major League Soccer has found their niche, they are expanding, and their product gets better every year.

In a plan to ride the coattails of the 1994 World Cup the inaugural season of the MLS  was 1996.  They began with 10 teams.  As those of us who have followed American soccer for a long time knew would inevitably happen, the beginning years of the MLS were plagued with bad decisions.  Teams played in enormous, partially filled stadiums.  In an attempt to appeal to the American sports fan they concocted a wacky shootout system to conclude every tie match, apparently believing that ties, though the rest of the world accepts them as part of the game, are un-American.  The commentators were no good, the experience was lame, and the players tried their best.  They put one of their founding teams in one of the 5 worst sports town in America, Tampa Bay, for a league that plays a summer schedule.  They expanded two years later to one of the 5 worst sports town in America, Miami, for a league that plays a summer schedule. 

That was then.

The MLS currently has 19 teams, with an expansion to put a 2^nd team in New York City in the works.  Fourteen of those 19 teams play in soccer specific stadiums, most of them intimate venues with capacities around 20,000.  The recent round of expansions have tapped into some of the best sports towns in America - Salt Lake City, Portland, Seattle, Philly – and are capitalizing on the Canadian love of soccer as well – Vancouver, Toronto, and Montreal.  The atmosphere in the Northwest rivals that of European clubs. 

And speaking of other soccer leagues, the product on the pitch is fantastic.  High profile European defectors like Beckham and Henry, though they move the media needle, are not the main reason for the quality on the pitch.  World class internationals from smaller western hemisphere nations, homegrown talent, and a handful of big name Europeans have combined to produce a great product – don’t let any snobby yet uninformed sports fan tell you otherwise. 

This is now.

The attendance numbers are impressive.  MLS has surpassed both the NHL and the NBA in per game attendance averages (18,807).  The league broke the 6 million fan barrier in 2012.   To put that into perspective, they broke the 5 million barrier in 2011 and 4 million in 2010.  Granted, expansion has a lot to do with those numbers but that is eye catching growth no matter what the reason behind it. 

This year they began a new TV contract with NBC sports, and as we all know it is the TV contracts that drive American sports (and American Universities as is evidenced by the conference shakeups of recent years).  If they can figure out the TV piece of the equation (side note:  even the commentators are exponentially better now), that will be the key to marketing the game outside of MLS cities. 

You may not have noticed that the MLS is a great product.  Maybe you, like me, don’t have the pleasure of living in an MLS city.  Here is some sports advice that you will thank me for later – get on the MLS bandwagon.  You will be glad you did.