MLS will no doubt win this one. But any victory can only be illusory. For if MLS believes that merely tweaking the status quo will solve its basic problem -- the necessity for it to compete in the capitalistic free-for-all that is the global soccer market -- then it’s hopelessly lost in cloud cuckoo land.
I'd love to know the reasoning behind thinking MLS's basic problem is the failure to establish an intraleague free agent market for a subset of long-tenured players who make decent money anyway. Perhaps it's the immediate problem in these negotiations - but the core flaw of the league?
I'd need to think about it for a while before sticking my neck out and positing what could be MLS's core flaw, but the lack of free agency is a feature, not a bug.
-FS
4 comments:
Its tough to fault the MLS owners for having a stable and solid business plan at a time when Europe drowns in debt....but still, at some point the owners need to switch gears if they want to go from college bar-touring indie band to moderately respectful-rock band.
Should we expect free agency in 5 years? 10 years? Is there even a magic number or formula in place?
Will every franchise need to make $100 billion dollars per month before that happens?
As a US soccer fan who grew up with Preki's Wizards, I am rapidly losing interest. As EPL and Spanish games enter my living room on the cheap, my MLS knowledge and "investment" decrease..
You have the unfortunate luck to be a Wizards fan in a time of pain.
I don't know if we should ever expect free agency from this league. I can see MLS raising the salary cap when the revenues justify it (5-10 years? who knows).
-FS
Gardener is dead on.
The straw man of debt in which the sky is supposed to be falling is bunk.
But that's the stuff you have to believe in to support a league that enforces mediocrity on all it's clubs to randomize domestic matches, and then send "top" clubs into international play.
It's a cozy little cocoon, if you want to stay in the larval stage forever.
Why not do of this outside of the pyramid, and let owners build the best clubs they and their supporters can support, instead of holding division one hostage for this cirque de soccer?
-But that's the stuff you have to believe in to support a league that enforces mediocrity on all it's clubs to randomize domestic matches, and then send "top" clubs into international play.
Actually, I don't think that's true.
-FS
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