(Editorial) – With Minnesota United FC being awarded an MLS expansion bid, many talking points have come up. How’s Minnesota’s stadium situation shaping up? Is the league going to get to 24 teams by 2018 and who will that 24th team be? As The Loons are an NASL team, promotion and relegation have once again shown up on the radar.
Is MLS Pro/Rel A Net Gain? Will it Make Or Break MLS?
Let me first disqualify myself by saying I am firmly against Pro/Rel and think that any discussion of if and when it should happen is laughable. The leagues aren’t ready for it in many aspects and they probably won’t be anytime soon. Even bringing it up in conversation gives it undeserving credibility. I don’t see how Pro/Rel is remotely plausible in the next 15 years if not longer, even if it’s a good thing in the long run.
To those adamantly for MLS Pro/Rel, I disagree with your opinions. I respect your opinions. Feel free to keep reading if it pleases you. If not, go in peace.
Let’s say it happens. What will be the affect? Will this catapult MLS and US Soccer to the top of the world? Will it solve all the problems the league is dealing with? Will it give the league a new level of credibility with Europeans? Will the Ronaldo and Messi-level players come in droves to play for MLS teams?
Yes, Pro/Rel will make the final month of the season very exciting for teams at the bottom of the league. It will put even further value on winning the league for an NASL or USL franchise. Maybe instead of fans losing interest as playoff hopes fade, it will reinvigorate the the fan bases of whomever is the 2013 D.C. United or 2014 Montreal Impact.
But some of that excitement will be for the wrong reasons. Look at what the system has done to the likes of Queens Park Rangers and Portsmouth? QPR has bounced around in this purgatory between the Premier League and the Championship since getting promoted in 2011. Portsmouth has gone through a disastrous five years. Relegated from the EPL in 2010, ownership overspent in a desperate attempt to stay up. This lead to a massive debt and an overhaul in the roster. Follow the story to the present, and Pompey now sits mid-table in League 2. The financial investment that comes with a promoted club overhauling their roster to survive in a higher league has caused the EPL to provide massive grants to relegated teams, coined parachute payments. Pro/Rel creates an instability that can shred a franchise to pieces.
While it may help the league on the whole, it can have disastrous affects for the relegated team. This kind of thinking helped invent the Hunger Games.
In the past two seasons, D.C. United and Montreal Impact would have been relegated. Following a bottom table finish, United were Eastern Conference Champions. Montreal is on the brink of advancing to the CONCACAF Champions League Final. That’s parity and recovery not found in Europe. That’s Wigan making it to the knock out round of Champions Leauge.
Perhaps the gains from Pro/Rel would outweigh the losses. Maybe Orlando City wins the U.S. Open Cup. Maybe promotion gives Indy Eleven the extra support to make their soccer-specific stadium happen. Maybe these gains beat the losses of the relegated teams in absolute value. Maybe not.
I move to the question of why Pro/Rel is so critical. “Because the European leagues do it” isn’t a good enough reason. European leagues also have no salary cap. Some have institutionalized racism and match-fixing corruption. Those things won’t improve MLS. How much more competitive and exciting would La Liga be if Real Madrid and Barcelona were forced to spend the same as other Spanish sides? Look at these salary numbers and tell me no salary cap makes MLB and the European leagues better.
The European leagues may be better than MLS. That doesn’t mean everything they do is better and should be mimicked. In some ways, Europe could lean a thing or two from MLS. Much like their fans, MLS is a young urban hipster/mover-and-shaker. MLS suspended Alan Gordon for a homophobic slur. Meanwhile, Chelsea fans are doing this. As much as MLS referees are maligned, no other league has anything close to the infrastructure that is MLS PRO.
Many variables affect MLS’s growth and rise in world football. Pro/Rel is one of them. It is not the end-all-be-all. MLS is capable of becoming a world power with or without it. Tradition doesn’t make something right. Neither does a sacrificial net gain.
Suppose MLS becomes a top league with a salary cap, with allocation, and without Pro/Rel? Would that not make European leagues reflect on themselves? The First Continental Congress changed the trajectory of modern government in the world. Would America be where it is today if it copied Europe and adopted a monarchical government?
Thank you to the Pro/Rel believers for making it this far. I still disagree with you, but you have my respect. Go in peace.
